Sex Made Easy (39 page)

Some women feel ready to masturbate or have sex soon after giving birth, whether by C-section or vaginally. However, health care providers often recommend waiting four to six weeks following delivery (regardless of how you delivered) before resuming sex. And while they often just say “sex,” this typically includes masturbation. Women who have had a C-section have had an incision in the uterus, which can take time to heal. It's also common to experience bleeding in the weeks following delivery. If you have questions about your own sex or masturbation timeline after delivery, ask your health care provider. Every woman, every pregnancy, and every new mom is different, so you'll get the most personally relevant information from your provider.

A number of vibrator characteristics matter to women and men. They often want toys that are affordable, easy to clean, high quality—and not terribly loud. It's not that people are worried about vibrators being so loud that they'll pierce their eardrums. Most vibrators aren't all that loud in comparison to other sounds in our homes or other environments. Rather, people often prefer relatively quiet vibrators so that nearby neighbors, housemates, parents, kids, or even pets won't hear the noise and be curious about what's going on. However, quiet vibrators tend to lack intensity. If you want a powerful, intense vibrator, you have to learn to deal with the sound its motor makes. No worries—if you need to drown your vibrator sound, try the following:

•
Choose a vibrator with a multispeed dial.
That way, you can lower the vibrator to a setting that meets a good middle ground of sound and intensity.

•
Masturbate under the covers,
with a thick comforter on top of you (and the vibrator).

•
Grab a pillow or two
and place it over the covers that are already over your hands and vibrator.

•
Play music.
As long as people have had record players or boom boxes in their rooms, they've been masking sex noises—including sex toy noises. Create a sex playlist (see my book,
Great in Bed,
for tips on how to do this) and use it when things get fun.

If you or your partner has had recent surgery, ask the surgeon how
quickly you can resume masturbation and/or sex together. Doctors rarely talk to patients about how surgery and other medical treatments may affect their sex lives, so it may be up to you to ask the initial question.

Get specific too. Ask what changes, if any, you will need to make to your sex life once you resume having sex. If you've had surgery for carpal tunnel syndrome, it may be some time before your surgeon thinks it's okay to use a vibrator. If you've had a knee replacement, there may be some sex positions (such as those that involve certain angles for, or pressure on, your knees) that are ill advised. If your surgeon seems uncomfortable answering sex-specific questions (most doctors have had very little, if any, training in sexual matters), then ask if there is anything specific you should avoid doing with your body—for example, ways you shouldn't use the part you had surgery on, and for how long. That may help you figure out what tweaks you need to make to your sex life. If you're seeing a physical therapist as part of your recovery, you may be able to ask him or her for additional tips about modifications to your sex life. Often, physical therapists get a sense from surgeons and doctors how patients' bodies should and shouldn't be moved post-surgery. Your physical therapist may be able to take that information and help translate it into sex tips that work for you.

If your child is very young (say, two or three years old), it's unlikely that they will remember any of this. And because your child is so young, you may have just as many questions for your child (“How did you get out of your crib?”) as he or she has for you (“What are you doing?”). At such a young age, a common parental response is to reassure their child that the parent is OK (some young children are worried that pleasurable moans or orgasmic noises are signs of distress rather than joy) and see what it is the child needs (such as food, drink, or a diaper change).

Slightly older children may have more specific questions—and can understand more accurate answers. If a five- or six-year-old child walks in on their parents having sex, some parents ask their child to leave, and then they dress, join their child in another room, and explain what it is they saw (saying, for example, “Adults sometimes have sex with each other as a way of showing how much they like or love each other”). Other parents are more vague with their explanations. If you're raising a child, then whether your child is six months, six years, or sixteen years old, I highly recommend reading
From Diapers to Dating: A Parent's Guide to Raising Sexually Healthy Children
and/or
What Every 21st-Century Parent Needs to Know: Facing Today's Challenges with Wisdom and Heart,
both by Debra Haffner.

Finally, rest assured that in my work teaching college students and writing sex columns, I have yet to come across someone who feels they were truly traumatized by walking in to find their parents having sex. More often, these stories are funny and involve some level of discomfort, on both the child's and their parents' part, but they are not typically upsetting encounters. Often, children don't pay much attention to the episode until years later when they have a more advanced understanding of what sex is and then look back and realize what they witnessed when they were younger.

Sex toys and cats don't mix. Several women have told me that their cats are curious about their vibrators and even bat them around with their paws (cats do love moving objects, whether it's string or a cat toy dragged along the carpet . . . I guess vibrators aren't that different). When you're using your vibrator, try to keep your cat busy in another room, such as with catnip, its meal, or a toy of its own. When you're not using your vibrator, catproof it by locking it away in a box or a nightstand drawer—someplace where your cat is unlikely to find it. Lubricant, too, should be kept with the cap on and somewhere out of your cat's reach, as it's probably not good for them.

In my “pets and sex” study, it was a common occurrence for dogs to get feisty as their “dog parents” got kissy or huggy. About one in five dog owners and close to 10 percent of cat owners said that their pet sometimes or often interfered with their hugging. Similar numbers reported pet interruptions when they and their partner kissed. Cuddling was particularly tricky: close to 30 percent of dog and cat owners reported that their pet sometimes or often interfered with their cuddling attempts. Because recent research from a colleague at the Kinsey Institute found that touching, cuddling, and kissing play an important part in men's sexual satisfaction (and let's face it, most of us like a good cuddle), it's worth figuring out how to balance this part of your life so you can enjoy your pets and enjoy your partner too.

Our dog, Jezebel, barks when we stand and hug and kiss one another hello or good-bye. Sometimes we keep up with it anyway, barking be damned. Other times we put her in a “down” position to quiet her. Still other times, we simply turn to the side, open our arms, and invite her to join our “hug circle” after she's been quiet for a moment; she then stands
on her hind legs and puts her paws on us to join the hug. Other people put their pets in another room if they're down for some serious cuddle time. Some people give their dogs peanut butter–filled dog toys or throw some catnip their cats' way. You know your pet best; to the extent that you can create some touchy-feely space for you and your partner, it can be a good part of your relationship.

It depends how serious your allergy is. Some people have one or more pet-free rooms in their home (that the pet is never allowed to enter, including when the person isn't there) to accommodate an allergic partner. Often, one of these pet-free rooms is the bedroom, which can make for an easier time sexually. Other times, the nonallergic pet owner makes the trip to the allergic partner's place when they want to get naked. It can help for the pet owner to put on clean clothes that are free of pet hair before they visit their allergic partner. It may also help if the person with the pet refrains from kissing their pet good-bye before leaving, lest their lips end up having traces of dog or cat that may rub off later, via a kiss or oral sex, on their partner.

If a person has a severe allergy to dogs or cats, he or she may decide that it's best to avoid dating pet owners. It may narrow one's dating pool, but it's important to take care of one's health. If you have any questions about steps you should take to deal with your allergies, consult a health care provider, such as an allergy specialist.

We may not talk openly about it, but new parents, people with sleep apnea, and overworked individuals aren't the only ones who suffer from sleep disturbance. Pet owners are often struck with sleep difficulties too. A Mayo Clinic study found that a sizable number of its sleep disorder patients let their pets sleep with them. In another study, Austrian researchers used a device worn around a person's wrist during sleep to discover that people experienced greater sleep difficulties when their dog slept in the same bed
as them than when their dog slept elsewhere. And in my post-pet sex study, I found that about a third of dog and cat owners typically slept with their pet in the bed. Of those who shared the bed with their pet, about a quarter of dog owners and 12 percent of cat owners said their pet slept between them and their partner. And nearly half of dog and cat owners said their pet woke them up at least once during a typical night. Given how important sleep is to feeling rested, energetic, relaxed, and happy—not to mention avoiding accidents on the road—we should all perhaps find ways to experience sounder sleep.

There are a number of steps you can take to improve your sleep life (and better sleep can set you up for better sex). Try to support your natural sleep rhythms by using bright lights during the day and dimmer lights in the evening. If possible, limit your exposure to bright screens (like televisions and laptops) in the hour before you normally go to sleep. Keeping to a regular sleep schedule can help too, as can sleeping in a dark room with dark shades. And as far as your pets are concerned, if your dog is a puppy, it's a prime time to crate train them so that they will learn to sleep in a crate rather than your bed. Not into the crate idea? That's OK: you can still train them to sleep in another room or in their own dog bed rather than in your bed. Cats, too, can be trained to sleep elsewhere, particularly if their water, litter box, and food bowl are there too.

Of course, some people really enjoy having their pet to cuddle with, and that should be respected too. It can feel meaningful and loving to share one's bed with a pet. And for some people, sharing their bed with both their partner and a pet brings the two people closer as they cuddle together with their pet and laugh about the silly things it does (like burrow under the covers or pounce on their feet).

Either find a new place for your pet to sleep aside from the bed (see above) or see if you can relocate your pet to sleep by your feet. Some people can be very sensitive about any attempt to move their pet's place of sleep. I know some men and women who adore sleeping with their pets and have ended relationships with partners who wanted the pet to sleep elsewhere, so you may need to proceed delicately. Try to frame it in terms of a positive for your partner by saying something like