I think I have realised I don't really like sex with men

[smallskylight]

I am middle aged and, when I think about it, I have only enjoyed sex with one man. I loved sex with him because he spent so much time touching and caressing and really enjoying my body. He clearly loved women's bodies, and he was clearly very aroused by touching me like that for that length of time. It made me realise most men are not like that, or at least not the ones I have been with. They lose their erections if they spend too much time touching and pleasuring me. Maybe I have been very unlucky, but I have probably had sex with up to 20 men. He's also the only man I have enjoyed penetrative sex with. Normally I get nothing out of this at all. TBH I find it boring. I think I enjoyed it with him because I was so aroused by the time we got around to penetrative sex. But even then I don't orgasm from it. The last two guys I had sex after him were awful. And kinda made me realise just how much I don't enjoy sex with men. I don't like sex where they seem to think my pleasure is entirely centred in my genitals, and if they move quickly after a snog to lick and rub that, then that is all they need to do.

Does anyone else feel like this? TBH I am wondering whether or not to bother trying to find a man to have a relationship with. The thought of crap sex just puts me off.

I guess the length of time is relative. I'm comparing it to quite cursory efforts prior to 'sticking it in'. I'm not saying great sex guy spent an hour just touching me or anything. I think the guys who lost their erections, it wasn't because they touched me for a long time (because they didn't) just because they lost arousal as turning me on did nothing for them, if they weren't getting simultaneous direct physical stimulation.

I'm glad to find I am not the only one who had these experiences!

I think you have been unlucky , my husband is lovely and keeps his erection without any issues and we have been together 25 years !

doubt any lesbian would be interested in a middle aged only-ever-been-heterosexual woman with kids.

You need to give it a try or always wonder. Your feelings about sex with men are how a lot of lesbians feel before they come out.

Get yourself out there and have fun!

I think there are men out there for you. There are plenty of older widowers who are desperate for tender affection and will treat you like a goddess. When my husband died I got a lot of comfort from my tap dancing partner whose wife had died a few years prior and let’s just say he had not forgotten his moves but importantly he took his time and made sure to get my juices flowing

I think expected a middle aged guy to keep wood the entire time he's playing with you is a bit much tbh, they can certainly be enjoying pleasing you without one. So long as its not far away when you turn your focus onto them then what's the problem?

There's two types of men.

Type A who genuinely want you to enjoy sex with them and will do anything, will listen and have researched or practised (lucky lady) to improve their technique.

Type B assume its all about the penis, as in their pleasure and if you get off too it's a bonus, but not mandatory.

I've met a handful of good ones, but mostly type B so I can understand why you've come to your conclusion. It's like anything in life, those who put in the effort get the results. Personally I'd highly recommend a younger man, provided you don't mind giving them a few pointers, they're usually very willing..

Or you could try women. Life's too short to waste on bad sex

I get what you mean, I’ve been with enough men and pretty much every single one of them have been very selfish! I’m not attracted to women though. I haven’t had sex in over 3 years and I don’t miss it.

I think expected a middle aged guy to keep wood the entire time he's playing with you is a bit much tbh, they can certainly be enjoying pleasing you

Great sex guy was 52 and he managed it! It's not just the loss of the erection. It was clearly a mechanical task they thought they 'should' do. One guy even bloody moaned and whinged about me asking him to pleasure me. Another guy, who always had a least two orgasms when we were together (and I had none), when I asked him to do something, for the first time, for me, refused and actually said, 'why does it always have to be about you?' I dumped him after that.

I suppose that's the chance you are taking when having ONS - you've got no background to them or anything, no sort of warm up of previous dates to get an idea about them. Some men are amazing, some are good, some good enough, some awful. Just like women.

I'm puzzled by people telling op to try sex with women - surely you need to be attracted to women?

You can try sex with women and it might be a lovely experience physically but you very likely won’t have an ounce of emotion for them.
You sound like a bicurious person who wants to dabble with women sexually just to see what it’s like, if it is a better, more pleasurable experience than being with a man. But love and emotions? If you loved men all your life, it is highly unlikely you’ll fall for a woman and develop anything remotely romantic with her.
Most people who claim to be bisexual actually have romantic feelings for the other gender, but with their own gender they only have purely sexual affairs, no feelings involved.

I think this podcast might help - it's the first of two on sexuality. Much of our sexuality lies in our programming and can change by changing the way we think about sex. For instance, why is it even a problem if a man loses his erection whilst pleasuring you? Chances are he's still having fun.

But women are conditioned to think a man's sexual response is on them

unfuckyourbrain.com/lets-talk-about-sex-vol-1/

Suffice it to say that I have had lots more partners than 20, and a 1 in 20 rate of satisfaction is not my experience - more like the opposite. But maybe that is because things like a man losing an erection during cunnilingus didn't register as a problem with me.

Presumably if op has sex with another woman then op needs to be willing to pleasure the other woman too? Can you just switch your sexuality like that? How do you even go about that?

@Treacletoots - good post.

Sounds like you caught more Type B, OP. I think many women might have similar thoughts. You probably just need to find a Type A.

Not sure it necessarily means you should try and have sex with women. Only you know if that’s a thing that excites you over men as a whole class.

Sounds like you mostly only had crap lovers, OP. But there's definitely men out there who know how to, and want to, pleasure the woman they're with. Some may need a guiding hand at first, though.

I've had some great lovers. But I'm fed up with sex. I'm fed up with men who spend hours and hours pretending to be interested in what I've got to say, in my mind, in how I think, but it's really all because they wanted to shove their penis in me.

I'm staying single.

@Hearhoovesthinkzebras

Presumably if op has sex with another woman then op needs to be willing to pleasure the other woman too? Can you just switch your sexuality like that? How do you even go about that?

Was thinking the same thing...how do you just switch from men to women? Totally different beast.

Sounds like the crap guys are crap at foreplay and don't really want to do it. There are quite a few of them about.

If a guy was really good at foreplay and really into you would you really care that he was losing and regaining his erection throughout that foreplay? Most men I have been with will do that and to be honest if he is good with hands and tongue I'm really not watching his cock like a hawk.

The best sex I've ever had was with a Type A with a very small 'micro' penis. I would come in seconds. He wasn't a man I wanted a serious relationship with though. I married a man with a big'un who didn't know how to or care about satisfactory sex.
I've thought of woman but sadly I'm straight.

@smallskylight

Oh OP I really know how you feel. I’m 40 years of age and have gone right off sex. Almost every experience in adulthood has involved a guy just wanting to shove it into me & feeling like an object to them.

The best experiences I had were as a teenager before I had sex — lots of touching, petting, kissing, caressing, tingling. It has never been as good since. Sex seems to ruin things as it’s boring. I never climax (well I did once ever, so I agree that it’s in the mind).

I don’t know about you OP but my plan from now on, now that I’m single again, is to wait. I’m not getting in bed with anyone until I know them very well & we’re committed. I think for me it’s the lack of true deep caring & emotion that makes the sex so dull. I have always felt it’s about pleasuring the man and it has always felt like my pleasure was a favour or a duty.

I’m hoping to fall in love and then have sex. By waiting, it’ll build up the lust and sexual energy while also having genuine feelings. Most guys I know will ‘shove it in you’ given half the chance so it does tend to be up to us to pace things.

As for a woman, I’m really not sure...I’ve never been with a woman but I do remember the sheer sexual energy and arousal of my teenage years with men, so I think it’s just about tapping back into that by taking sex off the table...

I have been with my DH for 21 years but before him I certainly had more than my fair share of men and some boys ( I am talking about under 18s as I was under 18) who were only interested in their pleasure, I assumed that it was because we were young but perhaps it's that some are just like that.

I have to admit that one of the many reasons I fell for DH was the sex.

I do know what you mean though OP especially about finding sex boring, it's even more disappointing if everything is great up until then.

Was thinking the same thing...how do you just switch from men to women? Totally different beast.

Wine helps.

Right, that would make OP seem a good bet to any discerning lesbian - totally inexperienced, thinks she wants to give women a try cos the men she's been with are crap and has to be drunk to get started .

@ChristmasFluff

Changing my name due to the nature of the topic.

For instance, why is it even a problem if a man loses his erection whilst pleasuring you? Chances are he's still having fun.

This.

I am now a little less ardent than I was when younger, and I routinely lose my erection when pleasuring DW. I don't see why she or her should put me under any pressure about this, as it would hardly help.

I will admit (just about in a whisper) that I am starting to get a little bored during the lengthy time I spend doing various things to her, if the truth be told, it's starting to put me off and the amount of sex is declining. Which brings me to another thing you say:

But women are conditioned to think a man's sexual response is on them

I disagree. I think the opposite is truer, except that a lot of men don't give a toss. But truer even than that is that men are conditioned to dictate the play in bed and women are not. The complaint that a DH doesn't do this, that, this, that and the other is the standard complaint on here. When I read them, I find myself thinking "then stop just lying there and make an effort like he has".

There's a few things here. Yes, women are conditioned to think about sex in a particular way (for men's pleasure) but then so are men (as a predictably sequential narrative with the goal being penetration and orgasm-through-penetration.

I think as a young man, the two lessons I assimilated about being manly in sex were (1) a real man is able to make the woman cum, and (b) the way to do this is through "stamina" - by getting to the final PiV stage and then ploughing away for as long as it took.

It took me years and experience with many different partners to work out that that's not how it is for women at all, and that the whole penetration part can often be largely irrelevant. That's not even just a question of sufficient "warm-up" though: There are women who can enjoy a full, long foreplay session up to the point where they direct it towards penetration because they feel ready - and then just get bored because penetration does nothing for them. Honestly I think some women are just wired that way, physically. It may be you're one of them.

Foreplay and timing can be an issue. It is true that sometimes we just get bored. It helps if you are really into the other person so really enjoy their pleasure vicariously. But even then there can be limits. I had one girlfriend who used to like it to go on for literally 3-4 hours. Just used to lose herself in it. Eventually I developed an ED problem and we eventually worked out it was because I'd lost the ability to respond spontaneously and joyfully to sexual cues, because in the back of mind I knew they meant I had to be ready for an exhausting olympic performance.

But nobody teaches us this stuff, it's not like PSHE in schools actually teaches you anything useful like this. And women vary hugely as well, so even learning from experience can be difficult because a lot of what works with one partner won't (or will be actively counterproductive) with another. It's a bit like trying to learn to play the piano in a world where all pianos have the notes in a slightly different order.

I don't know what the answer is, other than as a pp said, open communication within a healthy relationship. I think for me, the situations that worked best for the woman (as far as I could judge it) were those where she was very clearly aware of what works for her and able to direct things that way, with a low level of sexual shame or inhibition. That of course depends on the bloke caring enough though, which it sounds like some of yours simply didn't.