Sheryl Sandberg, Lean In and Listen

What Women REALLY Need . . .

Sheryl Sandberg's book, Lean In . . .misses some valid points.  It might be a good read for those of us who have social supports but not for the 50% who have only themselves to rely on.  Lean In and ask for more work, for a raise, for more responsibility?    

            Last night, my youngest of six, Matthew, saw me working on the computer.  "Mom," he said. "Can I make dinner for you?"  I smiled.  But I'm grinning wider now—he's part of a new generation of men and women who have taken on nontraditional roles without balking and squawking.  He's part of the solution, groomed by my desire to earn a PhD in Psychology and have a career.  Remember that old TV show, Queen For a Day?  For you younger ones, women would compete for the crown and the ermine cape.  One winner was woman whose house burned to the ground. She moved her entire family into the backyard shed, wove beds out of pine boughs, gathered dandelion greens, and fed them small game caught in a noose, fashioned out of an electrical cord.  She won a barbecue grill for her glorious of multitasking.  They took that show off the air, deeming it too indignant to women.  Well, they ought to bring it back because I deserve that title—and I'm not alone. I want Martha Stewart herself to crown me.

            As I wrote this and had a good laugh, my husband David poked his head out of my computer and said, "What we really need is King for a Day."  I looked at my king, the poor guy whose mother garnished his plate and needed to be reprogrammed by his wife-who-wanted- a-career, and knew there was a grain of truth in what he said.  There is our first quandary—we need men or partners just as much as we need to meet our aspirations.      

            Our second dilemma is what women want and need may not be the same thing.  While my oxytocin-wired brain summoned babies (I'm a mom to six), my intellectual side needed stimulation.  Perhaps if I were back some 10,000 years ago with my cave sisters I might have had some female company.  I might have been debating, inventing some new method of weaving rushes, or leaving my babes with a friend while I dug up some fresh roots.  Sadly in today's world, sisters, mothers, grannies or friends are not there to reinforce our social needs—which are different from men's.  We're wired for comradery and cooperation rather than competition and contest. 

            Our folly might be discarding  those needs and attempting to circumvent them.  We're also wired to worry.  It might have served our cave-sisters well but not us.  Thinking about raises and job opportunity when you have babies in daycare?  Ha!  It's made all the more terrible by the fact that we have little choice in the matter; we live in an economy where not working is some sort of shame.  Most of us come home to waiting laundry piles, and hungry men—not necessarily hungry for food.  To add insult to injury, we're expected to Martha-Stewart our lives in our spare time.  One year I carved twenty five tiny pumpkins to hold the Thanksgiving soup, and that was before I collected flora and fauna for the centerpieces.   No Betty-Croker-in-the-box for our generation.  Had Martha been born in the late sixties, we might have been embroidering our bras, not burning them.

            Have a laugh now because the rest of it is poignantly sad.  American women are among the most depressed and stressed in the world. "Role-strain" is what we call it—and we need to admit it before we try to tackle the problem.  In the 1990's, a PhD student, teaching for pennies, I was accused of breastfeeding my newborn in the classroom—by the male chairman of the Psychology Department!  It was untrue, but such sentiments have hardly gone away.  The pull to "mother" will not wane until the pull to "father" meets it with equal force.  With men earning at least 20% more than us, the tradeoffs are not in our favor.  While many European countries provide stipends to parents who need to parent, today's woman faces a quandary; leave and parent, or stay and hold on to one's position.  Yes, while that job might still be waiting, chances are you'll lose seniority, accumulated six time, raises, and respect.  Women who leave for more than a few weeks are castigated as the Benedict Arnolds of the workplace, their minds thought lost in the world of diapers, bottles and teddy bears.  I've had friends who've been on that cliff, holding onto their positions with their fingernails as their eggs rotted.  "I don't know when the right time is to get pregnant," said my thirty- nine- year old executive friend. 

            No wonder we take the crumbs we're offered, and don't lean in.  We're caught between thinking we don't deserve it or worrying that any added responsibilities to our pile might just Jenga that tower.  The male patriarchy (yes, it's alive) is not going to fess up to its complicity.  And it also means that most of our life-partners have to take on additional responsibilities.  Ours was a balancing act, dividing up the chores, yet reserving time for one another, no matter what.  This brings this conversation to a happy note.  When men take on that task, they raise children who understand those roles.  Those children will one day be executives, CEO's, and wield the power to shift our strain, equally.  

            I looked at my husband, the man who let that screaming baby suck on his nipple until it was purple while I was taking my doctoral qualifying exams.  I'm going to crown him King For a Day—tonight.    

Dawn Marlena Hopper, PhD 

The Smallest Penis . .

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/12/smallest-penis-contest_n_1962514.html

  Yes, there is a small penis contest.  Can I enter a Gorilla? The king of the harem comes in at a whopping 2-3 cm--or the size of a cigarette butt.

You can possibly win an iPhone or ipad if you have the smallest erect penis -in Denmark.  The average penis is 5.5 inches and there is a lot of variety out there.  The cocky collaborators of this stunt think that it will open dialogue for men who thinks they don't measure up. From a scientific point almost all women are completely satisfied with their partner's size but almost all men think they don't measure up. And boy do they obsess over it, spending millions on pills, stretchers and pullers--none of which work.  But men have good reason to think this way.  The only erections they see are on porn sites and there is just no market for the average.  And science tells us something else men should know--when women love them, they love all of them, tiny, teensy, bent, crooked, blue, pink, dark.  It only makes me wonder what other crazy things we can dream and scheme up. 

   

 

Match.com: Plenty of Fish in the Sea

It seems all my friends are trawling these days on dating sites and I have a lot of chum to chew about.  I’ve vowed that if I ever have a single life, I will never go out to sea.  Take Bob, by far the best fisherman out there and my gf’s ex.  She left, he wasn’t ready, and with a broken heart, a heavy dose of sexual rejection,  he did exactly what men do to heal—they fish the sea of women.  He’s not into the catch and release program and he’s floundered the last month with at least a dozen fish,  some still on ice, in his walk-in-cooler.  I know he’s not exaggerating; my cousin, an experienced fisherman has told me many times the lure can be a phone call, a cheap dinner and a bottle of wine.  “Dawn,” he said, “there are so many women out there!”

So when Bob showed me his line and hook, and made his cast, I had no doubt they’d feast on his bait.   He listed his income in the 99% that most of us 1%er’s despise yet covet and then characterized himself as loving, generous and out for a long term relationship with a woman who could travel the world with him and visit exotic places.  They swarmed.

Bob responded, and with a heavy heart telling them he was still in love with his scornful wife and terribly lonely.  Men, he cast the perfect line.  This wounded guppy created the perfect feeding ground for bottom dwellers.  Woman #1 responds.  He tells me she is self-made, a professional gambler,  living with her aged parents, who she lovingly tends to and runs an internet business on EBay. I’m sitting right there when she sends him a picture of her at that moment in her panties. A Black lace piece of dental floss.  I look down at my crotch imagining what my husband might think if I sent him my shot, right at that moment—jockey microfiber granny panties.  I tuck away the idea of doing something fun for David and  went back to Bob’s plight.  Hi mind was wound in the Black lace but my logical prefrontal cortex was screaming.  So I translate: Compulsive gambler, lost so much money she has to live her parents basement and sell her garage sale finds to fill her gas tank.  I add that she might be selling her used underwear.” 

“But she doesn’t drink,” he retorts.

“Oh,”  I say, “she’s a recovering alcoholic too.” 

A week later he tells me I was right. His revelation came after he found himself eating alone in the casino dining room and after she swiped the tip off the table for “just one more game.”  The evening was topped off with wild sex after she beat him at strip poker and out of a couple hundred dollars.  “How did that happen?” I asked.

“Every time I lost a piece of clothing I had to pay her fifty dollars.”

By now he’s got a new one on the line.  “She’s really down to earth,” he tells me. He describes her life:  She doesn’t care about money— which was a revelation after her near-death experience, after the bus hit her, and after the state took her four kids when she woke from the three month coma, couldn’t recall her own name but had to start again by working in a soup kitchen and living in a studio.

“How old is she?” I ask.

He responded but all I processed was “still fertile.”

“Did you use a condom?” I asked. 

“Oh my God,” he said. “I never thought about that.”

Somehow my mind conjured up the predatory image.  Nothing more juicy than a fat wallet and a desperate man. 

“Bob, it’s like the food chain.  You think your landing plenty of fish but they have to feed too.”

As the weeks went by  Bob got tired of his expedition. “It’s like a full time job,” he told me. “Depressing as hell.”  

He turned the iPod towards me so I could read it. 

All the right words were there; Attractive, divorced, financially secure, wanted honest long term relationship, loved to travel to exotic places. . . .”

He scrolled up to the photo.  It was his ex.

Happy Valentines Day- Can you Please Penis and Clitoris up?

What?  What the hell is that about?  My girlfriend told me she wanted one thing for her Valentine's day present.  It was not a ring, a piece of jewelry, flowers or chocolates.  In fact it is free.  She asked me to write this and she is going to set it under his pillow.
First, only 20% of all women can orgasm without clitoral stimulation.  I think is a hell of a lot more but since we are all supposed to be orgasmic and amateur porn stars ready to go for that great guy, few want to fess up to their need for some FOREPLAY.  What is FOREPLAY?  I actually heard this once while giving a sex lecture -" Four minutes of sexual play before penetration." Blame it on porn- the absolutely worst training material- but that will be another blog! 

So what does girlfriend want from her husband?  A warm bath, bubbles, a massage, a bottle of wine, to sit face to face naked and talk about love for a full five minutes, no touching, to kiss for a whole five minutes without tongues, then another five minutes with tongues, and then she wants him to ask her one question.  "What can I do to make you happy? - Show me" 

She tells me this story and I all-of-sudden- get something really big- she cannot bring herself to tell this man!  Is she alone? Hardly.  Many many women stay silent.  Research tells us they do this for many reasons; sex guilt, embarrassment, afraid they are abnormal or will be viewed as abnormal, they don't want to be demanded, hurt his feelings...on and on the list goes. 

Here is my Valentine’s Day suggestions to write on that card.
Actually make a list of all the reasons and qualities you love then for.
Write the lyrics of a song that reminds you of them.
Send that loved-one the song as a message.
Text lover all day with simple words that all add up to a romantic encounter "Tonight...." pause for a few minutes..."I want ...." 
Or text lover with a menu of the dish you might be serving.
And for my shy friends, do what my girlfriend is going to do. She is sending him a card and beginning with the following words "Honey, I found this on the internet in a sex and love blog,  and I thought it would be the best gift we could give each other.  So read this and tell me what you think:

Happy Valentines form your Sex and Love Fairy Godmother.  Here is a special recipe for a great night.  Give this to your lover!

1. Let's take a bath.  Please open a bottle of wine and light a candle. 
2.  Let's sit face to face and let's tell each other what we love about each other. (Tonight it is only about the two of you- no other's, no erotica, no sex toys, it is only the two of you.)  We have to come up with at least 10 qualities or memories.      
2.  Now we need to kiss for five minutes, gentle, no tongues. 
3.  Now we need to kiss for another five minutes, no rules. 
3. Stop.
4. Now we tell each other something that we have never shared before: 
   * Tell me one fantasy that you have had about me and I will tell you one I have had about you.       
   *Tell me one thing you would really find pleasurable that I can do, that involves me that you have not told me before. I will share the same with you.

  * Show me, by taking my hands or describing exactly one thing I can do to give you pleasure - and in return I will show you or teach you something that can give me pleasure. 

Do men love? Giving Men a Bad Rap

            Recently, a comment swayed my thinking about love and sex towards a different direction.  “I don’t have bad men stories to tell,” was the comment I made, which might be defined as “I don’t have man-hate.”   For sure I do have some really bad stories to tell that have involved a man.  I have been that one in four statistics often quoted; it was a relative and I was a mere three when it began.  In my younger years it did shape some perceptions of trust but bad things happen to all of us.   It really is what we do with the bad that truly shapes us. 

            When I began my research on men and love I discovered (it was easy) that many of us hate men.  Really hate men; and we love to hate men.  Sure, we find one here and there we exempt from the man-hate rule.  We brand them different, exceptional or worthy for some reason.  “He’s not like the rest of them,” I heard my girlfriend tell me. 

            Man bashing is a sport.  I have spent a lot of time around women and a lot of time they get on the male bashing rant.  I remember many years ago  the conversation in college that turned to the bad sex we had experienced with men and dialogue went on to the about the strangeness, uniqueness of their body parts or techniques.   This poor guy Rob was discussed by two of the women.  He was my Physics study partner and every time I looked at him in the face I could only think about the fact his penis turned to the left and he had one testicle.  Okay- that might be funny but here is the real point- How often do men get together and degrade vaginas?  Tell me if you are a guy out there and you and your buddies have sat around degrading and discussing the bad sex you’ve had.  And it’s not all about sex.  I’ve been privy to all the faults of men for my 25 year history as a therapist.  In couples therapy I hear it all, what a louse he is, his sexual follies, fetishes, hygiene habits but when I meet this guy he only mutters “I don’t know what is going on.”  Nothing about fat ass that say in my chair the hour before.  Men have a really difficult time ranting about us.  And God forbid they do- I cannot image a male college professor entering a class and talking about women and the power tactics they use. 

            But we are entitled to do this.  Yes!  Somehow our enslavement has given us a sort of permission to sling the mud right back and in a way, we are set up for us to do this.  We can hate men politically and historically for enslaving us and taking away our freedoms.  Show me a time in history where women were on equal footing, when double standards did not exist—yes there are a handful of examples out there, but it’s child-sized.  I’ve had women heckle me—yell out in lecture centers, “ female circumcision…rape…divorce laws….”  Yes I agree.  They also kill us!  Murder us!  I have a theory about why men have done this, why some men do this and why society and social forces were culpable.   It might be a strange idea but I believe that men love women far more than women may realize.  Controlling women is the cultural or societal method to do so- bind them in marriages they can’t leave, sew their vagina’s shut, stone them for adultery.   What religion is not guilty of setting up rules to make women obey men?  Yeah, I know we’ve come a long way.  But really, women are second class citizens in most of the faith realms. 

            Aside for culture, religion and history, on a personal level men will go to great lengths for their love objects; they take the physically most demanding jobs, they take the riskiest jobs, they die on the job ten times more than women do, and engage in the most dangerous activities to support their families or women in their lives.  And they die much earlier than we do.  My poor father-in-law built his own house out of wood crates, worked 60 hours a week as a meat cutter to support his 10 children and dropped dead days after he retired.   Yes, my poor mother-in-law was delegated to her role of cooking, cleaning, making him happy and reading her bible which told her to never complain. 

            I know I’m getting philosophical on you.  but I want you to think of all the things we have come to associated with mans’ hate and control a little differently—It  is driven by fear of abandonment or the fear of losing the object of love.  Men might love us so much they enslave us, and sometimes themselves in the process.  And there is evidence in the brain and the neurochemical make up- but that will have to wait.   

What do you think? 

Does it measure up? Please be Happy with the Penis in your Life!

Men are more centered on physical appearance than women.  It would be a great world if men were okay with little boobies, a flabby stomach or hairy legs.  But they are the motor that we drive to plastic surgeons, hair removers or gyms.  But, that centering has bitten them back.  They are just as critical when it comes to their appearance!

           

            In the largest (and most valid) study of its kind, over 25,000 men were asked to rate the size of their organ (when on high): 66% said they were average, 22% said they were large, and 12% stated they were small. But the researchers found a whopping 55% of American men were dissatisfied with the size of their equipment!  They wanted a bigger one!  Well, there were about three chaps who thought they could be smaller, but the men tended to be quite unhappy with the size of their tools, even rating themselves less attractive; facially and body-wise. 

          While these 55% were complaining, 84% of the women (nearly 25,000 of them), were perfectly happy with their partner’s penis size.  Other research tells us that those 16% might be more interested in girth rather than length. The scientific moral is that women truly don’t care.  Pause for a moment; let’s get a true picture of a real penis—I mean in size—erect, ready to work, on paper. . . . 

          What is the normal?  

          The average length of the average penis (in America!) is 5.3 inches or 13.5 centimeters if you really need to pull out the scientific tape-measure.    

68% of all men measure between 4.6 and 6.0 inches.

13.5% measure between 3.8 and 4.4 inches.

Another 13.5% measure between 6.1 and 6.8 inches.

Only 2.5% are larger than 6.9 inches or below 3.7 inches. 

          For students who have taken a basic statistics class you should note that most men are normal.

          Very big men, as in obesity, tend to have smaller penises.  Big men have the problem that their penises look petite when on their massive bodies, kind of like nestled in needle in their haystack.    Height is the only predictor and as the mother of a near 7 foot tall son, who I diapered, I believe this statistic.  No, hand size or shoe size is not a predictor. That was my mother's theory which freaked me out when I was 14 and knew my mother's shoe size. Yuk! I called her today and told her she was wrong, about something.

          Can you make it bigger? The promise of growing longer and bigger penises is a billion dollar industry.  The phallus fairy grandfather is a myth, you got what you got.  And nothing can change it!  But it doesn’t matter!  The truth is we women don’t really care.  We are simply not that into your buddy, unless of course it is part of that person we care about.  You don’t believe me?  Huh!  Remember that famous movie scene when the chick is being interviewed for the crime and she crosses her legs revealing her pleasure patch???  Try exposing your stiffy to a woman and see what happens.  Women aren’t lining up to see men flash them in parks; women don’t put secret cameras in men’s bathrooms or locker rooms!

          Do you know our ancestors walked around naked? Just which man would your cave grandmother prefer; the one with the kielbasa sized sausage or the one who could shoot an arrow and knock down a kill in one shot? 

          Why do we get sucked up (No pun intended) into this dilemma? The media, the media the media.  There is no market for digital press with men owning pinky sized weeines.  But then again there is no market for fifty five year old women either.  Somehow the big dong has been sexualized and you have gotten the message.  Giant penises slapping buttocks all the while she moans and screams.  Supposedly in delight.  Another Ha!  That actress needs to have health insurance.  There isn’t a woman alive who wants to be pounded by some mega dong, on all fours, for a half hour.  Please don’t email me if you think you know her; I’m only going to recommend she have her kidney’s x-rayed for bruising.

          Finally the most important message.  The size of the tool, the mass of the ship, or the height of the flag- DOES NOT MATTER!  Women want a partner who cares about her orgasm.  Most women are clitorally stimulated; it has little to do with the vagina. Your job is to make your little buddy her favorite play toy.  Therefore being a tender, considerate and devoted lover trumps everything. And by the way, when we love you, we love whatever accessories you come with!   

Dr. Dawn Marelan Hopper

For more information: Does size matter? Men's and women's views on penis size across the lifespan. Lever, Janet;Frederick, David A.;Peplau, Letitia Anne

Psychology of Men & Masculinity, Vol 7(3), Jul 2006, 129-143. doi: 10.1037/1524-9220.7.3.129

http://dfred.bol.ucla.edu/LeverFrederickPeplau-2006PMM-PenisSizeSatisfaction.pdf

Looking for Men in Love- Are you There?

No, I am not crazy.  Men love more than women think.   I am looking for men who would write their love stories.  Yes, men!  So if you know a  man who has a love story, ending good or bad, long or short, pleasure or pain,   I’d like to hear from him!   Length is unimportant.  Love, livid, lurid, longing, life-changing, lachrymose, lascivious, lustful, lasting, laudable, lubricous, low-bred, luminous, lush, or lucid  -  I want them!  Lesson learned, hearts tormented, love that sustains It is all good.  Email the longest to dawnmhopper@gmail.com   -  I am collecting them.  Yesterday an 87-year-old man wrote me a 6 page single spaced story… WOW!  It was great.  I might publish it in a series, so wait….Thanks!

Men Love!

Who loves more? I believe men do.

You are laughing right?  Stop.  Women don’t kill themselves over men, women don’t kill their families, rivals, stalk or obsess anywhere near the rate the men.  Rejected men go nuts.  Why?  Because they tend bond to the women they love furiously. 

     Stereotypes however portray men as cold, aloof, cunning, ruthless in exploiting women, going from conquest to conquest.  Women are the lovers and men are the leavers.  Not so. One of the most interesting studies on this topic was done by Zick Rubin, Latitia Peplau and Charles Hill in 1981 who followed a large group of couples over a long period of time examining their love relationship and their break-ups.  That stereotype of men as cads is false.

Men and Sex? The Evidence...

     Consider this- women will not rape for sex nor pay for it. Do you know of any woman prowling the street corners looking for able men to have sex with them?  She needs to have her head examined. Ask any female what she would rather have- a new pair of designer shoes or a night with a good looking sexually able man.  Hands down, I know the answer.   In looking for fundamental differences between men and women researchers have found the differences staggering.  For the benefit of my more research orientated audience I’ve included some reference aids in parentheses next to the statements I deliver.    

     Come to Pornatopia! The research on men and sex is plentiful.  Excuse me, I should qualify this statement; the research is usually conducted using college students, usually freshman.  Sex drive might be considered the motivation to engage in sex and men do possess much more.  Men think about sex more than women (Oliver and Hyde, 1993).  Males experience more unwanted and intrusive sexual thoughts (Byers, Purdon, and Clark, 1998; see Baumeister, 2010) report more sexual compulsive thinking and need to control it (Vanwesenbeeck, Bekker, and van Lenning, 1998), have more spontaneous events of desire; sometimes several times a day while females report only a few times a week (Beck, Bozman, and Qualtrough,1991;  Knoth, Boyd, and Singer, 1988).  Men also report much more fantasy having over twice as many sexual fantasies per day (4.75 vs. 2.00)  than do females (Jones and Barlow 1990) and they masterbate more.