Customer Service
Instagram
YouTube
Brands
Advice
Is it appropriate to use the word ‘nymphomaniac’ as soon as a woman expresses her desire? This term, with its scandalous undertones, is still fairly common, labeling women who have a high sex drive as sex obsessed. However, this is simply not the truth. Nymphomania is an outdated, biased term that not many people actually understand.
In reality, nymphomania and hypersexuality are two completely different things. The former is based upon outdated moral views on feminine sexuality, the latter aims to describe a complicated reality in which sex takes up too much space in a person’s life, becoming hard to cope with.
Nymphomania, an Outdated Term
Nymphomania has long been used to describe women who have been judged as 'too' sexual. Too much desire, too many needs, too self-assured, too much freedom… too much in general. Historically, this term applies mainly to women, which is telling in itself.
It’s not simply a question of how much sex a person is having. The word stems from the persisting surveillance, judgment and commenting on female desire. To put things into simple terms, as soon as a woman strays from societies expectations regarding sex, she’s eligible to receive the nymphomaniac label.
The problem with this term is that it’s outdated and far from being neutral. Propped up by fantasy, debates on morality and clichés surrounding women and sex, nymphomania is less about an actual sexual disorder and more about society’s unease when it comes to a woman who owns her desire.
The Reality Behind Hypersexuality
Being hypersexual isn’t simply really wanting sex or being particularly at ease with your desires. It’s nothing to do with how often you have sex or how many people you’ve had sex with.
It’s more accurate if we talk about sex transforming into something invasive, compulsive and difficult to control, resembling more traditional patterns of addiction and weighing on a person’s daily life. What matters is how desire is expressed, not how often it’s expressed.
You can have a high libido, think about sex often, enjoy experimenting in the bedroom and have an active sex life without it necessarily being problematic. It does become a problem, however, when sex is no longer pleasurable. When it takes over your daily life, when you feel like you’re doing things out of compulsion and not pleasure, this might signal a problem.
Say No to Nymphomania
Nymphomania is an old sexist term, whereas hypersexuality provides a nuanced approach to sexual disorders.
Nymphomania is a highly gendered word that has long since been used to shame women who were considered ‘too’ sexual. Hypersexuality doesn’t put a judgement on libido or behaviour, it focuses on possible suffering, a loss of control and complicated relationships to sex.
This is why the two terms are worlds apart. On one hand, we have a word designed to pass judgement, on the other, a word designed to try to understand.
No, Liking Sex Doesn’t Make You a Nympho
Let’s make that clear. Having a high sex drive, fantasising regularly, enjoying sex, talking about it openly and wanting to explore different things doesn’t mean you have a problem.
An active sex life doesn’t equate to a problematic one. Having a high libido doesn’t make you ‘too much’, it doesn’t make you ‘excessive’. The difference lies in how you feel about it.
Is your sex life something fulfilling, that you openly choose to participate in, and that you find pleasurable? Or is it something that weighs on you, interrupts your daily life, and makes you feel guilty? That’s what the focus should be on.
Above all, nymphomania is an outdated term that still gets used, despite the fact it isn’t beneficial to conversations around sex. It reduces female sexuality to a sensationalist cliché, despite the reality requiring much more nuance.
Simply replacing nymphomania with hypersexuality in your vocabulary is a great step. With this term, we aren’t talking about a woman deemed ‘too sexual’, but instead a relationship to sex that can be difficult to live with, regardless of gender.
