Understanding Her Sexual Body Language

When you're in bed with a woman, do you ever get the feeling that she's uncomfortable or that something is amiss? Are you able to read your girl's body language?

Well, you might be right -- there might be something she is telling you. Check out these body language movements and reactions that likely mean that something is up with your girl. If you are able to confront these issues, you may be able to eliminate the sexual party pooper that is dwelling in your girl.

She won't look at you

If she lets you get inside her but won't even look up at you, something is definitely up. And not in a good way. If every time you lean in to kiss her, she turns her face and doesn't open her eyes, there is definitely a problem.

Possible reasons: It's possible that she's shy and isn't very experienced in bed. If she won't let your mouth get anywhere near hers, you might have bad breath, she might have bad breath, your facial hair might be scraping her face or, if you went down on her, she might find it "distasteful" to kiss afterwards.

Fix it: The next time you're having sex, pull out and make your way to her face; in a soap opera-romance way, gently hold her head in your hands and kiss her like Casanova. If you feel like she wants to pull away, let her and ask her what the deal is. The only way to figure out why she's reacting that way is by asking.

Her expressions are stoic

If you're giving the session your all and she's staring into space or focusing all her attention on the ceiling, something has got to give.

Possible reasons: It's possible that she doesn't like sex much. As well, she might want to be engaging in some other sex act and is afraid to tell you about it. Maybe she feels like a caged animal and wants to be on top or maybe you're not giving her enough room to maneuver.

Fix it: Put her on top and tell her you want to watch her move. Or, when you're not having sex, ask her about her sexual fantasies; maybe that'll help you get to the bottom of her body language behavior.

Bumpy Problem

Ques: I've had a strange growth on the underside of the shaft of my penis for more than a year. It’s like a little bump under the skin that you can slide the skin around, but it won’t move from its actual place. I’m not sexually active, so I’m wondering if this could have something to do with a vein or a bump in the shaft? How do I get rid of it?

Ans: While I can’t say for sure, it sounds like you have a sebaceous cyst on your shaft. Now, don’t panic. The name may sound unpleasant and fatal, but I assure that if you do indeed have a sebaceous cyst on your penis, you have nothing to worry about. This is a sac containing a pasty-like secretion under the skin. It is usually painless, but it can occasionally become inflamed. It also has a tendency to leave a bruised-like appearance on the surface of the skin directly covering it. Usually, one of these cysts can just be ignored, but since it happens to be on you penis, I can imagine that it makes you feel very self-conscious. Talk to your physician for an accurate diagnosis and to discuss possible methods of removal.

Ques: I have read some background information on adult circumcision and I believe that it would be right for me. I live in a town of about 175,000 people in Texas so my options are pretty limited. My question is: Who should I call to ask about getting this procedure done? How much can I expect to pay for this procedure?

Ans: It’s not uncommon for men to opt for the circumcision route later on in life. And being from a small town doesn’t mean you can’t have a circumcision. If you’d like to get more informed on the procedure, simply visit your family physician and he’ll refer you to a urologist you can visit. As for cost, be prepared to dish out about $100 to $200 USD for this routine procedure.

Self confidence

Most of the time, we avoid making the first move because a nasty little negative thought pops into our mind at exactly the wrong moment. Here are some of the most common:

• They will never fancy me
  Attractiveness is very much in the eye of the beholder. If you never approach that person you fancy, how are they going to get the chance to decide? So long as you are clean and wearing stuff that you're comfortable with, what's the problem? There's a lot more going on here than physical appearances, and a good personality shines through. So what if you're brunette and they only like blondes? It just means that person is shallow, not that you're unattractive.
• They might say no, or have a boyfriend/girlfriend already!
  True, you might not be their ideal partner, and they have a right to say no. But they could also say yes, and surely that's worth taking the risk? Rejection is part of the dating scene, and it isn't the end of the world - you just move on and meet someone else. As for them already having a partner, there's no way you can tell in advance, so ask anyway.
• I might make a fool of myself!
  You'll have more luck if you're pleasant and friendly, rather than flash or cheesy. Even if you end up feeling embarrassed, chances are that nobody else will even notice. If they say 'no thanks' nicely, then deal with it graciously and don't start insulting them, it'll only make you look immature and insecure. If the other person deliberately tries to embarrass you, they've actually done you a favour by letting you know that they have an attitude problem.

What is sexual orientation?

Sexual orientation is an enduring emotional, romantic or sexual attraction to another person. It is easily distinguished from other components of sexuality including biological sex, gender identity (the psychological sense of being male or female) and the social gender role (adherence to cultural norms for feminine and masculine behaviour).

Sexual orientation exists along a continuum that ranges from exclusive homosexuality to exclusive heterosexuality and includes various forms of bisexuality. Bisexual persons can experience physical, sexual and emotional attraction to both their own sex and the opposite sex. Persons with a homosexual orientation are sometimes referred to as gay (both men and women) or as lesbian (women only).

Sexual orientation is different from sexual behaviour because it refers to feelings and self-concept. Persons may or may not express their sexual orientation in their behaviours.

What causes a person to have a particular sexual orientation?

It is generally agreed that sexual orientation is most likely the result of a complex interaction of environmental, cognitive and biological factors. In most people, sexual orientation is shaped at an early age. There is also considerable recent evidence to suggest that biology, including genetic or inborn hormonal factors, play a significant role in a person's sexuality. It is important to recognise that there are probably many reasons for a person's sexual orientation and the reasons may be different for different people.

Do I have a choice over my sexual orientation?

No, human beings can not choose to be either gay or straight. Sexual orientation emerges for most people in early adolescence without any prior sexual experience. Although we can choose whether to act on our feelings, psychologists do not consider sexual orientation to be a conscious choice that can be voluntarily changed.

How do I know if I'm gay?

Many people will be attracted to someone of the same gender at some time in their lives. Some people might act on this; some people don't even admit it.

Drug-Facilitated Sexual Assault

Picture it. You wake up. You're naked. You have a pounding headache, aching muscles, and you can't remember anything from last night. One minute you and some friends are getting a ride to a party, the next you're waking up here, on a stranger's bed in a room you've never even seen before.

You search around in the dark for a minute or so, and piece-by-piece you find the clothes you were wearing last night. You quickly pull on your underwear and jeans, and are about to throw on your top when you notice something's wrong. There's a long tear stretching down from the neckline of your shirt. For a minute, you just sit there in confusion - what the heck happened last night?

Then, a spark fires in your brain. You remember something from the night before that makes your skin crawl, and in a single instant, your life is changed forever. You're not sure, but you think you've been raped.

This is drug-facilitated sexual assault, and no one's really sure how often it happens.

Often known as "drug rape" or "date rape", drug-facilitated sexual assault is when someone uses the fact that you've taken or been given alcohol or drugs to sexually assault you.

This sexual assault can be anything from unwanted kissing or touching to full-blown rape. Obviously, rape is worse than an unwanted kiss or touch, but all sexual assaults are serious crimes.

Someone could also slip a "date-rape" drug into your drink that will make you completely out of it and an easy target. These drugs can also make you pass out or erase parts of your memory, so you might wake up the next day and never know what's happened to you.

Other times, someone may take advantage of a person who's had too much to drink or took drugs willingly - a girl who is passed out at a party, for example.

Tips and Tools

People have been having sex ever since...well...people! And sex goes back a lot further than that! Yet for some reason, after 5 million years of having sex, not one of us has figured out a good way to bring it up around the dinner table.

If you're embarassed about talking about sex, join the club! For just about all of us, talking about sex is embarassing. Why?...Well, that's a much bigger question than it seems. But asking questions and getting answers about sex is important. And even though no one's gotten it down cold yet, there are ways you can make talking about sex and sexuality easier.

Check out this section for tips to getting the info you need, whether it's from your boyfriend, girlfriend, parent or doctor. And if you're concerned about your first visit to a clinic, relax.we've broken it down, piece by piece. We've also got a tonne of good articles and links worth checking out. So go ahead...surf around!

Goals for Reducing Heterosexual Bias in Language

1. Reducing heterosexual bias and increasing visibility of lesbians, gay men, and bisexual persons. Lesbians, gay men, and bisexual men and women often feel ignored by the general media which take the heterosexual orientation of their readers for granted. Unless an author is referring specifically to heterosexual people, writing should be free of heterosexual bias. Ways to increase the visibility of lesbians, gay men, and bisexual persons include:
   • Using examples of lesbians, gay men, and bisexual persons when referring to activities (e.g., parenting, athletic ability) that are erroneously associated only with heterosexual people by many readers.
   • Referring to lesbians, gay men, and bisexual persons in situations other than sexual relationships. Historically, the term "homosexuality" has connoted sexual activity rather than a general way of relating and living.
   • Omitting discussion of marital status unless legal marital relationships are the object of the writing. Marital status per se is not a good indicator of cohabitation (marital couples may be separated; unmarried couples may live together), sexual activity, or sexual orientation (a person who is married may be in a gay or lesbian relationship with a partner). Further, describing people as married or "single" renders lesbians, gay men, and bisexual persons as well as heterosexual people in cohabiting relationships invisible.
   • Referring to sexual and intimate emotional partners by both male and female pronouns (e.g., "the adolescent males were asked about the age at which they first had a male or female sexual partner").
   • Using sexual terminology that is relevant to lesbians and gay men as well as bisexual and heterosexual people (e.g., "when did you first engage in sexual activity?" rather than "when did you first have sexual intercourse?").
   • Avoiding the assumption that pregnancy may result from sexual activity (e.g., "it is recommended that women attending the clinic who currently are engaging in sexual activity with men be given oral contraceptives" instead of "it is recommended that women who attend the clinic be given oral contraceptives").
2. Clarity of expression and avoidance of inaccurate stereotypes about lesbians and gay men. Stigmatizing or pathologizing language regarding gay men and lesbians should be avoided (e.g., "sexual deviate," "sexual invert"). Authors should take care that examples do not further stigmatize lesbians, gay men, or bisexual persons (e.g., an example such as "psychologists need training in working with special populations such as lesbians, drug abusers, and alcoholics" is stigmatizing in that it lists a status designation (lesbians) with designations of people being treated.
3. Comparisons of lesbians or gay men to parallel groups. When comparing a group of gay men or lesbians to others, parallel terms have not always been used. For example, contrasting lesbians with "the general public" or to "normal women" portrays lesbians as marginal to society. More appropriate comparison groups might be "heterosexual women," "heterosexual men and women," or "gay men and heterosexual women and men."

Problems of Terminology

Problems occur in language concerning lesbians, gay men, and bisexual persons when language is too vague or concepts are poorly defined. There are two major problems of designation. First, language may be ambiguous in reference, so that the reader is not clear about its meaning or its inclusion and exclusion criteria. Second, "homosexuality" has been associated in the past with deviance, mental illness, and criminal behavior, and these negative stereotypes may be perpetuated by bias.

1. Sexual orientation is a preferred term for psychological writing over "sexual preference" and refers to sexual/affectional relationships of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and heterosexual people. The word "preference" suggests a degree of voluntary choice that is not necessarily reported by lesbians and gay men and that has not been demonstrated in psychological research.

   The terms "lesbian sexual orientation," "heterosexual sexual orientation," "gay male sexual orientation," and "bisexual sexual orientation" are preferable over "lesbianism," "heterosexuality", "homosexuality", and "bisexuality", respectively. The former terms focus on people and some of the latter terms have in the past been associated with pathology.

2. Lesbian and gay male are preferred to the word "homosexual" when used as an adjective referring to specific persons or groups, and lesbians and gay men are preferred terms over "homosexuals" used as a noun when referring to specific persons or groups. The word "homosexual" has several problems of designation. First, it may perpetuate negative stereotypes because of its historical associations with pathology and criminal behavior. Second, it is ambiguous in reference because it is often assumed to refer exclusively to men and thus renders lesbians invisible. Third, it is often unclear.

   The terms "gay male" and "lesbian" refer primarily to identities and to the modern culture and communities that have developed among people who share those identities. They should be distinguished from sexual behavior. Some men and women have sex with others of their own gender but do not consider themselves to be gay or lesbian. In contrast, the terms "heterosexual" and "bisexual" currently are used to describe identity as well as behavior.

   The terms "gay" as an adjective and "gay persons" as a noun have been used to refer to both males and females. However, these terms may be ambiguous in reference since readers who are used to the term "lesbian and gay" may assume that "gay" refers to men only. Thus it is preferable to use "gay" or "gay persons" only when prior reference has specified the gender composition of this term.

   Such terms as "gay male" are preferable to "homosexuality" or "male homosexuality" and so are grammatical reconstructions (e.g., "his colleagues knew he was gay" rather than "his colleagues knew about his homosexuality"). The same is true for "lesbian" over "female homosexual", "female homosexuality", or "lesbianism."

3. Same-gender behavior, male-male behavior, and female-female behavior are appropriate terms for specific instances of same-gender sexual behavior that people engage in regardless of their sexual orientation (e.g., a married heterosexual man who once had a same-gender sexual encounter). Likewise, it is useful that women and men not be considered "opposites" (as in "opposite sex") to avoid polarization, and that heterosexual women and men not be viewed as opposite to lesbians and gay men. Thus, male-female behavior is preferred to the term "opposite sex behavior" in referring to specific instances of other-gender sexual behavior that people engage in regardless of their sexual orientation.

   When referring to sexual behavior that cannot be described as heterosexual, gay, lesbian, or bisexual, special care needs to be taken. Descriptions of sexual behavior among animal species should be termed "male-male sexual behavior" or "male-female sexual behavior" rather than "homosexual behavior" or "heterosexual behavior," respectively.

4. Bisexual women and men, bisexual persons, or bisexual as an adjective refer to people who relate sexually and affectionally to women and men. These terms are often omitted in discussions of sexual orientation and thus give the erroneous impression that all people relate exclusively to one gender or another. Omission of the term "bisexual" also contributes to the invisibility of bisexual women and men. Although it may seem cumbersome at first, it is clearest to use the term "lesbians, gay men, and bisexual women or men" when referring inclusively to members of these groups.

5. Heterosexual as an adjective is acceptable for people who have male-female affectional/sexual relationships and who do not engage in sexual relationships with people of the same gender.

6. Use of gender instead of sex. The terms "sex" and "gender" are often used interchangeably. Nevertheless, the term "sex" is often confused with sexual behavior, and this is particularly troublesome when differentiating between sexual orientation and gender. The phrase "it was sexual orientation, rather than gender, that accounted for most of the variance" is clearer than "it was sexual orientation, rather than sex, that accounted for most of the variance."

   In the latter phrase, "sex" may be misinterpreted as referring to sexual activity. It is generally more precise to use the term "gender."