Sex For Dummies. Dr. Ruth K. Westheimer
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Название: Sex For Dummies
Автор: Dr. Ruth K. Westheimer
Издательство: John Wiley & Sons Limited
Жанр: Секс и семейная психология
isbn: 9781119596585
isbn:
What parts of me does this person activate? My head? My heart? My loins? Two out of three? One out of three?
Will I want to keep the lights off, so this person doesn’t see the parts of me I don’t like, or on, so I can see all of this other person?
I could use a shower. Will this person care? After getting undressed, will I care?
Where do I see us as a couple one month from now? Six months from now? Ten years from now?
If neither one of us has an orgasm, will I ever want to see this person again?
What will I think about myself in the morning?
Chapter 2
Tuning the Male Organ
IN THIS CHAPTER
For a man, the penis is the star of the show in the bedroom (or in the living room, on the kitchen floor, or even in the aisles, as long as the theater is empty!). But as with any star, what you see on-screen is only the final performance. Lots of other factors go into preparing for each scene. In this chapter, you’ll get the behind-the-scenes tour of the male anatomy and meet such important “extras” as the glands, tissues, and organs that allow the penis to stand tall and proud when the director yells, “Action!”
The Penis: Inside and Out
Sexual intercourse occurs whenever a man puts his penis into a woman’s vagina. When the penis is in its normal, flaccid state, this feat is difficult (though not impossible) for a man to accomplish. (The technical term is called stuffing.) However, when the penis becomes erect and hard, most men learn quite quickly the technique of inserting the penis into the vagina — sometimes too quickly (for more about that, see Chapter 22).
How a man gets an erection is relatively, ahem, straightforward. But to fully understand the process, you need to first examine a man’s basic apparatus: his penis. This section is all about how and why a man gets an erection.
The three sponges (No cleaning involved)
Basically, a penis is composed of three structures (see Figure 2-1), which are made of a spongelike material that can fill with blood.
The two corpus cavernosa contain the central arteries and lie on the top half of the penis. They are cylindrical tubes and are larger than the other spongy structure.
The corpus spongiosum, which is under the two corpus cavernosa and surrounds the urethra, is the pipeline for both urine and sperm.
Illustration by Kathryn Born
FIGURE 2-1: The penis: not as simple as it looks!
When a man becomes excited — and I’m not talking about watching his team score the winning touchdown here — the nerves surrounding his penis become active, causing the muscles around the arteries to relax and more blood to flow into the penis. The spongelike material then absorbs the additional blood, making the penis stiff and hard, or erect. This erection tightens the veins so the blood can’t leave the penis, enabling the penis to remain erect. After a man ejaculates or if his arousal fades, detumescence occurs, in which the brain sends a signal to allow the blood to leave the erect penis, and it returns to its flaccid state.
At the base of the penis, the two corpus cavernosa split to form a Y, where the two ends connect to the pubic bone. This ligament controls the angle of the erect penis. I get many questions from men, each asking me if something is wrong with him because the angle of his erect penis isn’t straight out, parallel to the floor. I tell all of them not to go hanging any weights in an effort to change the angle, because they have nothing to worry about!
Penises become erect at all different angles — and the angle doesn’t have any effect on the way the penis performs. As a man gets older, the ligament at the base of his penis stretches, and the angle changes. A man of 70, for example, may have an erection that points downward instead of upward, the way many a young man’s erection does.
At the head of the class: The glans
The head of the penis, called the glans, is shaped like a cone (see Figure 2-2). The opening of the glans is called the meatus (pronounced “me-ate-us”), and at the base of the glans is a crownlike structure called the corona.
Illustration by Kathryn Born
FIGURE 2-2: The glans brings it all to a head.
The glans serves several purposes:
The glans is a little thicker than the rest of the penis, particularly around the corona. This extra thickness serves as a seal to keep the ejaculated semen inside the vagina, near the cervix, after an orgasm. This is nature’s way of making sure that the chances for fertilization are high. The glans also contains the greatest number of nerve endings.
The glans also creates extra friction, which, in this case, produces “good vibrations” that help promote orgasm and ejaculation.
Men aren’t the only ones who benefit from the glans. With all the thrusting of the penis inside the vagina that goes on during intercourse, the woman’s cervix may get damaged if it weren’t for the glans, which acts as a shock absorber.
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