Sex Gets Real 193: JoEllen Notte on the best of 2017

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On to this week’s show!

JoEllen Notte is here to talk about her favorite things of 2017, as well as some of the tips and ideas she explored around sex, depression, and resentment.

We talk about her love affair with the Doxy wand vibrator, how she decides what makes her Favorite Things list, why we both hate the phrase “porn for women”, and why depression isn’t really the relationship killer that so many people think that it is.

We also answer a few listener questions. Is it weird to hate touching your genitals? Is there a wrong way to use a bullet vibe?

Tune in to find out!

Follow Dawn on Instagram.

In this episode, JoEllen and I talk about:

• JoEllen’s round-up post on her favorite toys, companies, bloggers, books, and products of 2017.
• What makes the Doxy wand so special? JoEllen has lots of feelings and has a love affair with this sex toy.
• Why did it take 3 different versions of the wand vibrator Le Wand before JoEllen enjoyed it?
• Why going for the most strong and most powerful toy isn’t what works for everyone.
• How does something get on JoEllen’s favorite things list? It’s so much more than sex toys now, and I love it.
• SeaGrape is one of my favorite companies, and JoEllen had them on her 2016 list. Totally worth checking out if you want fun, fresh products.
• You MUST check out SheVibe. Their art alone is worth a visit, but they also have super sexy things to buy, too.
• The amazing work happening in sex and disability, and why it was so important to JoEllen to feature these voices in her 2017 round-up.
• The desexualization of disabled bodies and why it’s so important for more of us to be honest about the realities of our bodies and sex to help break down the performativity of sex that we see so much of these days.
• “Porn for women” is NOT men doing the dishes or red soled designer shoes. Why are we still using this terrible phrase? Porn is porn. JoEllen’s post about this is brilliant.
• JoEllen as a theater director and feminist porn.
• Ryan Gosling MIGHT give JoEllen an orgasm, but it’s not porn when he says, ‘Hey girl.’
• Porn sex versus real sex.
• People come on each other. It’s not just in porn. Kate Kenfield suggested we call that “frosting” someone.
• Depression in relationships and the resentment that builds. JoEllen has been thinking about this a lot, so we chat about why resentment is so corrosive.
• We field a listener question from Sam who wants to know if she’s weird because she loves sex but she hates touching her pussy and hates being penetrated. Is that wrong or weird? JoEllen and I discuss.
• Don’t let worrying about sex ruin the sex you enjoy. YES!
• Megan wants to know if there’s a wrong way to use a bullet vibe. JoEllen and I have both used bullets and talk about ways to use them.

About JoEllen Notte:

JoEllen is a writer, speaker, researcher and mental health advocate whose work explores the impact of depression on sex and relationships. Since 2012 she has written about sex, mental health, and how none of us are broken on her award-winning site The Redhead Bedhead. JoEllen has spoken at Clark College, University of Chicago, University of Tennessee, Woodhull’s Sexual Freedom Summit, the Guelph Sexuality Conference, and the Playground Conference and is currently writing her first book: “The Monster Under the Bed: Sex, Depression & The Conversations We Aren’t Having”.

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Episode Transcript

Dawn Serra: You’re listening to (You’re listening) (You’re listening) You’re listening to Sex Gets Real (Sex Get Real) (Sex Gets Real) Sex Gets Real with Dawn Serra (with Dawn Serra). Thanks, bye!

Happy Holidays, listeners. Welcome to this week’s episode. I am your host Dawn Serra. No matter what faith or non-faith you have, it’s hard to deny that this episode, dropping on December 24, smack dabbed in the middle of all the big holidays that happened. So between Hanukkah and Kwanzaa, Christmas and Solstice, and New Year’s – there’s a lot going on right now. So I just wanted to take a quick minute to wish you and yours a very happy holidays. I hope that it’s a season that’s full of fun and joy, and sexiness and seeing people that you really care about. And if that’s not your story and the holidays are a tough time for you, for a variety of reasons as they can be for so many of us, I hope that you find spaces that feel safe and welcoming. And, at a minimum, that you get to drink some warm hot chocolate or eggnog and be in your slippers and pajamas. 

Dawn Serra: I will be spending the holidays in Calgary with my in-laws and extended family on that side. It will be a high of minus 17 degrees Celsius. I hope nothing freezes off. We shall see. I also wanted to let you know that this week’s episode features JoEllen Notte. She has been on the show before and she just released her 2017 favorite things on her blog and I thought that would be a super fun conversation for us to have as we looked towards the end of 2017 and moving into 2018. If you want to hear my favorite things of 2017, anyone who supports at any level over on Patreon is going to get access to a little bonus 15 minute episode that I did on my favorite things of 2017. So you can head to patreon.com/sgrpodcast. You can’t search for it because my content is considered adult. And Patreon, like all the other websites in the world, like to cockblock me. So you actually have to type the URL in patreon.com/sgrpodcastl to find the show. If you support at any level, you’ll get access to that little bonus content. So I hope you will check it out. And also, thank you to all of you who already support.

So this week’s episode, JoEllen Notte is back. For those of you who haven’t heard Joelle on the show before, she is a writer, speaker, researcher, and mental health advocate whose work explores the impact of depression on sex and relationships since 2012. She’s written about sex, mental health, and how none of us are broken on her award winning site, The Redhead Bedhead. Joe Ellen’s spoken at tons of universities and conferences, and she’s currently writing her first book, “The Monster Under the Bed: Sex, Depression, and the Conversations We Aren’t Having.” So here is me and JoEllen, talking about our favorite things and then fielding a few of your questions.

Dawn Serra: Welcome back to the show, JoEllen. I am so excited to have you here to talk about your favorite things of 2017.

JoEllen Notte: Thank you so much for having me.

Dawn Serra: Oh, you’re so welcome. When I saw your posts, I immediately thought, “Now that is going to be a fun way to wrap up the year on the show,” is to come and have you talk about toys and experiences and books. So thank you for saying yes.

JoEllen Notte: Oh, I’m so excited to do it.

Dawn Serra: You’ve had two round-up posts this month. One is your “JoEllen’s 2017 Favorite Things,” which includes products and books and companies and then this really wonderful thing that you call “The Big One.” And then you also did a round-up of all of the posts and appearances that you’ve made throughout the year that you really wanted to highlight. I thought it would just be fun to hear some of your favorite things and share a few of mine and give people listening a chance to also reflect on maybe what some of their 2017 favorite things are. So okay, we have to talk about your favorite products. Because we know that you love wands.

JoEllen Notte: Yes. And I feel like this was the year I decided to stop even pretending that I might like anything else. I think this year, I just accepted a whole lot less products for review. In fact, even Le Wand, which is one of the products that’s on my favorite things list – I took under duress. If you read my review of it, I was offered Le Wand. I didn’t really want it. They sent it to me. I hated it. They sent me a second one, I still hated it. They sent me the third one, which was the second version of the toy and that was when I came around on it. So really, it was like a bad rom-com with all of the bad messages about like, “Pursue somebody until they come around.” It just happened to work.

Dawn Serra: Yeah. So what was so different between the earlier versions and the version that finally made you say, “Okay, now I can get behind this.”

JoEllen Notte: I feel so bad for Le Wand because I kept really ripping on them when I explained this. The first one was basically a prettied-up knockoff of toys that already existed. It had the exact same number of speeds and settings. It was like a rechargeable wand that already exists, but pretty. And it was so loud. It was so loud. I live in a big apartment building that was put up fast and cheap. And, I was self conscious about using it here. So loud. So that was how the second one came to me. I did an Instagram post where I was like, “Folks, this is weird, right? This one is so loud.” So they sent me a second one. 

The second one, the premise was, “We think something’s wrong with that one you have now.” The second one was marginally quieter but not quite enough that I wanted to write about it. Now, then version two happened and version two had a big difference. One, it was actually quieter though. I would still take the toy quieter because it gets louder when you press down on it, which I feel is like saying, “Hey, everybody. I’m masturbating.” 

Dawn Serra: I’m really close now.

JoEllen Notte: But it has 10 individual steady vibration patterns, which if you ask most people who are into, especially wand type things, steady vibration patterns are where it’s at. The things where it’s like, I don’t know, masturbate to the pattern of Edelweiss. I don’t know anybody who loves those. 

Dawn Serra: No. I was just talking about that with Kate Kenfield the other day. No, just give it to me.

JoEllen Notte: I’ve never been like, “I finally found one that goes to the tune of ‘You Shook Me All Night Long.” It’s never been the patterns. It’s always – I want options where it stays steady. And so this has the option you can do up and down through 10 or you can hold it down and just glide through all the steady settings. That to me, was enough of a difference that it won me over. It also had a travel lock. So it arrived right before I went to Woodhall this year. I was standing there with it and another rechargeable wand, that I love, in my hand. And I realized that Le Wand had the travel lock and the other one didn’t. And I put Le Wand in my bag because I could lock it for travel.

Dawn Serra: Yeah, that’s really interesting. I like that feature. And, of course, Doxy, you have a love affair with. And for people who are curious, can you tell them a little bit about why you love Doxy so much?

JoEllen Notte: God, it’s getting embarrassing. So Doxy came into existence because you can’t get the famed original magic wand aka the Hitachi, in England, Europe. And so the Doxy was made – the Doxy wand. And it’s fabulous. It’s this plug-in, high-powered wand. So they made the original one – I know I got my first one in 2014. It had a soft head and a hard plastic body and it’s very powerful. It’s a bit rumblier than the Hitachi. I always say – I think of it in terms of tone, if the Hitachi was a tenor, the Doxy would be a bass. Then they just kept making them fancier and more intense. So then they made a steel one and then they made the steel ones in gorgeous colors. 

This year, they made a small one. I keep calling it the baby Doxy. And that’s now that’s name, the Doxy number three. And what it is, is – I have to admit as much as I love giant wands and I love broad stimulation, and I love all the power. I have to tone it down sometimes and remember that that’s not a thing for everybody. I was actually in a shop last Spring and they didn’t carry the Doxy. And they talked about how they were just too big. They were just too big and too powerful and the whole thing. and I knew that the Doxy three was coming. And I was like, “What if I told you a little Doxy was coming?” And the owner’s eyebrows shot up. She was like, “Tell me more.” I actually didn’t know more at the time. So I couldn’t. But I got the Doxy three in August. And when they first gave it to me, I was actually not wowed. I was like, “This isn’t as strong.” I made the bad toy reviewer mistake. Where I was like, “This is less strong than the thing I liked so it’s worse. It’s not as good.” That is not right. That is incorrect.

JoEllen Notte: It’s got so many things going for it. It’s got a head you can screw off.So you can actually take the head off to wash it, which with plug-in wands, you can’t run them under a faucet. So it’s pretty rad. I like it because – I always hate when people make like, “This toy is small and slips easily between bodies during sex.” Because any toy can be used during– All toys are couples toys. But I will admit that as a giant toy user, often when I want to use a toy with a partner it turns into like, “Okay doggy style it is.” But I like the Doxy three because I’m able to use it while facing a partner. Because it is smaller. A wand came out a couple of years ago called the Palm Power Wand that a lot actually loved. 

I loved the Palm Power Wand. And it had these silicone heads that popped on and off. And they popped on and off really easily and they popped on off a little too easily. And that was kind of the problem. But the thing with the Doxy number three, because the head screws off, it’s got ridges. You can take the Palm Power heads and put them on the Doxy and the ridges hold it in place. So it came to market with this set of heads that exists out in the world already that let you make a whole bunch of different stimulation options for it. So it’s basically this neat, strong, powerful, smaller Doxy that fits in a purse, that has attachments already existing. When you put one of them on it, it looks like Louise Belcher and it’s great.

Dawn Serra: So for folks who need exactly that, now you know where to get it.

JoEllen Notte: Exactly.

Dawn Serra: When you’re putting together your list of favorite things, because you’ve had some wonderful things on here. I mean books, Of course, we have to say Elle Chase and Curvy Girls Sex. I loved having her on the show to talk about the book. And you dove into the the amazing people doing so much work around sex and disability, which I’d love to talk about a little bit, and SheVibe. But for you, what makes something make that list?

JoEllen Notte: So I actually had a big transition last year around this list because for the first couple of years, I had at the first, I think, three years, it was literally just a list of toys. I used to review toys a lot and I would just round up my 10 favorites and have a list. And then last year, I noticed I was just reviewing a lot less and the focus of my work has shifted significantly. I thought, “I’m not going to do that anymore. There’s no reason.” And, I realized I was missing a tremendous opportunity. Because there were things that were in the world I wanted to celebrate that had nothing to do with, “What’s the coolest vibrator out this year?” 

So last year, I realized there were three companies that I thought were doing tremendous work. And there were a couple of, I think, books I lumped in with products last year and I tossed in an idea. I just took a moment to figure out when I thought about the year stuck out for me, what would I look back on that year and think, “Oh, yeah. I discovered that that year and that was cool. And now I use that a lot or now I think about that all the time.” I remember last year’s list had a book called “Sex from Scratch” on it. And I quote “Sex from Scratch” all the time. And so, that’s what puts something on the list. Is it something that I think moving forward is going to be part of my vernacular or something I’m going to recommend a lot? And that’s kind of how it ends up on the list.

Dawn Serra: Yeah, I was so excited on last year’s list to see The Butters and Sea Grape, which is a really small company. So many people don’t know about it, but they make such amazing things. And so this year, I know one of the company or companies that you wanted to highlight was SheVibe. So for people who aren’t familiar with SheVibe, can you tell– I mean, a lot of people have probably seen their covers because they’re kind of superhero, comicise, sex positive leaders in the community, which you’ve been on a cover and Cooper Beckett. So they might be familiar with the art piece, but can you tell us a little bit more about SheVibe? 

JoEllen Notte: So, drastically over simplify the situation SheVibe is an online sex shop. But, like I said, that drastically oversimplifies it. SheVibe is a tremendously sex positive company and what is fascinating about it is – you say that phrase and you get this picture in your head of what that means. I don’t know. I’m trying to find a way to put this that isn’t insulting to other people. SheVibe to me feels so much – I’m from a region that is… Where I grew up is not far from where SheVibe is based. 

So to me, SheVibe is like if people in my family decided to start a sex positive company. They’re an incredibly accessible sex positive company. You don’t feel like you have to have already known all of the cool sex positive stuff and the language and the whatever to be hip to what they’re putting down at SheVibe. And what they do with the comics, to me, it’s great because it draws people in. People who get there because, “Oh, that’s the place that had Wonder Woman on their cover.” And then a year later, they’re talking about this cool thing with Jizz Lee, who they discovered because Jizz Lee was drawn in a comic. What they do is so simple but incredibly brilliant, actually. 

Dawn Serra: They do some amazing work. And I think you’re so right, the power of their art that feels so fun and inviting and accessible is such a powerful way to get people willing to maybe think about sex or talk about sex toys, or share it with a partner who maybe would be turned off by a lot of the branding that we see with other sex toy companies. Because they’re just so overtly sexual. So, yay for SheVibe being on your list. I think that’s incredible.

JoEllen Notte: And something SheVibe does and does tremendously is they listen to input without being drawn into, without a better way to put this, into the screaming. So there can be a lot of turning on a dime like, “This company sucks and we all hate them now.” And SheVibe takes a very measured approach to, “Okay, well. Let’s look at what’s going on.” Has this company done the terrible thing? Okay, let’s look at why that’s bad. 

My favorite story from them actually appears in The Post and it’s about lube. And, they were talking to us at an event, we were all at dinner, and they were talking about how they were carrying this lube. I talked about how it had actually burned me, literally physically burned me because of an ingredient that I don’t do well with. And there had been a brilliant session on lube at that conference that we were all at – Sarah Mueller from Smitten Kitten. Amazing. 

Dawn Serra: Amazing. 

JoEllen Notte: And the people who had gone to it were explaining this ingredient and why could do this and Sandra and Thor from SheVibe were listening and by the time we were done, Thor was on his phone getting the lube off the website. Because he took in what we said and said, “We don’t want part of that. I don’t want to be carrying that.”

Dawn Serra: Yeah, that’s awesome and so important to be responsive to people and to be willing to take an input like that. That, to me, is such a great sign of not only smart business, but also people who are truly invested in community and conversation, which we need in this world. 

JoEllen Notte: Yeah. That’s true.

Dawn Serra: Are you looking for a wonderful last minute gift to surprise a lover or a partner? Or, maybe are you looking for a way to kick off 2018 with some new skills and tidbits and goodies? If you head to dawnserra.com/courses, you can see all of the courses and activities that I have available. They’re on-demand and available online right now. From the Hands Down workshop about ethical pornography and how you can use porn to connect in your relationship, to my anal one-on-one workshop all about anal. Or, if you’re just looking for new ways to connect with a partner, there’s a Relationship Charter workbook, my Sex Mapping game, which is one of my favorite things to offer clients, and several other fun, juicy, connecting options. So head to head to dawnserra.com/courses and check it out.

Dawn Serra: So, are there any other of your favorite things you want us to touch on before we talk about some of your brilliant posts?

JoEllen Notte: I do want to visit the sex and disability. Because, oh my goodness, so much amazing work is happening. When I first started talking to people – I did a professional coaching session in 2013. And I mentioned the idea of sex and depression to the person I was talking to. And they said, “Write about that, because nobody’s writing about that. Do it.” And I was afraid to do it. I thought that maybe wasn’t sexy enough and I want it to be sexier. I was super hesitant. And, early that next year, a couple of us submitted a panel about it to a conference and we got turned down and not nicely either.

There was a time, not super long ago, where these were conversations that you could legitimately say were not happening. And now I look around and there are so many people having conversations about making our sex education accessible and understanding that people are going to have different needs, and that’s important, and we can’t ignore that. And, having conversations that– I always reference, Kirsten Schultz from Chronic Sex as somebody who writes posts that I always look at and go, “Oh my God, why didn’t I think to write about that? Jesus. That’s brilliant.” There’s just some great, smart, engaging work going on right now that’s so exciting to see. 

Dawn Serra: It is. And it’s so important, too, because anybody who does any kind of teaching or writing about sex knows that the majority of the questions we get come down to, “Am I broken?” or “Am I wrong?” And, to have people who are not only sharing their stories and writing about accessibility, but making it normal and acceptable to say, “My body doesn’t do these positions. And here’s these really great interesting things that we can do to make sex more accessible and to make conversations easier.” I mean, you’re right. There’s just so many incredible people who are doing really wonderful work in this space. Even for people who don’t have visible or physical disabilities now, to know, “If something happens or when something happens, or as I age, or as I put on weight,” or whatever it is, “There’s people out there who are going to be able to help ease that transition or that new body or that new experience.” It’s so important.

JoEllen Notte: Yeah. When I first came to the sex positive world, as it were, I came here as somebody who felt like an outsider, previously from lack of knowledge, from feeling like an awkward person, from believing for most of my life that I was not attractive enough or whatever. And I was somebody who, except for every couple of years when my spine stopped working and when depression kicked up, I lived most of my life passed as able bodied. To understand that there are people navigating this who don’t have that privilege at all. And our world, our medical community and our world, in general, has this horrible habit of deciding that those people don’t have sexualities.

Dawn Serra: And that they shouldn’t even be visible because they won’t even be able to get into our spaces.

JoEllen Notte: Yeah. You and I have talked before we did a great episode on that. positivity versus sex performativity. And when spaces are all like, “Ooh, look how sexy I am. Whoo.” And they feel like they don’t have room for anything that isn’t like, “I am conventionally attractive and rocking a bikini and dancing half-naked up on the banquette.” It can be incredibly scary. So to have all of these spaces opening up, even that are just people talking about like, “Yes, I an ostomy bag and I have really good sex. Let’s talk about that.” Andrew Gurza and I had a great conversation about how when he started, he was committed to saying, “I’m disabled and I have sex and it’s hot. Sex and disability is hot.” And then I came around and realized, “No, no. I really actually need to be honest about the fact that sometimes it really sucks.” And that to me was – it was so exciting to hear him say that because I feel like that’s what the sex positive world, in general, has had to do.

Dawn Serra: Yes, yeah. I love the discomfort and the awkwardness and the willingness to say, “Sometimes I don’t know what I’m doing and sometimes this sucks. And sometimes people reject me or often people reject me because of my body.” But we still are going to have this conversation. We need that so much in so many spaces, because you’re right. For so long, the sex positive worlds and the kinky worlds were all about, “Hey, look at us over here being super sexy,” and it was the over the top conventional Hollywood version of all the things. And there were so many people being left behind. So now to start seeing more people being able to actually take up that space and say, “Sometimes sex hurts and sometimes, I don’t want to do it. And sometimes it sucks because my body doesn’t do the thing or my chair can’t get into the munch,” or whatever. I mean, these are the kinds of conversations that actually make it easier for us to have meaningful relationships and to feel okay in our bodies. More, please.

JoEllen Notte: When I look around, I’m actually starting to feel like it’s a bit passe to have the sex columnist who’s always in the booty shorts and crop top talking about her super sexy weekends that she has every weekend. It’s funny because I have a very specific magazine in my head right now that’s still doing this and it’s killing me. Whenever I see that I’m like, “Really? Really, you’re still doing that? Because I feel like the rest of us have turned this corner,” to this more real person place, which I hate when we say real versus not real because everybody’s real. But, this more relatable place where everybody gets to admit that, yes, sometimes I walk down the street and I feel super hot and then sometimes I take a month or two where I want no one to look at me at all.

Dawn Serra: Yeah, yeah. So speaking of that phrase “real people” because we’re all real people, you also released your best of posts and podcasts and appearances, which included your interview with Tristan Taoramino on Sex Out Loud and a whole bunch of really awesome things that you’ve created over the year. One of the things that jumped out at me and is in this same “real person” phrase is, “Stop calling these things porn for women.” Oh my god, I loved it so much. And we see this all the time. So, I will of course link to all the things we’re talking about. 

I love that you finally named this thing where we, as a culture, are like, “Oh, look at this man vacumming. Porn for women!” Pinterest porn for women and, of course, you’ve got a picture of red-soled shoes – porn for women. And how you’re like, “Actually, porn is naked people doing sex.” The rest of the things are just pandering to this gender essentialism that basically says, “Women find, basically ,all of these somewhat superficial things to be porn because women couldn’t possibly actually like porn.” Oh my god, I love this so much. Where did this come from?

JoEllen Notte: Honestly, why did I get so annoyed about this? I will tell you. I will admit very openly, because this is something I also got up on a high horse about talking about while I was writing my favorite things post this year. This was a sponsored post this year. Because there’s a big belief in our industry that if somebody is paying you to write, they are somehow dictating what you write. Actually, that’s where this came from. So, I was approached by a company that was, and I will admit openly, this was a company that later in the year got in a lot of trouble for taking people’s work unethically. I did not know any of this at the time. 

However, their whole thing was they wanted to provide porn for women. And I kind of hated that they were saying that anyway. Because what the hell does that even mean? And that’s where I started from. I started from my annoyance at them for using the phrase “Porn for women.” I have a really long history with that. I was a director, my first career. I was a theater director. And my college professor, one of his most successful students ever, had graduated from, I think, NYU and gone off to direct feminist porn. And our friends in college didn’t understand this. They would get so angry. They’d say, “That’s ridiculous. Porn is not the place to be marching around with signs and yelling about women’s rights.” And I remember saying to them, “You don’t understand what that means.” And having a whole argument about porn where women aren’t just a hole. I meant for this post to be about that. Then I started poking around the internet and seeing what people were calling “Porn for women,” and getting angrier and angrier. And seeing any meme with Ryan Gosling is porn for women. Ryan Gosling is great, but Ryan Gosling saying any sentence that starts with the word “Girl,” isn’t going to make me have an orgasm. Ryan Gosling using a vibrator on me might make me have an orgasm.

Dawn Serra: Might. It depends on how he’s using it.

JoEllen Notte: It might just make me go, “Ryan Gosling, just hand me the vibrator.” It was like this giant snowball where I meant to say one thing and realize the world was more ridiculous about this topic than I thought it was.

Dawn Serra: Yes. I could fill an entire hour just talking about the way we categorize porn on mainstream porn sites. And the whole porn for women category is definitely one of those places where I have a few thoughts. I’m just so happy that you named this thing around like romantic comedies and men doing household chores, and men holding babies. I mean, it just feeds the toxic masculinity myths and it feeds the emotional labor that women are required to do. And it also takes away, why wouldn’t someone of any gender enjoy super hardcore rough porn? Why wouldn’t someone in any gender potentially also love really sweet, tender, soft porn? I mean, it’s just like… So that was one of my favorites from you.

JoEllen Notte: So there’s another post further down the list called “Here’s The Thing About Porn Sex Versus Real Sex.” And, it actually grows a bit out of the same myth that men want sex and women want rings and babies and have maybe heard of sex. And I think this is what makes us arrive at, “Well, that’s what happens in porn. But in real life people don’t do that.” Pople do, I don’t know, things that don’t happen in porn, I guess. That always makes me super uncomfortable. Because, A, the deal with porn is that they’re actually having sex. So it’s real sex. And, B, I hate saying anything ever that’s going to other people who are listening to it. And frankly, C, I’m one of the people who’s being othered when you’re like, “That thing that happens in porn never happens in real sex.” So I’m always like, “Well, actually…”

Dawn Serra: Yeah, of course, porn is edited and color-corrected, and there’s multiple takes. So, there is this element of entertainment and manipulation happening. But the sex we see are the human beings having the sex. There’s lights and people around and maybe that’s not happening in your bedroom and obviously what’s also happening in your life has context, which often porn doesn’t have context. But I really like what you’re pointing out about the real sex thing. Well, what is even “real sex?” It’s anything that has that sexy for you and feels like sex.

JoEllen Notte: Yeah, when people– It’s important to understand, yes, people who are porn performers are basically sexual athletes. They can accomplish things that most likely your general average person on any given day probably can’t do and that’s okay. And generally, it’s not a good idea to go for no warm up anal – the way you see it in porn. Most of us can’t squirt across the room the way you see it in porn. However, if I see another Bustle / Jezebel / Jane whatever article being, “And that thing in porn where somebody comes on somebody else, what the hell is that?” I’m going to scream at somebody because that’s sex, okay? I understand that that’s not sex the way you have it, snarky lady. But that’s some people’s sex. There’s those lists where they’re like, “10 Things in Porn That Never Happened in Real Sex.” And then you open it, expecting it to be like, “The Pizza Guy suddenly drops trou,” and actually it’s things like “18 Positions in One Night.” And I’m like, “I mean, sometimes you move a lot.”

Dawn Serra: Right, right. Yeah, I totally agree. So the next time somebody publishes one of those – when we hear everything got burned down, we know JoEllen read it and got really mad.

JoEllen Notte: It’s me being like, “Listen, not only do people come on each other, but we need a name for that.”

Dawn Serra: Fact. And it’s okay if you’re the person who likes that.

JoEllen Notte: One of my goals for 2018 is to have an official name for that act. 

Dawn Serra: Oh, I like it.

JoEllen Notte: A year and a half ago, I ran this idea by Kate Kenfield and I believe she floated frosting as the name.

Dawn Serra: Yeah. I really kind of like that. Like, “I’m just going to give you a good frosting.” I mean, action-oriented and sound sweet. So, good for me.

JoEllen Notte: Yeah, that’s what I’m saying. “I have a frosting fetish.” You say it and it doesn’t sound… Because you say it to people and they’re like, “Bukake?” And I’m like, “No, not what I mean.”

Dawn Serra: “Not that. That’s something else.”

JoEllen Notte: That’s different.

Dawn Serra: You’re right.

JoEllen Notte: Totally its own thing.

Dawn Serra: So before we hopped on, we were talking a little bit about, because of course, you’ve been working on your book, “The Monster Under the Bed,” which is all about sex and depression and the conversations that we’re not having. And you write so much in such beautiful ways around managing life with depression and experiencing sex when you have depression, and also partnering with people who are experiencing depression. You had mentioned that one of the things you’ve really been sitting in is, when it comes to being in relationships with, when one or more people have depression, that one of the things that can really come up is this resentment.

Resentment is something that I work with couples around in so many different ways. And it’s such, such a toxic thing to have in any kind of connection with any kind of human is when we have that underlying resentment and we don’t know that that’s what it is. It can be corrosive. And, I would love to hear what you’ve been thinking about and chewing on as you think about relationships and depression and what this resentment is.

JoEllen Notte: So, as I’ve been working on the book and writing articles and things – the pattern I noticed was that, almost everything I was recommending seemed to be ways to take care of each other, and yourselves, and the relationship that were custom built to avoid resentment. And what really made this clicked for me was, somebody entered my life who was in recovery and I don’t even remember what situation we were dealing with. But they were talking about something and they proposed that we deal with something up front because, in their words, letting it go would would plant seeds for resentment later. Something just clicked in me and I went, “Oh my god. Oh my god, that’s what this whole thing is about.” 

This thing – depression that we look at is this relationship killer. It’s not the nature of depression, yes, a lot of horrible things come with depression. But I see it in my own relationship. My partner has now been with me through two depressive episodes and what I’ve seen is our big “Let’s have a talk” talks all come when I say, “Okay, we’ve got to talk because I think that you’re going to start being angry at me soon if we don’t talk about this,” or “I’m starting to get all resentful about this. So let’s talk about it now.” And it’s all about not letting resentment build up in the relationship. 

JoEllen Notte: When I look at my marriage, I had a marriage that ended and I often say that a lot of what was wrong with that relationship was that it was built around not understanding depression – not understanding what depression does to relationships, to people, to any of it. And I now, still, it’s hard writing the book. It’s hard talking about it in the book because there’s so much resentment around the way we handled things and didn’t handle things. It sounds so hokey to say this, but I’m starting to think that resentment is the actual monster under the bed.

Dawn Serra: Yeah. I agree. And I think what’s so interesting is resentment shows up in these little ways that are pretty easy to dismiss. Sometimes when we get just a little passive aggressive, what’s underneath that is some kind of need is not getting met or we feel like we can’t ask or say something, something didn’t go our way. And when we sit on it without acknowledging it, it goes into our little bucket of resentment. We have these moments where they come up in a variety of situations around, “I thought life would be different.” “I didn’t realize I would have to compromise this much,” or “I never asked for that thing I wanted to and now I feel like I can’t.” Those little things start creating this space where resentment starts taking it more and more space, and driving more of our behavior. And when we don’t know that’s what it’s doing, it just becomes insidious. It becomes almost impossible to create connection when you just reach a certain level of resentment.

JoEllen Notte: It’s a problem when you’re dealing with something like depression in a relationship, because you get these situations where the partner with the depression feels like they can’t ask to have a need met because they’re already asking for so much because of their illness. Or the partner without depression feels like they can’t ask to have a need met because their partner’s already dealing with depression. Their resentment starts to build based on the things they feel like they’re not allowed to do. 

So, a lot of what I talk about in the book is just strategy for getting partners on the same team. Because so much of what’s out there right now in terms of books and stuff for navigating this, A, is 20 years old. I don’t know why this topic hasn’t been written about in so long, but it hasn’t. And, B, partially as a function of it all being 20 years old, comes at it from a very – “So your partner has depression, here’s how you protect yourself from that place.” So it divides a couple and what do you do when you want to conquer people? You divide them. So I want to bring couples together and put depression on the opposite team. Just to clarify, that doesn’t mean you’re going to defeat the depression. It might always be there. I had to say to somebody the other day, when I call my depression chronic I don’t mean it in a Snoop Dogg kind of way.

Dawn Serra: It’s just I was going to have a seat at the table or potentially could always have a seat at the table, and when you’re on that team, you can just find ways to navigate it.

JoEllen Notte: Yeah, exactly.

Dawn Serra: Have you heard about Oschool? It’s this fantastic new online space that’s creating shame-free, pleasure-based sex education through live streaming and moderated chat. You can learn about sex and pleasure, join a diverse community, and share your own experiences. And the best part is, I am one of their pleasure professionals. I’ll be live streaming on the evening of December 29 from 3 to 5pm Pacific. And, starting on January every single Wednesday afternoon, I will be doing live streams with Oschool – all about pop culture. From 6 to 8pm Pacific, Wednesdays starting in January. You can hear all about John Hughes’ films, Ryan Gosling, Game of Thrones, Twilight, Pegging in Pop culture, and Bachelor Nation. We’re going to pick apart love, romance, and what it all means in our lives. So check out Oschool now. It’s free. 

Dawn Serra: I would love to shift gears there was a listener question that piqued your interest a little bit when I was going over the possibilities. And so, if you’re up for it, I would love to roll around in this question with you.

So it comes from someone that says “Sam AKA Am I weird?” Subject line: “I don’t know if I’m weird or not, I need help.” And the message says, 

“Hey, Dawn. I just started binge listening to you and I’m only on episode 98. I can’t stop. I may have an addiction. I love this show. I also don’t know if you discussed this or not, but I have an issue. I don’t like being penetrated. I’m 20 years old, I’m a lesbian, and I don’t know if I’m weird or not. I don’t like being touched or even touching myself underneath my panties. I’ve had a couple of girls finger me, but not for too long and usually I have them tie me up so that I won’t stop them. Don’t get me wrong, I love sex. I love my face being ridden. I love fingering a girl. I love eating girls out. I love being super fucking submissive. I like being tied down and spanked and flogged and smacked around. But I have an issue when it comes to my pussy. It’s gotten to the point where I tell girls that I get off by the pain, which I do sometimes. But still, is there something that I should just get out of my comfort zone or should I leave it alone? I feel weird about it, but I just kind of can’t get over this. It’s a block, I guess. Thanks for listening. Sam.”

Dawn Serra: What are your thoughts?

JoEllen Notte: Okay. First of all, Sam, you are not weird. I guess my first question is always when people ask me, “How do I fix this thing about myself?” Like, do you want to? Are you okay with– Because if you’re okay with not wanting to be penetrated, if you woke up tomorrow and nobody ever wanted to penetrate you, if you woke up tomorrow and were told that you could, for the rest of your life, have all the sex you wanted and everybody would just leave your pussy the hell alone, would that be cool? Would you be excited about that? Because if the answer is yes, then I don’t think you need to do anything. I kind of want to get you a pair of panties that have a “Do Not Enter” sign on.

Dawn Serra: No go.

JoEllen Notte: Because if that’s a boundary for you, that’s legit. I will tell you – I actually felt guilty the other day, because I sent one of my partners an email that was almost “yelly” because while I love penetration, I hate hands on me in any way shape or form. And he was talking about manual stimulation and I was like, “No, no, stop it. Bad.” So, it’s always okay to have those boundaries if that’s your boundary. If it’s a no go, it’s a no go. If it is something you think you want to ultimately change, that gets a little more complicated because it becomes about exploring whether it’s a physical thing – is it a vulva pain type of thing or is it an emotional mental block? And that’s when I feel like you start seeing doctors and things. Do you agree with that?

Dawn Serra: Well, yeah. And I also think, culturally speaking, we’re taught that our pussies are dirty and disgusting and should be hidden at all times, and no one should ever touch them. And if someone touches you down there, it’s bad. So from the youngest of ages, if you’re born with a vulva, it can be so easy to internalize that our pussy is a place that’s weird and gross and bad, and a violation if someone touches us there.

JoEllen Notte: That also, it’s not real sex unless we get penetrated there. God, I hate that world.

Dawn Serra: Yeah, let’s just hold that for a second. I think you’re so right. I mean, if this is a thing of, “I don’t really care, I don’t really want to touch my pussy. I don’t really want to be penetrated. But everyone around me is saying I should.” That’s one of those things where it’s exactly what you said of – just set the boundary. You probably will encounter people who are like, “Well, I’ve never heard of that.” “Well, too fucking bad. This is my thing and my body and if you can deal with it great. If you can’t, then guess what? You don’t get to experience my amazing skills.” I think that examining the why – if this is something that Sam wants to challenge is, what stories have you been told about your pussy? What stories did you hear growing up about who was allowed to touch it and what masturbation meant for girls? 

I think just being curious about those stories might give some input and, at a minimum, just knowing you’re not broken, you’re not doing it wrong. You get to feel however you feel about your body. And it’s really is up to Sam to decide how much time and energy she wants to put into, trying new things and getting curious, and maybe there’s certain contexts where it’s a little less weird than others. But again, that’s by no means something you have to do. It’s only if you feel like that’s a fun adventure for you.

JoEllen Notte: Yeah, absolutely. Don’t let worrying that you’re doing sex wrong, ruin the sex you enjoy.

Dawn Serra: Right, exactly. Because one of the things I love about this email is Sam listed 10 things that she loves doing. So, do those things you love doing and it’s exactly like you said. For me, I love hands. I love hand sex. I love fingering, I love being grabbed, and held. And for you, JoEllen, you’re like, “Fuck you. Get your hands off me.” Neither one of us is better or wrong or weird. It’s just how we exist in our bodies. And so, some people feel weird about their assess being touched and it might genuinely be because it just isn’t enjoyable or it might be because they’ve internalized some of the messages we get culturally about what it means to have your ass touched. So, why wouldn’t the same be true for how you feel about your pussy? It’s like we’re surrounded by these fucked up confusing messages. 

Also Sam is 20, so there’s lots of time to have changing relationship with your body and have new experiences. Right now, it might be the grossest thing ever. But who knows in 5, 10, 20 years, you might be like, “Penetrate me with all the things!”

JoEllen Notte: It’s true. When I was 20, I haven’t figured anything out.

Dawn Serra: Right, exactly. And it sounds like Sam’s figured out some stuff. 

JoEllen Notte: So much that I have figured out then.

Dawn Serra: Yes. I would not have known what a submissive was or that it was okay to eat girls out at 20. So you know, hey, Sam.

JoEllen Notte: You’re doing great. 

Dawn Serra: You’re doing great. Yeah. So thank you for writing in with this question for letting us geek out about it. And just ask yourself some questions about where you are and then let that just be the answer. Even if other people don’t understand it, which is inevitable in any situation in our culture. You do you and that’s good enough.

JoEllen Notte: Yeah, absolutely.

Dawn Serra: So I got one other email from someone named Megan who wants to know if she’s using a bullet vibe wrong. Would you help me answer it? 

JoEllen Notte: Absolutely. 

Dawn Serra: Okay, because since you’ve reviewed so many toys, I thought you might be a great person to have on this one. So Megan writes, 

“Is there a wrong way to use a bullet? My meta was talking to me about not really enjoying them in her, because she prefers clitoral stimulation. Aren’t bullets intended for clitoral use? I have bullet buddies in the works and I’ve always enjoyed using them on my clit. But now wondering, am I doing this wrong? How many ways can you use a bullet? Megan.”

JoEllen Notte: I would only ever use one cliterally. But also I’m also a big toy person. So, bullets aren’t really part of my jam. I think there were very few I would try to use internally. Because they tend to be super small. There is a part of me that’s wondering if there also might be a little confusion on the definition of bullet happening here, because there are those bigger smoothie vibes that are also confusingly bullet-shaped. Do you know what I mean? Those plastic ones? 

Dawn Serra: Yep.

JoEllen Notte: So, I would not say anyone is using a bullet wrong in this scenario. But I recommend them for clitoral stimulation. Don’t let anyone shove one in their butt. Other than that, I think you’re good.

Dawn Serra: Right, I agree. Yeah, they do make vibrating butt plugs that look a little bit like a bullet with a flared base like BeVibe does that. But, yes, please don’t put anything in the butt that doesn’t have a flared base or a big handle. And I agree, I’ve used bullets many times in the past. I actually don’t have any right now. But in the past, I have, for me, the bullets I used had he cord down to a handheld control.

JoEllen Notte: I always forget about those.

Dawn Serra: Right. This was early ‘90s. So, I would use the bullet mostly on my clitoris. But every once in a while, I would slide it inside and then use my hands on myself, because it had the cord so that I could just retrieve it. But, I think as long as you’re doing things that are safe for your body, I mean, you can kind of use toys however the hell you want to. I mean, who’s to say you can’t use any of your toys as a massager or on your nipples or whatevs.

JoEllen Notte: I use bullet vibes to clear my sinuses when I get cold. 

Dawn Serra: How do you do that? 

JoEllen Notte: Oh my god, I’ll send you – there’s a post on my site called “Lube in My Hair: Sex Geek Life Hacks.” There’s a tutorial on using a bullet vibe to clear your sinuses. 

Dawn Serra: Oh, look at that. See? Now we’re all going to have to go check that out because that sounds like a pretty awesome life hack. 

JoEllen Notte: Yeah, I learned it from Krista Ann.

Dawn Serra: So, Megan, bullets – I think you do you and your meta does whatever they do. And I mean, it might be kind of cool if your meta was like, “I prefer clitoral stimulation. And my bullet doesn’t offer that.” Why not have a conversation of like, “Oh, I use bullets for that. I’d love to see your toy,” and just learn more – if you want to have that kind of conversation. But, I don’t think anybody’s doing it wrong. So if that’s how she uses it or how they are using it and how it feels for them then they get to do it that way.

Well, JoEllen, would you tell everybody how they can stay in touch with you and find you online because, of course, I’m going to link to a bajillion things that we’ve talked about today, but just in case someone’s listening and they don’t have time to go click the links where can they find you? 

JoEllen Notte: You can find me at my site redheadbedhead.com and you can find me on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr – basically all the social medias at JoEllen Notte.

Dawn Serra: Yay!

JoEllen Notte: Yay!

Dawn Serra: Thank you so much for doing this with me and helping us hear some of your favorites from 2017. I’m hoping everyone will listen and then let me know what their favorites for 2017 were because you inspired this. So, thank you for coming on the show. 

JoEllen Notte: Thank you so much for having me.

Dawn Serra: You’re so welcome. And to everybody listening, if you want to share your favorites of 2017 – your favorite books, your favorite toys, of course, feel free to comment on social media and/or write to me with any questions or feedback. I will be sharing some of my favorites for 2017 with Patreon supporters of the show. So if you go to patreon.com/sgrpodcast and support the show at any level, you’ll get access to a few of my favorites for the year. Thank you so much, JoEllen, for being here. And to everybody listening, I hope you have a wonderful week of holiday season stuff. And I will talk to you soon.

P.S. Don’t forget that I love hearing from you. I have some incredible educators lined up over the next couple of weeks, folks from Oschool who are doing live streaming, along with me, Andre Shakti and Kate Kenfield. Plus, authors, thought leaders, YouTubers, and I want your questions so that I can roll around in exactly what you need help with with all of these incredible people. So head to dawnserra.com. There’s a contact page where you can send in your question and stories and comments. You can do it anonymously, too, if you’re shy or you don’t want to let anybody know who you are. So please head there. It’s like a Christmas present every single time I get one of your emails. I love hearing from you. Thanks for listening.