THE GREAT FAKING-IT DEBATE – Sept 8^th 2006

 

Fay Weldon claims that faking orgasms will make women happy. A simple way to get a good night’s sleep, or a dangerous betrayal of womanhood?

 

 

Tess Stimson, 38, is a novelist with three children aged 12, nine and four. She says:

 

There’s a simple reason women find the orgasm-in-the-restaurant scene in When Harry Met Sally so hilarious – it strikes a chord. Unless you’re exceptionally lucky or unreasonably honest, at some time in your life, you’ve faked it.

 

Perhaps you’re tired. Or he’s useless. But he’s been slaving away at the launch pad for ages and you’re still not getting lift-off. You don’t want to hurt his feelings, but you’re beginning to lose all feeling below the waist. At times like this, faking it is the polite thing to do.

 

Why this obsession with telling the truth all the time? You don’t tell your best friend her new Seven jeans make her look like Fern Britton, or your mother-in-law that her famous sherry trifle tastes like Polyfilla.

 

We all tell little white lies from time to time – why should it be any different in the bedroom?

 

The only problem, of course, is that if he thinks wibbling your wobbly bits with his toes drives you wild with lust, he’s going to keep on doing it.

 

I was brought up a good Catholic girl, which meant I didn’t lose my virginity until I was 20. I didn’t want my boyfriend to think I was frigid, and so, once in a while, I overdid the moans a little.

 

Eventually, I gained enough experience to know what I wanted in bed. Occasionally, it still didn’t always hit the mark, but I was sophisticated enough to shrug it off and look forward to next time.

 

When I met my second husband, an American, six years ago, I was taken aback by his forthright attitude to everything in life – including sex. He punched past my British reserve and demanded to know precisely what I liked in bed, when, and why.

 

His matter-of-fact approach gave me the confidence to tell him. These days, I don’t have to fake my pleasure for anything – except my mother-in-law’s trifle.