Category: Women’s Health

When the marital partners extend their psychosensory interchange to coition in the female-superior position, the wife once mounted is instructed to hold herself quite still and simply to absorb the awareness of penile containment.

Interspersed with moments of sensate pleasure created by her proprioceptive awareness of vaginal dilatation should be the opportunity to feel and think sexually. The vaginal distention should be interpreted as the sensual desire for further increment in sexual pleasure.

This increasing demand for sexual stimulation can be further implemented by the female partner if she will institute a brief period of controlled, slowly exploring, pelvic thrusting. The husband’s specific responsibility at this moment is to provide the needed erect penis without any concept of a demanding thrusting pattern on his part.

In anticipation of her need, the co-therapists must encourage the wife to think of the encompassed penis as hers to play with, to feel, and to enjoy, until the urge for more severe pelvic thrusting involuntarily emerges into her levels of conscious demand. It may take several episodes of female-superior coital positioning, as the woman plays pelvically with the contained penis before full sensate focus develops vaginally.

Once vaginal sensation develops a pleasant or even a fully demanding vein, the next phase is to add to the sensate picture the male-initiated, non demanding, slow pelvic thrusting.

The non-demanding thrusting by the husband should be kept at a pace communicated by his wife. This constrained form of male pelvic thrusting is suggested to create an obvious opportunity for the extension of the female’s sensory potential and to provide sufficient stimulative activity to maintain an effective erection.

Ejaculatory Control

At this time the question frequently asked by the male member of marital units whose concept of sexual interaction has been based primarily on the stock formula of performing, produce, and achieve is, “What if I feel like ejaculating?” It requires continuous effort by the co-therapists to convey the concept not only that acquiring ejaculatory control is possible but also that such a facility usually is enhancing for the male as well as his female partner.

The couple must be educated to understand that ejaculatory control enlarges the range of sensual pleasure in the sexual relationship for both marital partners. However, it is appropriate for co-therapists to emphasize the fact that ejaculation or spontaneously occurring orgasm is not caused for alarm, nor is this involuntary breakthrough considered a breach of direction.

The husband and wife must be reassured that if such a breakthrough from the original direction occurs, the experience should be enjoyed for itself. Within a reasonable length of time, the unit is encouraged to provide another opportunity in which to follow the originally described interactive concepts.

When the husband has developed security of erective maintenance, the episodes of vaginal containment with exploratory pelvic thrusting should continue for as long as both partners demonstrate pleasurable reactions. At appropriate intervals during the total coital episode, the partners should separate two or three times and lie together in each other’s arms.

Once rested, they should return to whatever manner of manual sensate pleasuring they previously enjoyed and continue without any concept of time demand. They should remount, again using the female-superior position, repeating earlier opportunity for the wife’s stimulative proprioceptive awareness of vaginal containment of the penis to be emphasized by alternate periods of exploratory thrusting and lying quietly together in the coital connection.

The timing and duration of sexually stimulative activity should follow the directive formula as outlined in the Therapy topic. Generally interpreted, any period of time is acceptable that emerges from mutual interest and continues to be enjoyable for both marital partners without the incidence of either emotional or physical fatigue.

Once both partners have been successfully educated to employ experimental pelvic movement during their episodes of coital connection rather than following the usual prior pattern of demanding pelvic thrusting, a major step has been accomplished.

Women have little opportunity to feel and think sexually while pursuing or receiving a pattern of forceful pelvic thrusting before their own encompassing levels of excitation are established.

If a woman initiates the demanding thrusting, she usually is attempting to force or to will an orgasmic response. The wife repeatedly must be assured that this forceful approach will not contribute to the facility of response.

If the husband initiates the driving, thrusting coital pattern, the wife must devote conscious effort to accommodate to the rhythm of his thrusting, and her opportunity for quiet sensate pleasure in coital connection is lost.

Frequently, it is of help to assure the wife that once the marital unit is sexually joined, the penis belongs to her just as the vagina belongs to her husband. When vaginal penetration occurs, both partners have literally given of themselves as physical beings to derive pleasure, each from the other.

Woman Sexuality

A separate discussion of female sexuality is necessary primarily because the role assigned to the functional component of a woman’s sexual identity rarely has been accorded the socially enforced value afforded male sexuality.

While the parallel between sexes as to physiological function has gained general acceptance, the concept that the male and female also can share almost identical psychosocial requirements for effective sexual functioning brings expected to protest.

Only when a male requests treatment for symptoms of sexual dysfunction, and possible contributing factors are professionally scrutinized in the clinical interest of symptom reversal, are the psychosocial influences noted to be undeniably similar to those factors which affect female responsivity.

Then such factors as selectivity, regard, affection, identity, and pride (to name a few of the heterogeneous variables) are revealed as part of the missing positive or present negative influence or circumstances surrounding the sexual dysfunction.

Woman Sexual Dysfunction

Man has had society’s blessing to build his sexual value system in an appropriate, naturally occurring context and woman has not. Until unexpected and usually little understood situations influence the onset of male sexual dysfunction, his sexual value system remains essentially subliminal and its influence more presumed than real.

During her formative years, the female dissembles much of her developing functional sexuality in response to societal requirements for a “good girl” facade.

Instead of being taught or allowed to value her sexual feelings in anticipation of an appropriate and meaningful opportunity for expression, thereby developing a realistic sexual value system.

She must attempt to repress or remove them from their natural context of environmental stimulation under the implication that they are bad, dirty, etc.

She is allowed to retain the symbolic romanticism which usually accompanies these sexual feelings, but the concomitant sensory development with the symbolism that endows the sexual value system with meaning is arrested or labeled for the wrong reasons, objectionable.

The reality of female sexual function today aside from its vital role in reproduction, still implies shame, although such a dishonorable role has been rather difficult to sustain with objectivity.

The arbitrary:
The social assignment of the role of sin to female sexuality has not contributed a desirably consistent level of marital harmony. Nor has society always found it easy to eliminate recognition of female sexuality while still supporting and maintaining the male’s role of tacit permission to be sexual with honor, or even praise. If you are looking for bracelet. There’s something to suit every look, from body-hugging to structured, from cuffs to chain and cuffs.

Especially is this true of a society that continues to celebrate events before and after the fact of sexual expression (marriage, birth, etc.), and mourns the female menopause because it is presumed to signify the demise of sexual interest.

Since, as far as is known, elevated levels of female sexual tension are not technically necessary to conception, the natural function of a woman’s sexuality has been repressed in the service of false propriety and restricted by other unnecessary psychosocial controls for equally unsupportable reasons.

In short
The negation of female sexuality, which discourages the development of an effectively useful sexual value system, has been an exercise of the so-called double standard and its socio-cultural precursors.

Residual societal patterns of female sexual repression continue to affect many young women today. They mature acutely aware of repercussions from sexual discord between their parents and among other valued adults, so they grope for new roles of sexual functioning.

Discomfort in the communication of sexual material still prevails between parents and their children.

The young frequently are condemned, by lack of information about what is sexually meaningful, to live with decisions equally as unrewarding sexually as those made by their parents.

In other words, because of cultural restraints, the members of younger generations must continue to make their own sexual mistakes, since they, like previous generations, rarely have been given the benefit of the results of their parents’ past sexual experience; good, bad, or indifferent as that experience may have been.

The necessary freedom of sexual communication between parents and sons and daughters cannot be achieved until the basic component of sexuality itself is given a socially comfortable role by all active generations simultaneously.

She responds physiologically to sex-tension elevation. The four phases of the female cycle of sexual response established in the 1960s will be employed to identify clinically important vasocongestive and myotonic reactions developing in the pelvic viscera of any woman responding to sexual stimulation.

Sex-tension increment, the first physical evidence of her response to sexual stimulation is vaginal lubrication.

Lubrication is produced:

By a deep vasocongestive reaction in the tissues surrounding the vaginal barrel. There also is evidence of increased muscle tension as the vaginal barrel expands and distends involuntarily in anticipation of penetration.

When sex tensions reach plateau phase levels of responsivity, a local concentration of venous blood develops in the outer third of the vaginal barrel, creating partial constriction of the central lumen.

This vaginal evidence of a deep vasocongestive reaction has been termed the orgasmic platform. The uterus increases in size as venous blood is retained within the organ tissues.

The clitoris evidence increasing smooth-muscle tension by elevating from its natural, pudendal-overhang positioning and flattening on the anterior border of the symphysis.

With orgasm, reached an increment peak of pelvic-tissue vasocongestion and myotonia, the orgasmic platform in the outer third of the vagina and the uterus contract within regularly recurring rhythmicity as evidence of high levels of muscle tension.

Finally, with the resolution phase, both vasocongestion and myotonia disappear from the body generally, and the pelvic structures specifically.

If the orgasmic release has been obtained, there is rapid detumescence from these naturally accumulative physiological processes. The loss of muscle tension and venous blood accumulation is much slower if orgasm has not been experienced and there is an obvious residual of sexual tension.

The presence of involuntary-muscle irritability and superficial and deep venous congestion that woman cannot deny, for these reactions develop as physiological evidence of both conscious and subconscious levels of sexual tension.

With the accumulation of myotonia and pelvic vasocongestion, the biophysical system signals the total structure with stimulative input of a positive nature.

Regardless of whether women voluntarily deny their biological capacity for sexual function, they cannot deny the pelvic, irritative evidence of inherent sexual tension for any length of time.

Once a month with some degree of regularity women are reminded of their biological capacity. Interestingly, even the reminder develops in part as the result of local venous congestion and increased muscle tension in the reproductive organs.

On occasion, the menstrual condition, through the suggestive sensation created by pelvic congestion, stimulates elevated sexual tensions.

The presence or absence of patterns of sexual desire or facility for a sexual response within the continuum of the human female’s menstrual cycle also has defied reliable identification.

Possibly, confusion has resulted from the usual failure to consider the fact that two separate systems of influence may be competing for dominance in any sexual exposure.

The necessity for such individual consideration can best be explained by example:

It is possible for a sexually functional woman to feel the sexual need and to respond to high levels of sexual excitation even to orgasmic release in response to a predominantly biophysical influence in the absence of a specific psychosocial requirement.

This freedom to respond to direct biophysical-system demand requires only from its psychosocial counterpart that the female’s sexual value system not transmit signals that inhibit or defer how erotic arousal is generated. In any situation of biophysical dominance, the effective sexual response requires only a reasonable level of interdigital contribution by the psychosocial system.

Conversely, it also is possible for a human female to respond to erotic signals initiated by the predominant psychosocial factors of the sexual value system, regardless of conditions of biophysical imbalance such as hormonal deficiency or obvious pathology of the pelvic organs.

A woman may respond sexually to the psychosocial system of influence to orgasmic response in the face of surgical castration and spite of a general state of chronic fatigue or physical disability. In any situation of psychosocial dominance, the effective sexual response requires only a reasonable level of interdigital contribution by the biophysical system.

Sexual Values

An interesting variation on this classification of repression should be mentioned. There were several primarily non-orgasmic women whose receptivity to the repressive conditioning was slightly different. Their own particular personality characteristics or their relationship to negatively directive authority was such that they fully accepted the concept of sexual rejection.

They developed pride in their ability to comply with sexual repression and did so with apparent social grace. Their selection of a mate in most cases represented a choice of similar background. The difficulty arose with marriage.

For example:

On the wedding night, a completely unrealistic, negative sexual value system usually was revealed during their attempt to establish an effective sexual interaction. These women reported either total pelvic anesthesia or isolation of sexual feelings from the context of psychosocial support.

Women entering therapy in a state of non-orgasmic return reflected the complete failure of any effective alignment of their biophysical and psychosocial systems of influence.

They had never been able to merge either their points of maximum biophysical demand or their occasions of maximum psychosocial need with optimum environmental circumstances of time, place, or partner response to fulfill the requirements of their sexual value systems.

Primary orgasmic dysfunction:

A condition whereby neither the biophysical nor the psychosocial systems of influence that are required for the effective sexual function is sufficiently dominant to respond to the psychosexually stimulative opportunities provided by self-manipulation, partner manipulation, or coital interchange.

If the concept of two interdigital systems influencing female sexual responsivity can be accepted, what can be considered the weaknesses and the strengths of each? Input required by either system for the development of peak response is, of course, subject to marked variation.

There may be some value in drawing upon the previously described psychophysiological findings returned from preclinical studies. As a human female response to subjectively identifiable sexual stimuli, reliable patterns of accommodation by one system to the other can be defined, and tend to follow basic requirements set by earlier imprinting.

Patterns of imprinting can be either reinforced or redirected by controlled experimental influence. They can also be diverted in their signaling potential by reorientation of a previously unrealistic sexual value system. The sexual value system, in turn, responds to reprogramming by a new, positive experience.

Variations in the human female’s bio-physical system are, of course, relative to basic body economy. Is the woman in good health? Is there a cyclic hormonal ebb and flow to which she is particularly susceptible? Are the reproductive viscera anatomically and physiologically within normal limits, or is there evidence of pelvic pathology? Is there evidence of broad-ligament laceration, endometriosis, or residual from pelvic infection?

Certainly, most forms of pelvic pathology would weigh against the effective functioning of the biophysical system. On the other hand, are there those biophysical patterns that tend to improve the basic facility of her sexual responsivity? Is there well-established metabolic balance, good nutrition, sufficient rest, the regularity of sexual outlet?

Each of these factors inevitably improves biophysical responsivity. There must be professional consideration of multiple variables when evaluating the influence of the biophysical system upon female sexual responsivity.

Overcome Sexual Difficulty

However, the system with the infinitely greater number of variables is that reflecting psychosocial influence. Most dysfunctional women’s fundamental difficulty is that the requirements of their sexual value systems have never been met. Consequently, the resultant limitations of the psychosocial system have never been overcome.

Many women specifically resist the experience of orgasmic response, as they reject their sexual identity and the facility for its active expression.

Often these women were exposed during their formative years to such timeworn concepts as sex is dirty, nice girls don’t involve themselves, sex is the man’s privilege or sex is for reproduction only.

There are also those whose resistance is established and sustained by a stored experience of mental or physical trauma, rape, dyspareunia which is signaled by every sexual encounter.

Again from a negative point of view, there may be extreme fear or apprehension of sexual functioning instilled in any woman by inadequate sex education. Any situation leading to sexual trauma, real or imagined.

During her adolescent or teenage years or her sexual partner’s, crude demonstration of his own sexual desires without knowledge of how to protect her sexually would be quite sufficient to create a negative psychosocial concept of a woman’s role in sexual functioning.

The woman living with residual of specific sexual trauma (mental or physical) frequently is encountered in this category.

Finally, there is the woman whose background forces her into automatic sublimation of psychosexual response. This individual simply has no expectations for sexual expression that are built upon a basis of reality. She has presumed that sexual response in some form simply would happen but has a little, idea of its source of expression.

In these instances, sexual sublimation is allowed to become a way of life for many reasons. Particularly is this reaction encountered in the woman who has failed to enjoy the privilege of working at being a woman.

The positive side:

The psychosocial value system can overcome physical disability with dominant identification that may be personal and/or situational in nature. In states of advanced physical disability, the strength of loved-partner identification can provide orgasmic impetus to a woman physically consigned to be sexually unresponsive.

When there has been a pattern of little bio-physical sexual demand, as in a postpartum period, sexual tension may be rapidly restored by the psychosocial stimulation of a vacation, anniversary, or other experience of special significance.

Again the biophysical and psychosocial systems of influence are interdigital in orientation, but there is no biological demand for their mutual complementary responsivity. It is in the areas of involuntary sublimation that the psychosocial system is gravely handicapped and would tend to exert a negatively dominant influence in contradistinction to any possible biophysical stimulative function.

Make sure the tape measure is straight when you go around.

Breast Frame

The breast frame is the diameter around your chest just below your breasts. Using a tape measure, measure around your ribcage directly under your breasts. With the measurement, numbers add 5 to it. For example, if your frame measured 26 inches, when you add 5 to this you get 31 inches. You should round up to the nearest even number which is 32 inches. And since bras only come in even numbers, this will be your bra size, 32 inches!

Breast Size

The next measurement you need to take with the tape is breast size. Go around the chest over and include the fullest part of your bust (usually at the level of the nipples). This is the diameter of your chest plus your breast.

Breast Cup

To obtain the breast cup size, simply subtract Breast Frame from Breast Size (breast size – breast frame = breast cup).

The Bra Element

Is your bra the right size for you?

Besides support from mature nature, we also need material support for our breasts against the force of gravity. Over 80% of women do not know they are wearing the wrong size bra. Either too tight or too loose, too high or low, wrong cup size or old comfortable bras but doesn’t support breast, and so on. Our bust size changes with age, time, and weight fluctuations. Once in a while, we should also follow up with our measurements. If you are not sure, do not worry. Just visit the lingerie department and ask for sales assistance. Most big malls have friendly salesgirls to offer advice.

Are you wearing the bra correctly?

Tell signs that your bra is not right for you:

1. Your breasts are drooping or looking generally out of shape when you put on the bra.
2. Breasts pushed over the top of the cup.
3. Red marks on your shoulders, breasts, or back caused by your ill-fitted bra or bra straps.
4. The Center of your bra does not touch the breastbone.
5. Any or all of these signs could tell that you are wearing the wrong bra size and that’s not only uncomfortable. Over time, it may distort the shape of your breasts and cause a variety of health problems, from headaches to backaches and even migraines.

Did you put on a bra correctly?

This may seem silly to women who have been putting on bras for years but there is indeed a proper way to do it. We recommend that you try the following steps when putting on your bra:

Slip your hands through the bra straps over your shoulders, lean and bend forward from the waist to allow your breasts to fall into the cups of the bra. Then, fasten the hooks of the bra.

While still in bending position, with one hand holding the side of the bra, insert the other hand in between the breast and the bra cup and push/scoop the excess flesh from the underarm area up and into the breast cup. Repeat on the other side. Stand up and make sure the breasts snug comfortably into the bra cups.

Next, looked into the mirror and see if the nipples are in the center seams of the bra cups if the front under bra band and the back band are at the same level (between the armpit and elbow). Lift your arms up. A well-fitted bra should not move around when you make any movement.

You can experiment with this method with your normal way of putting on a bra. You can really see the difference it makes.

You should also check on:

1. The back of your bra does not ride up, otherwise, the under band may be too big, and you could need a smaller size.
2. Your bra straps are not falling down or digging into your shoulders. If they are, adjust them or use wider straps.
3. Your flesh does not squeeze over the top of your bra. If it does but feels fine everywhere else, the cup size is too small for you.
4. Run your finger under the bra stripe in front. Your bra should be comfortable but not tight, otherwise, you need a larger band size or you must fasten your bra at the next looser hook.
5. No, holes at the center of the bra and breasts. The middle of your bra lies as flat as possible against your breastbone for a comfortable fit.

Cup Size

Small breast, to make the most of a small breast, wears a soft or thin padded bra. This can give you an enhanced neckline, good uplift, and a lovely shape. Half-cup bras are also flattering for smaller busts, padding at the sides and under give a maximum lift to the breast, revealing sexy cleavages. Less endowed women should try to avoid bras that have square-cut, they only flatten your breast.

Big breasts or women with larger busts can get support from a bra with wider shoulder and back straps. Bras with full cups contain the breast better and give the breast a better appearance. Underwired bras provide better support under the bust while smooth, plain bra styles, without too much lace, help to make your bust appear smaller.

Different bra for different age

Breast sizes are growing in recent years as more women are having proper diet and breast supplements are the culprits. Bra-wearers are getting younger and larger too.

A child as young as 9 years old starts puberty. Significantly is her breast growth. Bra experts normally recommend cotton or thinly padded bra for young bra wearers as their breast development changes quickly and a soft bra allows breast tissues to stretch. For a mature female, a good comfortable bra to keep breasts in shape and support should be worn. Examples a sports bra, underwired bras, or padded bras.

Is it good to be braless?

Almost three-quarters of the day, a woman had her bra on. The good time for the breast’s skin to breathe and the breasts to rest is during bedtime. It is also a time for the breasts tissues to be fully relaxed. By going braless allows unrestricted blood circulation as well.

The entire sexual development of women in present-day society, from childhood to motherhood, is better educated and informed. But sex education for young children remains a dilemma for parents. We know the appearance of menstrual is a sign of puberty but, at the same time, it is also the beginning of sexual contact. All parents being protective towards their child, the word sex or subjects related to sex have been deliberately kept in ignorance, the small girl is hardly informed of the primary facts of sex.

At this stage, the child naturally and unconsciously perform masturbation or infantile masturbation which is part of a biologically natural character during this transition phase, they are curious about their new development. Occasionally, erotic dreams and daydreams lead to girls’ orgastic sensations.

Thus, safely say that masturbation constitutes an almost inevitable transition phase in the sexual development of the young girl or even boy in the present day. The practice is relatively harmless so long as it remains confined to this transition phase and it is a temporary character, and as long as it is not considered later on preferable to normal sexual intercourse.

It becomes harmful if involves permanent neurotic complications, is induced by warnings, scares, and threats of punishment, or disease resulting from masturbation. Once, the late Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld, pioneer of sexology reported the experience of a young girl who, despite threats and warnings, could not but continue to obey the irresistible impulse:

“… I did it when I was at home, and lying in bed. I do not remember whether I thought anything of it when I did it. I only know that it was quite dark and quiet. I was doubled up under the bed-clothes. When it was over I often cried to myself. I went to bed frightened and could not go to sleep without praying. My spiritual condition went from bad to worse, and I kept on promising myself never to do it again until I finally comforted myself and went to sleep. I never kept my promise. It happened again, I do not know how long after, and I think not more frequently than once a month. A year ago, I gave it up as my mother caught me at it and gave me a lecture. So out of love for my mother, I gave it up until a little while before menstruation.”

Then I felt such a tickling and itching that I did it again with great passion. The next morning I found that I was bleeding and had pains in the knees and the thighs and could not get up. I told my mother that I had done it again and that I was bleeding, for I thought this was a consequence of it and cried bitterly. Mother comforted me and gave me a second talk. I was then thirteen years old.”

The child inevitably reacts to this with a mixture of curiosity and horror. The curiosity springs from the natural impulse, the horror grows out of the automatic reflection that these forbidden and “indecent” practices were and are carried on by her own parents and that in fact, she owes her very existence to this baseness of which the parents also speak with stern distaste.

Sexual Curiosity

In the earlier years of sexual studies, some scientists without exception acknowledge that nearly 100 percent of all men and women masturbated during this transition phase. This view is supported by statistical investigation we are quoting below statistics on the frequency of masturbation, as compiled by various senior sexologists (see Encyclopedia of Sexual Knowledge):

• Dr. Marcuse (Munich) 93.9%
• Dr. Deutsch (Budapest) 96.7%
• Prof. Duck 90.8 %
• Dr. Rohleder (Enquiry among students) 90.1%
• Dr. Dukes (Enquiry among English students) 90-95%
• Dr. Searley (Enquiry among American students) 85.3%
• Dr. Hirschfeld (Berlin) 96%
• Dr. Desider Hahn (Enquiry among workmen) 96%
• Dr. Brockman (America) (Enquiry among theological students) 99.3 %
• Dr. Young (America): 100%

It is also no exaggeration to say that the first arrived period also inevitably constitutes a minor emotional hurt to the little girl who is kept in unnatural ignorance. A feeling of being unclean, self-disgust, is nearly always connected up with the bad conscience which sees bleeding as punishment for actual masturbation, and “dirty thoughts.” Even at present, the young girl has sufficient knowledge to know that such a direct causal connection does not exist, there is still some vague conviction that bodily uncleanness is caused by spiritual impurity that is generally maintained in the subconscious. The widespread frequency of this attitude and its effects contribute a great deal to sexual misery, especially in conservative or religious cultures. The subject of sex is often to abstain in strict traditional families.

When a young girl questioned her mother about the origin of babies, she was told ‘You don’t need to know. Those are dirty things with which you must not stain the purity of your little soul,’ etc. Anna had no idea that she herself, her mother, and her little brothers owed their existence to those ‘dirty things’ the nature of which remained a mystery for her.

Always closely chaperoned by her governess she never even had an opportunity to discuss the subject with her friends. One day, in the course of a gymnastic lesson, she noticed that climbing up a pole gave her ‘a pleasant sensation’; then she found that she could induce the same sensation by pressing her legs tightly together. She would have mentioned it to her mother, but she vaguely suspected that her discovery was not unconnected with the ‘dirty things.’

One day little Anna woke up and saw bloodstains on her sheets and nightgown. She immediately concluded that she had defiled herself with those dirty things, and fallen ill. God had punished her, and her mother would learn Anna was an abject being. She decided to die, and going to the kitchen, turned on the gas. She was rescued at the last moment after she had already become unconscious.”

“The terror of the uninitiated girl at the sight of this inexplicable hemorrhage is such that she frequently regards it as a punishment for having masturbated and harbored impure thoughts. She often sees no other solution than suicide. Dr. Stekel cites the case of little Anna.

Persistent, recurrent problems with sexual response, desire, orgasm, or pain — that distress you or strain your relationship with your partner — are known medically as sexual dysfunction.

In the past, the socio-cultural requisite that the female dissembles her sexual feelings did not lessen general interest in female sexuality.

The nature of female sexual response has been interpreted innumerable times, with each interpretation proposing a different concept or variation on a concept.

Interestingly, more than 95 percent of these interpretive efforts have been initiated by men, either from the defensive point of view of personal masculine bias or from a well-intentioned and often significant scientific position, but, because of cultural bias, without the opportunity to obtain unprejudiced material.

Even the small numbers of women combining research expertise with their own firsthand awareness of female sexual behavior have been disadvantaged by cultural limitations on the scientific investigation of human sexual response.

Conceptually these women also have shared cultural bias with their male professional peers.

Even though definitive research findings have emerged in the field of sexual behavior, the handicap of cultural bias has so constrained progress that there has been little professional concurrence in a final definition of female sexual function.

There are three apparent reasons for this stalemate in the definition of female psychosexual expression:

1. Until recently there was a failure to develop a directly related body of biophysical information.
2. There has been little interest in the duplication of physiological investigative procedures to validate research findings.
3. There has been little or no effort to incorporate established laboratory findings into the clinical treatment of female sexual dysfunction.

A psychophysiological interpretation of female sexual response must be established and accepted, for it is impossible to consider sexual dysfunction with objectivity unless there is a base for comparison afforded by an acceptable concept of a woman’s sexually functional state.

In an effort to establish such a baseline interpretation, the female sexual response will be contemplated as an entity separate from the male sexual response is not, as might be presumed, because of any vast difference in their natural systems of expression.

Beyond the influence of fortunate variations in reproductive anatomy and their individual patterns of physiological function the sexes are basically similar, not different but because of sex-linked differences that are largely psychosocially induced.

A separate discussion of female sexuality is necessary primarily because the role assigned to the functional component of a woman’s sexual identity rarely has been accorded the socially enforced value afforded male sexuality.

While the parallel between sexes as to physiological function has gained general acceptance, the concept that the male and female also can share almost identical psychosocial requirements for effective sexual functioning brings expected to protest.

Only when a male requests treatment for symptoms of sexual dysfunction, and possible contributing factors are professionally scrutinized in the clinical interest of symptom reversal, are the psychosocial influences noted to be undeniably similar to those factors which affect female responsivity.

Then such factors as selectivity, regard, affection, identity, and pride (to name a few of the heterogeneous variables) are revealed as part of the missing positive or present negative influence or circumstances surrounding the sexual dysfunction.

It is obvious that man has had society’s blessing to build his sexual value system in an appropriate, naturally occurring context and woman has not.

Until unexpected and usually little understood situations influence the onset of male sexual dysfunction, his sexual value system remains essentially subliminal and its influence more presumed than real.

During her formative years, the female dissembles much of her developing functional sexuality in response to societal requirements for a “good girl” facade.

Instead of being taught or allowed to value her sexual feelings in anticipation of an appropriate and meaningful opportunity for expression, thereby developing a realistic sexual value system, she must attempt to repress or remove them from their natural context of environmental stimulation under the implication that they are bad, dirty, etc.

She is allowed to retain the symbolic romanticism which usually accompanies these sexual feelings, but the concomitant sensory development with the symbolism that endows the sexual value system with meaning is arrested or labeled for the wrong reasons, objectionable.

The reality of female sexual function today, aside from its vital role in reproduction, still carries an implication of shame, although such a dishonorable role has been rather difficult to sustain with objectivity.

The arbitrary, social assignment of the role of sin to female sexuality has not contributed to a desirably consistent level of marital harmony. Nor has society always found it easy to eliminate recognition of female sexuality while still supporting and maintaining the male’s role of tacit permission to be sexual with honor, or even praise.

Especially is this true of a society that continues to celebrate events before and after the fact of sexual expression (marriage, birth, etc.), and mourns the female menopause because it is presumed to signify the demise of sexual interest.

PID (Pelvic Inflammatory Disease) is a generic name for any infection of the uterus, tubes, and ovaries. These are normally germ-free. Their position keeps them safe from infection, with added protection from the cervix, and its mildly antiseptic mucus.

The sexual disease is very dangerous once it reaches the cervix because this often starts with a cervical infection that travels to the uterus lining, then to the uterus muscle, then the tubes (salpingitis), the ovaries (oophoritis), and out into the pelvic cavity (peritonitis).

Consider the extent of damage that can occur. These normally germ-free areas, organs, and tissues are now inflamed, swollen with pus and disease. Symptoms include fever, chills, lower abdomen pain, irregular bleeding, spotting, pus-filled discharge from the vagina, and pain during or after intercourse.

The more severe the infection, the worse the pain and other symptoms. About 100,000 women each year become infertile as a result of PID.

Visit the clinic or physician promptly. Therapy is urgently required to reduce the extent of the damage. Hospitalization is necessary for the first PID attack so that antibiotics can be given intravenously (IV).

If the infection is widespread, PID may not respond to antibiotics. Surgery is then required to drain an abscess or pus-filled cavity or to remove infected tissue. One attack of PID gives no immunity against further attacks.

Other causes include miscarriage and abortion. Surgery is required to remove fetal or placental tissue still in the uterus. The infection is associated with intrauterine devices, and the IUD should be removed.

Birthing and endometrial biopsy also open the cervix and increase the risk of PID. Some women are more vulnerable to PID after a period. In others, the risk seems higher after intercourse. It is thought that germs on sperm proteins might be carried through the uterus and out to the pelvic cavity via the tubes, but this is not proven.

The cervix is the last defense against PID. Use barrier methods such as condoms and diaphragms where there is any risk. A significant number of PID cases are due to gonorrhea; keep in mind a partner can be asymptomatic. Chlamydia, which breeds on the cervix and causes PID, can also be asymptomatic. Protect the cervix.

Molluscum Contagiosum: There are two kinds of warts, simple and genital. Both can infect the genitals; it is crucial to recognize the difference. Simple warts are the kind that appears in the hands of children. They are small, dimpled papules, which look like spots with a drop of pearly fluid inside and are highly contagious. They can be transmitted to the genitals by self or partner from warts on the hands and elsewhere. The virus enters the skin through invisible lesions that occur during sexual activity. Warts appear some 30 days after contact. Attacks of simple warts on the genitals are rare, being most likely in the teens and 20 to 30 age group.

If the penis is infected with genital warts, some men try self-therapy. This is not advisable for women. Simple warts can be painful if rubbed, otherwise, a woman is unaware of them. They are not life-threatening, nor do untold damage, but they are highly contagious. Visit the physician or clinic. Therapy varies.

Human Papilloma Virus: HPV is specific to the genital area. It is transmitted by direct sexual contact. Warts appear 3 weeks to 3 months after contact, but the incubation time can be up to 8 months, even more. Warts can be single; usually, they grow in clusters like grapes. With their raised, bumpy tops, they look like miniature cauliflowers. They grow on the labia lips or anus, inside the vagina, or on the cervix. In many cases, they are asymptomatic, and the woman is unaware that she is infected.

The warts are painless, but easily irritated by rubbing, and sometimes they itch. If there has been anal contact, they can grow inside the rectum and around the anus. More rarely with oral contact, they infect the linings of the mouth. If warts breed in colonies on the cervix, the disease may not be detected until a Pap smear is done. Women with HPV have a five times higher risk of cancer of the cervix.

Larger warts, especially on the cervix, maybe vaporized by laser therapy, but it is difficult to know if they have all been destroyed. The healing process takes 6 weeks. Repeat therapy is necessary if they flare up again; avoid losing patience as laser therapy usually works. Other therapies include burning warts off by electric cautery or freezing them with dry ice. The physician then snips them off. External warts can be painted with the drug podophyllin. It takes 3 or 4 weekly treatments for warts to dry up and drop off.

HPV infection is also called condyloma. The prescription drug Condylox has just been made available for home treatment, which means that patients no longer need to have a physician apply the therapy. At least 56 different types of the virus have been identified.