You begin to thrust - in and out, out and in. She feels great; and she moans - you know it feels good for her too.
Then, the unspeakable happens: you'd been hoping to give her an incredible performance...
But instead, your body doesn't listen, and you ejaculate into her inside of minutes... maybe sometimes even seconds.
She's obviously disappointed; you're obviously humiliated. Why does this happen to you? Why can't you just make it stop... and be like one of those stallion-like men in the movies who go for hours and hours?
You know she's rethinking her decision to go to bed with you; even as she tells you it's okay, it's fine, not to worry about it, you know what she's really thinking: He didn't seem like the kind of guy who was going to have this problem... what a let down.
Why does early ejaculation happen - and what can you do to stop it, and how do you learn how to last longer in bed?
In 2007, around the time I started struggling with performance anxiety and being able to get turned on with new women I was taking to bed, I ran smack into another distressing sexual problem: suddenly, I began to prematurely ejaculate.
Previously, I'd had no difficulty lasting for 30, 40, or 50 minutes in a row. I didn't even have to try to control my ejaculation... it simply took a long time for me to reach climax. I normally had to keep going long after I'd already made a girl orgasm herself into exhaustion, and now she was just lying there tired, experiencing small mini orgasm aftershocks, waiting for me to finish up.
But then, one day, something happened.
Suddenly, I found myself struggling to not cum too soon into sex.
I had no idea how to last longer in bed... it hadn't been a problem I'd had to deal with before. The only things I'd paid attention to when reading about it in the past were "Think of a baseball game." But I didn't watch baseball all that much.
The problem got worse and worse - I'd be struggling not to cum in 15 minutes, then 10 minutes, then less. Sometimes I'd win the battle... sometimes not.
Finally, one day, I started having sex with a girl, and less than 2 minutes in, I lost control and came. All I could do stare at her sheepishly and say, "It's never happened that fast for me before..."
SEROTONIN AND PENIS SENSITIVITY
I had a theory for a long time that penis sensitivity was related to premature ejaculation. The more sensitive you were, the bigger a problem this was for you, I suspected. I had friends who struggled with far more premature ejaculation than me report that the sensation was just so good that they sometimes came just trying to put the condom on.
It turns out this is indeed part of the problem... but the other part? It's anticipation.
From "The Neurobiological Approach to Premature Ejaculation", a meta-study reviewing literature on premature ejaculation published between 1887 and 2001, and published in The Journal of Urology:
“[P]sychopharmacological treatment studies, animal research data and stopwatch assessments in men with rapid (premature) ejaculation indicate that lifelong rapid ejaculation is a neurobiological phenomenon related to central serotonergic neurotransmission and likely influenced by hereditary factors.
...
Basic and clinical psychopharmacological studies suggest that premature ejaculation is a not a psychological disturbance but a neurobiological phenomenon.”
In other words,
Premature ejaculation is not the result of a man having mental issues / being personality disordered (as had previously been thought - e.g., narcissists cum more quickly, etc.)
Premature ejaculation is a result of serotonin (feel-good chemicals) released in the brain and their transmission
So it isn't that you're crazy... it's that your brain is getting very excited.
And in case you were thinking, like I was thinking, that it's all about penile sensitivity - well, we were right:
“Patients with primary premature ejaculation have penile hypersensitivity, which provides further implications for an organic basis of premature ejaculation.”
That's from "Penile Sensitivity in Patients with Primary Premature Ejaculation", published in the same Journal of Urology, 8 years before the meta-study.
So, we now have two smoking gun factors for why you may be struggling to last longer in bed:
The sensitivity of your member
The excitement in your brain
THE RUSH OF PREMATURE EJACULATION
I am an incessant analyzer of thoughts, and in the case of premature ejaculation, I took the same process I used to overcome depression and put the magnifying glass on what was happening in my brain when I came too quickly.
And I discovered several things:
First, the sensation was good. It felt good. I enjoyed it.
Next, I focused on the sensation. My mind started thinking about how good the sensation of sex felt.
Then, I started to think about the sensation of climax... which would feel even better.
Once thinking about cumming, I'd begin to feel a heightening of sensation - my body began to rush toward climax.
Sometimes I would try to tell myself, "Don't cum too quickly!" but I noticed that even when I was telling myself this, I was still imagining ejaculation - and just trying to stop that future from happening. But I was imagining the sensation, and my brain and body were excited about it, and rushing headlong toward it anyway.
It became pretty clear what the problem was: thinking about ejaculation.
If you want to ejaculate, all you have to do is think about it, and imagine the sensation it will give you:
This can be conscious
It can be unconscious
It can be while trying to tell yourself not to ejaculate - and thinking about and imagining ejaculation as you do
And when I talked to my friends who were cumming in condoms before they even got to sex, they reported the same thing - they were fearing cumming too early, telling themselves not to cum too early... and thinking about, anticipating, and mentally EXPERIENCING cumming too early.
It's like being at the carnival trying to hit a moving target with a pop gun, telling yourself, "Don't choke... don't choke... don't choke..." and all the while vividly imagining firing the gun and missing the target wide to the side.
What's going to happen when you finally pull the trigger?
You're going to choke.
And just like the nervous man obsessing over not missing with the pop gun at the carnival, when you're reprimanding yourself not to cum early but nevertheless vividly imagining and internally experiencing a wonderful, satisfying release - you're going to choke too.
Yes, organ sensitivity matters - and we'll talk a little more about in what way below. The mind, however, is the most important part of all.
If you have any lingering doubts about how huge a role your mind is in orgasm, just take a look at wet dreams.
I'm sure you've had one - you have a really hot, steamy dream, and have some great sex with a girl in the dream... only to wake up and find yourself alone, soaked in your own ejaculate (or to wake up at the moment you begin ejaculating).
The funny thing about wet dreams is you're not touching yourself - no one is. There's no physical contact happening whatsoever... it's completely in your mind.
The mind alone is enough to bring you to orgasm.
And if you can control it, not only can you achieve orgasm - but you can put it off, too.
HOW TO LAST LONGER IN BED: 5 PRO TIPS
Most of what you see scattered about the Internet for this are tips about squeezing the head of your penis (no fun) or using desensitizing condoms (also no fun). These things work (even my most premature friends have reported an end to premature ejaculation with thick enough condoms... though this usually also ends up leaving them with no ejaculation at all), but take a lot of the joy and enthusiasm out of sex, if you ask me.
I believe your goal with lasting longer in bed needs to be lasting longer without sacrificing the experience of the sex itself... for you or the girl you're sleeping with.
So, that in mind, here are the 5 sex pro tips I used myself to vanquish premature ejaculation problems more or less forever, and not have to rely on a thick piece of latex or on giving myself an unfriendly squeeze - these are the ones you want to achieve the desired end result:
Beginner Level: Multiple Rounds. Most guys are fine the second or, worst case scenario, third round of sex in a row, even if they went fast in the first (or sometimes second) round. If you're prepared for your own fast climaxing, you can be more nonchalant about it and just tell the girl, "It's been a little while / few weeks since my last time, so I might go fast on the first round," so her expectations have already been set. Or, if you weren't anticipating it and it just happened, just tell her this afterward. Then, relax with her until you're ready for sex again... and make up for it in Round 2 or Round 3.
Beginner Level: Baseball. The old baseball trick really does work - or, any sport of your choice (or anything else, for that matter - I used to use American football when I still needed this trick). The trick is really getting into it during sex - really taking yourself through a great game, going through all the plays, or even making up your own imaginary game. The sex won't be quite as good for her as it will be if you're fully present - but you'll at least get your staying power back.
Intermediate Level: Stop and Relax. As you start getting closer to climax, simply stop thrusting... and just stay there inside her. I've seen advice telling you to pull out, but I've never found this necessary - if you simply stop thrusting, you can just stay on top of the girl and drop down to zero sensation in your penis. Don't begin thrusting again until the feeling of excitement has completely subsided - otherwise, you'll just pick up close to where you left off. Don't worry if you only make it a few thrusts, then need a break - just keep doing this, and you'll usually end up getting more staying power after a little while. And, even if you don't - you can still use this to greatly lengthen the time the sex itself takes.
Intermediate Level: Insensitive Positions. If you're still SO worried about lasting longer in bed that you're going to ejaculate no matter what you do, this one won't help much. But if you have that more or less under control and premature ejaculation is only something that happens when you feel more pleasure, get more excited, and start thinking obsessively about ejaculation, you can kill these thoughts by having sex in positions that aren't especially stimulating for males - like woman on top sex, or any number of less-stimulating positions. You can even change positions from a more stimulating position to a less stimulating one when you feel yourself getting overly excited - you can stretch out the sex nearly indefinitely going back and forth between stimulating and not-so-stimulating.
Advanced Level: Total Immersion. The counterintuitive advanced counterpart to distracting yourself with some other engaging line of thought is, instead, completely immersing yourself in the present moment of the sex - the sensation, the girl, what she looks like, what she feels like. The reason this works is because you are NOT thinking about orgasm - orgasm happens in the future, and you are not thinking about the future. You are only thinking about right now. Essentially, if you're thinking about cumming - you are not immersed. Instead, you're imagining your desired future outcome (climax), rather than focusing on what's going on right now (thrusting, touching, stroking, etc.). When totally immersed, you can have sex as long as you like and not cum - it's only when you turn your mental focus back to the objective of ejaculation that you open yourself back up to climax again. This does take some training to do, however.
The goal, of course, is to get to total immersion - where you can just focus completely on the moment, right now, without a single thought about enjoying your future orgasm.
WHY IS TOTAL IMMERSION SO POWERFUL?
Total immersion in sex is powerful because it pulls you completely into the present moment, and robs you of the buildup of anticipation that orgasm requires.
Orgasm is dependent on a peaking crescendo of excitement and desire. If you disallow yourself from experiencing this escalating excitement and desire, you shut down the process the mind requires to begin orgasm and ejaculation.
When you hear of guys premature ejaculating simply by putting on a condom, that isn't because they've gone through the process of sex and their bodies are releasing their seed to impregnate a mate. They're doing it because they've worked themselves up so much anticipating sex and become so excited (or nervous... same thing, physiologically) about the prospect of ejaculation, that the slightest touch sets them off.
You probably won't be able to do it as a beginner, but as you work on the other techniques, make sure you're also constantly focused on trying to get yourself present in the hear and now, and shut down thoughts about future orgasm.
If you do this well enough, you may even find yourself having trouble orgasming at times - and when this happens, all you have to do is the reverse: just immerse yourself in the future, imagining how good an orgasm would feel, how amazing the sensation of ejaculating your seed out into this girl. Real-life orgasm will shortly follow.
OTHER OPTIONS FOR LASTING LONGER
There are other options too, some of which I mentioned above:
Thicker condoms that desensitize you to sex
Squeezing the glans (head of the penis) when you feel yourself nearing climax
Doing reverse kegel exercises to even out pushing and pulling kegels
Masturbating prior to sex to get the first, quicker orgasm out
... and while you can use these as either a quick fix or (in the case of kegels) a longer-term solution, each is a rather inelegant solution in its own right, and none is really necessary if you use the five tips I shared with you earlier.
MAKE IT LAST
The one thing we didn't dwell on much here is penis sensitivity - simply because there isn't much you can do about that. Your sensitivity is what it is - but it is enhanced and controlled by the mind.
While you may be inclined to blame any troubles you have lasting longer in bed on the sensitivity of your member... don't. Because if you remember that meta-study - the one that included every piece of literature on premature ejaculation out there, including the earlier paper we looked at that talked about penis sensitivity - the main realm of premature ejaculation appears to be neurobiological - that is to say, it's mostly in your head.
As great as things may feel, your brain is still responsible for interpreting those sensations... and then deciding what it's going to focus on: the here-and-now... or that prospective orgasm lying (or looming, if you're thinking about it while trying to resist it) just over the horizon.
I still sometimes these days get a little too excited, and think about climax a little too much, and have to take a break to relax and cool off and refocus myself on the present moment or (if I'm really anticipating it for whatever reason) distract myself by playing a mental sports game. But these days, that's pretty uncommon.
The tools above for lasting longer in bed work; they're effective; and they put the power of your sexual performance back in your hands... instead of out of it.
So: if you want those bed-shaking, neighbor-waking, lover-girl-making nights of passion that stretch on and on for as long as you like, until you're both utterly exhausted, don't resort to desensitizing condoms that kill most of the buzz for you and for her, and don't sneak off into the bathroom to rub one out before you do the deed.
Instead, take a little time to learn how to redirect your thoughts and quit obsessing over ejaculating (or NOT ejaculating), and learn to drop the probable future to focus on the definite now. That's where the real pleasure is - for you and her.
Chase
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