It was the spring of 2008, I was on the phone to my boyfriend at the time, we were having phone sex, and I was using my bullet vibrator. He was talking dirty to me about all the kinky things he was going to do to me, and suddenly all this liquid came out of me. It was intense and a bit of a surprise. And that was my first orgasm.
Or so I thought.
As a teenager, I felt completely disconnected from my genitals. I never accidentally felt anything good down there, I never felt the urge to do anything. I only started masturbating because I’d heard it was something people did. And even then all I did was put my finger inside for a few minutes, and wonder what all the fuss was about. My friend did buy me a vibrator for my 17th birthday, however it was one of those basic bitch ones. Hard, plastic, and weak. 
When I had sexual experiences, I never really got wet, or felt anything close to what know arousal is now. An ex once told me I had a ‘cold uninviting vagina’, which is not exactly great feedback. I might even sometimes be mentally turned on, but it wouldn’t transpose physically. Having my clit touched, or having penetrative sex mostly didn’t feel that good, and I couldn’t imagine it resulting in an orgasm. Oral sex either felt too ticklish, or so lame that I could fall asleep during.
But I was obsessed with sex. Or at least the idea of sex. I have a dirty sense of humour, and have always been curious about sex. Perhaps because I was always looking for something I felt like I was missing out on. I’ve now come to realise it’s mostly not actual sex that I enjoy. I get more aroused by certain kinks and fetishes, and the chemistry that I have with a person, than the physical act of any kind of sex. I also much prefer the type of stimulation that vibrators give me than any hand, mouth, or dick.
So after this 2008 ‘orgasm’, for the next 10 years I just thought I was a prolific squirter, and that when that happened I was cumming, but it turns out this whole time I was just pissing myself. (It also turns out I might be into that)!
The orgasm
I did always wonder in the back of my mind whether I was actually orgasming or not. I obviously knew that it can take a while for women to cum, but I assumed that I was cumming so quickly because those little bullet vibrators are quite powerful. Of course the men that I ‘came’ in front of didn’t notice that I wasn’t actually orgasming. But to be fair to them, quite a few women didn’t either.
As an advocate of not faking orgasms, and someone who has in the past proclaimed never to have faked an orgasm, it’s kind of funny that all this time I was faking them, but I was also faking them to myself. So I’ll take this opportunity to change that proclamation to ‘I’ve never knowingly faked one.’
This ‘squirting’ I thought I was doing did feel good in a way. It’s was a release. But it wasn’t an orgasm. And now that I think back on what was happening, it did just feel like peeing. But I had convinced myself that orgasms just weren’t that poweful for me and that they were always accompanied by having to put a towel down. I ignored the signs that it was just pee and just got on with it.
So when and how did I actually have my first orgasm? It was April 2018, and I was particularly turned on. I was thinking about the guy from my post about figging, and some very specific kinks, and suddenly something different happened. I remember feeling pleasure in a way I had never felt before. I finally had the tingling, and contractions. It still didn’t really click initially that it was my actual first orgasm. I just thought it was a better orgasm than usual.
But something had changed. I suddenly felt the desire to masturbate more frequently. Sometimes it would take ages, 40 minutes – 1 hour to make myself cum. But as I’ve practiced, I can do it in less time now. I still find it difficult to do in front of someone else, as it can be distracting, and I need to be in a very specific position on my back. I did manage it once a few months’ ago, while someone else was there, but am trying to practice so it can be something I can enjoy regularly with a sexual partner.
Squirting vs Female Ejaculation
When I first started orgasming, I would still release some ‘squrting’ sometimes before or during orgasm, but as I’ve done it more and more, and I strenghened my pelvic floor muscles, I started to orgasm without doing this at all. But I do ejaculate, which involves a liquid more similar in consistency to semen, kind of sticky and viscous. There’s much less of it, but it can still be enough to make a bit of a sexy mess. I’ve also started to have multiple orgasms.
There’s been a lot of discussion about squirting, and there seems to be some confusion. I’ve read so many articles, and heard women say anecdotally that a large volume of liquid comes out, but they insist it is not pee, however this article says that “Women who squirt urine only during orgasm usually don’t identify it as urine because it is far more dilute and doesn’t smell or look like urine even though it comes out of the bladder”.
Annoyingly, the article doesn’t offer any explanation as to why it is more dilute – perhaps it is because the muscles have been stimulated in a different way?
And so this brings me to the famous French study about 5 years’ ago where 7 women were studied and it was found that all of them were squirting urine. 2 of the 5 were also releasing fluid recognised as prostate-specific antigen, i.e. female ejaculate.
I didn’t pay to read the study in full, so I’ve only read the summary and articles about it like this one. In none of the summarising articles does it say where exactly they were collecting from – whether it was just general fluid from the genital area, or whether there were instruments targeted to collect from the urethra and the vagina. Medical News Today, suggested it was ejaculate fluid flowing back into the bladder.
Regardless, the study does prove at least for these women, and therefore potentially for other women, that even if the liquid doesn’t appear to be urine, it is. This piece also explains the prevalence of incontinence during sexual activity.
The scientific evidence tends to suggest that squirting is coital incontinence, which would make sense. I’ve been plagued by urinary tract infections since I started having penetrative sex, and subsequent frequent urge to urinate generally. I heard somewhere recently that even just having a UTI once can damage your bladder / urethra / whole system down there. And that explains why it was so easy to accidentally pee when my vibrator was stimulating my clit, since everything is so close together on a woman’s anatomy.
However after a few months of thinking that squirting as a true phenomenom did not exist, only peeing or female ejaculation, I experienced something different.
I had an orgasm, then carried on stimulating myself and started to have another orgasm and while having the second orgasm, I squirted and it felt like the most intense climax I’d ever had. Liquid spurted out of me, and I finally realised this was what everyone was talking about. It’s only happened on a couple of occasions and, it’s a rare treat, but it did feel different to peeing because I was orgasming simultaneously. It was like a hedonistic explosion in my vulva. The few times it has happened, the initial orgasm didn’t feel any different than usual, I was stimulating both my clit and my g-spot at the same time as usual, and the squirting caught me off guard.
If you’re experiencing pre-orgasmic peeing from stimulation without orgasm, like I was, then you may be experiencing coital incontinence. When you get the urge to pee clench your pelvic floor muscles and then re-stimulate yourself. You can also take a pee break halfway through sexual activity.
But if it happens and you feel the pulsating pleasure of an orgasm at the same time, congratuations, you just squirted.
In conclusion:
Not squirting – liquid coming from the urethra, feels like you are peeing, no orgasm present
Squirting – involuntary clearish liquid from the skenes gland and/or urethra that probably does have some pee in it, but feels amazing and is accompanied by orgasm
Female Ejaculation – viscous, sticky, sort of milky, sort of clear liquid, and comes out of the vagina at the point of orgasm
Squirting and Porn
Men LOVE watching women ‘squirt’ in porn. There are so many videos of it. But the long list of acts that supposedly got banned from any paid porn sites in Britain a few years ago, includes the phrasing ‘female ejaculation’, because it’s too difficult to tell whether or not it is pee (urolagnia is also banned), and of course the people who make these laws don’t know the difference between squirting and female ejaculation. And don’t know that by phrasing it in that way, they are also technically banning seeing any sort of fluid come out of a woman’s vagina at the point of orgasm. Which basically means banning the female orgasm for some women. As if we needed more reasons to not see real female orgasms in porn. In light of this, I am happy to give sex education lessons to the BBFC, so if anyone knows people who work there, please feel free to link them to this blog.
A note on the G-spot
What is the g-spot? Does it even exist? When will people stop asking stupid questions about it?
It seems obvious to me that the g-spot is just an extension of the clitoris. Everyone’s bodies are slightly different – some people may be able to orgasm from inside / vaginal stimulation, and some may not. Most studies seem to cite that only 25% of women can orgasm from vaginal stimulation alone.
Either way, the clitoris is always inherently involved, whether you are having a g-spot orgasm, a nipplegasm, or even a magic orgasm with your mind that doesn’t involve any touching. It’s because all our nerves are linked together. All roads lead to the clitoris. There just might be more particular roads to inside your vagina, hence having a sensitive g-spot.
I think it’s interesting that there is never this much confusion or mystery when it comes to cis men’s bodies. But I can tell you that there’s no male equivalent of squirting. Just plain old ejaculation. Unless you have had your prostate removed, it’s basically physically impossible for your urethra to make that happen.
In the same vein, we know that men have a g-spot in their anus in the form of the prostate gland. Given how many men want to give anal sex but not receive it, it’s a damn shame cis women don’t have basically a mini clit in our arseholes too. (Yes a small amount of women can have analgasms, because all roads lead to the clitoris, but in my experience talking to lots of women about sex it doesn’t seem to be the general consensus).
Orgasmic tips
If you are reading this and you have a vulva, and you have never had an orgasm, and you want to have one, here is what you should do:
- Get a bullet vibrator.
- Put aside a lot of time alone. Be patient and spend longer than you think you need to.
- Fantasise or watch something that truly turns you on. I personally find conventional porn a massive turn off, so don’t worry if you can’t find any that you like, that’s what your imagination is for. Or try reading erotica. Be honest with yourself about what turns you on, and use that to your advantage.
- Vary pressure and speed until you find what works for you.
- Use your kegel muscles.
- Breathe.
- If this doesn’t work, invest in the womanizer.
I wish I’d known about the womanizer ages ago. It’s not strictly a vibrator – it provides a sucking and pulsating motion, and is supposed to simulate the best oral sex ever. I have the womanizer pro. Yes it’s £139, but it is incredible. People pay more for less satisfying sexual experiences. It can take a bit of practice getting the right angle and getting in position, and since you put it directly onto your clit, it can be very intense, and actually quite painful. This article about it and similar toys is a fun read, if only for the title. Unsurprisingly I quite like the pain, but also I think your clit does adjust to it after a while. Often the build up feels absolutely amazing in a way that it just doesn’t with the bullet vibe. Sometimes I like to use the bullet for a bit then switch to the womanizer at the end.
If the womanizer works for you, you will feel like Britney in the music video for womanizer, as illustrated in the header image of this page, and you can thank me for not having to see another article about squirting where some twat has used gushing water as the accompanying image. I fucking love fountains, but come on, it’s getting ridiculous now.
If you’re worried that orgasming with a vibrator / pulsating click sucking toy meaning you won’t be able to orgasm naturally, I would say, so what if you have to use a toy. If nothing else is working for you, and you are one of those people who needs very intense stimulation, as I do, there is no reason to deny yourself. Perhaps you will learn later to do it manually, perhaps you will not. But either way at least you will now be having orgasms, so there is really nothing to lose.
If you’re not sure if you have orgasmed or not, I would say that if it still feels like something is missing afterwards then you probably haven’t.
If it feels like pure anadulterated pleasure taking over your genitals then that’s it. It is unlike any other feeling, and you do not want it to end.
Final word
It’s kind of embarrassing as someone who likes to think of themself as a sexpert to have to admit that you didn’t even know what an orgasm was. But as a self proclaimed ‘sexpert’ that also means I’ve spent the last few months researching the fuck out of it, and experimenting with my own body. Now I just need to get used to orgasming in front of other people.
So to everyone I had sex with 2008 to mid 2018, I’m sorry for peeing on / near you / in front of you / in your bed. Unless you’re also into that. In which case, you’re welcome.
***
This blog post has been updated recently (Dec 2020) to correct some errors and update some of my views/research on squirting.
Carmen Ali aka April Fiasco 
Leave a comment