I’m a straight guy and I’m really into having my balls sucked—it’s one of my favorite things, and just thinking about it turns me on. But whenever I’ve had my balls sucked, it hurts, and ball pain is not a kink of mine! It hurts enough to override any pleasure, and I have to tell my partner to stop. Is this normal? Does ball-sucking hurt for everyone? Is there something I can do to make it less painful?

She Can’t Roughly Osculate Trouser Eggs


The next time you find yourself in an argument with a proponent of “intelligent design,” SCROTE, lay this one on ’em…

There’s this muscle called the cremaster that attaches a man’s balls to his abdominal muscles. When a man is cold, the cremaster contracts, lifting his balls toward his body so those little darlings stay nice and warm; when he’s hot, the cremaster relaxes, dropping his balls away from his body, keeping the little darlings cool. Putting this in language the average “intelligent design” proponent can understand: Your cremaster is Goldilocks and your nuts are a delicious-looking bowl of sperm-cell porridge. Cremasterlocks doesn’t like sperm-cell porridge that’s too hot. Cremasterlocks doesn’t like sperm-cell porridge that’s too cold. Cremasterlocks likes sperm-cell porridge that’s just right.


And here’s the cruel twist, SCROTE, the absolutely irrefutable proof that humans evolved over the eons through a completely random and directionless process of spontaneous mutation and natural selection: Our cremaster muscles don’t just contract when we’re cold, they also contract when we’re aroused. So the better it feels to have your balls sucked, the more turned on you get. The more turned on you get, the more your cremaster contracts. And the more your cremaster contracts, the more it hurts to have your balls sucked! You can call a system like that a lot of things—crazy painful, deeply ironic—but it can’t be called “intelligently designed.” (In defense of the cremaster muscle: It’s pulling your balls up toward your body so they don’t get hurt during intercourse—so they don’t get smacked around too much—but if humans are smart enough to create a car that knows when its door is open, then an intelligent designer would be smart enough to create balls that know when they’re being sucked, right?)

So the problem here, SCROTE, isn’t ball pain, it’s muscle strain. And there is something you can do about that.


“This guy should get himself a set of short ball stretchers,” said Stephen “Ox” Lane of oxballs.com, an online sex shop that specializes in toys for men. “We have a good selection of ball stretchers, most made of silicone, so they are nice and soft. He should get in the tub, soak in warm water, and let his sack relax and sag, then gently put one ring on. Then he can play with his balls for a while, stroking them and his dick, and if everything is feeling good, add another ring.”

At least for now, though, Lane doesn’t recommend that you leave the ball stretchers on when you come.


“His balls will pull up as he’s getting ready to shoot, and that may cause pain,” said Lane. “For the time being, he should use his ball stretchers as a warm-up. Over time, his balls will get used to the feeling and his sack will stretch.”

And not just your sack, SCROTE, but your cremaster, too. And a slightly looser, more elastic cremaster will mean less painful ball-sucking. Good luck!


Here is my question for you, Mr. Savage: My girlfriend and I are sexually active, and I can get an erection in the beginning, a fully hard erection, but a few minutes into intercourse, I start to lose my erection. Intercourse feels amazing, it’s just that after a while I start to lose my erection. I can get my erection back if I allow my girlfriend to use her hand on it for a while. And then when I penetrate her again, I lose my erection again. I heard you on TV talk about how a guy shouldn’t grip himself too hard when he beats off. I grab it pretty hard, I have to admit, and when my girlfriend uses her hand, I ask her to grab it really hard, too. So I am writing to ask if you think the reason I can’t keep an erection during intercourse has something to do with how hard I have her use her hand and how hard I use my hand?

Having A Real Dilemma


Here is my answer for you, Mr. HARD: The way you grip your dick when you beat off? And the way you allow your girlfriend to grip your dick? No more gripping your dick like that, HARD. From now on, whenever you masturbate, you’re going to jerk it with a light touch and few drops of lube. And if you can’t come using that lighter touch and a few drops of lube, then you don’t come. At least for now.

Basically, HARD, you gotta cut your dick off. Um, let me rephrase that: You gotta stop serving up the kind of stimulation your dick has come to expect—the death grip—because the only way your dick will ever come to appreciate the subtler and damper sensations that vaginas provide, HARD, is if you give your dick no choice. Give your dick what it’s used to, HARD, and your dick will be forever dependent on it. Drive your dick (and yourself) to desperation, and your dick will find new ways to get off.


Your dick will adapt.

You can help your dick adapt faster by stirring some other forms of physical and mental stimulation into the mix. Talk dirty (your biggest sex organ is between your ears), do some nipple play (I’m talking about your nipples), and explore different scenarios that turn you on (girlfriend calls the shots? Do it outside?), all the while experimenting with different positions that might provide you with a slightly snugger fit (girl on top, doggy style, etc.). Good luck!


I’m an 18-year-old male about to head off to college in the fall. I’m not the best-looking guy—skinny, pale, some acne—and I’m afraid I’m going to be one of those college freshmen who aren’t getting laid. What can I do to help make my potential college sex life better? I’m a smooth-talking guy in some ways, Mr. Dan, but it doesn’t work a majority of the time, and I don’t understand why.

College-Bound Boy


First, CBB, “it” doesn’t work for a majority of the people a majority of the time.

It doesn’t matter how smooth a guy’s talk is, how tight his abs are, or how fat his wallet is, most of the people he meets won’t wanna sleep with him. I’m not going to lie to you: Smooth talk, tight abs, and a fat wallet improve a guy’s odds considerably. But for reasons that run the gamut from religious to logistic to simple miscommunication, most people won’t want to fuck a given person, however smooth, tight, fat, etc.


The trick is to keep working it—to keep looking around—until you find someone who does want to fuck you. And there will be plenty of skinny, pale, and spotty girls at your school, as well as girls who can see past those things. Your odds will be better if you can look past ’em, too.

Find the Savage Lovecast (my weekly podcast) every Tuesday at thestranger.com/savage. Got problems? mail@savagelove.net


@fakedansavage