[image via Flickr]

Other people’s dreams are never interesting…except when they’re about sex. Each week, our dream analyst Lauri Loewenberg tells one lucky reader what their dirty dream means. Got a dream you want Lauri to analyze? Click here to submit it. This week, a reader asks Lauri:

I keep having this dream and my ex is in it. Same dream just different places. It’s always with him and his sister. I always end up walking into them. I talk to the sister but he is quiet and walks away. I had a different dream where the same thing happened but this time I ran away when his sister wanted us to talk. This dream always comes back. He and I do still talk and we’ve remained friends and there are still feelings between us. I don’t know if this has anything to do with it . Help please.

Lauri: I believe it has everything to do with it! Our dreams are most often connected to unresolved issues. It seems to me that the lack of communication between the two of you in these dreams is a direct result of something that is going unsaid between the two of you in waking life. And that unsaid something is most likely the feelings you both still hold for each other.

It’s interesting that he is the one that always walks away and I think it is because of one of two reasons: he’s the one that ended the relationship OR you feel he is the one that should bring up what has been unsaid all this time… and he never does. However, in the latest of this series of dreams you RUN away. AY yi yi mija! I think that is a good indication that deep down, you know it is best that a romantic relationship with this boy should not be rekindled. Remember, he’s an ex for a reason.

The dreams will stop when some sort of finality is made. Initiate the conversation and get that closure you need or decide to close your heart to him so you can open it to someone you can have a lasting relationship with.

Want to be able to figure out your own dreams every morning? Lauri’s latest book, Dream On It: Unlock Your Dreams Change Your Life, will give you the tools you need to become a Dream Expert too! Check out all of Lauri’s books here.

MORE FROM EMandLO.com:

• How to Buy a Sex Toy (With No Buyer’s Remorse)
• 50 Shades of Play: A Guide to the Toys in “Fifty Shades of Grey”
• LELO’s Luna Beads Noir – Very Cool, Very Sexy, Very “Fifty”

photo via Flickr

Last week, we were on Kiss FM in Toledo promoting 150 Shades of Play and fielding listeners’ questions. There were some good ones we wanted to share them here on EMandLO.com this week. So each day we’re featuring a quick question with some lightening advice from yours truly. Today’s question:

How do you keep things new and exciting and not get into a routine?

One of the best ways to keeps things exciting in the bedroom is to keep things exciting outside of the bedroom. Couples who continue to experience new and novel things together find they can keep that romantic connection stronger. Even better if those new activities are sometimes adreneline rushes, which can really bond a couple. You can even use going to the gym together as a form of foreplay: get the heart pounding, the blood flowing, the endorphins going so when you get home your ready to jump into the shower…together!

More from EMandLO.com:

• 5 Ways That Getting Kinky Can Improve Your Relationship
• Dear Em & Lo, Should I End This Relationship?
• Wise Guys: What’s the Best Relationship Advice You Ever Got?

photo via Flickr

Last week, we were on Kiss FM in Toledo promoting 150 Shades of Play and fielding listeners’ questions. There were some good ones we wanted to share them here on EMandLO.com this week. So each day we’re featuring a quick question with some lightening advice from yours truly. Today’s question:

I would like to feel sexier while pregnant…any ideas?

Have your baby and then send them off to kindergarten. By then you should be finally feeling sexier.

Seriously, some women feel great when they’re pregnant, and others feel awful. If you’re more in the latter category, you’ve just got to try to embrace the crazy miracle of it all: revel in having new curves, appreciate all the extra blood flow in your nether regions that can actually increase your libido during pregnancy, and feel the power and beauty of the amazing life-giving force within you!

And definitely do pregnancy appropriate exercises — that’s going to keep you feeling much better throughout the pregnancy, and the better you feel the more likely you are to keep wanting sex.

More from EMandLO.com:

• Dear Dr. Joe: Can Pre-Ejaculate Get a Woman Pregnant?
• Rosemary’s Baby Could Have Been Made in 2012
• Dear Dr. Kate: Can You Get Pregnant Without Intercourse?

photo via flickr

We get a lot of advice questions coming in at EMandLO.com, but sadly, we just can’t answer them all. Which is why, once a week, we turn to you to decide how best to advise a reader. Make your call on the letter below by leaving your advice in the comments section. 

Submit Your Own Question to EMandLO.comTry Our New
*PRIVATE* Advice Service!

Help! I’ve been married to my husband 5 years (6 years dating) and our sex life …well, let’s just say I don’t think I can ever win. #1 we have sex once every 3 months…if I’m lucky. He’s always tired, headache, or any other number of reasons why he can’t. When we do have sex it’s in one position only, no foreplay, and once he’s “done”…he rolls over and goes to sleep.

Now, you have to understand that I want sex everyday all day, but it’s been so long we’ve struggled with this that I’m to the point I don’t look at him “like that” any more. I think if he came in right now naked, cock swinging…I could walk away….easily (because I know how it’s going to end).

I love my husband but I don’t know how to get things back on track anymore. I’ve talked to him about this so many times and he just says he’s going to “work on it.” He doesn’t want to talk about it or get any help. He says he loves me, but I feel it’s more like a “friendship” love more than anything else.

I also have to tell you when we were dating it was a long distance relationship, he is a Marine and was stationed in all kind of places. When we did see each other we couldn’t keep our hands off of each other. I told him so many times about my sex appetite and he never had a problem with it….when we got married….immediatly I could see the difference in our appetites and he immediately stopped trying to “impress” in the bedroom.

We have 2 children (the first one we planned and for 1 month had tons of sex…as soon as I found out i was prego…it stopped). Our 2nd happened when I was drinking and basically jumped him….I found out I was prego and didn’t have sex for about 10 months. I’m so tired. He’s a great dad, provider and friend. But our lack of intimacy is killing this relationship and he doesn’t even acknowledge it. I don’t know what to do. Please help.

– Sexless in Seattle

What should S.I.S. do? Let her know in the comments section below.

MORE LIKE THIS ON EMandLO.com:

• Do Men Want Less Sex as a Relationship Progresses?
• How Can a Woman Enjoy Lots of Sex Without Shame?
• Can a Relationship Work If One Person Is More Into It?

Lelo’s Etherea Silk Cuffs

Last week, we were on Kiss FM in Toledo promoting 150 Shades of Play and fielding listeners’ questions. There were some good ones we wanted to share them here on EMandLO.com this week. So each day we’re featuring a quick question with some lightening advice from yours truly. Today’s question:

How do I go about asking my husband to try something new…like toys, whips, bondage? Where should I go to buy them, a local store or online?

Start small — you don’t want to spring a whole drawer full of intimidating new toys like nipple clamps and whips on him. Go with something simple, like a cute little pair of fuzzy velcro cuffs. Put it in the positive: “I’d love it if we tried this” and bring it up in bed when make it part of the pillow talk — that’s a time he’ll probably be more amenable to new sexy ideas.

And include him in your exploration of products — if he’s shy or hesitant then a bricks & mortar store might be too much for him, so stick with a reputible place with high quality products and good information like GoodVibes.com, Babeland.com or Lelo.com.
GoodVibes is actually selling a nice little kit with our book, some cute cuffs, a beautiful blindfold, and a nice feather tickler — it’s a great way to ease into more daring things.

150 Shades of Play: A Beginner’s Guide to Kink  is on sale now!

photo via flickr

Other people’s dreams are never interesting…except when they’re about sex. Each week, our dream analyst Lauri Loewenberg tells one lucky reader what their dirty dream means. Got a dream you want Lauri to analyze? Click here to submit it. This week, a reader asks Lauri:

Hello, I’m single, celibate, and have been for seven months. I fear intimacy with someone who isn’t right for me or doesn’t want to commit, and recently I had two bizarrely weird sex dreams.

In the first I am in a Garden of Eden type place. It’s a mild summer dusk, the sky is a very pale blue, and the Garden is lush with green grass, broad trees, and abundant foliage, but everything is covered with fresh, green Eucalyptus leaves. A Facebook friend who’s usually a grouch is there being encouraging, smiling and good natured. I am hungry so she suggests I eat, but all I can see is an eaten apple. I look again and that too is covered with Eucalyptus leaves. She suggests getting something from a tree that’s enclosed by a picket fence. I walk in and the Eucalyptus grass stirs. A fat green snake, covered in Eucalyptus, hisses and lunges for me. I scream and wake up.

In the second dream I am lying naked on a luxury upgraded version of my bed. My mouth is open and pouty. I look great and am horny. My hands reach down towards my genitals. My pubic hair is groomed but fluffy. As I am about to masturbate, I pull out juicy, ripe peaches from my genitals. It doesn’t hurt pulling them out. I try to again and this time I pull out cream cheese. Green salad leaves start growing from there as well.

It’s so confusing, what does this all mean please?

Lauri:  I have to tell you, I absolutely adore these dreams! The imagery and especially the messages are fantastic! Making the decision to remain celibate until you find that special someone you know won’t disrespect you or take advantage of you is a big deal! And in this day and age that is something to be commended… yet at the same time, in this day and age that is something that will be difficult to do. But fear not! These dreams are not only confirming that you have made the right choice for yourself, they are also giving you some very clever encouragement.

The setting of your first dream is the Garden of Eden, the most famous place of temptation in history! And boy, howdy, are you going to be finding yourself in places of temptation as you try to stick to your guns! But notice how everything is covered in leaves. I believe that is a reminder that when you gave into temptation in the past, someone would “leave” you. Yes, dreams loooove to use puns. If you can find one in your dream, you have found part of the message.

You are hungry in the dream because you are hungry for a lasting, healthy, trusting relationship in real life. The eaten apple you find symbolizes how you feel about letting others take a bite out of you in the past. You don’t want to be that girl that is considered all used up. I think your typically grouchy friend who is unusually friendly and encouraging is how your dreaming mind wants you to be: kind and supportive to yourself rather than angry at yourself over the past.

The snake that comes at you at the end of your first dream is the absolute perfect symbol for the temptation you are going to have to face in the coming months. The snake not only represents the temptation that Eve fell victim to, but it also represents the tempting phallus -0 or rather phalli — that you will likely be confronted with and must resist until you finally encounter that friendly, trustworthy phallus that is out there somewhere.

Since the first dream is all about the phalli you are trying to resist, this second dream is all about “the lady garden” you must protect! Yes, you can certainly enjoy it all you like and that will certainly help you to resist falling prey to a smooth talking snake with ill intensions! But what’s more, I think this dream is trying to show you the value of what you’ve got going on down there. The peaches represent how juicy, delicious, and tempting it is for men but at the same time, it is a fruit that they must labor for and should not be given away willy nilly!

The cream cheese is… well, duh! But it could also be a warning not to spread yourself around too thinly as may have been the case in the past. And finally, the growing salad leaves, I believe are all about how a “healthy” relationship can grow and flourish. And ultimately, that’s what you are after and it seems all the delicious symbols in this dream are giving you the recipe for how to acheive just that!

Want to be able to figure out your own dreams every morning? Lauri’s latest book, Dream On It: Unlock Your Dreams Change Your Life, will give you the tools you need to become a Dream Expert too! Check out all of Lauri’s books here.

photo via Flickr
Submit Your Own Question to EMandLO.comTry Our New
*PRIVATE* Advice Service!

Hi Em & Lo,

I’m with my husband thirteen years, only married for two. In all that time I’ve had maybe four orgasms. He can’t get me off, but he also told me before he doesn’t like me touching myself during sex (I think he takes it as a criticism), and wishes I could climax the “normal” way (which hurt a lot).

Once he’s had his orgasm, it’s over. And if I say “What about me?” he’ll say sorry and start to touch me, but by then I know his heart’s not in it, so when I say “Never mind,” he says okay and stops instantly. He’s never said, “No I want you to get yours!” I’ve told him many times over the years how frustrating it is, but nothing changes.

Now I cringe when he touches me. He’s realizing now its dangerous, and he’s started trying more, but it feels too late. I dont find him sexy, though he’s handsome. And now I’m attracted to a man who thinks I’m sex on legs (he’s wrong, but still!). I’d resigned myself to the sex because my husband is such a good man and our relationship has been really good apart from this, but now I think I could have a relationship with this other man that’s caring and passionate. What should I do?

– Mrs. S. Frustrated

Dear Mrs. S. Frustrated,

One short letter like yours isn’t really enough for us to tell you whether or not you should leave your husband, so instead we are just going to make a few points on the subject in the hope that they will help you make a conclusion about your marriage:

We answered a reader’s advice question on small penises almost four years ago and it’s still the most popular article on our site! 591 comments and counting! We can’t tell you how much letters we get from guys asking how they can safely increase the size of their penis. So we shouldn’t have been too surprised when Cosmopolitan magazine recently asked for our input on a post about jelquing (though, for the record, we don’t really think they should have actually included instructions for an activity that can’t help and can definitely hurt).

We were quoted only briefly in the Cosmo article, so we thought we’d post for you a few of our extended thoughts on the subject of penises, great and small.

Penis Enlargement Surgery

Penis enlargement surgery is the only way to get a bigger boat, permanently. But this usually just increases the flaccid length and width, and that’s generally not the point, right? Also, it’s surgery. On his penis. It’s expensive, it’s dangerous, and it doesn’t improve sex. Don’t do it!

RELATED: What’s the Deal With Men and Their Penises?

Jelquing

Jelquing is one of the many, many, many techniques or products claiming to increase penis size that has gained widespread interest thanks to the internet — and, in particular, thanks to spammers! The short story is: It doesn’t work. More importantly, it could do some serious damage to a man’s number one guy. Here’s a good rule of thumb: If someone tells you something will increase penis size, they’re lying. Let’s say that one more time, shall we? If someone tells you something will increase penis size, they’re lying. 

Penis Pumps

Sure, penis pumps can temporarily increase penis size — because they give the guy an erection, duh. And some guys do report that a penis-pumped erection is a little more impressive than a regular one — that’s because the pump literally forces blood into the penis. But after using the pump, it can be harder to ejaculate. Also, pumps can cause bruising (yowza!).

Kegels!

Here’s the good news — something that actually can improve the strength of a dude’s erection: kegel exercises! Seriously, they’re not just for the ladies. Check out our how-go guide for kegels for dudes.

Put Down the “Penis Enlargement Cream” and Get in Shape, Dude

In general, good cardiovascular health will improve a guy’s erection, because they’re both about good bloodflow.

RELATED: Why Don’t I Stand at Attention Anymore?

Put a Ring On It

Some guys find that their erections are a little more impressive when they wear a love ring (a.k.a. cock ring). But you’ve got to be safe when using this kind of ring! No solid metal rings — make sure the ring is something that can be easily removed, e.g. a stretchy silicone ring or a velcro ring. We’re big fans of couples’ rings like the Tor 2 by Lelo, which offers a little vibrating action for the woman, too.

RELATED: Is a Saucy Love Ring a Good Gift for a Dude?

People for the Ethical Treatment of Penises,

Em & Lo

RELATED ARTICLES ON EMandLO.com:

• How to Have Sex with a Small Penis
• Do Men Know Whether Their Friends Are Circumcised?
• Do Men Check Out Each Other’s Penises?
• Is My BF Too Big for Intercourse?
• Will a Big Too Make My Boyfriend Seem Too Small?
• My Boyfriend Is Too Big for Me
• Comment: Small Sexy Bit Are Loveable!
• Comment: It’s the Little Things!
• Comment: Love a Man As He Is

photo via Wiki Commons

We know that it’s pretty traditional on Valentine’s Day to share a candle-lit dinner which concludes with some kind of dessert involving chocolate and strawberries, and then you go home for face-holding, teary-eyed, missionary sex together. Well, in case you hadn’t noticed, we’re not exactly the traditional type around here. So here are five better ways to spend Valentine’s night in bed, inspired by our new book 150 Shades of Play:

1. Find something in your house to spank each other with — a slipper, a ping-pong paddle, a wooden spoon, a spatula. Just remember to stick to spanking fleshy parts only (and if you have no fleshy parts, go back for a second helping of that strawberry and chocolate dessert). Here are some more spanking tips.
2. Talk dirtier than you ever have before. If you’ve never talked dirty, then try just narrating what’s happening as it’s happening — here are a few other tips on talking dirty without being dirty. If you’re a dirty talk pro, then make it your goal to go one step further. Make your partner blush! (FYI, check out our Wise Guys on dirty talk.)
3. Experiment with sensory deprivation. Blindfold your partner and then make them guess what you’re touching them with, or make them wear headphones so they can’t tell when you’re getting close.
4. Share a fantasy with your partner. This will be a little easier if you’ve had a few glasses of wine during your candlelit dinner. In fact, if you can do this without the aid of a little Dutch courage, then you’re a stronger person than either of us! Tell your partner something you’ve always wanted to try, or something you never want to try but you still lover fantasizing about. Before you tell them, make them promise to tell you something, too. Hint: It’s Valentine’s Day, people! Make sure your partner has a starring role in this particular fantasy.
5. Fine, go ahead and do it missionary style. But here’s a way to turn up the heat in this position: Finally figure out the Coital Alignment Technique. Here’s why:  full-body contact with a focus on the clitoris and a Buddhist-like repetition of steps that may very well get her closer to Zen (i.e. orgasm) better than any other hands-free intercourse position out there. Aw yeah.

For many many more ideas on how to spice up your Valentine’s night, anniversary night, birthday night, every other Sunday night…check out our new book 150 Shades of Play: A Beginner’s Guide to Kink.

Siri by Lelo

Other people’s dreams are never interesting…except when they’re about sex. Each week, our dream analyst Lauri Loewenberg tells one lucky reader what their dirty dream means. Got a dream you want Lauri to analyze? Click here to submit it. This week, a reader asks Lauri:

Last night I had a dream I was at work, talking to this girl I’m not very close with. In fact, our conversations are generally short and kind of awkward. Anyways in the dream we started discussing masturbation and such and I asked her if we had vibrators in the store, to which she replied ‘yes’ and walked me to the aisle where we have vibrators?! And so I bought one and put it in my car, and as I was walking to my car I was desperately trying to hide it. But I also never used it in the dream. What does this mean?

Lauri: Masturbation dreams are usually about the need to give our selves more attention and appreciation in waking life. Are you uncomfortable taking compliments or showing off your skills? Do you do too much for others and not enough for yourself? Do you feel awkward when you are given praise? That may be what the co-worker represents.

Purchasing the vibrator suggests part of you is ready to start giving yourself some more me time, not necessarily in the bedroom or the shower but rather in being kinder and more forgiving of yourself perhaps, or in taking better care of yourself or even being more willing to show off your skills, looks or assets.

However, the way you try to hide It on the way to the car makes me think that either a part of you still is not comfortable with the idea of giving yourself more attention, credit, etc. OR there is something else in your waking life that you are trying to keep to yourself, something that maybe you fear will make you appear selfish or self-absorbed. I think the message of the dream is that it’s okay to do what pleases you and to be proud of yourself… it feels good!

Want to be able to figure out your own dreams every morning? Lauri’s latest book, Dream On It: Unlock Your Dreams Change Your Life, will give you the tools you need to become a Dream Expert too! Check out all of Lauri’s books here.

MORE FROM EMandLO.com:

• How to Buy a Sex Toy (With No Buyer’s Remorse)
• 50 Shades of Play: A Guide to the Toys in “Fifty Shades of Grey”
• LELO’s Luna Beads Noir – Very Cool, Very Sexy, Very “Fifty”