Women’s Sexual Arousal

Mona Lisa Smile

Women in recovery from alcoholism or addiction may experience new or unfamiliar sexual sensations. While drinking or drugging sexual arousal may have ceased, been dormant, been inconsistent or excessive.

In almost all cases women have questions about their arousal and how it affects their sexuality. In most cases a chat with a female doctor, sex therapist or a visit to a sexual health clinic will be fruitful.

Women have 3 types of sexual arousal.

These are;

spontaneous sensations of genital arousal that are appraised as mildly pleasurable;
persistent feelings of genital arousal that are experienced as mildly distracting but not especially unwelcome or bothersome; and
continuous, intense, and persistent genital arousal that is extremely distracting, distressing, and worrisome.

Interest in women’s sexual functioning has increased in recent years although the primary emphasis has been on shortfalls in both genital and personal sexual response.

Female sexual psychological and physical research suggests that women are capable of greater sexual responsiveness than previously thought and can experience genital response in the absence of a mental experience of sexual arousal.

Women who report relatively persistent genital arousal, both with and without accompanying stimulation illustrate the potential for the separation of genital and psychological sexual response.

In this article, we provide case illustrations of women reporting unprovoked genital arousal both with and without stimulation and suggest that what appears to be spontaneous genital arousal in some women may be the result of either subconscious processing of sexual stimulations in the environment – stimulations that are either consciously unacceptable or not noticed.

A variety of psychological, chemical, physical, and brain factors may account for these differences in women’s genital arousal and responsiveness.

Research by Sandra R. Leiblum & Meredith L. Chivers ‘Normal and Persistent Genital Arousal in Women: New Perspectives’ Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy, Volume 33, Issue 4 July 2007 , pages 357 – 373