What is delayed ejaculation?

Most men ejaculate far too quickly, but as you will know if you have delayed ejaculation, this condition means that lovemaking goes on and on and on …..often for so long that a woman becomes bored, sore and frustrated, while the man become angry, shamed and anxious about his inability to satisfy his partner and ejaculate during lovemaking.

Fortunately a reliable cure is available, and it’s one you can use at home, in privacy. It’s based on the methods used by professional sex therapists.

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A Problem With Delayed Orgasm

One man said, of his delayed ejaculation:

I am unable to ejaculate during sexual intercourse as my wife and I make love. A little bit about my history with this problem might help you understand and help me better.

I am 36 years old and have been married a little over 3 years. I was a virgin when I was married and have never achieved orgasm and have always been unable to ejaculate during our lovemaking without masturbating myself to do so and then release inside of her.

I was raised with a “religious moral” mindset and my family almost never talked about sex and when they did it was negative, as in “you are too young to know about that”, “it’s wrong (until you’re married)”, “it’s something we don’t talk about”.

So my earliest memories of sex after being told what it was by an older brother were that it was bad and that I shouldn’t even know about it – this was shaming.

I had an early fascination with masturbation (pre-puberty) and self exploration which may or may not be “normal” – I masturbated often as a teenager, however, I never was able to achieve an orgasm (except in occasional wet dreams) and I was unable to ejaculate during masturbation until I was 23 years old.

My sexual fantasies during my teen years were heterosexual yet I also felt drawn toward the masculine, mostly because I never had strong male friendships and was not good at sports and I envied other guys of a certain stereotype of the masculine.

I dated in high school and college, yet never got very physically intimate with my girlfriends because I feared that I wouldn’t be able to ejaculate, and indeed, until my sophomore year of college I never penetrated my girlfriend.

Needless to say I did not ejaculate – I simply could not come inside a woman during sex. I was a man with a complete failure to ejaculate during mutual masturbation, oral sex or intercourse. Not much of a man, really, and I think it was around then that I gave up the idea of ever being a husband and father.

I viewed pornography in my senior year of high school and how I wished it was me that was ejaculating with those porn stars! During the time I used porn, I realized the addictive potential of this and gave it up, but the sexual fantasies I read stayed in my mind, and I also began writing my own sex fantasies to masturbate to, They were full of men shafting women and ejaculating all over them, but not, interestingly, inside them, during sex.

Soon after I left college I married. This was, naturally, a mistake. I guess I thought my difficulties with sex would end in a relationship, but they didn’t.

After a while, however, when I grew to trust my partner, and I found I could ejaculate on a woman’s body, albeit by masturbating myself. I feel ashamed that I was  unable to ejaculate during lovemaking. Sometimes I have to use heavy duty fantasy to reach orgasm, and this makes me feel bad too, because when I’m off exploring fantasy in my head it isn’t as though I have a real relationship with my partner during sex.

When I married I did not expect to have the difficulty with ejaculating in sex that I am now having. My wife is a very sexual woman and I love her deeply. She was a virgin when we were married and so we have learned together. She has been very supportive of my delayed ejaculation, and loving toward me through this in ways I never could have imagined.

I do not have problems being sexually aroused by her although I am more aroused by physical touch than visual. I do find her body attractive and sexy and enjoy sexual intercourse with her despite the fact that I have not achieved release inside her the natural way.

It has been better at times than other times. Sometimes I feel more stimulation than other times. A number of times it has been very intense to the point that orgasm felt inevitable yet I was still completely unable to reach a normal ejaculation.

Sex sometimes ended with me being exhausted and unable to take the extremely pleasurable sensations on my penis any longer. Usually it feels very good but not quite to that level. And sometimes I don’t feel very much arousal at all.

I have gone through counseling on my own, although it was not a sex therapist. We have had a few counseling sessions with a sex therapist together, although didn’t feel that he was very helpful. Is it possible I require a higher degree of sexual stimulation than most men? I think it might also be my subconscious mindset that is the problem. However, I have taken great strides and believe that my views on sex have drastically altered. I am much less inhibited than I was.

I love my wife and we want to be “one together” with me getting over this problem of being unable to ejaculate inside her. We do have a two year old as a result of masturbating to the point of orgasm and me then releasing my semen inside her. She has been able to masturbate me to orgasm although this takes a very long time and usually results in frustration for both of us.

So when we have intercourse I either masturbate myself to orgasm or I don’t have one. I have pretty much given up masturbating on my own apart from being together with my wife, thinking that it will help to solely focus on her when I do it.

Occasionally I will still masturbate and occasionally slip into old sexual fantasies, maybe a couple times a year.  Usually when I have masturbated I focus on my own body, I like to watch myself, etc.

So now when I am with her I masturbate focusing on her and her body and being with her and the desire I have to ejaculate inside her without any delay in ejaculation.

She has been very supportive as I have mentioned, but it is having an effect on both of us after three years. Other aspects of our marriage are fine and we get along great and are best friends.

Sometimes we are able to enjoy lovemaking for what it is without me having an orgasm and other times we are left frustrated from trying.

She is often able to achieve orgasm from my thrusting in her vagina which is pleasurable for both of us.

I have always felt very free being naked with her without any degree of shame whatsoever. I love being naked with her and holding her close since we have been married. We are both healthy and in decent shape, not overweight or any other physical concerns or limitations. My wife and I have tried reading the science of delayed ejaculation but now know we need help. 

Delayed ejaculation

This is an ejaculatory dysfunction that occurs in a large number of men, resulting in them being unable to ejaculate during sexual intercourse and sometimes even during solo masturbation.

The cause of delayed ejaculation it is not exactly clear, but we know that men who have this problem fall into several broad categories.

The first category of men is those who have learned to masturbate using a hard and fast technique which desensitizes the penile nerves, so that ejaculation becomes impossible as the point of ejaculatory inevitability is never reached.

A second group of men appear to be experiencing delayed ejaculation because of emotional and psychological issues which prevent them achieving a sufficiently high level of sexual arousal to trigger the ejaculatory reflex.

Delayed ejaculation is not the opposite of premataure ejaculation! 

Whether or not delayed ejaculation is due to physical insensitivity to sexual stimulation, or is due to internal emotional inhibitions on the levels of sexual desire that they can reach is not clear. However we do know that DE is not the opposite of premature ejaculation.

The fact that dictates treatment strategy is mediated by both physical resensitization strategies and emotional exploration using in depth psychology and psychodynamic therapy. Treatment can generally be successful, at least to the extent that a man becomes able to ejaculate much more readily than previously, even if his ejaculatory responses are not as labile as those amongst men in the general population.

Ironically, that may not in fact be much of a disadvantage, since many men in the general population experience premature ejaculation all too readily! However, we know is that the duration of intercourse that is common among most men with delayed ejaculation is far too long for the satisfaction of their female partners. As a general rule, we know that sex which goes on for more than 10 minutes is not satisfactory for the great majority of women.

In fact it’s not satisfactory to the great majority of men either, despite the illusion which seems to be widespread in society that men who can make love for a very long period of time are somehow very desirable as lovers. The truth is that both the man and his partner will experience high levels of frustration and distress, not to mention the possibility of physical soreness for the woman.

The fact is that a man will see himself as a sexual failure, unable to satisfy his partner, and the woman may see herself as an unattractive partner who cannot bring her man successfully to climax.

Now having said that, we do know that delayed ejaculation sometimes obscures other psychological or emotional issues, so in treating delayed ejaculation one has to be aware of the possibility that there may be some collusion between the couple at a subconscious level to maintain the sexual dysfunction.

For example, it may be that a woman is unable to reach orgasm, or perhaps doesn’t like sex particularly, a fact which she is able to disguise by the distress and emotional difficulties caused by delayed ejaculation. If her male partner was able to ejaculate in a timely fashion during intercourse, it may be that her own dissatisfaction with sex would be revealed.

Equally, for the man, it’s possible that delayed ejaculation serves a purpose, perhaps allowing the couple to focus on emotional distress of the delayed ejaculation rather on the fact that the man has a difficulty with being in a relationship with his partner in the first place.

Now clearly not all cases of delayed ejaculation will actually have such powerful and emotive underlying issues, but certainly many of them do.

Treatment is generally by means of sexual therapy and exploration of the deeper psychological issues underlying the condition, combined with behavioural adaptation techniques – in particular, cognitive behavioural therapy. The outcome can generally be expected to be very good, a man reaching ejaculation within five minutes of intercourse starting.

The main workers is in the field of delayed ejaculation have beenHelen Singer Kaplan, Marcel Waldinger, and Bernard Apfelbaum, all of whom have presented original, novel treatment approaches that have benefited men with delayed ejaculation and their partners, who often lack sexual satisfaction and pleasure because of the man’s condition.

The main models that have been proposed to explain delayed ejaculation are the desire-deficit model, and the sexual inhibition model, both of which have been explained on this website.

I want to emphasize again that treatment of delayed ejaculation is generally successful, and that there’s no need to be depressed are upset about this problem; in particular if a couple are experiencing relationship difficulties because of delayed ejaculation, then it can often be a catalyst to the resolution of these difficulties through (1) both seeking and finding therapy, and (2) being able to learn a better system of communication within the relationship that allows the partners to understand each other’s point of view much more openly and honestly.

An Interesting Way Of Looking At Delayed Ejaculation (DE)

The simplest and most common definition of retarded ejaculation, or delayed ejaculation, as it is now more commonly known, is the inability to ejaculate during intercourse, or difficulty in doing so.

Delays in ejaculation may mean a man is slow to reach (or cannot reach) his point of no return.

Once upon a time, the treatment was to apply highly intense stimulation to the penis before intercourse, at a level which was so intense it would (hopefully) make the man ejaculate.

This does not show much interest in the reasons why a man can’t come, as you can see! 

This so-called treatment was based on the belief that once a man had overcome his inhibitions around ejaculation, and in particular once he’d managed to ejaculate inside the vagina, he’d be able to enjoy intercourse successfully in the future.

Bernard Apfelbaum

The psychotherapist and sexual therapist Bernard Apfelbaum has written a lot on this issue, and he’s also worked hard to change thinking around the cause of DE and how it needs to be treated. 

He started by asking why a man might have delayed ejaculation problems, a question considered in this book.

A Difficult Issue Like Delayed Ejaculation May Need Radical Answers

Does this man’s erection mean he is aroused – or not?
When a man is slow to ejaculate, his erection – which is usually hard and long lasting – may not represent arousal at all. It may just represent an automatic response to sexual stimulation.

Often, men with DE do not particularly enjoy intercourse, and they may even regard it with some distaste, or perhaps as a “chore” that’s necessary because the sexual partner expects it.

These are controversial suggestions, based on Bernard Apfelbaum’s view that a man with difficulty reaching orgasm during intercourse has an autosexual orientation.

In other words, Bernard Apfelbaum’s defining assumptions about this condition are based on the starting point that for a man who has difficulty ejaculating, only his own touch is capable of arousing him sexually.

Another person’s touch – could it be a turn-off?

More importantly, he may even be inhibited by the touch of another person.

And even more oddly (at first sight, anyway!) his penis may be insensitive to stimulation when he’s involved in a sexual relationship with a woman.

In Bernard Apfelbaum’s definition, this problem is regarded as a sexual desire disorder, specific to the relationship with that particular sexual partner.

This is most clear during sexual intercourse, when the man’s sexual arousal is really low – and stays that way.

This is because coitus is naturally the activity during which a man with problems in the area of ejaculation is least able to stimulate himself.

Apfelbaum sees the condition on as a spectrum of severity. At one end of the range are men who reach orgasm and ejaculate easily during self-pleasuring [masturbation], and for whom not reaching orgasm is a specific issue during intercourse.

The opposite end of the range is represented by men who have never had an orgasm of any kind under any circumstances.

Treatment Of Ejaculation Difficulty?

Apfelbaum says treatment strategies have usually been directed only at the man’s inability to reach orgasm during intercourse, which cuts out men who cannot reach orgasm under any circumstances.

He says that part of the difficulty of both defining and treating DE is accounted for by the fact that there are in fact two separate syndromes which we call delayed  ejaculation.

He observes that one type of delayed ejaculation involves a man who can reach orgasm easily and enjoys doing so during masturbation.

The other group, he suggests, is composed of men who cannot even reach orgasm during masturbation.

That leads us to a new definition – which seems to define the condition by a single factor: that only a man’s own touch is erotically arousing, and his orientation is basically “autosexual” i.e. masturbatory.

(By the way autosexuality is not an indication of homosexuality.)

Of course there are more defining factors: one is that a man will experience sexual intercourse as unpleasant or even disagreeable. This is explained in this book.

And here’s the thing: when a therapist starts from the presumption that all men will or “should” enjoy sexual intercourse, the whole course of treatment is defined too – often incorrectly. Start from a different place, and everything that follows is different too.

Can multiple female orgasms result from delayed ejaculation during long-lasting intercourse?

In general, one oddity of delayed ejaculation is that the partners of men with this dysfunction are indeed often multi-orgasmic.

They often respond with multiple orgasms to the sexual stimulation they are receiving during intercourse, despite the fact that these women may feel rejected and frustrated during intercourse.

This is often due to the fact that a man with this condition can sustain a hard erection which can give his partner a lot of physical stimulation.

And that’s true even when psychological or emotional stimulation is missing. In Bernard Apfelbaum’s words, he is the “workhorse” of sexual relationships. And he resents it.

Finally, Apfelbaum observes that many men with anorgasmia have a kind of compulsion to please their partner sexually, and that this compulsion creates both resentment and (sometimes) pleasure for the man as he unconsciously withholds his orgasm from his sexual partner.

But of course, you have to be careful here (especially if you’re a therapist), because saying that a man experiences sex as “a continuous demand for performance” is something you can never prove.

Bernard Apfelbaum and The Theory Of Autosexuality

“Apfelbaum is not only a creative theorist in the field of sex therapy; he is an innovator in the practice of sex therapy.” From Principles and Practice of Sex Therapy (2nd Ed), S. R. Lieblum & L.A. Pervin (Eds), Guilford Press: NY, 1989.

Masturbation Technique Can Cause Ejaculation Problems

A lot of men develop unusual masturbation styles – ways of self-pleasuring that use a lot of friction and pressure.

And lying prone on the bed thrusting against the mattress is a prime example of this.

As a result, they effectively train their bodies to reach orgasm through masturbation with hard stimulation, with a much higher level of stimulation you can get from sex with partner.

End result: insufficient arousal to reach orgasm and ejaculate.

Video: delayed ejaculation & masturbation