Sex Matters®: Louanne Cole Weston, PhD

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"My wife has become addicted to her Magic Wand vibrator, and can only orgasm when we use it. I feel left out. What can I do?"

The opinions expressed herein are the author's alone and have not been influenced by WebMD.

Women can get accustomed to reaching orgasm through one particular path. I'm reluctant to use the word addicted because it's a term that gets thrown around so loosely and yet has such stigma attached to it.

If your wife was capable of reaching orgasm before the vibrator was introduced, then she certainly retains that capability now. You didn't mention that she was not orgasmic before the vibrator.

The Magic Wand is a particularly stimulating vibrator. It's probably the most powerful one out there. That means that the vibration is more intense than any human body part can replicate.

First, she'll need to know that you are interested in varying the pattern in your sexual relationship. Then, she's got to sign on too. If she is interested, then I would recommend selecting some other less powerful vibrators to scale down the intensity of the vibration that gets her to orgasm. This might take a while -- a few months of somewhat regular "practice."

Then, I would encourage her to use her mind actively during sexual stimulation that comes from a human being -- her or you. If her mind is fully engaged in images that are erotic to her, a little physical stimulation can go a long way toward orgasm. When people start using vibrators to reach orgasm, they are usually relying heavily on the physical component of sex and very little on the mental aspects of it.

I'd encourage her to indulge herself in mental imagery that arouses her. You can use audiotapes of erotic stories, videos, pictures, and stories that you make up and tell her -- whatever she likes. This would be the time to try them all.

These are essentially the steps that you can take to broaden her path to orgasm.

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