In a front-page story on December 3, 1992, the New York Times reported startling scientific research that seems to confirm the ancient Taoist insight about the toll that sperm production takes on a man’s body. “These results are the last thing I had expected when I started doing the experiment,” said Wayne Van Voorhies of the University of Arizona. “They were so startling that I did the work over four times to make sure I got it right. They basically say a lot of our preconceived notions [about male sexuality] just do not hold.”

Dr. Van Voorhies was studying simple but revealing worms called nematodes. What, you may ask, do worms have to do with your sexuality’. Well, these nematodes are not just your everyday, garden-variety worms. “The genes and biochemical processes nematodes use,” explains Dr. Philip Anderson of the University of Wisconsin, “are the same as those that humans and other mammals use.” In scientific studies, nematodes are frequently used in place of human subjects. (more…)

As doctors, the Taoist masters were interested in sexuality as part of a larger concern for the health of the entire body. They practiced Sexual Kung Fu because they discovered that ejaculation drains a man’s energy. You have probably also noticed this loss of energy and general feeling of fatigue after ejaculating. Even though you would like to be attentive to your partner’s sexual and emotional needs, all your body wants to do is sleep. As one multi-orgasmic man put it, “Once I ejaculate, the pillow looks better than my girlfriend does.”

The image of the unsatisfied woman whose lover ejaculates, grunts, and collapses on top of her is so common that it has become a cultural joke, but the exhaustion that men feel after ejaculating is as old as the first coital groan. Peng-Tze, a sex adviser to the famed Yellow Emperor, reported almost five thousand years ago: “After ejaculating, a man is tired, his ears buzz, his eyes are heavy, and he longs for sleep. He is thirsty and his limbs feel weak and stiff. In ejaculating he enjoys a brief moment of sensation but then suffers long hours of (more…)

Probably the most extensive laboratory investigation of male multiple orgasms was made by sex researchers William Hartman and Marilyn Fithian. They tested thirty-three men who claimed to be multi-orgasmic – that is, to be able to have two or more orgasms without losing their erection.

While these men had sex with their partners in the laboratory, Hartman and Fithian monitored their heart rates, which the researchers had chosen as the clearest method of identifying orgasms. At rest, the average heart rate is around 70 beats per minute; during orgasm it almost doubles, rising to about 120. After orgasm, the heart returns to its resting rate (see figure 1). They also measured pelvic contractions (most obvious in the involuntary squeezing of the anus), which coincided with the peaking of heart rate at orgasm. What they found was pretty surprising: the arousal charts for these men were identical to those of multi-orgasmic women.

Male and female sexuality may be more similar than is usually thought. Developmentally, this similarity makes (more…)

Orgasm is one of the most intense and satisfying human experiences, and if you have ever had an orgasm – and almost all men have – you will not need to have it defined. All orgasms, however, are not created equal. Orgasm is slightly different for each person and even different for the same person at different times. Nonetheless, men’s orgasms share certain characteristics, including rhythmic body movements, increased heart rate, muscle tension, and then a sudden release of tension, including pelvic contractions. They feel good, too. After noting that “orgasm is the least understood of the sexual processes,” the thirteenth edition of Smith’s General Urology explains that orgasm includes “involuntary rhythmic contractions of the anal sphincter, hyperventilation [increased breathing rate], tachycardia [increased heart rate], and elevation of blood pressure.”

These definitions include changes that occur throughout your entire body. However, for a long time orgasm was seen – and for many men is still seen – as strictly a genital affair. In the West, William Reich, in his (more…)

You may already have experienced multiple orgasms. Surprising as this may sound, many men are multi-orgasmic before they enter adolescence and begin to ejaculate. Kinsey’s research suggested that more than half of all preadolescent boys were able to reach a second orgasm within a short period of time and nearly a third were able to achieve five or more orgasms one after the other. This led Kinsey to argue that “climax is clearly possible without ejaculation.” But multiple orgasms are not just limited to prepubescent boys. Kinsey continues: “There are older males, even in their thirties and older, who are able to equal this performance.” In Fundamentals o Human Sexuality, Dr. Herant Katchadourian adds: “Some men are able to inhibit the emission of semen while they experience the orgasmic contractions: in other words they have nonejaculatory orgasms. Such orgasms do not seem to be followed by a refractory period [loss of erection], thereby allowing these men to have consecutive or multiple orgasms like women. (more…)