I grew up in the 1950s in Calvinistic South Africa. It was a very straight-laced and conservative place — still is, in many ways. My mom was very religious, and sex, in any form, was not a subject of discussion. At school the word "sex" was never used. We would talk of "gender" or, maybe, male and female. A form might ask what your "gender" was. At least the modern forms say "sex" — to which I always want to respond, "Yes, please!"
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erection
Sex: Yes, please!
Lifelong quest
My nearly 9 years of masturbation have been plagued with misinformation. I keenly recall one of my early experiences: I was watching Saturday Night Live, and Dr. Joycelyn Elders was being portrayed, just after all the hoopla over her now-infamous remarks. At that time, I had just turned 12 and had been getting erections for some time, but was still uncertain exactly what they were good for other than embarrassment. Speaking with my parents on anything sex-related was, and still is, difficult.
Penis guitar
I first learned about "playing with myself" when I was 6 or 7 years old. Before that I had always "played with myself" like any young boy does, but I had never really thought about it. Then one day I started thinking about it. I was at my best friend's house, and we were playing hide-and-seek with his neighbor. We bored of it, so we hid in his woodshed and locked the door. The neighbor soon tired of looking and went back to his house.
Midnight watch
My first orgasm occurred at age ten when I was climbing a metal pole on a playground. I had been pulling myself up with my arms and then tightening my legs around the pole while I slipped my arms up and continued climbing. When I got near the top of the pole, I experienced the wonderful, thrilling feeling of my first orgasm. I held on to the pole very tightly while it happened, and then I slid back down and sat on the corner of a sandbox to think about the experience. I was very excited by the discovery.
Couch car
To begin with, I am a 16-year-old male, so I haven't got much to tell. I'm sure my parents must know I masturbate, because they joke around with me about masturbation and the myths and call me names, and I think it's a good thing they know. I'm sure my dad, uncles, and male cousins have masturbated before. So I feel no shame, embarrassment, or guilt in masturbating.
Porky's
I've always been a person who thinks too much and concentrates too hard. This can become vexing, because you can never relax. I would build up huge amounts of stress. Seeing as I was the oldest of three brothers and had only an older sister, I had no way of stumbling across pornography or talking to a sibling about masturbation.
Dizzy Drollers
It all started in 2nd grade, at around age 9. Somehow, I got a hold of two "Dizzy Drollers," as they were called — cute little psychedelic-colored pens, which an ordinary kid would have used to draw jaggy red or blue lines on a piece of paper. In retrospect, the small vibrating phallic-shaped "pens" could be easily called and sold as vibrators, if it weren't for the coloring tip (which was removable, by the way). It didn't take me long to get bored by the seemingly random lines it created, so I started looking for other ways to use it.
15 strokes per minute
I can remember my first time exactly. It was June 7, 1997. It was finals week at my junior high, and each day of that week was a half day, so I was home early. I decided to get online to see what was going on. The strange thing was I had seen some movies that used masturbation humor. I felt obligated to laugh when I heard these jokes, since everyone else around me was laughing. Quite frankly, though, I had no idea what masturbation was, and I had no idea why everyone thought it was so funny. I got on a search engine, typed in "masturbation," and off I went.
Erotic research
I am a heterosexual Caucasian male living in Upstate New York. I discovered masturbation accidentally. Around age 12, when my penis began to grow, my erections became more frequent and started to capture my attention. I initially wasn't concerned about my penis size; I was in the early stages of exploring my sexuality. I would stare in the mirror with my penis erect at a right angle to my body, just admiring the beauty of the whole experience. My erections were very hard, but they were still only about 4 inches.
Hand jive
When I was growing up, in the early 1960s, no one talked about masturbation — at least not that I was aware of. I had no older brothers, older cousins, or even older friends to put me wise. I attended a small country school, where unless you were a jock you did not even participate in the kind of athletics that required daily showers at school. So I was isolated from "man talk." No wonder I didn't learn to stroke it until I was about 14.