Women and Sex Partner Numbers

Excerpts from:
Wrong 'number'? New movie explores real-life worries
Published: Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Author: Mark Blankenship, Today Health

Dr. Bat Sheva Marcus, director of the Medical Center for Female Sexuality, says most of her patients feel as though something is wrong with their number. "On the same day, I could have a woman say, 'Oh my God, you must think I'm crazy because I only slept with one guy before I got married,' and then an hour and a half later, a woman will say, 'Oh my God, you must think I'm crazy because I slept with 15 guys before I got married.'"

But even if no one agrees what it is, most people believe in a "wrong number." Cosmopolitan and AskMen.com recently surveyed thousands of women and asked them what they considered to be a woman’s “slut number”: 37 percent said it was 20 sexual partners, 35 percent said it was 10, and 16 percent said it was 50. Just 9 percent of respondents said a woman can never be a slut.

"Somehow, we're a society that just can't let go of the fact that women who have sex are sluts," says Marcus. "It used to be that if you had sex with more than one person, you were considered a slut. Now they're redefining it that if you have sex with more than 20 people, you're a slut."

Marcus encourages women not to link their number of sexual partners to their sense of lovability. "There's no right answer," she says. "There isn't a rule, and there's nothing that's going to guarantee you're going to have a better sex life."

Read the full article.

Get a free women’s sexuality information packet.

Contact us for more information about the center or call us to make an appointment at (914) 328-3700.