Ethical Slut - Dossie Easton [45]
The use of a good water-based lubricant can do wonders to make latexed sex more pleasurable for both or all partners. Along with smoothing out the friction of rubber on mucous membranes, a single drop of lube inside a condom increases the transmission of warmth from one person to another, which feels nice and—well—hot. For tips on how to use barriers in a pleasure-enhancing manner, check out chapter 21, “Sex and Pleasure,” and some of the books in the Resource Guide. And if you’re not completely comfortable using any of these barriers, practice! Gentlemen can masturbate with a condom (or two, or three) until it comes easy. We have heard of one dedicated fellow who managed to put on eighteen condoms at once—he said the tight squeeze felt really good. And why not get a little playful with your rubber?
If you are inexperienced with condoms and plastic wrap, give yourself some space to learn. Get playful, spill some lube, and roll around in it; invent creative ways to wrap body parts in plastic wrap and then find out what interesting new things you can feel. Plastic wrap doubles nicely as a risk reduction barrier and a bondage toy, and it comes in colors. Explore the taste and feel of your safer-sex equipment, and check lubricants on tender places for allergic reactions—not fun to discover when you are all excited only now it itches inside and you have to go wash that stuff out right now. Pay attention to the sensual qualities: fine latex is wonderfully silky, and the best lubricants feel like liquid velvet.
We want you to have fun and make wise choices: we need all the readers we can get, so we don’t want to lose you.
EXERCISE Practice Makes Perfect
For a man: Commit to masturbating with a condom on at least once every three or four times you masturbate, until you feel like you have that skill down perfectly.
For anyone who has sex with men: Buy a large box of condoms—the cheap kind are OK for this—and practice putting them on bananas, cucumbers, or dildos, in as sexy a way as you can … first with your hand, then with your mouth. Use up the whole box.
For everyone: Make a list of ways you can get off with little or no risk of fluid transmission.
Fluid Bonding
One popular safer-sex strategy used by some couples is called “fluid bonding” or “fluid monogamy.” The couple agrees that they are safe to play with each other with no barriers, and to use condoms and rubber gloves very conscientiously with all their other partners. Both of us have made such agreements with life partners. To do this kind of agreement, both (or all) partners get thoroughly tested for HIV and other diseases. You might have to wait six months to be sure, since HIV antibodies don’t reliably show up in the bloodstream for some months after the individual is infected. Once you’re both sure you’re healthy, you’re free to practice unprotected sex with one another and to use barriers with your other lovers. Be sure you’re in clear agreement about which sexual acts are safe enough to do without a barrier and which ones require a barrier; to reach such an agreement, everyone involved will have to do some homework on the risk levels of various activities and decide together what level of risk is acceptable to you. Don’t forget to factor in information from everybody’s individual sex histories.
You may wish to restrict certain kinds of sex—often vaginal and/or anal intercourse, which place the participants at highest risk for disease transmission—to your primary relationship. Any time when you are actively trying to make a baby, you might not want to engage in potentially reproductive activities with all and sundry.
If barriers were infallible, fluid bonding would be a nearly perfect strategy;