Online Sex With The People You Love

Much is being said these days about the negative impact the pandemic has had on people's sex lives. Stress and anxiety seem to have tanked people’s sex drives. A poll conducted by NBC News found that more than half of respondents were having less sex with their partner than they had pre-covid.

But not everyone is losing out. Paid phone sex is on the rise. NiteFlirt — a phone sex operator — reports a 10% bump in business. A Kinsey Institute study found that 20% of people have tried something new, sexually during the lockdown; the most popular new activity being online sex. And camming sites like Cams and Chaturbate have seen a 30% increase in their traffic.

The fact that people are turning to online sex as they are stuck at home is not surprising. It's easy to do from home; it shakes up the long evenings; and it's less effort, perhaps than creating special and intimate moments with your partner.

But what if the idea of masturbating with a stranger online is not your cup of tea? You may not like the idea of pulling your junk out in front of strangers, or you may be in a relationship where that's not within the rules. Does this mean video sex is not for you? Not necessarily.

DIY camming

My wife came to me, about mid-way through the pandemic, saying she had been fantasizing about cam girls. She thought the idea of being online and having a bunch of random strangers watching her and getting turned on… seemed very hot. She was definitive — she would not want to do this in real life, but the fantasy of it really intrigued her. So, the next weekend, I was in the basement on a laptop, and she was in the bedroom with hers. We connected on zoom and she was my ‘cam girl’ for the evening. She chatted with me about sexy things, slowly removed her clothing, and eventually touched herself. It was fantastic. And for her, it was a fun way to show off her sexuality, see my pleasure in it, and add something new into the sexual mix for us during the lockdown.

Amping it up with friends

Another antic we’ve tried a couple of times — virtual sex with friends. This was more hit and miss. We have close friends — a couple — with whom we are close. We’re all quite sexual and we lamented, many times, about the difficulties with staying sexy during the pandemic. So, one Saturday night, at about 11 as my wife and I were having a glass of wine in our basement, we saw a FaceTime call coming through from our friends. They were having some wine too and were calling — mostly naked — from their at-home date. We chatted a bit, my wife and I joined them in their near nakedness, and quite quickly moved to having sex .. each watching the other. It was awesome, spontaneous, and super sexy. We’ve since done it 3 or 4 more times with them. Sometimes it was awesome, and other times it — honestly — felt a little forced. In my estimation, its all about the mood you are all in. You need to be feeling pretty un-abandoned.

My lesson from all of this... there is always a way to make lemonade from lemons. I’m not a video sexter, and the idea of online sex with strangers doesn’t really do it for me. But I really love the ways we’ve found to make virtual sex a part of our repertoire.