Poll: Come with Me

[thefourthvine]

It's time to discuss a very sensitive topic that I know you will all handle with maturity and respect for your classmates. Yes, it's time to discuss...orgasm.

I heard that, makesmewannadie. One more remark out of you and you will be staying after class, young lady. Also, fanofall? Don't think I don't see you rolling your eyes.

Yes, orgasm can be a beautiful thing. When a person (or assistive device) gives pleasure to another person, that's a lovely, selfless act, and one we - last warning, people - as mature adults can appreciate. Or mature teenagers. Whatever. 'People old enough for porn' is the concept I'm trying to get across here.

Of course, orgasm can also be, well, a little less than beautiful. Particularly in certain kinds of fictional endeavors. Because, see, sometimes a person can be reading along, and then there's a sudden incursion of screaming and fainting and smelling salts and Mr. Darcy with a riding crop, and that person might think, "Did I just take a detour from Smut Boulevard onto Victorian Novel Lane? I...wow. I didn't know you could do that in spats." Or that person might think, "Jesus, what the hell is wrong with me? I've never done that."

And yet I know some of you out there in readerland have done that, and now is the time to tell me about it.

I'm trying to assuage my own fears of serious abnormality, here. (Yes, really. Well, mostly. Well, partly, anyway. But I also tend to assume anyone I can hear laughing is laughing at me. I never said I wasn't paranoid, if you think back.) I'm also trying to figure out how often these things honestly happen, and under what circumstances. (Because I am nosy. No, there is no better reason. What reason could be better than that?) So let's remember the honor system, OK?

And, truly, no shame attached, no matter what you answer. For one thing, I included in the list items I could answer 'yes' to, and I'm not going to tell you what they were. (Well, OK. Possibly with begging. The right kind of begging. But then, the right kind of begging can get pretty much anything from me.) This should encourage those of you who can answer 'yes' to any of these to believe I'm right there with you, just in case you forgot to bring your sex-positive confidence with you today. And since I can't answer 'yes' to all or even most of them, people who can't check anything should also believe they're in good company. (You can decide for yourself if I count as good company or not.) Furthermore, no one can see your answers, and you should feel free to comment anonymously. Internet + sex + anonymity is pretty much the recipe for sharing, isn't it? So share.

(Which also means, for the record, that if you folks want to pimp this I'd be grateful. I definitely want to hear from all of you, but it'd also be very cool to get answers from people other than the Egregiously Tasteful and Talented Cohort.)



[Poll #513074]

Comments

*giggles, passes notes*

[norah.livejournal.com]

Dude. The wash, the flood, the absolute TORRENT of TMI you're in for, here...the mind fucking boggles. And no, I won't have sex with you, as I think our respective partners might be a bit miffed; but yeah. Talky, if the other person seems receptive, very talky. *blush*

*waves ruler menacingly*

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I know; I'm braced for all kinds of responses to this. (I do not fear the TMI so much, although I guess I could have the chance to learn the Error of My Ways here, but - yeah, I think there's some potential for trouble in this post.) The thing is - I just could not stand it any longer. If I read one more story in which someone screams, whites out, comes back to reality a half-hour later, and yet manages to continue a first-person narrative the whole time - well, I will begin to feel inferior. Which leads to rants. It's better this way.

(At least people are taking this poll. I seriously wondered if anyone would. Yay for the allure of ticky boxes!)

[hjcallipygian.livejournal.com]

I have never passed out during sex, but when I was in high school my girlfriend had this really annoying habit of doing so. She had asthma and would get worked up enough that she would just stop breathing and pass out and let me tell you: that was some really freaky shit to have happen when you are just a clueless seventeen-year-old boy. I was so totally convinced that I was going to end up one of those urban legends slash scare-kids-into-abstinence stories wherein the boy and girl have premarital sex and it kills her.

Anyway. I think the above experience is why I am aware enough during all moments of sex to be able to keep track of first-person narrative at all times. I mean, I'm already paying attention and checking vital signs. It's not too hard to talk about it.

[lyra-sena.livejournal.com]

*dies*

I apologize to barge in here, as you don't know me, but I just laughed so hard at this:

I mean, I'm already paying attention and checking vital signs.

Lord have mercy, that cracks me up.

[tazical.livejournal.com]

*snickers* You said orgasm.

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

*ticked-off sigh*

Yes, thank you, Miss tazical. Ha ha ha. I suppose you will find detention as humorous?

*assumes Snape-like posture and orders tazical from the room*

Does anyone else feel the need to share clever remarks? Because I have just about had it with you kids, and the next person won't be sent to detention.

(*snicker*)

[lyra-sena.livejournal.com]

*raises hand in shame*

I'm in the camp that's moaned out a name while with someone who, uh, was not the partner at the moment.

[norah.livejournal.com]

Me too.

I WAS DRUNK. IT WAS AN ACCIDENT SHUT UP.

[erika-sanely.livejournal.com]

Never fainted during an orgasam, but if its a good one, my right foot cramps up until I'm almost in too much pain from it to enjoy myself.

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

Ow ow OW. That has only happened to me on rare occasion, but OW it hurts, and you have my total and complete sympathy. Every good one?

That is so not fair.

(So, I'm guessing you ticked the "screaming" box. Because that? Would so make me scream. Although not in a good way.)

[zoerayne]

Engaged in other orgasm behavior common in fan fiction, which you will of course tell me all about in the comments?

Okay, this is cheating just a little, because it's not me but rather someone I used to date.... And, honestly, I don't see this all that often in fic, but I would like to. *g*

Anyway. So, this guy I used to date could have an orgasm on command. Not totally out of the blue, but pretty much any time during sex or masturbation, you could order him to come and he would within 5-10 seconds.

And why don't I have a TMI icon? *frowns*

[norah.livejournal.com]

That's really cool. Now, if it worked the other way, and you could get someone to hold off just by telling them to, I'd dig that, too.

[dexwebster]

a sudden incursion of screaming and fainting and smelling salts and Mr. Darcy with a riding crop

Strange, sure. But doesn't that last bit sound interesting?

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

In theory, yes. In practice, I am afraid it would take us to the Badfic Place:

"Oh, that dreadful Mr. Darcy. He is so very toppy," Elizabeth said indignantly. "I cannot bear the man. Do you see the way he is always laying about with his riding crop? It is past imagining, I tell you."

"Oh, Lizzy, do not be so hard on him," Jane cried, in real distress, for it was not in her nature to criticize the kinks of others. "He may act that way, but I am quite sure that if it came to it he would remember that a lady always gets to choose first."

And, OK, that's it. Can't badfic one of my favorite novels anymore. Feel tremendous guilt and shame as it is.

*departs in search of good works that may allay some small part of this dreadful, dreadful crime*

(Although, hey - if you can write it so it doesn't go badficcy, go for it.)

TMI?

[overly-shy.livejournal.com]

My husband & I have had simultaneous orgasms without trying a few times. It was just a coincidence, and has more to do with having had sex many times over the last 15 years than anything else. It did not, by the way, seem any more meaningful than having separate orgasms.

Re: TMI?

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

It did not, by the way, seem any more meaningful than having separate orgasms.

I've never had one without some effort on the part of my partner, so I'm glad to hear you confirm my opinion of the whole deal, that there's no special wonderfulness there. For me, it was like - why go to any trouble just so that both of us miss half the fun?

That could potentially be TMI. But I don't think I'm going to make it through a single comment in this post without giving at least some of that, so, you know - sorry.

[the-star-fish.livejournal.com]

Okay, so I checked off "Said your partner's name" but I only did it because (you're going to laugh) I'd read it so much in fanfic and wanted to see if it was even remotely plausible.

I, um.

Wasn't having a very good time anyway. But I minored in theatre ....

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

OK, I admit it. I laughed.

Because that? That was excellent. You deserve some kind of Testing the Realism of FF Even in Potentially Thorny (or Possibly Just Boring) Circumstances award. Or, no, I've got it now: Best Use of a Drama Minor in RL.

*snickers, but very quietly, and with love*

(No, seriously, it's a great story and I love it. But I'm not, you know, laughing at you. You know that, right?)

[giglet.livejournal.com]

Engaged in other orgasm behavior common in fan fiction,

Well, no, but it *ought* to be common in fanfic, darn it!

I tend to laugh. Giggles, guffaws, everything in between. I do it enough that I warn my partners beforehand. I married the guy who laughed with me.

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

Oh my GOD, I so want to see that in FF. Because I do that, too. People in FF take sex really damn seriously, y'know?

But not nearly as seriously as people in original fiction. Or, god help us all, most people in real life. I bruised some egos giggling inappropriately in intimate situations in my youth, but I couldn't help it. Sex is funny! And sex and snark seems like a natural combination to me. (I don't have the ego-bruising problem anymore, because now I have Best Beloved, who laughs along with me.)

[heuradys.livejournal.com]

I did not check fainted/passed out. But nearly. Once. Had a lot more to do with the being tipsy and in a very steamy shower, I think, than what we were doing in there.

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah. Hot showers and alcohol together can do that to you. I once fainted getting out of a hot bath, just from standing up. (Admittedly, I also had a fever - I hadn't connected my sudden freezing-coldness and related desire to take a super-hot bath with illness, but I figured it out shortly after I came to on the bathroom floor.) Marble counters? Are hard, and you do not want to hit your head on them. For the record.

I'm claiming

[maygra.livejournal.com]

past life experiences...because those folks who were me before I was me? had great sex lives.

I'm thinking that falls under reality lapse.

Re: I'm claiming

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

You know, I think we've found something that has - well, I'm not saying never, because of course it's somewhere, so let's go with 'rarely.' That has rarely been used in FF, in my experience. I don't think I've ever seen it.

And, yup, I agree. Reality lapse!

(Was it a good past life?)

[nolivingman.livejournal.com]

His name was not Bob - I don't remember his name, actually, just that it was most definitely not Bob. He was cuter than Bob, though, and actually better in bed, so I'm not sure why I felt the need to call out for Bob.

Only time I ever used a name, and it was the wrong one.

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

Oops!

And it is a very embarrassing thing to do under any situation, but if you actually know someone by that name (and I assume you did know a Bob), yikes.

I think what I've learned from this poll thus far is that it's best to stick to non-specific terms of endearment in bed. So that goes on page 116 of a book I'll never write. (Possible title: TFV's Guide to Surviving Your Sex Life.)

[doolabug.livejournal.com]

Once I nearly drowned, although I've seen that in fic only once.

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

That's 'cause we can give our characters the, you know, grace and narrative coherence fate won't let us have. (I've never come seriously close to drowning myself, but I nearly drowned someone else once. Challenging sex is probably not all that safe for me - or anyone else - given that I am insanely clumsy.)

[misspamela.livejournal.com]

I went out with this guy who once knocked himself out cold masturbating. In the heat of the moment he sort of lurched forward and smacked his head on his dresser. His mom found him naked on the floor a few minutes later. Awkward!

[sprat.livejournal.com]

LOL! You should write this into a fic. John might have done that as a kid, I think. Or hee, Rodney might *now*. :)

[neonnurse.livejournal.com]

Q. What's the bad thing about having an orgasm if you're an atheist?

A. No one to talk to.

And hey, how about having orgasms when you're asleep? You should have had that on your list!

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

Dang. I knew I'd forget stuff. Although, in my defense, I don't see this one in FF that often, except in the form of wet dreams. But I do question the realism of any male character over the age of 20 actually coming in his sleep. (Women, yes. Men, probably not.)

And then there's the whole FF thing where a character dreams someone's touching him or her and wakes up to find it's really happening, which I wonder about.

You're right. This should've gone on the list.

Ah, well - fodder for the next one.

[ficbyzee.livejournal.com]

Why wasn't 'have you ever bitten something (pillow, partner's shoulder, e.t.c.)' an option in the first question? :P

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

Because I thought everyone did that sometimes.

*slinks away in shame*

(Although I did consider asking if people found biting something particularly helpful as, like, a silence aid, because I don't. Now I'm glad I didn't put that in, because I would've revealed my own biteyness for all the world to see. Ah, the insidious hidden dangerous of LJ polls.)

[(Anonymous)]

Turn off IP logging for honest answers.

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

'Tis done! The anonymous world is your oyster.

*waves hand cheerfully*

[ilexa.livejournal.com]

My orgasms -- while varied, delightful and abundent -- suddenly seem very, very boring.

I think they would be vastly improved if I were actually having sex with David Hewlett.

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

*makes mental note about possible future birthday gift*

Possibly we could take up a collection or something.

(And, no, see, the point of this poll is that it's good not to be able to tick off any of the boxes, because if you could check them all, it'd strongly suggest that you were living in badfic. And then the fourth wall would break, and you'd see who was writing you, and then you would stomp away in a huff, muttering, "Oh, please. I was a Mary Sue for a 14-year-old who has obviously been taking all her fashion tips from Go Fug Yourself? The shame! Jeez, she could at least have put me in RPH with David Hewlett." Whereas having varied, delightful, and abundant orgasms that aren't badfic conventions is pretty much proof that you are not in any such story, but rather are in fact the real - well, not McCoy, as that would just confuse things further, so - the real ilexa.

Good lord. I seem to be espousing the Theory of Badfic Solipsism or something now. Must nap. Philosophy coming over me like a plague. Sennnnnd heeeeeeelp!)

[(Anonymous)]

TMI and anonymity! Great things.

I'm always wildly confused by people that scream during orgasm in fic, especially when it's a masturbatory orgasm. (I've never had sex and therefore can't vouch for that.) But - honestly, my breathing changes are barely audible, even for really, really good ones. Screaming seems like insane theatrical overkill. Long periods of black-out make me nervous for their health - I've fainted before (in standing positions, over hardwood floor and hard tile respectively) and it's never a sign of anything good. Narratives seem vaguely acceptable during intercourse (because, sure, why not?) but during wanking.. especially when they have to muffle themselves to stop it.. I just honestly don't get it. What kind of environment does a kid grow up in where speaking while masturbating isn't just plausible (thin walls, etc) but so commonplace that it becomes an unbreakable force of habit?

[syredronning.livejournal.com]

Well,, I belong to the screaming fraction. I once "learned" to let loose like this on a vacation, and now it's very hard to be silent. Today, I find silent people...unusual and overly shy *LOL*

[ladysorka]

*raises hand*

I'm, er, in the camp that simply can't orgasm. Doesn't really matter what I try. Granted, I'm also a virgin (yes, I am 22, do shut up), but I have tried so many masturbatory techniques it's not even funny - perhaps a partner could solve this problem, but I don't have my hopes up and I don't expect to get to test this anytime soon.

So, yeah, permanent female blue balls.

Talk about a problem that you never, ever seen in fic.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm a 25-year-old nonvirgin who's had multiple partners and many vibrators -- I can't do it either.

[(Anonymous)]

Let's see... Fainted once, not during actual intercourse, but from my first uh... non-me-induced orgasm.

Had blackouts and whiteouts. Screamed, name and non-name, loud enough that my whole dorm probably knew what I was doing.

Cried, but it was because I got something in my eye.

Nearly fallen asleep....

Simultanious orgasms are/were common, but, um... Well, I never could count high enough to know how many orgasms I've had during one round of sex. And why do women in fanfic seem to always only have one orgasm no matter how long they spend with the sexing?

Once managed to do something that made his orgasm last about 5 minutes, and sent me into a string of them. No clue how we did it, and we never duplicated it.

Left all sorts of unintentional hickeys, nailmarks, bruises, etc. I've also left marks that weren't noticed until the next day.

Gotten cramps in all sorts of muscle groups.

I'm sure there's more, but not that I can think of at the moment...

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

And why do women in fanfic seem to always only have one orgasm no matter how long they spend with the sexing?

This is a mystery for the ages. Seriously. I suppose we should just file this in "Unsolvable Points to Ponder" alongside the equally mystifying question of why so many men in FF seem to be capable of true multiple orgasms, and why so very few of them have anything like a refractory period. (I know about the whole prostate v. cock thing, although that's a whole other rant for a whole other day. But, seriously, it is not, in my experience, that common for men to be able to come once from jerking off, once from sucking, and once from fucking in the same half-hour.) (And, side note: I've observed that women have what I consider to be more normal orgasms in FF by people who usually only write m/m slash. Not sure why that is, though.)

But, go you for admitting to nearly falling asleep. That's happened to me a few times, too, and it's embarrassing.

Hmmm. I don't think I've ever read any FF in which one of the characters falls asleep during sex before either party comes.

This poll is not only revealing a lot about what should really be occurring less often in FF; it's also suggesting some fascinating lacunae in the FF corpus.

[evil-librarian.livejournal.com]

Okay, that's it. Sex for me when I come home.

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

Amen!

[(Anonymous)]

No blackouts/whiteouts, but a really powerful orgasm will sometimes make my ears ring and/or cause partial deafness for five or six minutes afterwards. It's a strange feeling.

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

Good orgasms seem to short circuit random chunks of nerves. I have no idea why that is. I mean, I've never done the partial deafness thing, but I've lost feeling in my extremities.

Yet another mystery of sex. I need better reference materials, I see this now.

T! M! I!

[(Anonymous)]

My husband's passed out a few times. Usually from long blowjobs or really long sex. It's disconcerting.

In the halcyon days of my youth, I would sometimes have out-of-body experiences around orgasm 18 or so - I think it was linked to oxygen deprivation. My viewpoint went up to the ceiling and looked down, which is where it always goes when I leave my body. Which happened somewhat regularly in those days for other reasons, too.

I scream if the orgasm hits me at the right point in my breathing an my mouth is open.

I've narrated sex a couple times, but it requires special encouragement.

Once in a while simultaneous orgasms just happen.

Responding to a comment above, I once woke from a sexy dream to find my husband's head between my legs. It surprised us both - apparently I'd been masturbating in my sleep, and he thought I was awake and decided to help out. I was freaked enough the activity did not continue.

-R

Re: T! M! I!

[thefourthvine.livejournal.com]

Yay for TMI! (Yet another thing I never expected to say in my pre-FF life. But, really, this poll is yielding a lot of fascinating information.)

I've dissociated (during sex and at other times), and now I'm wondering what the difference is between dissociation and an out-of-body experience. Research is indicated, I think.