Ovulation pain and spotting, kitting out, hyperventilation

A typical menstrual cycle chart

The Photo: A typical 30 day charting grid for recording menstrual cycle basal body temperatures vertically and cycle days, cervical fluid, intercourse as well as ancillary information horizontally. On this chart ovulation spotting is shown on CD15 I have a very regular 28 day cycle and usually ovulate on CD14. If the woman’s cycle is regular (stable) charting fertile signs this way can be very effectively used to increase the likelihood of pregnancy or to know when protection should be used, or the couple abstain, during the fertile interval if trying to avoid conceiving.

The candidate’s cycles: the seven candidates cycles are all between 28 and 32 days in length, are relatively stable and they haven’t been together long enough to have developed any menstrual synchrony. From the beginning of the eight week course two have just experienced ovulation spotting, one is newly fertile and one has just started her menses. The other three are luteal.

Ovulation pain and spotting:  “Who Has Painful Ovulation? Many women never experience painful ovulation. Some women, however, have mid-cycle pain every month and can determine by the pain that they are ovulating.”

“Mittelschmerz is the pelvic and lower abdominal pain that some women experience during ovulation. Ovulation generally occurs about midway between menstrual cycles; hence the term mittelschmerz, which comes from the German words for "middle" and "pain." The pain of ovulation can range from a mild twinge to severe discomfort and usually lasts from minutes to hours. It is generally felt on one side of the abdomen and may vary each month, depending on which ovary is releasing the egg during that cycle. In some cases, a small amount of vaginal bleeding or discharge may occur. Some women experience nausea, especially if the pain is severe.” The above is from the WebMD article: Painful Ovulation (Mittelschmerz). The entire article can be read HERE.

In my case I have a twinge of pain for a few minutes on the side on which the follicle ruptures to release the egg and a few hours later a little blood colors my fertile cervical mucus pink.

The seven PA candidates as flowers:  My current group of Personal Assistant candidates I’ll refer to as: Cinnamon, Fern, Heather, Holly, Iris, Ivy and Jasmine and their male partners as: Doc, Dopy, Sleepy, Happy, Grumpy, Sneezy and Bashful if I need to be specific.

Kitting out the flowers and dwarfs: Carla, my Divemaster, is taking them through qualifying (or requalifying in two instances) for their Open Water SCUBA certification needed to be able to perform dive-sex in pools in the Americas, the UK, and Europe. Taryn’s new startup is springing for their kitting out. Startup costs are high, but her core business, porn, is extremely profitable so the front end costs aren’t a concern. The girls and their partners are only responsible for their swimsuits; side-tie thong bikinis for the girls and Speedo slingshots for the guys. And I fit the girls with my clinics latex flat spring diaphragms for flood insurance which allows them to use DiveGel+ which is a silicone base combination lube, spermicide and biocide protecting the girls from the likelihood of a yeast infection from having so many male partners. I’m very pleased to say that the latex FS diaphragms in all seven trainees develop very strong suction in the domes indicating a superior fit especially after expressing the remaining air from the dome with the fingers.  

Carla had a rep from the Aberdeen dive shop where she had worked bring a van full of gear and fit them all (women and men) with an OTS Guardian FFM and they tried them out wearing BCs and 80 cu ft HP steel tanks in the shallow (64 ft deep) well just to get them acclimated to the energy and the amount of air expended (you tend to forget about air conservation techniques during orgasm) during dive-sex. They were on regular air rather than Enriched Air Nitrox with 32% oxygen (EAN32) which I use if I’m bottom diving the shallow well or in the deeper one. The net was strung across the well at 30 feet to prevent a diver in an uncontrolled descent from sinking to the bottom. During training the candidates are tethered to the net with an ankle leash which keeps them about fifteen feet below the surface during an encounter. Anya and I already had our FFMs, BCs and pool-pointes in the gear room in the wells ladies’ dressing room. Returning readers may recall that pool-pointes are silicone rubber pointe shoes with nylon ribbons and threaded female connectors on the platforms of the shoes to take male threaded weights that will hold the wearer on the bottom or guarantee the wearer stays in the vertical position in the water because of the weighted footwear.

The female condom and dive-sex: As I mentioned above latex flat spring diaphragms can be used for ‘flood insurance’ along with silicone base DiveGel+ as a lubricant that isn’t quickly washed away during dive-sex. However, the silicone in DiveGel gets in a partner’s mouth during cunilingus. Since the dwarfs will be licking and sucking the flowers vulvas during surface sex for dive-sex training the girls will dive wearing only the FC2 nitrile female condoms - which have silicone lube preapplied in the sheath - for training purposes since they will be having a lot of underwater penile-vaginal intercourse, PVI.  And, since they don’t need the FC2 for contraception they can reuse them, but only for multiple acts during the same training session encounter.   

Do not try this at home! The FC2 FAQs say the inner ring of an FC2 will interfere with the rim of a diaphragm during contraceptive use and that is a real possibility. The Flowers have GyneFix copper IUDs implanted for contraception and shouldn’t need flood insurance, in case a partner accidently inserts outside the sheath in the rush to reinsert after slipping out, while training with a professional male escort.

However, in my case I feel I need a FS latex diaphragm because of the high frequency of my encounters and training nonprofessionals. I’ve been testing wearing an FC2 in addition to a flat spring latex diaphragm while luteal and have found in my case using an FC2 should not affect the seal when I am using them together for training purposes. That’s because I wear an 80mm diaphragm and the 68mm closed end ring will nest inside the rim on the convex side of my latex diaphragm when air has been expressed from the dome so it develops very strong seal. That way the smaller inner ring of the FC2 will slide over the collapsed dome of the larger diaphragm and shouldn’t affect the seal.

Any wear on the dome of the diaphragm is checked after every encounter and spare diaphragms are available for immediate replacement if necessary. I have been double bagging this way several times a day for several days while diving the well and so far there is no sign of wear on any of the latex diaphragm. The FC2 is about 7.2 inches long the inner ring is 67mm in diameter and it has silicone lubricant already applied in the sheath. When used w/o a diaphragm a very long man penetrating a very deep woman thrusting his glans into her anterior or posterior fornix could force the outer ring into the vagina, but this is unlikely for the average user. However, since the male partners are very well endowed and the Flowers all have long vaginas the men wear a double cock ring to prevent forcing the outer ring of the FC2 into their partner’s vagina during training. A video that shows how to correctly insert and remove a FC2 can be seen HERE.

Dive-sex and Hyperventilation: Hyperventilation is where air is only partially exhaled leaving CO2 in the lungs and little room for fresh air. That makes the diver feel she can’t breathe and try to increase her respiration rate with shallow breaths which only makes the situation worse. Hyperventilation can come from over exertion or stress which increases the breath rate w/o fully emptying the lungs. To prevent that a diver should try to hold her breath rate relatively steady and fully exhale to rid her lungs of the CO2 and needed oxygen can get to her lungs. While having sex using SCUBA gear hyperventilation is a fairly common problem if divers are not taught to control their breathing and fully exhale. When approaching and during orgasm are the most common times when couples new to dive-sex experience hyperventilation.

Equalization difficulties: Two of the trainees have problems equalizing when diving so are on a generic of the Sudafed decongestant. “Pseudoephedrine, a key ingredient in Sudafed(r), is a commonly used decongestant by divers. A recent study* highlighted its effectiveness. The study compared pseudoephedrine to a placebo in its ability to prevent middle ear squeeze in novice divers. It concluded that a 60-milligram dose of pseudoephedrine administered 30 minutes before the dive was effective. This study was conducted to a depth of 40 feet / 12 meters, with objective data gathered only through otologic (ear) exams. Symptoms of side effects were collected in a questionnaire.” The complete article, “Taking medications when you dive” can be read HERE.

 

 

Women, fertility and desire

Fertile: Is she or isn’t she?

Live Science
By Stephanie Pappas,
LiveScience Senior Writer
17 October 2010

Booty Call: How to Spot a Fertile Woman

Ask the average person how the menstrual cycle affects women's moods, and you're likely to get an earful about PMS, or premenstrual syndrome. While it's true that PMS symptoms are common (although not as stereotypical as usually believed), new research is finding women's behavior shifts at another point in the reproductive cycle: ovulation.

Two new studies in the November issue of the journal Evolution and Human Behavior find that women get a little wilder during their most fertile days of the month. One study found that fertile women are more open to the idea of hooking up with a stranger or acquaintance, while the second found that women with less masculine-looking partners are more likely to lust after strong-jawed men during fertile days than women with partners with manly mugs.

The new studies are two of more than 20 that have examined the effects of ovulation on the way women dress, talk and think. While it's not yet clear if or how these temporary changes affect women's relationships in the real world, they may by a key to humanity's past.

"The idea is you see the preferences that would have evolved ancestrally still show up," Steven Gangestad, a University of New Mexico evolutionary psychologist and co-author on both new papers, told LiveScience.

Ovulation and lust

Until about a decade ago, most research on the menstrual cycle focused on PMS, which occurs after ovulation and before menstruation. Few people had investigated whether ovulation affected women, Martie Haselton, a psychology professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, told LiveScience. (Ovulation occurs when a woman’s body releases an egg down the fallopian tube where it can meet up with Mr. Sperm.)

"Nobody was asking what happens on fertile or non-fertile days," Haselton said.

One reason no one had tackled the question is that researchers in human evolution had long assumed that ovulation didn't matter much in humans. Unlike other mammals, which go into "heat" during fertile periods, women can be up for sex any time of the month. Evolutionary theorists have tried at several explanations for the loss of this estrus cycle in humans, one of the most common being that humans lost the "heat" phase to conceal ovulation. If a man didn't know which sexual encounter would pass his genes along, the theory went, he'd be more likely to stick around and help raise offspring.

The problem is that men do seem to be able to tell when their partner is ovulating, albeit imperfectly. No one knows how men can tell (smell is one hypothesis), but several studies have found women report that men become more attentive and jealous around fertile days. One 2006 study published in Evolution and Human Behavior found that when women were fertile, their male partners saw other men as a greater threat to their dominance.

Another problem is that women do seem to have a "heat" phase, although it works very differently than in other mammals. It's not that women become more receptive to sex in the five or so days around ovulation, Gangestad said. It's that they want sex for different reasons.

"It may be experienced more as a kind of lust mid-cycle," Gangestad said. "Outside of mid-cycle, women may be more interested in sex for intimacy."

Multiple studies have found that women go for more masculine-looking men when they're ovulating. According to a 2008 review of research by Gangestad and his colleagues published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, some of the masculine traits fertile women prefer are strong-jawed faces, muscular bodies, dominant behaviors, deep voices and tallness.

Because most studies on the topic have been done on heterosexual women, little is known about how ovulation affects lesbians or bisexual women. One study, published online in May 2010 in the journal Archives of Sexual Behavior, found that ovulation boosted lesbian women's motivation to act on their desires for other women, while bisexual women showed smaller increases in motivation. While women's sexuality is more fluid than men's, study coauthor Lisa Diamond, a psychologist at the University of Utah, told LiveScience, the findings suggest that ovulation could be a window into the biologically-based component of female sexual orientation.

Girls gone fertile

Back in the more-studied world of heterosexual couples, Gangestad's most recently published study on female preferences finds that if a woman is partnered with a man without a masculine face, her eye is more likely to wander during her fertile days.

This wandering eye doesn't necessarily translate into a cheating heart. Most women probably notice nothing more than a "funny little feeling" of lust during their fertile days, Haselton said. But other studies have shown that the hormonal fluctuations surrounding ovulation do change women's attitudes and behavior.

For instance, fertile women seem to be more open than non-fertile women to the idea of taking "sexual pleasures where [they] find them," in the words of one question asked to participants in the study by Gangestad and his colleagues published in the November issue of Evolution and Human Behavior. They're also more likely to express interest in sleeping with an attractive stranger or someone they don't care about.

A 2006 study in the journal Hormones and Behavior found that women who had their pictures taken during fertile and non-fertile stints were judged to be trying harder to look nice on fertile days, suggesting the hormonal boost of ovulation may translate to real-life decision-making. The women's faces were blacked out, so judges could only go on hairstyles and clothes to make their assessments, said Haselton, who co-authored the paper. To avoid any menstruation effects, none of the women were photographed right before or during their periods.

"We saw that the effect was strongest for women who were photographed closest to the day of ovulation within the high-fertility window," Haselton said.

An online shopping experiment reveals fertile women are also more likely to choose sexy clothes and accessories than women who weren't fertile, according to the study published online in the Journal of Consumer Research in August. For those who aren’t as interested in sexy clothes, ovulation can mean more money. In a widely publicized study published in Evolution and Human Behavior in 2007, researchers found that ovulating strippers made an average of $30 more an hour than menstruating strippers and $15 more an hour than non-ovulating, non-menstruating strippers.

Do fertility fluctuations matter?

The big question, of course, is how much ovulation affects the real lives of the non-strippers among us. Do women give in to the temptation to cheat more often when fertile? (No one has found any evidence suggesting they do, Gangestad said.) And what about the massive number of women on the birth control pill? The pill halts ovulation and smoothes out monthly hormonal cycles, so do women on hormonal birth control act differently than those who aren't on the pill?

The answer to that question depends on whether women base any long-term relationship decisions on the changes that happen around ovulation, Haselton said. So far, none of the studies on the topic have shown that ovulation changes women's preferences for long-term mates, just short-term flings.

"Being on the pill does remove a lot of the variation in the changes in hormones across the cycle, so we certainly would expect it to have an impact on a woman's behavior," Haselton said. "But if it's only having an impact within that narrow range of fertility, then maybe it's not that big a deal."

From an evolutionary perspective, unraveling the question of ovulation could reveal a lot about how human reproduction evolved. It's possible that women really are trying to signal their fertility with sexy clothes, Haselton said, but it's more likely that the changes are side effects of the hormonal tides women experience throughout the month.

Perhaps women really did evolve to conceal ovulation but can't quite cover up all the side effects, Haselton said. "There may be a co-evolution arms race between women concealing and men detecting any cues that leak out."

Personal comment: I think this is an important article because it summarizes and to an extent explains in print so many of the psychological aspects of a woman’s menstrual cycle and how they affect her personality. Some women, especially dancers and those of us in the adult entertainment industry have known since we were teens how to use our hormonal fluctuations to increase our attractiveness to men. It’s instinctive, but can be developed into an art with a little practice. We have known for years that intimate performances while fertile can bring in a lot more money than the same routines when we aren’t. That is why my dancers and other entertainers at the casino don’t use hormonal contraceptives.

Copper IUDs are the contraceptive of choice for the younger girls and sterilization is popular for the older ones and gas guards are now commonly worn by professionals even when no dive-sex is anticipated so if while receiving oral her client blows into her vagina the likelihood that he will give her an embolism is greatly reduced. Guy’s wanting to ‘blow-up-a-pussy’ has become very popular here recently. Initially that caused a lot of concern because it’s not good business to tell a client no. Fortunately it is just a matter of a girl being fitted for a diaphragm to use as a gas guard and she’s good to go. Personally I’m a lot more likely to try risky things with risky men while I’m fertile than when I’m not, although when I’m menstrual I’m almost as adventuresome.

Fertile female behavior

Fertility and female behavior

DiscoveryNews.com http://news.discovery.com
By Emily Sohn
Wed Aug 18, 2010

Ovulation Changes Women's Behavior

THE GIST: Ovulation changes the way a woman acts, and affects the kinds of men she's attracted to. Going on or off the birth control pill can influence the types of men a woman will pursue. The research could affect dating behavior, marketing strategies and more.

For a long time, scientists assumed that the hormonal shifts of ovulation happened without measurable changes in how women behaved.

When a woman is ovulating, her behavior changes in a startling number of ways from the way she walks, talks and dresses to the men she flirts with, according to new research.

The findings might offer some practical tips for women to boost their online dating prospects; for scientists to develop new kinds of ovulation detection kits; or for marketers to target sales of clothes and jewelry. The work also suggests that going on or off the birth control pill might influence a woman's choice in men.

Why does ovulation change women's behavior in such subtle yet fundamental ways? Experts propose that it's an innate and subtle strategy to both attract the most desirable guys and convince them to stick around for the long haul.

"The idea is that women turn up everything that has to do with femininity" at ovulation, said Greg Bryant, an evolutionary psychologist at the University of California, Los Angeles. "This is showing that there are all sorts of phenomena that happen in our behavior that we're not actually aware of."

For a long time, scientists assumed that the hormonal shifts of ovulation happened without measurable changes in how women behaved. That's because women have a strong motivation to hide the fact that they're fertile, unlike other members of the animal kingdom. While a female baboon's swollen red rump encourages males to mate and go, for example, a female human's ability to keep a man guessing should up the chances of him mating and then staying to help take care of their children.

Starting in the 1990s, studies began to show that in the days before ovulation women start to become more attracted to men who have deeper voices and more chiseled, masculine and symmetrical faces. According to some studies, that may be because men who look like George Clooney are more likely to have dominant social roles, better genes and stronger immune systems.

Women who are in relationships exhibit the most extreme spike in interest for masculine men around ovulation. The shift is even more exaggerated when they're not happy with their current partners, said Kristina Durante, a social psychologist at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. Women are also more likely to cheat on their partners while ovulating.

Fertile women may even be better at getting the men they want. Adding to findings that men prefer the smell of women who are more fertile, a study published last year in the journal Psychological Science found that testosterone levels were higher in men after they smelled T-shirts worn by ovulating women than after smelling T-shirts worn by women who weren't ovulating. Higher testosterone levels imply a higher likelihood of striking out in romantic pursuit.

Another study, published in 2007 in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior, found that lap dancers raked in higher tips when they were most fertile.

In addition to changes in looks and smells, Bryant and colleagues have measured a subtle but detectable shift upwards in the pitch of a woman's voice when she's approaching ovulation. Her voice reaches its highest pitch on the day before and the day of the egg's release. Now, he's trying to figure out if a higher pitched voice is indeed more attractive to men.

In other work, scientists have found that ovulating women sway their hips more while walking, though they hold their upper bodies in a more defensive position. Fertile women also show more skin, and they are more interested in going to social gatherings.

In one of the latest studies, reported by Durante and colleagues in an upcoming issue of the Journal of Consumer Research, women chose slightly sexier and more revealing clothes, shoes and accessories when they were at their most fertile. The researchers also found that women made their fashion choices not necessarily to attract men directly but to out-compete other women.

Knowing how ovulation affects them could help women make smarter choices about dating, shopping and more.

"If women are aware of the five or six days in their cycle when they're most fertile, they may be more likely to become more or less attracted to different types of men, or they might want to rein in their purchases if they happen upon a Victoria's Secret," Durante said. "Your picture might look more attractive near ovulation, so take your Facebook picture mid-cycle."

Starting or stopping any method of hormonal birth control might also affect your feelings about your partner -- or someone else's.

"The thought might be upsetting to many women, but that's what researchers are thinking," Durante said. "When you are ready to pick a mate, go off the pill."

Personal comment: I’ve known my friends and I are more flirtatious, more feminine and more attractive to men when fertile ever since my late teens. It’s interesting to see that now research is catching up to what experiential evidence has shown knowledgeable women as we learn to use the power of our cycle to our advantage. It’s another reason I don’t care for hormonal methods of birth control because by suppressing ovulation it robs a woman of some of her natural attractiveness and in competition for the best men a girl needs all the help mother nature can provide. The down side of being fertile is that dancers and athletes are slightly more liable to be injured while fertile because our higher estrogen levels make our joints a bit looser, but that is offset by the more juicy and dramatic performances a dancer generally gives performing while fertile.

Fertility Awareness Method of contraception

Every woman should read this book

Fertility Awareness Method (FAM): On my August 6, 2010 post ‘Teens, rhythm and pregnancy’ Eric asked a question about the difference between FAM and the Rhythm Method. Since the two are often confused I thought I’d explain a bit about FAM which is far more reliable than the Rhythm Method if practiced correctly, and post it in an entry where more readers, who might be interested, can read it. An excellent book on FAM is Taking Charge of Your Fertility by Toni Weschler. It’s easy to understand and a very empowering read. I highly recommend every woman reading it regardless of whether she plans on using FAM or not as it gives you an understanding of what’s happening in your body all through your cycle. And guys, it’s worth you reading it too if you are interested in what’s going on in a woman’s body and why we may be cranky at times during our cycles. FAM is super for when you are trying to conceive, because you can tell exactly when you ovulate so you know the best time to go baby dancing. However, what my circle generally uses FAM for is as an aid for contraception and the discussion below is from that viewpoint.

First a caution: Used for contraception FAM is unforgiving of Oopses and just-this-once events like “Just let me stick the red part in for a minute” That’s against the rules when the woman is fertile! Ok?

To use FAM fully (including taking basal body temp) takes discipline and a stable schedule, because the temp readings should be taken at the same time each morning, immediately after awakening after more than 4 hours of uninterrupted sleep. The temps are recorded so the woman can see her temp shift at ovulation. So for any woman with an erratic schedule the temp part is questionable. If you are using FAM for birth control the temperature shift upward by a few tenths of a degree at ovulation is a sort of after-the-fact measurement that tells you when you’ve ovulated. About two weeks later, if you haven’t become pregnant, your progesterone level drops – causing a decrease in temp – that occurs a day before your period starts. No temperature drop about two weeks after ovulation is an indication that progesterone is still high and you may be pregnant.

It’s good to know that you have ovulated and therefore after another 24 hours (O+1) it should be safe to go without protection if you’re sure STIs aren’t a problem. However, if you haven’t been carefully watching up to that point for slippery stretchy cervical fluid and a ripening of the cervix when it softens, opens and rises higher in the vagina - which tells you you’re fertile and should be using a barrier - you may find you’ve been truly fucked in every sense of the word. That’s because when sperm reaches fertile cervical fluid it can live in a woman’s tubes as long as 5 to 7 days waiting for her to release an egg. In the teens and early 20s (19 to 26 years old) a woman has a 50% chance of becoming pregnant from a single act of unprotected IC on her most fertile day. So a woman really needs to be careful using FAM.

Hollywood and bi-sexual actresses

Immediately before insemination

An awesomely beautiful Bi-chick: My psychiatrist asked if I would be interested in working with a 29 y/o A-list actress who needs to be pregnant for a role in an upcoming film. I asked what function I would perform in any arrangement with her since in this life I’m female and can’t impregnate her myself. Well, I could but it would be with a donor’s sperm so I didn’t see any reason she would want to have me involved, until I was told she was Bi-sexual and wanted the support of a bi-sexually active female after being inseminated. I’m not particularly pleased that it’s getting around that I’m bi-sexual. I don’t really think of myself that way. I think of myself as being primarily Het, but I do take a few of the women in my circle Taryn, Cyndi and occasionally Anya to bed and we do have marvelous times together. So it’s not as though I don’t appreciate a soft cheek against my breast, an estrogenic mouth sucking on my nipples or the scent of a woman with my face buried in the fine soft golden hair of a natural blond as I breastfeed her while she fingers my clit taking me to orgasm.

She is a huge talent, I respect her work and I really wanted to meet her so I had my agent talk with the film’s Producer to see just what she needed or expected. It turned out her Producer didn’t know exactly except that she was insisting on having me as an assistant, so a meeting was set up when she and her current husband would be in Vegas. She is a Method Actress. In Method Acting the actor immerses herself in the role she is playing for the duration of the project. And since she is to play a bi-sexual pregnant dancer/escort she wanted me as an intimate assistant – though she already has a retired escort as a technical coach for the sex scenes. She had met Alistair in Hawaii who had recommended me. She wants me for my insight and support with pregnancy issues in the dance world, girl-girl sex and during the abortion which is an important event in the film. She is being inseminated (Robin is the sperm donor) by an escort so she will really be preggers for the film and have real morning sickness (she hopes) and hopes her body will have some very early signs of pregnancy, like breast changes, that she can feed off and the camera’s can film. She is having an escort impregnate her because the role calls for her to have an abortion and she insists on it being a real abortion – which will be filmed - so her character can continue her career and she doesn’t want to abort a pregnancy created by her husband.

I wondered what her husband thought about all this and curiously he seems ok with it, as long he’s allowed to watch when I comfort her and we have girl-on-girl sex. Go figure! My encounters with her will not be in the film they are intended as a form of personal emotional support to help her remain in character and for relaxation. I understand guys get off watching two girls do one another, but I’ve never been sure why. Certainly it’s a great opportunity for guys to see two beautiful female bodies (if you are watching professionals perform) involved in ‘deviant’ sexual practices. And, it’s a lot more hygienic – since girl-on-girl doesn’t usually involve anal penetration - than some of the variations of Gay sex.

The filming has been underway for several weeks and the scenes of her being impregnated were filmed in one of our pool bungalows. A lot of them with her coming out of the pool in an amazingly small bikini and having it stripped off and drilled doggie style on a luxuriously thick pool mat, a fave position of escorts clients because they can go so much deeper. Her abortion will take place in our clinic – we do a lot of those procedures - and because of the way the clinic is situated deep on private property there are no protestors. A set crew has already blocked off one of the procedure rooms and made some changes they want for the film. The real work toward her becoming pregnant by Robin for the film began yesterday when she became fertile. He will mount her twice a day every day she is fertile and also the day after she ovulates which is supposed to be a total of 7 days if she doesn’t freak out and have stress delay ovulation which commonly occurs. That’s where I come in by having sex with her to keep her calm and let her talk over the sexual part of the character she is playing and to guide her past the moral ambivalence she has about abortion.

Spontaneous Abortion Incidence Rates: I keep assuring her that between twenty and fifty percent of pregnancies end in miscarriage. The vast majority of spontaneous abortion cases occur during the early weeks of the pregnancy. In most cases, signs of miscarriage during the initial stages of pregnancy are undetectable, and the woman may not even be aware she was pregnant, or that she had a miscarriage. Once pregnancy is detected, approximately ten percent end in miscarriage. Most diagnosed miscarriages occur during the seventh to twelfth weeks of pregnancy. These statistics aren’t talked about by the wing-nuts who want to change state constitutions to grant every fertilized egg the rights of ‘personhood’. She wasn’t aware that the failure rate of fertilized eggs was anywhere near that high and she has come to agree with me that what’s one more failed pregnancy in the scheme of things?

My contribution: I think where I have been the most help to her so far is after Robin fills her with semen with her hips raised on a pillow where she stays for the next thirty minutes so her cervix is immersed in a pool of semen. I’ll snuggle beside her and give her a clitoral orgasm by ever so lightly caressing the barrel of her clit. She inserts a mouth guard to muffle her screams as I can send her into a screaming orgasm with very little effort on my part. Afterward she will snuggle against my breast, feed briefly then slip into a very deep sleep for at least forty-five minutes. These calming encounters I have with her I (and her therapist) see as critical to holding her emotions in check so she won’t stress out and delay her ovulation. If that were to happen it would set the production schedule back. Not the entire four weeks of her cycle because there are other parts of the film that could be worked on, but at least two and no one wants that. Her husband is very quiet while watching us. I just hear him unzip his pants and gasp when he ejaculates while masturbating. Then he zips up and leaves. The plan right now is for me to continue my ‘therapy’ sessions with her to minimize the possibility that she might miscarry and if her pregnancy is stable then at least until a week or so after she has the abortion and perhaps longer depending on what the termination does to her emotional state.

Hormones and creativity

A Semina ‘Barbie Barrier’ diaphragm

Hormonal birth control and creativity: I’ve commented before on the fact that at St Lucy’s we try to minimize the number of ballet students during the normal school year as well as at the summer ballet intensives, who use hormonal contraceptives. That’s not only because of the annoying side effects of hormones like breast swelling and tenderness, weight gain and estrogen withdrawal headaches during pill-periods, but also because suppressing a woman’s ovulation can rob her of some of her most creative moments when both mind and body stretch to perfect her artistry and reach new goals. Allowing a student to extend her capabilities by training while fertile and at her hormonal peak is one of the strengths of the dance program. There is some slight increase in the injury rate of dancers during their fertile days because of the loosening of joints due to the estrogen peak but that is more than offset by the increased creative genius unleashed by an estrogen stimulated mind. There are a few women of course who for medical reasons (other than contraception) need to be on birth control hormones but they are often put at a creative disadvantage when competing with ballet students who are cycling naturally.

To maximize a students creative potential we try where possible to have her use a GyneFix IUD – a very effective and low maintenance method - or a cervical barrier for contraception so that she can experience the surge of creative energy released during her fertile days. Most students have a GyneFix implanted but still need a barrier as a sports shield. Our dancers prefer a Semina diaphragm for contraception and for flow control during menstrual sex and a strapless FemCap as a sports shield and thrust buffer for dive-sex. I’m pleased to say that in the 24 months we have been offering dive-sex at St Lucy’s there have been no women injured nor have there been any unplanned pregnancies for students using their cervical barriers correctly.