My Favorite Mood for Love? Selfishness

Being selfish gets a bad rap, especially when it’s draped across a woman’s shoulders. Mothers are especially socialized to put themselves last, martyr their desires, dreams and aspirations – in and out of the bedroom – for the sake of the family unit. Who has time at the end of a day as a chauffeur-accountant-babysitter-executive chef and butt wiper for anything remotely wanton? “Oh baby, rip this snot stained t-shirt off me!” sounds as hot and bothered as burnt toast. Which is what many moms eat for breakfast along with leftovers from their kidlet’s breakfast (soggy cereal – oh, yeah. I know. Been there, done that).

Worn out by the demands of daily living, inundated with work and personal stress, who has time to kick up her heels at the beach, get a massage, read that naughty book or shtupp your vibrator?

Some women, even as they are reading this, are balking at the idea of taking ‘Me Me Me!’ time. How’s that working for you? If guilt has your gonads bunched up in granny pants, it’s time to try something unreasonable – stop sacrificing your succulent self. Get off the vicious cycle that is zapping your vitality, leaving you and your family sucking on fumes (instead of his you-know-what). Being a mother means nurturing yourself too.

I’m not alone in this thinking – family experts agree that a relationship and family are stronger when mom’s cup runneth over. Flip things around and make your children the center of the kinship universe, and your love nest becomes a haven for sexless nights, days, weekends, and years.

Self-sacrifice is one twin pillar to kill libido. The other is failure to masturbate. The breasts may sag, the belly may bag, the butt may drag, and your vagina is a muscle. Use it or lose it.

It helps to have a doctor confirm the importance of self-pleasure. Dr. Lissa Rankin, founder of OwningPink.com, suggests a woman “pick up a battery-operated boyfriend to help keep things healthy. If properly tended, your vagina will be able to pleasure you until the day you leave this life.” Think of masturbation and orgasm the antidote for sexual blahs, when you are alone, in the mood, or your partner is unable to keep those embers going (like when your middle aged husband threw his back out golfing, putting his putter on temporary bed rest).

“Learning to masturbate really well – to reach MY special kinds of orgasms that work for me – was a huge step I took in owning my sexuality,” writes Rankin. “There's only one place to start – touching yourself. There’s more to masturbating than just being comfortable in your own head. With rare exception (some women can get off without actually touching themselves) we need to touch ourselves or be touched to generate those feelings that result in orgasm.”

“So, ladies, touch yourselves,” she says. I say ‘ahhhh’ and ‘ohhhh’ and ‘yeah baby’ to the good docs orders.

It helps that our clitorides (plural for clitoris, though yes, I know we only have one. Multiple clitoris the next medical miracle?) have twice as many nerve endings as penises and never age or fall out (like a vajajay can). Who’s got envy now?

This Mother’s Day, we invite you to re-frame your understanding of selfishness. When your partner asks, what do you want for Mother’s Day, smile coyly, point to your wish list of (eco-friendly) toys and whisper, ‘Playtime.’ Then pull out your calendar of events and schedule regular dates with your lavish, lusty self. Leftovers will feed your family fine. Your kids won’t suffer if you spend a little moolah on yourself instead of another video game for them. Your beloved may not know what got into you until he’s there himself.

Once you’ve relinquished the guilty part of pleasure, check in and see your mood for love and life perk up more than a newly refurbished silicon valley. Want to be there for the one’s you love? Rescue you from your over-anxious, over-worked, under-nourished self, and find your inner hot mama with a penchant for making mischief on the kitchen counter.