HPV, Pre-cancerous Cells, and Me

August 8th, 2019

Two and a half months ago, I scheduled an appointment at the reproductive health clinic to have an overdue pap done. I also was excited to get my first HPV vaccine thanks to the CDC’s age limit changes last winter, and I needed a pap, also overdue by half a year. I was worried they wouldn’t let me do it all at once or that it would be overwhelming to do all of that at once but nothing else.

The appointment went as well as it could have save for switching to Kyleena (they no longer keep Mirena in stock), and my cervix being more sensitive than ever before. My first two IUDs were a breeze, but I practically levitated off of the table this time around.

I left feeling accomplished and with instructions to come back in 5 weeks later for IUD check and my second vaccine. I was honestly a little surprised to receive a phone call and already anxious as I listened to my voice mail. People who have gone through paps understand why: no news is good news. The news? My pap came back normal (false negatives are apparently common enough, however), and positive for HPV-16, one of the high-risk cancer-causing strains.

Honestly? I didn’t take it well. This year has already been so difficult with my sick cats, my dramatic family, my tight money, my bodily injuries. It all so consistently kept coming. The day after the bad news, I got a cold sore. Stress: 1, immune system: 0.

They wanted me to come back in for a colposcopy and biopsy, procedures I’d had done over a decade prior when I was first diagnosed with HPV. Knowing that the virus can resurface in time of stress, I wondered if that meant it was the same one. I made a few phone calls and contacted my ex-husband for the first in years to try to get information from the military clinic that had last treated me. As it turned out, they didn’t have any answers, so I needn’t have contacted him.

This all brought all the feelings I had after my first diagnosis. My ex had cheated on me and an abnormal pap indicated HPV. Except.. the doctors didn’t say that initially. They just told me to come back for monitoring. It was at a subsequent appointment when they mentioned me having HPV in passing. I was so shocked because this was the first I had heard of it. I kept a straight face but cried as I left and walked to the bus stop.

Two months ago I was dealing with the same thing and possibly still for the same reason. I resigned myself to not knowing, however, and went to the biopsy, which I scheduled for the next week to get it over with. Fortunately the terrible cramping and bloating I’d experienced after the IUD insertion had stopped on the morning of my biopsy. I am not sure I would have been able to handle both and was shocked; my first two were relatively easy!

The nurse practitioner who handles those was different from the gentle provider I’d had before. She’s rough in technique and demeanor. She’s a bit older and perhaps understands how much women can take, but I’ve heard from friends who have left her office in tears. When she later gave me my second Gardasil injection, she didn’t so much insert the needle as she did punch me with it.

My cervical discomfort remained despite taking more ibuprofen than I ever had before — so much, in fact, that I got home and developed a temporary case of tinnitus. HPV and hearing loss? Great!

I had to sign a waiver that they wouldn’t replace my IUD if it came out during the procedure, knowing that I wouldn’t be able to afford a new one if that happened. During the biopsy, the NP noted three places she wanted to sample and did so. She commented that the cell abnormalities were mild, and my fears were somewhat assuaged. I thought I could perhaps just get away with monitoring and not need additional procedures.

I can be a bit of a bleeder, and she struggled to staunch the bleeding with Monsel’s Solution. When it finally stopped, I was provided a pantyliner and free to leave.

While biopsies aren’t fun, I was more annoyed by the tinnitus than anything else. Over the next week or so, I experienced discharge from the Monsel’s Solution. After the bulk of it was discharged, I began spotting and didn’t stop until last week.  But because it was generally light and I didn’t have any other negative side effects (fever, etc), I waited to mention it until my IUD checkup.

After two weeks, I went back in for my results: moderate dysplasia, not mild. Not cancer but pre-cancerous. Not healthy enough to simply monitor. Not the best-case scenario.

I had to be referred to a different provider to receive treatment, and the NP recommended a Loop Electrosurgical Excision Procedure. A LEEP is essentially electrical cauterization of the cervix. I called up the OBGYN clinic at one of the hospitals and scheduled an appointment, but it was quite far out.

During this time, I went back for my IUD check and second HPV vaccine. Ironically, the medical student who performed that was much gentler than the nurse practitioner. Of course, I wasn’t spotting that day so they couldn’t check where the blood came from. But IUD looked okay, and I received the second shot. Fortunately, there were no symptoms — the first one caused a bit of discomfort at the injection site. Once that appointment was done, I simply had to wait for my LEEP.

I had initially been nervous. There have been so many appointments this summer. I went in to see the dentist in June because of some jaw pain I’d been having for about a month only to be told that I’m clenching because of stress. Knowing that I didn’t have some terrible infection eating away at my teeth was a relief, and I’ve made a concerted effort to relax my jaw since then. I also started therapy last week. I have followup appointments for both over the next week. While I am hopeful that therapy will help, just having so many appointments makes me anxious.

But by the time my LEEP appointment rolled around, I was more annoyed at filling out so much intake paperwork than I was anxious. I strode into the hospital, asked for directions, and took the elevator to the OBGYN department. I’ve never before been called as fast as I was. Yet after taking down information and instruction me to strip from the waist down, the nurse left me alone for what must have been thirty minutes. My appointment was only scheduled for thirty minutes, and the friend who drove me was waiting on me the entire time.

The doctor entered, explained the procedure and Monsel’s solution and got to work, first fiddling with a painfully ill-fitting speculum before swapping it out for another. A grounding pad stuck to my leg, I listened to the machine turn on. They applied a numbing gel that the nurse had informed me would make my heart race, and it started almost immediately. It’s difficult to remain relaxed when your heart is beating a mile a minute. Talk about a way to trigger anxiety.

On top of that, it made my legs shake, so keeping them in the stirrups was hard enough let alone being relaxed. I found out later that the gel was a mixture of numbing agent and epinephrine to prevent too much bleeding. Aside from the racing heart, epinephrine made my mouth taste awful for several days, a side effect that I had to search.

Unfortunately, I was not completely numb when the doctor turned on the LEEP machine and started cauterizing my cervix. I was on the way but definitely felt the first touches and seized up. As the numbing agent kicked it, it became easier, but the doctor still had to remind me to relax every thirty seconds.

LEEPs are short, much shorter than the time I’d spent waiting for the doctor to even make an appearance. Even though she had to apply extra Monsel’s to stop the bleeding, which hopefully means less spotting this time around (I’ve yet to start bleeding, so who knows).

I walked out frazzled because of the epinephrine and feeling discouraged that the sample would indicate I needed to go in for another procedure. I cannot stress enough how anxious this all has made me. My sleep has been terrible, and I’ve felt all the worse knowing that stress will limit my immune system, which I need to kick into overdrive to suppress this strain of HPV so I can maybe stop worrying about getting cancer.

This whole thing has had me thinking so much about my mortality. My healthiest years are likely behind me. Injuries will be more common. Sicknesses will last longer. This was all a very real reminder of that. I couldn’t remain ignorant. But sometimes ignorance really is bliss.

The shitty thing is knowing I may be okay for now but that this all could happen again someday. I could become sick or stressed, and the virus could pop back up, wreak havoc on my body.

Like it’s already wreaked havoc on my sex life. It took weeks for me to want to masturbate after my biopsy and similarly after my LEEP. Of course, penetration was off the table, but I didn’t want to touch my clitoris. I felt betrayed by my body, dysphoric. It was alien.

On top of that, I wouldn’t want to have sex with any new partner while HPV is still active in my system. While someone who has received the vaccine wouldn’t be at risk, I don’t even want to get my hopes up only to find that a potential partner isn’t vaccinated. I don’t want to think that I could transmit a virus that can give someone cancer. That’s heavy.

All of this has led me to do a lot of mesearch — research pertaining to things about myself. I’ve actually avoided looking up things this year. I wanted to remain blissfully ignorant. It didn’t work.

What may help is knowing that my LEEP results came back good. I don’t need to go in for another procedure. I will need to schedule an exam a year after my last (next May), but I can breathe a little easier for now. I hope that my anxiety can abate, my immune system can suppress this virus, and I can get on with my life. But it’s hard not to worry, to wait for the shoe to drop. 2019 has thrown me more than a few curveballs, and while I wish I was more resilient, I keep finding myself on the lookout for more danger.

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Categories: Everything Else

In Dreams

April 10th, 2019

I’ve dreamed about The Bartender often lately. My dreams aren’t about him, though; they’re about what he symbolizes. After all, we have barely talked twice in over two years. We haven’t slept together in closer to five. Hell, he’s not even a bartender anymore as far as I know. My how the time flies.

Yet, I find myself dreaming about him. In those dreams, I am longing, I am angry, I am hurt and confused. Most of all, I am searching. I am searching for solace and respite from the anxiety that has been running so high lately because of my cat’s declining health, increasing bills, lack of work, and the winter that never wanted to end (surprise: we’re getting more snow tomorrow).

The Bartender had a natural knack that allowed him to calm me. He wouldn’t have understood why it worked had he thought about it, which he never did. He could have expanded on his potential if he wanted to, but he didn’t.

Still, very few people have that sort of calming effect on me whether it’s intuitive or developed. And I could use some of those people now — the type of people with whom I can sit in silence and not vent about because I am so very sick of explaining what’s going on. The type of people whom I can hug or cuddle until the anxiety physically melts from my body, perhaps until I fall asleep.

I have so many people who are willing to listen and some who will spend time with me, but no one who currently fills that role. That’s part of the reason why it was so difficult to let The Bartender go.

And even though I am no longer in love with him and it’s been years since I was, my dreams bring back that rush of feelings. They seep into my waking life, reigniting a passion I thought I had forgotten. Sometimes I have dreams of my ex-husband, vivid dreams fraught with emotion. In many ways, these dreams are the opposite because there’s no respite from my anxiety; these dreams only cause more.

But these dreams are similar in that the emotions that evoke feel real. I wake up remembering what it was like to be in love with these people, to pine over them, to hurt when things ended. The emotional residue from my dreams is strong enough that I wonder if I might somehow still have feelings for these people.

The thoughts can linger for days, and just when it seems they’ve passed, I have another dream.

I wouldn’t act on these thoughts. There’s nothing to be rekindled or more closure to have. But my anxious brain just likes to rehash old hurts, perhaps because it’s easier than dealing with my current stressors.

For now, I dream of the day when those are over.

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Categories: Everything Else

FOSTA/SESTA Hurts the Very People It’s Intended to Protect

March 11th, 2019

Today’s guest post is about a topic that I’ve discussed on Twitter and Facebook but not here on my blog. My sex educator peers and the sex workers who run in adjacent circles are well aware of the costs of SESTA/FOSTA and similar policies in other locales. However, not everyone is. The following explains a bit more.

Sex work is a controversial topic. Some have moral and religious objections to the practice, while others view it as a normal way to make a living. Due to the nature of the vocation, there is risk of exploitation. Pimps manipulate the young and vulnerable into the practice against their will. They are often separated from their families and placed in dangerous situations. There is a high risk of:

  • Emotional abuse
  • Violence
  • Drug use to control depression
  • Death

As a society, we need to put measures in place to detect and stop sex trafficking.

On the other hand, some people voluntarily ent er the sex industry. Contrary to popular belief, it isn’t because they are from broken homes, or addicted to drugs. Some enjoy the perceived freedom, flexibility and relatively high earnings per hour rate of sex work. As of writing, the UK minimum wage is £7.81 an hour. An independent sex worker can expect to make £100 an hour in most cities. Therefore, it can be a rational choice.

The United States designed the FOSTA-SESTA bills in order to stamp out sex trafficking. FOSTA stands for ‘Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act’. SESTA stands for ’Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act’. Interestingly, there is no evidence that sex workers were consulted while creating this bill. Essentially, the United States government had meetings and decided what they thought was the best way to eradicate sex trafficking. It is difficult to solve a problem if you don’t know the root cause and complexities. In the end, they decided that the internet was a driver of sex trafficking. As a result, social media sites will be criminally responsible for content deemed to be promoting sex trafficking.

Let’s cross back over the pond for a second. It is difficult to get data on sex work because there is no national body. However, we use certain data to extrapolate from. Between 2002 to date, the percentage of soliciting of prostitution offenses has sharply declined. Interestingly, there is a positive correlation between internet access and the decline of prostitution. Could it be that those who might have been vulnerable to sex trafficking are now working independently in safe and controlled environments?

Since 1996, social media site operators were protected under ‘Safe Harbor’ in the United States. It stated, “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.” This meant that users were responsible for their activities. The FOSTA-SESTA bills make internet service providers and platforms responsible for what their users post. In response, top social media sites closed certain sections of their site. For example, Craiglist no longer has a personals section.

Interestingly, UK politicians were planning a version of FOSTA-SESTA. This is likely to have the opposite effect. Instead of protecting sex workers, it will drive it further underground. Ironically, instead of limiting sex trafficking, it will provide the environment for it to flourish. Hypothetically, the government will be able to use carefully chosen statistics to show that the incidences of prostitution has reduced. Would it have reduced or simply driven underground? Out of sight, out of mind.

The All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Prostitution and the Global Sex Trade, consisting of several members of Parliament, stood up in a House of Commons debate in July 2018 calling for a ban on “prostitution websites.”

They are also mulling the “Nordic Model,” in which selling sex is not illegal, but buying sex is. Ireland instituted this model in 2017, and immediately saw an uptick in violence against sex workers.

“People who are doing the worst of crimes are not deterred at all by this law,” says Kate McGrew, director of the Sex Workers Alliance of Ireland. “People see us as even more outside society, as vulnerable, as even less likely to call gardai or draw attention.”

Notably, the internet has increased the opportunities available for sex workers to operate in a safe environment. Some perform ‘cam work’ from home. They have no physical interaction with clients and are able to remain anonymous. Others sell video content and make passive income. Those who indulge in more ‘traditional’ prostitution, use social media to share information. For instance, they can notify their counterparts about violent clients or dangerous places.

The internet is an expression of freedom. It can’t be controlled, no matter how hard we try. Arguably, the FOSTA – SESTA bill is a form of political point scoring and a lazy way of trying to solve the big problem of sex trafficking. All it will do is increase the demand for underground sites which act as modern-day sex trafficking networks. The police should be trained on how to detect sex trafficking victims and establish rehabilitation programs to heal any emotional abuse or addiction.

Another issue is that the FOSTA – SESTA bill and any variations of it implemented around the world, is trying to limit a complex industry. For instance, some escort agencies, such as gentlemen4hire, strictly provide companionship. However, they are likely to be affected if such a bill was to be passed in the U.K.

There is a trend of governments trying to control the internet. In extreme cases, popular sites are banned. However, the internet is the exchange of information. People always find a way around it, Moreover, there are dark web sites which harbor all kinds of illegal activities. If governments truly care about stopping sex trafficking, they should train their police departments on how to detect and rehabilitate victims. They should also educate people on the tactics used by pimps and the effects it can have on one’s life. The FOSTA – SESTA bills are an ineffective bandage on a complex societal injury.

In conclusion, the passing of such bills has wide-reaching implications. Could businesses lobby to have other internet bills passed in order to protect their interests? This could open the floodgates to a world of scrutiny, and control over our lives – and perhaps that is the end goal. So, we need to take a deeper look into the issue of sex trafficking. Moreover, sex trafficking victims need to be listened to as they are best informed about how it works. Instead of trying to place a ban on sex work, more needs to be done to protect the vulnerable.

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Categories: Everything Else

Finding Myself in Faraway Lands

September 4th, 2018

I normally don’t post explicit about my “real” life on this blog, but my recent vacation includes some wonderful expressions of sexuality and personality that I wanted to reflect on.

As someone who lives in a small midwestern city, there’s not a lot of sex positivity to be found. Our sex stores are sleazy. I am not sure that you could ask about “body-safe” toys and get a helpful answer. You’re most definitely better off shopping online.

But one of my must-see stops in Seattle was Babeland, where I knew I would finally use gift cards that I’ve had nigh on a decade (and I did, on We-Vibe Touch). The Seattle location isn’t the flagship store, and it was smaller than expected. Still, it was a dream come true for a sex nerd and toy lover like myself (my Facebook check-in read “Dreams do come true!”). I also appreciated the vintage vibrators that had on display.

A few blocks down the road sits a bondage shop (Doghouse Leathers) staffed by folks who clearly participate in the leather community. It was not only larger than Babeland but the largest storefront I’ve seen dedicated specifically to BDSM. The smell of leather was heavenly as it washed over me; although, nothing begged me to take it home. Alas.

Both of these stores sit in Capitol Hill, Seattle’s gay neighborhood (is gayborhood too cute here??). It boasted the occasional rainbow crosswalk, and drag queens crossed the street, bedazzled and bejeweled as if it were nothing to bat a perfectly-applied lash at. Capitol Hill was a safe place for anyone who might not be cis or straight, but it also provided a place for anyone to express their sexuality in a positive and inclusive place. It was far for home as I could be, and yet it was more welcoming than I could have imagined.

I could have stayed all day if the walking wasn’t killing my back and feet. I returned to the hostel (Aside: when I mentioned staying in a hostel, one of my friends assumed I meant brothel instead. Chuckles ensued.) with a new sex toy and a feeling as though I had come within inches of my tribe and shared in energy that is only available to me here when I sign on to Twitter. It may sound corny, but I recently discovered Oprah’s “A-ha moment,” which occurs when something resonates with you and your consciousness recognizes it (Oprah’s words, not mine).

I attempted to fill my time on vacation with more things that would strike that cord within myself, but the stars just didn’t aline. I would have loved to attend a burlesque show, go to a sex club, or learn something new at a BDSM class, but time was limited. After having visited a few stores (as well as all of the tourist hotspots, the planetarium, and the cemetery), I felt my energy waning. Perhaps it was for the best that I didn’t try to add anything more to my schedule.

There’s always next time, I suppose, when I am in Seattle. Or Chicago. Or Minneapolis. Or wherever I decide to travel. When a small town girl from the Midwest is able to step out of her comfort zone and into the arms of something bigger, welcoming and somehow familiar despite its exotic status, that can only be found in certain places.

Until then, there’s always here.

This post contains sponsored links. All opinions are my own.

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Categories: Everything Else

10 Years of Blogging About Sex in 5150 Words

July 16th, 2018

10 years. 10 years is a long time to stick with anything whether it be a relationship, a job or, yes, a blog. Indeed, 10 years is nearly a third of my life as a 32-year-old. That really puts things in perspective.

Another way to think about the last 10 years that I’ve spent on this blog is to break down the numbers. 10 years equals 1002 posts. 5239 comments, 1742 tags, 554,109 words (not counting the 5,000 some words in this post), and countless of posts that never made it live. Not to mention the products I’ve reviewed, companies I’ve worked with, and time spent on social media and replying to emails.

There has been tremendous change in the sex toy industry as well as the sex blogosphere over the last decade, too, and I didn’t think a post about the 10 years I’ve been blogging about sex toys would be complete without commenting on those changes.

Jump to a section:

How Sex Toys Have Changed Over The Last Decade

Talking about the changes in toys might be among the easiest topics to address in this post; although, it’s all too easy to forget that things haven’t always been this way. Perhaps one of the best changes was the move to body-safe materials such as silicone. When I first started using and reviewing sex toys, I used more than a few jelly monstrosities and, yes, even some Sil-A-Gel. Sometimes material was an enigma: it was impossible to tell what it was or how safe it was.

This is no longer the case, however. Now, silicone fills the dildo and vibrator market. Nonporous materials are everywhere. It seems to be more difficult to find cheap, unsafe materials than it is to buy something that won’t leach chemicals into your body or become deformed if it touches another toy. With an increase in availability comes a decrease in price. It’s not just the luxury brands producing these toys, and you don’t have to spend an arm and a leg to own something that’s not hazardous. Awesome.

Another wonderful change in this arena is the availability of information. While sex toys, lube, and gear is still not overseen by a big agency and companies can and do get away with lying about their products (there’s a reason nearly every toy reviewer has tried to set a dildo on fire, folks!), some have stepped up. They’ve increased transparency and directly communicated with bloggers and shoppers. The end result is greater knowledge about how silicone dildos are made, why and when they might react with silicone-based lubes (RIP my VixSkin Spur )=), what makes a glass sex toy unsafe, how wood is treated to become nonporous and what osmolality has to do with lube safety, among other topics. This, along with an increase in research into sexuality, has made it even possible for me to write my monthly (I know, I know: I am using that loosely) Science of Sex feature. We have more information than ever before.

Even if you’re not interested in the science side of things, sex toys have come a long way. The toys of yore, including rabbits with beads that always jammed and weirdly-thrusting shafts (because sex toys had to mimic intercourse), seem almost laughable in comparison to today’s sex-tech: toys with remotes, pressure-responsive vibrators, sound-controlled toys, warming shafts, expanding toys, vibrators with cameras on them, oral sex simulators, toys that wave and rock, vibrators that rely on magnetic or induction charging, toys that bend and click into place, modular vibrators, wearable vibrators and dildos, and toys that work with your phone (some of which require firmware updates).

The list is long and, yet, I know that I am missing something.

Once upon a time, a toy with a dock and an internal battery was novel. Now, you have to hunt for battery-powered sex toys. Condoms are made with hexagonal shapes (that may actually be more prone to breakage).

Even when technology hasn’t changed, design has. Jimmyjane has recently produced a rideable sex toy that looks quite futuristic compared to the Sybian. Lelo has revamped numerous vibrators over the years, and Fun Factory is no stranger with more Boss vibrators that I can count (or hold) on one hand as well as a sophomore version of my favorite: the Laya Spot.

Where once only a handful of companies were producing toys that looked like works of art, we now have a multitude of sleek designs to choose from. Indeed, cheap toys may be designed well, or those gorgeous lines might lead us astray when they house inferior builds.

Of particular note are smart toys. You can control your vibrator with your phone, download new settings, and sync it. Of course, not everyone wants to do that. Epiphora has come out against using apps with her sex toys. I haven’t been quite as vehement but, you know what? I’m not a fan. Still, apps are handy for receiving feedback for kegel exercisers, a type of sex toy that has really changed leaps and bounds over the past decade. My first pair were tiny. painful beads made of plastic that hurt my PC muscles. I moved on to much larger balls, this time made of silicone and with an internal ball. I tried Lelo’s Luna Beads, which many people loved but left me lukewarm. Insert vibrating balls that were too uncomfortable and awkward for me to try twice. I eventually moved on to kGoal, which seemed the holy grail of smart kegel toys, only to find that it wasn’t built for my body. Did that stop me from trying yet another smart toy? No.

Not all of these changes are great. Some were ridiculous from the start (a tuxedo for your dick? C’mon!). A few ideas sounded promising but only succeeded to varying degrees (I liked Lelo’s Ora and thought the Ora 2 was even better, but it didn’t work for everyone. Same goes for JeJoue’s Ooh line with its modular motor). Some “new” ideas were simply rehashes of old failures, forgotten long enough that companies figured we might be willing to go through that hell again (I’m talking about We-Vibe Gala, which has already been shunned and removed from the market!). Sometimes we tried toys only to remember that less is more and, no, adding 3,000 settings to a vibrator does not guarantee orgasm.

For every Stronic that bloggers fell in love with, there was a much-hyped toy, often one created for a woman with absolutely no input from a woman or one that came after a boisterous crowdfunding campaign that advertised revolutionary tech and an amazingly-powerful motor, that barely made reviewers tingle let alone orgasm (although, as we all know, I try not to define satisfaction by the presence or number of orgasms).

Like the commas in my run-on sentence, new ideas, changes and sex tech keep coming. Some of it makes us come, too. It’s pretty rad when this happens.

And while some of these changes were pretty obviously on the horizon (smart toys that connect to your phone via Bluetooth, for example), I was astounded by the announcement or even the sheer speculation of many of them.

Overall, these changes are things about which I cannot complain. Although, I can bemoan and commiserate when my favorite toy is no longer made (and the sophomore effort falls short), when amazing companies go out of business before I can get my hands on their goodies (sometimes only to pop back up again.. and sometimes again) and when websites mysteriously disappear without a trade or an explanation.

With that, I am on to discussing the changes in sex toy stores.

Changes In Sex Toy Retailers Over the Last 10 Years

In some ways, sex toy stores have changed alongside toy makers. They both tend to be more transparent and accountable, which is something that bloggers like myself have demanded. Stores without reputations and with shady practices are no longer supported.

The notable exception I see is the number of Amazon vendors who have popped up, selling Chinese-made toys with no brand or with Amazon-only brands. You’ve probably seen them: they’re all over Amazon but no reputable seller carries them. They’re often direct knockoffs of familiar toys. Utimi is one brand that comes to mind. I more often receive contact from these makers than I do reputable sellers or manufacturers, and I almost always reject them. Some of these toys may very well work fine (and because it’s Amazon, many people have tried and like them), but it’s just so hard to know. Hell, even toys from brands that I know and have historically liked can miss the mark.

I’ve also not held my tongue about working with these people. There’s more than just a language barrier: they’re focusing on quick links and sales. In the past, vendors like these have been very pushy. They’ve wanted me to ignore FCC guidelines. It leaves a very sour taste in my mouth, and I’d rather avoid that.

I think that I was like many others when I first started. I wanted to get free toys. So I accepted a lot of shitty ones from even shittier companies. As I learned what I liked I became more selective, both in what I accepted and with whom I worked. This means I try fewer toys, preferring to focus on those that will actually work for me.

It also means that I work with very few companies. I still work with Good Vibes, Lovehoney, and SheVibe, and have made an effort to forge new alliances since I started this post. I’ve seen many, many PR people come and go. I’ve seen companies switched from in-house to external PR, purchase other brands (GoodVibes now owns Babeland), and change how they interact with bloggers. This is mostly due to how Google handles search engine optimization. Years ago, you could get a ton of people to use a link such as “sex toys” to your store and fly right to the top. And everyone did it. My old posts are full of those links words as well as others (vibrators, dildos, bondage gear, etc). In hindsight, it’s really awkward and lacks context. Sometimes the sheer number of links in posts was inundating.

This behavior is no longer lucrative, but neither is sending out product haphazardly. Many review programs have simply disappeared. Others have discontinued specific programs that didn’t work. I really enjoyed working with PinkCherry, sigh. But they discontinued their affiliate program for American bloggers (and perhaps others).

Looking back, it’s also no surprise that search engines would crack down on this sort of search engine manipulation (I also think this is why so many vendors have headed to Amazon where they’ve got better visibility). Thus, no companies demand links like this anymore, and most seem to work only with affiliates and not just bloggers. As an affiliate of a few companies, I don’t personally mind. Affiliate links are a chance for me to make a commission as well as for the store to make a sale. However, I’ve had varying success with those links because I do not promote them as well as some. That sort of promotion is crucial to your success as a blogger/reviewer in 2018, not just in making money from your blog but in attracting and maintaining relationships with sites.

Because of this, I tend to work with companies that I’ve known quite a while. There aren’t as many new companies popping up and very few that I support. Unbound Babes is one that’s been on my radar and that I’ll give props to. Not only have I worked with them and joined their affiliate program, but they have awesome newsletters and are a company that I just feel good supporting.

This isn’t to say that I won’t sometimes reach out or accept an invite from a newer company. Last year, I tried a number of Satisfyer models, and Svakom, whom I worked with a while back, is still lesser-known. I’m just less likely to do so. But those invites seem fewer and further between, too, as reputable companies work with fewer bloggers and discontinue their review programs.

I am not alone when I say that I am no longer happy supporting shitty companies. Yes, I’m talking about EdenFantasys, which I haven’t visited in years. But I’m also talking about how Lilly will call out Lelo or Pipedream when necessary. It’s why Epiphora speaks out about her experiences with Don Wands and Liberator. I have been fortunate to not deal with a lot of bullshit directly, but ours it a community that supports its members and that sometimes takes shape of revoking support of companies that refuse to do right by bloggers and consumers at large.

Occasionally this results in calling out the wrongdoings of companies we do support. Sometimes they’re just faux pas. It’s often the case of not knowing better, and companies have shown that they want to do better. Betty’s Toy Box, for example, ditched their gendered toy categories to make their site more inclusive. SheVibe actually made a few tweaks to their affiliate program after I wrote about using it years ago. Vibrant canceled a sale that some people thought was misguided. That’s the sort of thing that keeps me recommending a store. The expectations have changed, standards have increased.

Unsurprisingly, some stores have worked with manufacturers to created their own branded toys, some of which are identical to the originals. This is something that I’ve seen for quite a while, but it does seem to be more common. Trusted stores are putting their name on toys they want you to trust, too.

I’ve alluded to how blogging has changed, and that’s where I’ll give in next. But before I do, I just wanted to mention how manufacturers play a role in this. I’ve seen a number of boutique toy makers come and go (and sometimes come again): Fucking Sculptures and Phallix are just a few now-defunct companies that I can name off the top of my head. As I go cull broken links, I inevitably wind up lamenting that a wonderful toy or company no longer exists, perhaps to recommend a less alternative.

For every Split Peaches or Funkit, I worry how long they’ll manage to be around or who they may be replacing. Jollies has come, gone, come back, gone, and returned again. Phew! It’s hard to make it in this business, and this is my segue to talk about blogging.

How Sex Blogging Has Changed Over the Last 10 Years

When I started, I only figured this was a hobby, as did most other bloggers/reviewers. We created and maintained our blogs, tried toys, posted reviews and took pictures. Over the last ten years, it became more common for people to pay for professional/custom themes or even to have someone else maintain their blog while they focused solely on the writing. There are bloggers who don’t know a lick of HTML, a far cry from the Internet I cut my teeth on.

While there were people on both Blogger and WordPress in the beginning, most people use WordPress, and they’re almost entirely self-hosted. This is due to how Blogger has treated adult sites and users, I’m sure. I was always a bigger fan of WordPress myself. I’ve seen commenters move through Intense Debate, Livefyre, and Disqus for comments. I’ve never enjoyed any third-party commenting apps, but they’re here to stay. Regardless, the number of comments seems to have dropped, even for the most infamous of bloggers.

And there are only so many of those original bloggers around. I’ve already mentioned Lilly and Epiphora. Myself, of course. But so many names have disappeared and faded. The same, too, goes for communities and roundups. Pleasurists, Sugasm. You name it. That’s not even counting hashtag trends. I’m surprised when I still see someone use #FollowFriday and confused when #SOSS turns up.

It’s interesting how some platforms haven’t changed. Twitter still reigns supreme; although, it will be interesting to see how long this remains true with their recent shadowbans of sex workers and educators. Facebook, in some ways, has become another venue to leave comments, perhaps some of the reasons why blog comment counts are so low.

Another change is that photography has become increasingly more important, much to my chagrin. Not only do I personally prefer text to photos when I read reviews (especially if the reviews are all visual and do nothing to explain how well a product works), but I am not an excellent photographer. I have been trying more, however. Sometimes it’s apparent. But as someone who posts many of their reviews in the middle of the night (and may only be awake during those hours), natural light is a limited resource. Many of my reviews lack an original image let alone multiple, and I suspect this hurts my site.

While I struggled, I watched others succeed — and did they! Blogs became news sources. Bloggers became voices to be heard, and they were educating and revealing issues in the world. They earned respect. Bloggers went on to write for serious publications. Journalists began sex blogging as another venue to educate and discuss important issues at hand. From sex bloggers, were learned about shady companies, unsafe products, dubious practices. Companies were forced to take notice and do better. Bloggers were forced to up their game to remain relevant.

But I never really expected that having this blog would become a competition. I had no idea that people would make a job of it, that this was even possible, that people would no longer be doing it all themselves (although, in terms of sex blogging, many of us still are) and would hire different people to fill every possible role on their blog. I’ve made money through affiliate links and ads, but it was always spending money. Chump change. There came a point when I realized that if I wanted to keep up, make money and stay relevant, I would need to make this my full-time job. But that’s never what I wanted. It’s grueling and tedious. But the more I treated this as a hobby, the more I seemed to fade into the background. I think this leads to my final point.

How I Have Changed After a Decade of Blogging

I had so much time for this blog when I first started. At one point, I maintained five or so. I wrote reviews frequently, hung out in reviewer chatrooms, and posted on multiple forums. If you recall, I was married when I first started this blog — and living overseas. Returning home meant I was able to receive more packages in a more timely manner. It also meant that my marriage would soon be over.

During that time, I started working again. I moved home. I spent more time with people in real life. I shared with them my knowledge of sex and toys. The liberal and feminist ideals that I was exposed to as a sex blogger bled into my real life in big ways, but it was a one-way flow. I fell out of touch with my friends on Twitter, the blogosphere. I became more of who I am in person but shrunk away in the sex blogosphere. I felt alienated when I did return. I didn’t know where or how to dig my way back in or what I wanted out of it anymore. In my absence, people popped up. Bloggers who I still think of unproven newbies have been around for four or five years. How did that happen?

I had no time for the Internet, and as much as I wanted to still be apart of it, it was so difficult. On top of that, it all felt so fake. I had better things to do, and I was doing them. Still, I couldn’t help but grieve my losses, and I think my tweets and posts fell under a shadow because of this. It’s not like I didn’t decide I would return to blogging with a renewed vigor or didn’t try to come up with new features. I just couldn’t make it stick. It was hard to break back in, and time-management has never been my strong suit. Although I’ve stuck with the Science of Sex for over a year now, I rarely post on the second Saturday of every month the way I want to.

It’s no help that I have rarely had a consistent sexual partner since my divorce, and romance? Ha! I occasionally have some dating foibles to write about or thoughts on the whole process, but I felt as though being single somehow made me less qualified to write this blog. And it certainly makes it harder to explore some interests, bondage being one, that might make for interesting reading.

I really struggled to add personal thoughts to this blog because of that. Something that was once so relevant to this blog, to my identity, no longer existed in my life. This isn’t to say that it won’t ever again, but it makes things so much more difficult. And it was certainly an adjustment personally. My life went off the tracks in a major way, and I had to reconcile where I thought it was going with where it actually went.

Even if that weren’t the case, writing about toys gets old after a while. It takes so much more to blow my mind. So many reviews landed square in the realm of “This works. Now, why am I doing it again?” You can tell. And the process of writing a review became so dull, that I fell far behind. I couldn’t force myself to keep up with my obligations.

Aside from this, I became disenchanted with even reading blogs. Epiphora’s is the only blog that I read at any sort of frequent interval. I could scarcely keep up with new bloggers who seemed to disappear just as soon as they popped up.

It was such a chore when I could be spending time with people and immersing myself in my newfound/re-invigorated nerdy interests and friends. Boy, do I wish I knew which words in that sentence were worthy of parenthesis! LOL! I no longer needed to connect with people, ideas or communities online when I had those things offline. In my real life. I didn’t need to vent here when I could do so to people face-to-face. But it is my so-called real life that has brought me round again.

In 2016, I reconnected with my love of science, and the Science of Sex feature only made sense a few months later. I gleefully read the papers and learned the facts so that I could provide it with my readers. I remembered how awesome it felt to actively seek more knowledge. More than one month passed where I only posted once, and it was for this feature. It became my goal to post once a month for a year, which I had. During that time, I found bloggers, authors, podcasters, and other educators to teach and inspire me. I proactively make time to listen and read, and I follow some of these sources on both of my social networks, sharing with both of them as well.

In some ways, I’ve changed so much from the person who I was when I first began this blog. In other ways, I struggle with how I’ve remained stagnant over the last few years. It would certainly be nice if I had more things happening in my personal life that were also relevant to this blog, namely: love and sex.

I’ve often tried — and failed — to express these thoughts. Where I wanted to be vulnerable, I fear I simply came across as negative, whiny, and defensive, pushing away the people with whom I wanted to connect. I wanted to express my feelings of confusion, loneliness, and disconnection. I wanted to talk to my readers and fellow bloggers about how lost I felt. But it was so difficultc, perhaps because I started this with a pseudonym and tried not to let the streams of my two personas cross. I shared only so much information with my readers. I compartmentalized anything that wasn’t directly related to love, sex, masturbation or kink.

I think what will eventually make the most sense is for me to stop blogging under a pseudonym, to combine my professional writer persona with this identity and put everything under one umbrella. I am not yet ready to do this, but I can imagine how it will be when I do. Then, I will be able to share with all of you all of me. I won’t have to compartmentalize. I’ll be able to talk about sex with everyone from my real life and mention all those nerdy things to my readers here. It sounds like a pretty good deal.

In the meantime, I think I’m in a better place now, and I’m finding balance in my life, including with this site once more. It may not stick. Everything is a cycle, is it not? But I can live with this for now, and perhaps I can make a habit that enables me to stay active and in touch with this part of the blogosphere and, in turn, this part of myself.

Oh, and I also use Oxford commas more often than not, now. Gross.

How Views of Sex Have Changed Over the Last Decade

Although I won’t dive into this as deeply as some other subjects, I did want to take a look at how the world has changed regarding sex. In general, it seems to be more sex-positive and accepting of different sexual and gender identities, not just tolerant.  We’re more openly discussing sex, and for that I am grateful.

But there’s still so much work to do. For members of the LGBTQIA+ community, for sex workers, for women, for youth who are just exploring their sexuality and need factual sex education. The progress exists, but we need more.

Where Do We Go From Here

I think the last 4000 words or so have firmly established that I am not creative enough to imagine what the future might look like. I lack the capacity for big-picture thinking in a way that allows change to take me by surprise. But there are some things I’d like to see:

  • Businesses, organizations and bloggers will continue to take responsibility for their mistakes, however accidental they may be. Apologizing and striving to do better is important. None of us are perfect, but denial and willful ignorance help no one. Companies will be transparent about what they’re doing, how they make toys, avenues tapped for arts, etc.
  • USB standards will be adopted by toy makers, and rechargeable toys would not use proprietary ports.
  • Sex toy makers will work more closely with bloggers to create toys and get feedback. Toy reviewers should be involved in the process before a toy gets to the market.
  • Advertisers will pay equitable prices for spaces on our blogs and social media. If it’s important enough for you to ask, it’s important enough for you to pay. In this vein, it’s important for bloggers to get credit and respect where it’s due. The disrespect and condescension must stop.
  • Similarly,  purchasers should pay fair prices for the words we write for them. If you think our work is quality enough to use, then it deserves quality pay.
  • I want to see a stark decrease in the number of fly-by-night companies and Chinse manufacturers/retailers, even if they’re not showing up on my radar. I am not sure what might help this save for more regulation of sex toys.
  • Unsafe materials such as jelly will become defunct and forgotten.. Toy companies will use standard terminology to reduce confusion over what a toy is made from and strive to create body-safe toys without the need to lie or mislead about the toy.
  • Inclusive designs and marketing materials are a must. We’re moving away from “his” and “hers” toys, but that must continue. I want to see models of various skin colors and body shapes in ads, and I do not want to hear about the cost. If you cannot afford to do it right, you cannot afford to be in the business.
  • I’d love to see more conversations happening about sexuality in general, not sex-specific forums. I am seeing more of this and am contributing to it. Eventually, I will want to unify my online presences and write under my real name, and I can envision this being a possibility one day. Just not yet.
  • Ideally, some of the persistent cliques within this corner of the Internet would dissolve so that it would feel more inclusive.
  • I want, no, need, to see more people who are feminists, sex-positive, inclusive, and diverse in every venue, speaking and being held up and being heard.
  • Sex ed will move away from fear-based programs to factual programs that focus on more than just the risks of sex but also the benefits and the skills to have a healthy and happy sex life.
  • Sex work should be legalized and protected.
  • Birth control should be covered by insurance. All of it.
  • I want safe abortions that are covered by insurance and provided by professionals who do not demonize the people seeking out their medical services.
  • Members of the queer community should not have to fear for their safety when they walk down the street. Nor should they be denied the same respect and services as the rest of the world. They should not worry that they’ll be turned down for buying a simple cake or, perhaps more importantly, denied when they apply to adopt a child and start a family together.

There are so many things that I wish to see and that I believe can be a reality if we continue to work toward them.

My personal goals are the same as they always have been. I want to be more consistent in posting and more engaged with the sex blogosphere. I want to continue learning (perhaps by attending a sex/science event) and growing, to experiment sexually (especially with kink) and get out of my comfort zone. I hope that I will be able to do more creative writing, which is something that has fallen by the wayside this year. Time management is definitely crucial to all of my goals. Ironically, if I were having copious amounts of sex or in a relationship, I think I would have even less time and motivation to write about it.

To that end, I am focusing my 10-year anniversary giveaway on methods that will allow me to connect with my readers and other bloggers, to engage, perhaps to make a few friendships. I hope you will join me — and not just because you can win some awesome sex toys in my upcoming giveaway post!

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Categories: Everything Else

On one hand, lemons

November 10th, 2017

I don’t know when I first stumbled across Dr Emily Nagoski’s post on Lemonade Sex. I think I began reading her blog after I read her book. I’ve continued to read and references her work since then.

If you’re not familiar with Dr. Emily, she’s an expert on sex whom I greatly respect. Teaching and speaking about sex are her day job and, I suspect, her passion. Among her work is a relationship guide, and her post on lemonade sex starts with the following sentiment:

I spend a chunk of time talking about coping in my relationship guide because it turns out that effectively coping with stress is quite possibly the most important thing you can do to improve your sex life.

I believe you, doc.

Dr. Nagoski goes on to explain how stress can kill one person’s libido or raise another’s. And it wreaks havoc on your relationships. This is where coping comes into play. Coping is all about taking the hand you’ve been dealt and making the most of it or, you know, making lemonade out of sour lemons.

The good doctor recommends having sex with your partner even when you’re too stressed to really want it. It doesn’t need to be amazing but maybe could be. And you don’t do it because you’re expected or you feel obligated to do it for your partner. Lemonade sex isn’t about how sex is good for you. 

Lemonade sex paints having sex like flexing a muscle to keep it strong or maintaining something even though you’re not actively using it. Emily compares it to eating vegetables, something that people rarely like but that they do because it’s good for them — just like lemonade sex.

And the analogy to veggies works for me because eating them isn’t amazing, but the energy is. I’ll periodically ingest something with tomatoes (okay, technically a fruit) or spinach that’s so tasty that I feel legitimately excited over something that’s good for me.

I’ve been there with sex, too. The slumps with my ex-husband were never more than a few weeks and less so related to a lack of desire and more due to a lack of habit. It’s easier to fall out of the habit of something, even sex and even if you’re a pretty sexual person, than we always realize.

So I’d throw my ex a bone, and sometimes he would me. I found that this bone, or lemonade sex, worked in exactly the way that Dr. Emily predicted. Where my body went, my head followed, even though it hadn’t been in the game just a few moments before (she describe this as responsive desire). A similar thing happens when I watch someone I’m in a relationship with masturbate. I think I’m only an audience member but find myself drawn to willing participation in short order.

The concept of lemonade sex is one that’s controversial, and Emily admits this in her blog post. No one is suggesting anything that’s nonconsensual.  It’s important that if you have lemonade sex, you do it for you, because it’s beneficial for yourself, and not your partner. I think that’s the emphasis that Emily is trying to make toward the end of her post.

That’s also what’s stuck with me since I originally read this post. The kneejerk reaction might be to view lemonade sex as something that’s negative and potentially blurs the lines of consent, but I certainly think that it’s useful to consider whether throwing someone else a bone is really throwing yourself a bone in the long run.

Check out Dr. Emily’s post about lemonade sex on the Dirty Normal, and stay for her other insights into sex.

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Categories: Everything Else

The Purge

April 13th, 2017

No, I’m not talking about some presumably terrible horror (thriller?) movie. Rather, I mean the semi-annual completely random time at which I realized the product packaging dilemma in my apartment has gotten way out of hand. Not just a little out of hand but, you know, I’ve been waiting months to deal with this but I haven’t yet. And there’s a reason for that.

Because companies put so much extra shit in their packaging that I need to spend an ungodly amount of timing removing plastic and foam insert (even if they’re glued in), cutting out plastic windows, breaking down boxes, snipping fabric handles, removing magnets and for some ungodly reason cutout out metal fucking eyelets from sex toy boxes.

Listen, this isn’t my first rant about packaging. I don’t care how fancy your box is if it’s going to take up room and be difficult to dispose of, and I am downright angered when the toy inside is mostly a piece of shit that’s never going to do anything for me.

And I might be the only one, and maybe I make it harder for myself, but the way that boxes have become harder to recycle is downright creative. 

So if you must, allow us to remove the foam and plastic. Use open windows, not plastic. Don’t embed anything, okay? If I need to attack it with a pair of scissors or box cutter and my god damn hands wind up hurting, I’ll wanna hurt you.

The shitty thing is that while I can read reviews and look at product photos on sites, assuming that packaging is shown, it’s impossible to know if something is embedded or glued in to avoid buying it. Sigh.

Whatever. I’ll live. It’s done with. For now.

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Categories: Everything Else

Image © MisterUnlucky; used with permission.