I spent a chunk of my early 20s faking orgasms, and damn, was I good at it. I could’ve taken out more Oscars than Hepburn; my lovers were unaware.

Thanks to social media, we live in a world where we feel compelled to fake it. We don’t want to seem like we don’t know or have, so what do we do? We put on our showreel.

Somewhere along the way, we lost the beauty of the unfiltered, the appeal of clumsiness, and of not knowing.

Studies have shown 60- 80 per cent of women in heterosexual relationships admit to faking it, so why do we do it when we know we deserve pleasure just as much as our partners?

We often learn that sex is performative–it’s not good unless it ends with a mind-blowing climax. So the pitch of our moan becomes a measure of our success.

My reason for putting on a show was that I didn’t have the confidence to communicate what I wanted. And by faking it, I avoided what was for me, back then, uncomfortable conversations.

I’m not proud of my acting efforts because it was a great disservice to myself and my lovers.

Nobody wins when you’re faking it. Good lovers won’t be satisfied until you are. Good lovers want you to feel pleasure. And you certainly won’t be happy if your pleasure buttons aren’t pressed.

So my advice to you is this: find the courage to talk to your partner about what feels good for you and if you don’t orgasm, work on it, don’t fake it. Sex is an experience; it’s not a polished performance.

originally published in PerthNow, September 2, 2021