E-Book Overview
This fascinating and comprehensive book is the first to explore the complex biological process leading to orgasm. Here, sexuality researcher and nurse Beverly Whipple, coauthor of the international best-selling book The G Spot and Other Discoveries about Human Sexuality, joins neuroscientist Barry R. Komisaruk and endocrinologist Carlos Beyer-Flores to view orgasm through the lenses of behavioral neuroscience along with cognitive and physiological sciences. The authors explain how and why orgasms happen, why they fail to happen, and what brain and body events are put into play at the moment of orgasm. No topic is left unexplored, as the book describes the genital-brain connection, how the brain produces orgasms, how aging affects orgasm, and the effects of prescription medication, street drugs, hormones, disorders, and diseases. Covering every type of sexual peak experience in women and men?from intense to phantom -- this informative and entertaining work illuminates the hows, whats, and wherefores of orgasm.
E-Book Content
The Science of Orgasm Orgasm Barry R. Komisaruk, Ph.D. Carlos Beyer-Flores, Ph.D. Beverly Whipple, Ph.D., R.N. The Johns Hopkins University Press Baltimore x © 2006 The Johns Hopkins University Press All rights reserved. Published 2006 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper 987654321 The Johns Hopkins University Press 2715 North Charles Street Baltimore, Maryland 21218-4363 www.press.jhu.edu Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Komisaruk, Barry R. The science of orgasm / Barry R. Komisaruk, Carlos Beyer-Flores, Beverly Whipple. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 0-8018-8490-x (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Orgasm. I. Beyer, Carlos. II. Whipple, Beverly. III. Title. ra788.k66 2006 613.9v6—dc22 2006013040 A catalog record for this book is available from the British Library. I think the most unfair thing about life is the way it ends. I mean, life is tough. It takes up a lot of your time. What do you get at the end of it? A death. What’s that, a bonus? I think the life cycle is all backwards. You should die first, get it out of the way. Then you live in an old age home. You get kicked out when you’re too young, you get a gold watch, you go to work. You work forty years until you’re young enough to enjoy your retirement. You go to college, you do drugs, alcohol, you party, you get ready for high school. You go to school, you become a kid, you play, you have no responsibilities, you become a little baby, you go back into the womb, you spend your last nine months floating . . . You finish off as a gleam in somebody’s eye! —Sean Morey This page intentionally left blank Contents Preface ix 1/ Definitions of Orgasm 1 2/ Different Nerves, Different Orgasmic Feelings 7 3/ Bodily Changes at Orgasm 16 4/ Are Orgasms Good for Your Health? 45 5/ When Things Go Wrong 53 6/ Diseases That Affect Orgasm 77 7/ How Aging Affects Orgasm 88 8/ Pleasure and Satisfaction with and without Orgasm 97 9/ The Nervous System Connection 101 viii Contents 10/ The Neurochemistry of Orgasm 112 11/ Effects of Medication 123 12/ Counteracting Medication Side Effects 140 13/ Recreational Stimulant Drugs and Orgasm 145 14/ Depressant Drugs and Orgasm 150 15/ Herbal Therapies 156 16/ Hormones and Orgasm 162 17/ Mechanism of Action of Sex Steroids 188 18/ Nonreproductive Hormones in Orgasm 194 19/ Atypical Orgasms 199 20/ The Genital-Brain Connection 226 21/ Orgasms after Brain Surgery or Brain Damage 240 22/ Imaging the Brain during Sexual Arousal and Orgasm 250 23/ The Cast of Characters How Brain Components Contribute to Orgasm 267 2