Feature image of Valentine and Calico in Crash Pad episode 232. All of the photographs in this NSFW Sunday are from the Crash Pad Series. The inclusion of a visual here should not be interpreted as an assertion of the model’s gender identity or sexual orientation. If you’re a photographer or model and think your work would be a good fit for NSFW Sunday, please email carolyn at autostraddle dot com.

Welcome to NSFW Sunday!

Goddess Ixchel and Ray in Crash Pad Series episode 252

• There’s no “right way” to use a vibrator — just pay attention to your body and what feels good — which can make buying one feel complicated. If you’ve never used a vibrator before, get one with different speeds, intensities and powers so you can figure out what you like. If you have, just keep paying attention to what you like. Writing at Broadly about a new study on how to buy a vibrator, Kimberly Lawson says:

“According to a new paper published in Sexual and Relationship Therapy, there are several factors a person should consider when trying to decide what kind of vibrator to purchase. The paper, courtesy of a multidisciplinary team of sexual health specialists, appears to be the first to offer evidence-based recommendations for helping health-care providers and therapists advise patients on choosing and safely using a device to aid in genital vibration, whether it’s for sexual function and/or enhancement. (These recommendations come as the result of parsing decades of research on vibrators and sexual dysfunction.)

For their part, the study’s authors acknowledge that selecting a vibrator ‘may feel overwhelming given the countless varieties of commercially available vibrators.’ One of the first things you should consider, they write, is what you want your vibrator to actually do.”

Barbary Rose and Bella Rossi in Crash Pad Series episode 251

• Just imagine how complicated choosing a sex toy will be when you’re picking out a whole robot. On why people will be into sex robots, Tina Horn writes:

“Imagine a toy with the hydraulic power to pick you up and give you that real passionate sweaty fuck-fest feeling. Or a toy that you can mount and hump until you’re exhausted, perhaps with a self-lubricating orifice and entertaining moans of pleasure. Your toy could have any body type or any gender, any personality or pheromone smell; it might even look otherworldly. Meanwhile, we will still seek connection with non-artificially intelligent, flawed flesh and blood, just as your favorite Fleshlight isn’t a substitute for sentient love.”

Betty Blac and Kitty Stryker in Crash Pad Series episode 132

• Vulvic aura portraits? Why not? (You do not need to have a vagina to order a portrait.)

• What does your astrological sign say about how you masturbate?

• Here are some dating app opening lines. (And here are some very queer-specific ones.)

• We need to talk to kids about porn in order to help them think critically about the content they’ll inevitably see, adult filmmaker Erika Lust tells the Establishment.

Aviva Romelli and Selphie Labrys in Crash Pad Series episode 216

• You can try to get back together with an ex, but try only after there’s been enough time (months or years) to work through what went wrong, once you’ve both changed enough internally and externally to create a new experience together, be honest with yourself about your reasons for wanting to get back together, and go slow:

“Although there are a myriad of reasons that cause a relationship to break, being confident that those circumstances have changed is key to future success. Internal changes such as self-awareness, breaking old patterns, renewed vulnerability and trust, and healing from the past sets us up for a new experience with a familiar person. Also, external changes such as career, effective communication, and overall timing support a successful second chance. Getting back together with an ex partner can be likened to repairing an emotional injury. A successful relationship is not disqualified because it did not work initially, success comes in how you repair it. Repair it well!”

In the meantime, here are some benefits to divorce.

Cinnamon Maxxine and Amani Luxe in Crash Pad Series episode 243

• Getting Off is a new memoir about sex addiction from Erica Garza. In an interview at Vice, she says of her recovery:

“I like being a sexual person. I like being open-minded about my sexuality and being experimental. I just wanted to cut off the shame aspect of it. I think that was the most harmful and the most destructive part about my addiction, that I needed to feel bad. […] It’s an ongoing process, and it’s not perfect even now—my brain has gone through wanting shame for such a long part of my life that of course it’s gonna come up from time to time—but what I have now that I didn’t have before was this ability to stop and think and make a choice for something else.”

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