When the sex life of a healthy couple becomes bland, adding a few toys is a popular, yet taboo option and can possibly make a bed into a fantasy land with infinite opportunities.
“Anything used to heighten the senses can be considered a sex toy,” said sex expert and author Sari Locker in her book “The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Amazing Sex.” “Jump in a bathtub full of gelatin, lick champagne off each other, light incense sticks, tickle him with a feather — anything.”
The less creative sexual adventurers can head to a local sex shop for special toys that are proven effective by their makers’ tests, and approved as safe by the Food and Drug Administration.
Some people think sex toys are taboo and for perverted people, but board-certified clinical sexologist Michael Ra Bouchard M.A., Ph.D., said that these toys can be healthy as well as fun for a couple.
“Aside from the additional sexual pleasures, many couples report that they develop a sense of trust and bonding that often increases their intimacy and closeness both inside and outside the bedroom,” he said. “Knowing that we can trust our partner to respect our emotional and sexual needs and boundaries, and that our partner trusts us to do the same for them, can be a potent force in deepening love and affection.”
Sex toys have been around for hundreds of years, but in the past few decades they have become safe and accepted for mass consumption.
There is a toy for anything imaginable, including sex swings, strap-on penises, and a new device called “The Love Machine.”
The box says the toy, a rotating mechanism with six “appendages” in a line, is about three feet long by two feet wide and has three different multi-speed “strokers and thrusters,” and three different multi-speed “vibration and pulsation massagers.”
The included dildos and suction tubes can be arranged in any order and detached for optional use without the machine. This particular product runs for around $395 at Hearts on Airline Highway.
This toy, like most on the market, gives the option of use by one person or use with any number of people.
“You could have a guy or a girl on there, two girls and a guy, any number of people can get freaky,” said Alexis Wilson, who has worked at Hearts for three years.
Hearts sells a lot of revealing clothing, mostly lingerie, as well as novelty items, sex toys, and pornographic material.
“Since we only have clothes in the store window, a lot of people who come in are shocked by what they see in the back,” Wilson said.
Wilson said vibrators are the most common toys the store sells, with the Silver Bullet and the Jackrabbit styles being the most popular.
The Silver Bullet is the classic vibrator, she said, because it is light weight, remote controlled and smaller than a chicken egg, very reasonably priced under $10.
The Jackrabbit is a new item that Wilson said is gaining widespread notoriety for its multiple, simultaneous actions. The tip vibrates and spins, the shaft contains small beads that jump around like popcorn to stimulate the inner wall of the vagina, and a bunny’s head protrudes from the main portion and moves and vibrates to stimulate the clitoris at the same time.
There are many types of dildos and vibrators, including glass dildos, life-like dildos with “cyberskin,” a realistic texture, inflatable dildos, and dildos that ejaculate.
“Girls go crazy for those things,” said Daniel Carlton, an employee at Adult Video on Court Street in Port Allen, which sells toys along with a wide variety of erotic videos and DVDs. “Some girls would rather stay at home with their vibrators than spend the night with a man.”
Some dildos have suction cups at the base so that the user can stick it on any surface and others have tiny video cameras inside to tape the action.
According to author Betty Dodson, Ph.D., some women have different reactions with vibrators than they had expected.
“If your clitoris is becoming numb from your vibrator, you’re applying too much pressure,” she wrote in her book “Sex For One.” “You’ll get the most pleasure if you vary the pressure and move the vibrator around.”
Dildos are not just for girls anymore. There are hollow fake penises that men can wear if they have trouble maintaining an erection during sex.
Inflatable dolls also are for the men as well as “pocket vaginas,” which are lifelike vagina molds made with cyberskin attached to a tube that fits in the pocket of a pair of trousers.
“They sell pretty well here,” Carlton said. “You can’t get any sexually transmitted diseases from a fake vagina.”
Other popular sex products are massage oils, edible body paints and underwear, and lubricants.
Wilson said lubricants are used to make tight spaces like the vagina and anus a bit looser and allow the applicant to feel less pain during intercourse.
There are some common problems with lubrication though, and the user must check the warnings on the product box before use.
According to a 2003 article in “Redbook,” a magazine focused on women’s lives, many lubricants can contain irritating perfumes and other chemicals that can change the balance of good and bad bacteria in a vagina, which can lead to yeast infections.
Though there are some setbacks, lubrications have many good qualities, like making unchartered territory easily accessible and eliminating the normal sound created by air in the vagina being pushed around by a man’s penis during intercourse, according to sex expert and author Pepper Schwartz, Ph.D.
“Lubrication makes everything slick, so as the penis moves, it can’t create air pockets,” she wrote in her book, “The Lifetime Book of Love and Sex Quizzes.”
Wilson said a popular product in Hearts is the flavored warming massage oil.
“You can rub it on the person’s body, and as you rub it in, the oil gets warm,” she said. “Then, if you blow on it, it gets hotter.”
Another hot product at Hearts is a wide selection of costumes, which usually sell around Halloween and other holidays. Wilson said holidays provide the only real increase in sales revenue during a year.
“People come in here to buy toys and outfits for every holiday including Mother’s Day and Christmas,” she said. “They like any excuse to come out and buy some naughty stuff.”
Because many people are embarrassed to purchase adult items or even go into a sex store, there are many sites on the Internet that put a premium on privacy.
For example, www.a-womans-touch.com, operated by a physician and a social worker, offers a large amount of playthings and personal information never is shared or sold to other Web sites. Also, all packages are mailed without telltale labels or markings in a discreet package so strangers will not know what was ordered.