A man asked me an interesting question yesterday. He asked me how women can shut off their need for sex. He was explaining that when he feels the desire for sexual contact and orgasm he isn’t satisfied until he receives it. This man was wanting to understand why women are different.

My response was “women aren’t different”. Women want sex just as much and just as often. I know plenty of women who think about it just as much as men, or maybe even more then some men I know.

For me personally, not only am I unsatisfied until I orgasm, but I’m not satisfied completely until I orgasm by the touch of a man. And even then, sometimes after he leaves, I touch myself until I orgasm again thinking about him because I want more!

This question stems from a double standard that still exists in our world today. If it is even true that women can more easily shut down our sex drive and desire then man, it’s most likely a learned behavior. Women are taught that having a high sex drive or one that we cannot easily control makes us dirty and undesirable. What I find most interesting is the number of men in the kink community who enjoy sharing their woman and making her a complete slut. And then adore her even more for it!

My world view shifted the day I sat with a secure married couple who have been living the lifestyle together for nearly 30 years. I was with a man I was newly dating, and we were talking with the husband. I will never forget the adoration in his eyes as he talked about his wife enjoying gang bangs and the smile and twinkle in his eye when he looked at her and talked about what a slut she is. And then I glanced at the man I was on the date with, and he smiled and his eyes lit up to hear the husband say that and he agreed that it was a beautiful thing.

Sure, I have run across men, in and out of the BDSM lifestyle, who still value a woman who remains chaste and has had few partners. But these days it seems harder to find then men that don’t care and desire a woman with a dirty filthy mind and a high sex drive.

Like everything else, there is a spectrum of desire and belief. Men desiring a woman with a filthy mind as a life partner to those that would never date a woman who has been with over a certain number of sexual partners in her lifetime. But it is hard to say in a world that shapes our thinking so drastically through media and agenda. We have, every day, sexual images and sexualized people thrown in our faces, and then at the same time constant messages regarding how we are undesirable if we have too many partners. More so women than men on both accounts.

These dual messages we receive are confusing: be sexy, men love sex, don’t show too much skin, men only choose chaste women as life partners. It’s exhausting to even consider all the mixed messages we receive.

I think it’s possible that all these messages are why some women learn to shut down more easily and deny their true sexual appetites. Although, I do believe women and men alike are on a spectrum for sexual need. I would say we also have to consider all the victims of sexual trauma. Sexual trauma, even at a very young age, is much more prevalent than many realize or want to consider.

With all that being said, I conclude that women and men both can have an insatiable sex drive, and both can honor and fulfill those drives and neither one is bad or dirty or unworthy for it. There is a need, like with anything else, to live with a balance in our lives, and to engage in our desires in a safe thoughtful way. But to engage in and of itself should not be shameful for either sex, or any sex I should say.

The only double standard that exists here is made up by our society and has no basis in reality. We are all human and sex is a normal human function and desire. If you are alive, it is, after all, only because two people engaged in having sex.

Despite the images and messages we receive with our handheld devices and black screens placed constantly in front of our eyes, let us find what our own true desires are and honor them. Acting safely, let us engage if we want to engage and refrain if we want to refrain. If you have a high sex drive, I encourage you to find someone who embraces you as you are and has a high sex drive themselves. No longer worrying about what the world thinks of you. Being you, unapologetically.

Until Next Time,

Jill