Friday, September 19, 2008

Noisy, Screaming, Grunting Sex

Have you ever heard these unwelcome words? "Shhhh. You have to be quiet, we can't wake up my..." room mate, parents, the kids, the guests, the neighbors....whomever will be disturbed by the humping noises emanating from the two-headed beast.

I have always found that -although in the beginning it seems hot- my orgasm is thwarted by stifling my vocalizations during screwing. I'm not necessarily a "screamer" although I have been brought to the brink, but I am a noise maker. I grunt, squeal, breathe heavy, pant, moan, weep, talk, hold my breath, give directions, propose positions, cry out to god, jesus, joseph and mary- the whole holy family gets invited to join in on the good times and get to hear my thanks!

I have had to put a sock in it, literally. Bury my head in the pillows, clamp my mouth on a shoulder (but that leads to embarrassing fart like noises when I start to breath heavily). I'll even groan appreciatively with a dick in my mouth, so while that lowers the volume, it's no solution.

Why is it, I wonder, that noise or words have such an effect on the outcome of the sexual experience? A friend told me she unexpectedly orgasmed during sex when her lover first expressed his devotion. The "I love you" phrase whispered in her ear during sex was what did it for her.

A foreign accent can also make me immediately wet and swollen. The tone of a husky voice, a hushed whisper. They are all such turn ons! I once had a boyfriend who would say my name over and over again during sex, then later in the day or night when he would mention my name, on the phone, to a friend when introducing me, even asking what I wanted to order at a restaurant, I would get so hot because it would bring me back to that moment.

I think any kind of inhibition -including a mute button- limits the bodies ability to orgasm. If you are ashamed of part of your body, or hyper conscious of a perceived fault, or trying to be quiet, it can prevent that wonderful moment.


Martin Portner wrote in an article for Scientific American in their May 2008 issue:


...when a woman reached orgasm, something unexpected happened: much of her brain went silent. Some of the most muted neurons sat in the left lateral orbitofrontal cortex, which may govern self-control over basic desires such as sex. Decreased activity there, the researchers suggest, might correspond to a release of tension and inhibition. The scientists also saw a dip in excitation in the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, which has an apparent role in moral reasoning and social judgment—a change that may be tied to a suspension of judgment and reflection.


Brain activity fell in the amygdala, too, suggesting a depression of vigilance similar to that seen in men, who generally showed far less deactivation in their brain during orgasm than their female counterparts did.


“Fear and anxiety need to be avoided at all costs if a woman wishes to have an orgasm; we knew that, but now we can see it happening in the depths of the brain,” Holstege says. He went so far as to declare at the 2005 meeting of the European Society for Human Reproduction and Development: “At the moment of orgasm, women do not have any emotional feelings.”

Really, you can't be thinking of anything; fears, anxieties, your fat thighs, or anybody listening and probably at the moment that you are coming, you aren't making a sound. So shhhhh....