Sex File: I can't give my girlfriend an orgasm, what can I do?

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I consider myself very skilled in bed, but none of my failsafe moves are working on my new girlfriend. She hasn't had an orgasm since we got together and I've lost confidence. I don't know what to do.

This is a question I hear all the time from male readers. First, have you had a conversation with your partner? If she tells you she can have an orgasm alone but just finds it hard to have one with you, then you need to think about how you are approaching sex. Do you have what you believe to be "failsafe" moves - doing the same thing over and over again and hoping for the best? 

Many men fall into a coital script and then wonder why their partner is not completely satisfied. Often these moves include kissing, foreplay, penetration, thrusting, asking her if she is close, and when her silence indicates that she is nowhere near the point of no return, you reach your own peak and it is all over. That could be where you are going wrong.

The first thing you need to remember is that intercourse is not the best way to help a woman have an orgasm. It's a minority of women who climax through penetration alone - 18.4%, according to studies. You would never think that to be the case if, like so many men, you took your sexual cues from porn.

In real-world sexual relationships, the average occurrence rate of orgasm is 85% for men and 63% for women, according to Justin Garcia, a sex researcher at the Kinsey Institute. However, when Garcia looked at what happened when women had sex with women, the orgasm rate increased to 74%. That statistic tells us that women attend to the part of the female body that is the most reliable route to orgasm - the clitoris.

What you have is almost certainly a technical rather than a physical or sexual problem, and changing the script should change the outcome. The good news is that studies have found that when sex includes both oral sex and clitoral stimulation during intercourse, women are highly likely to have an orgasm.

Expanding your "failsafe" moves to include oral sex - or more of it - and all sorts of clitoral stimulation will likely change things for you both. Ask her to give you feedback on what feels good. Introduce sex toys.

Make sex about play and pleasure, not performance and anxiety.

Your partner having orgasms with you will boost your confidence, and hers, but don't expect things to change overnight. If, for example, your partner has never been able to let go completely in front of a man before, you'll need to be extremely patient and reassure her that you don't care how long it takes.

Even when couples feel completely relaxed with each other there can be a time lag between female and male arousal. Women take an average of 14 minutes to achieve orgasm with a partner when they can have one alone in just seven or eight minutes. So slow down. Keep talking. And don't give up. If you stick with it you will get there in the end.

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