What’s the frequency?

ALL THE TIME

Photograph: Neil Beckerman

DITCHED THE PILL
Bisexual female, 27, in an open relationship
“A year ago, I had no physical libido—though intellectually I still wanted it, which was very disconcerting. My partner and I assumed he was doing something wrong, so we kept trying to figure out what he could do to turn me on more. Then we realized it was because of my birth control. When I went off it, my libido skyrocketed; suddenly it was easy again. These days, I’m delighted with my sex life: I’m getting all my fantasies satisfied, exploring with multiple lovers, and sex with my partner is better than ever.”

HORNY GIRLFRIEND
Straight male, 32, in a relationship
“This is my first relationship, so I have nothing to compare my current experiences to. It wasn’t hard to adjust from having no sex to having sex all the time; although everything still seems very new. I think dealing with the other parts of the relationship are much more challenging than just worrying about sex, but I guess that’s because I never worry about initiating anything—my girlfriend takes care of that. Left to my own devices, I’m not sure how often I would want to have sex. There’s no chance of me becoming sexually frustrated in this relationship, so it’s hard to know what the threshold would be. My guess is that a couple times a week would be about right.”

GIRL GONE WILD
Straight female, 33, single
“I’m not currently in a relationship. So I’ll go, like, six months without sex. Then, I finally meet a guy. I like him. We go on dates. Eventually, we hook up and I go fucking crazy! I fuck like there’s no tomorrow. I just wrapped up a total ‘summer fling’ with a guy much younger than I, and I swear I got fucked, like, five times in one night. It was great. I never thought I had a high sex drive until my ex-boyfriend complained that I wanted sex all the time. I was like, Who doesn’t want to have sex? I don’t know if I could have sex every day, but I certainly expect it more than a couple times a week. And, with each encounter, I expect it more than once.”