Twisted sisters – Kaat Bollen

How can we have better sex? I talked with delightful Belgian psychologist and sexologist Kaat Bollen about slow love and porn, about reclaiming our bodies and starting a sexy sisterhood. “Your brain is your largest erotic organ. Keep it stimulated!”.

Marlies: Kaat, why is female sexuality still such a taboo?

Kaat: Because female sexuality is immensely powerful. And the way it empowers women doesn’t just scare men, but even women themselves.

Marlies: A lot of women right now complain about having a low sex drive.

Kaat: I see that too, and I think the root of the problem is in the way we are raised. From a young age, women are discouraged from accessing their sensual inner power. We tell toddlers: “Keep your hands above the covers!”. And teenagers: “Are you really going out dressed like that? People may think you’re a slut!”. After a while, women internalize the message: to be worthy of love and acceptance, we need to hide and suppress our sexuality. It’s also in the way we explain sex to young girls: “When you love someone, you may consummate your love together.” Well, that is total b******t of course!

Marlies: (laughs) Right on, Kaat!

Kaat: Before we even talk about sexual intercourse and penetration, we should teach girls about masturbation. It’s ridiculous how the whole world judges and controls our bodies while our pleasure and need for expression are being neglected. We need to reclaim ownership of our bodies!

Marlies: Absolutely, including the right for our bodies to be ‘real’.

Kaat: Yes, pubic hair is natural, so is body odor and bleeding once a month. Why should women have to smell like roses? This is another reason we become estranged from our sexuality: we are only allowed to be happy with our bodies after we’ve fixed and ‘perfected’ them.

Marlies: And with all that sanitizing and plasticizing we are forgetting something hugely important: sex is supposed to dirty!

Kaat: For me, if it wasn’t a little dirty, it wasn’t very good sex.

Marlies: Amen! Let’s talk about the orgasm gap.

Kaat: Sex in our Western culture is very much penetration centered. But to reach an orgasm during intercourse, 80% of women need stimulation of their clitoris, which is situated about 5 cm above the vagina entrance. Not surprisingly, on average, men come about 4 times as often as women. And what makes it extra crazy is that women are actually multi-orgasmic by nature, whereas men need to recover after they’ve come. For example, a 70-year old man has to wait 24 hours, while a woman could keep going and going. So, it really should be the other way around! I’m not saying that women and men should have the exact same amount of orgasms, but I’m amazed that this gap is a socially accepted thing.

Marlies: For me personally, I know I need time to reach that plateau where I can just keep coming. And so, I need to claim that time, and reeducate men who believe that sex equals 10 minutes of intercourse. You should see their faces when I say: ‘A good making-out session should last between 4 and 8 hours!’. (laughs) But during those hours, you can take breaks and dance around naked or look at erotic art together; it’s about broadening the definition of ‘sex’.

Kaat: I always say: foreplay starts again as soon as you’ve finished having sex.

Marlies: But if we want to have better sex, we have to be much more proactive.

Kaat: Yes, we have to really own our sexuality. For example, when asked about their number of bed partners, men will exaggerate the amount while women will play it down. But why feel ashamed of being sexually experienced? We should have the guts to say: yes, I masturbate, I use sex toys, I’ve had a lot of partners, I’ve been unfaithful once or twice. It doesn’t make us a better or worse human being.

Marlies: Often, men aren’t even that bothered by it. It’s women who judge other women. So, instead of calling each other sluts, we should be like: good for you!

Kaat: Yes! You go girl! (both laugh)

Marlies: How about porn? Can that be a useful tool for women?

Kaat: It has been proven that watching porn will affect your body within three heartbeats: your heart will beat faster, blood will flow to your sexual organs etc. So yes, it’s a very effective tool! But while about 90% of all men watch porn regularly, only a third of women do.

Marlies: Actually, the problem for me is that porn is so addictive.

Kaat: It can be, and the same goes for sex toys. I tell my clients: by all means, enjoy your favorite toy or videos with your favorite actors but only half the time, at the most. For the other half, use your own body, fantasy and being. Otherwise you’re having mostly sexual ‘fast food’.

Marlies: I have noticed that I become mentally lazy when I stop using my own fantasy.

Kaat: Yes, it’s important to remember that your brain is your largest erotic organ. Keep it stimulated!

Marlies: I realize that what you and I have been doing today – confiding in each other, exchanging information, having fun – is key if we want to break the taboo of female sexuality. We have to form sisterhoods.

Kaat: Absolutely! And we have to be shameless, like guys. You know how they have these WhatsApp groups where they share their favorite porn clips etc.?

Marlies: Let’s do that too! Thank you so much for this conversation, Kaat.

Kaat: You’re welcome, Marlies! I’ll see you in our dirty WhatsApp group. (laughs)