Wet and Wild: Cumming in Dreamland

Q. Is it possible for women to have wet dreams? I think I may have orgasmed in my sleep before because of a sexy dream I was having.

A. It looks like we are going to start out this week with a literal bang. Indeed, my sweet-dream orgasming friend, women can and do orgasm in their sleep, and often with as much frequency and variation as our nocturnal emission counterparts, le men. While le men often experience ejaculation during the process, women experience orgasm and wetness, both coalescing into what’s known as the “spontaneous orgasm.” Spontaneous orgasm? Is that like some rapture of the human organs, where in the body just says “fuck it” and cums whenever it damn pleases? Or what if it’s just ghost oral sex? Close bunny. Spontaneous orgasms are considered the immediate discharge of built up sexual tension that lies in the body, coming out when you least expect it. Tricky.

While most folks experience orgasm by their own physical effort, spontaneous orgasms are the result of rhythmic muscular contractions in the pelvic/groin area, often the product of  the autonomic nervous system, aka the stuff you cannot control. Think of the same core control system that is moving all your legs, pumping all your organs,  and doing most of the hard work that you yourself are often unconscious of. If we want to get all scientific, girl, you have got too much  prostaglandin E2 and cortisol  running around in your sleep. Your GABA nervous system, serotonin, and beta-endorphins are lying down on the job. In laymen’s terms? Your body gets excited, and the normal responses that would be there to say “hey baby, cool it till later” aren’t really up to the task when you are in a more relaxed state, aka sleep.

So why all of this? Girl, your body needs a little pick me up. I won’t cue up my Oprah, “You have to make time for you,” life balance speech, but sometimes, for whatever reason, be it stress, sickness, medication, whatever, we can go into the mode where we tend to ignore what our body needs. But our bodies are smart (well, most of the time). They know what we need, whether we are conscious of it or not. When we need a little orgasmic chemical bliss, our body is basically sneak attacking us when we are at our most relaxed and least likely to “resist.” Our sex drives are powerful things – they come from years of evolution and necessity. Our lives were way less hectic when we were running around on the plains all day, eatings bugs and having sex in the bushes, or whatever it was we did before jobs, iPods, and the agricultural revolution that turned women into non-sexual pieces of property of husbands and the state. How dull.

Remember that wild and crazy guy, Alfred Kinsey? Well, according to his research, over 40 percent of the 5,628 women he interviewed, experienced at least one nocturnal orgasm by the time they were 45. And who better to expand on this than one of my favorite sex advice gurus (surely the one I was sneaking peeks at when I was a wee tot) , the phenomenal super hero team behind Go Ask Alice!:

A smaller study published in the Journal of Sex Research in 1986 found that 85 percent of the women who had experienced nocturnal orgasms had done so by the age of twenty-one… some even before they turned thirteen. In addition, women who have orgasms during sleep usually have them several times a year. Dr. Kinsey and his colleagues defined female nocturnal orgasm as sexual arousal during sleep that awakens one to perceive the experience of orgasm. Girls and women who don’t have orgasms in their sleep, or who don’t know whether or not they’ve had them, are perfectly normal. It may be easier for men to identify their wet dreams because of the “ejaculatory evidence.” Vaginal secretions could be a sign of sexual arousal without orgasm.

Similar studies find that a much higher percentage of boys and men experience wet dreams. This, combined with a greater focus on male sexuality by science and the public in general, are probably two big reasons why we don’t hear very much about women’s nighttime orgasms.

I love smart bitches, especially when smart bitches are smart about sex. So relax, my divine, nocturnal adventure friend, this is all in the big book of your body. Alternatively, as Alice says, not having orgasms in your sleep is equally normal, so there’s not a should or a must in any of these experiences. The only should or must that exists is the one that makes you feel good and sexy. And as the divine goddess, Latrice Royale, hath said and danced, too, you need to feel good. Otherwise, it’s just the same old same old.

You do you, kitten. Just report back.

Got a ques­tion to ask, sub­ject you’d like us to dis­cuss, or myth you’d like us to bust? Keep “˜em com­ing! (Lord.Have.And.Mercy.) You can send us an anony­mous mes­sage via the Ask Us! fea­ture here. We promise we don’t bite (unless you’re into that type of thing”¦)