Anal Sex Part 1: What Couples Get Wrong About Getting Started
There seems to be growing curiosity about anal sex these days, but there are some widespread misconceptions about how to actually begin. Most people whose only education on the topic comes from pornography mistakenly think that inserting a penis into an anus is the entry point, and that it will magically feel good from the start. The truth is far more nuanced than that. Most anuses need a period of breaking in and training before any of it starts to feel good at all.
Going directly to penetration is probably the biggest mistake couples make when they start exploring anal sex. It was never our entry point, and I don't think it should be anyone's.
Where We Actually Started
Our actual entry point was analingus, and it has been part of our marriage, on and off, for twenty years now. It's not for everyone. But for us, it's where everything else began.
When I first mentioned it to my wife, she was appalled. Not curious, not hesitant, appalled. I didn't push. I made a few soft requests over time, nothing forceful, just an open door she could walk through whenever she was ready. Eventually she relented and agreed to try it. She was overwhelmed, in the best way, by how good it felt. What started as something she found truly off-putting became something she came to enjoy as much as, sometimes more than, oral sex itself. It's been part of our repertoire ever since.
I don't think it was a coincidence that this was where I could lead us. I've always been an enthusiastic giver when it comes to oral sex, so analingus was never a big stretch for me. It felt like a natural extension of something I already loved doing for her.
The Door That Closed
For years, alongside all of this, I wanted more. Actual penetration was something I asked about, on and off, for a long time. My wife was hesitant, and we've only had penetrative anal sex a handful of times across our whole marriage. It never became a lasting, regular part of what we do.
By the time she'd grown genuinely comfortable with her anus being touched and pleasured, a different problem had shown up. My ED had progressed to the point where I could no longer stay rigid enough to actually enter her. That door closed for reasons that had nothing to do with her comfort finally arriving. Timing is not always kind.
What Opened Up Instead
Once we moved past the original stigma she carried around the act itself, she became more open to other kinds of anal exploration. We introduced butt plugs. We started experimenting with Foria products, paying particular attention to that whole area. Those products let us explore with genuine ease, rather than fighting through friction or hesitation every time.
What we learned, gradually, is that the anus is dense with nerve endings, surprisingly and intensely pleasurable when it's approached the right way. That surprised both of us, honestly. Neither of us expected it to become one of the more sensual parts of our intimacy.
The Biggest Lesson
The single biggest thing I learned, mechanically, was how to breach the sphincter muscle. That's the real skill in all of this. Your partner has to be warmed up and in a state of complete muscle relaxation for this to feel good. Once you get past that point, the pleasure intensifies considerably, but getting there takes true patience. You have to go slow. There's no shortcut through it.
We didn't have a name for this when we were figuring it out on our own, but I later came across an episode of the Sex With Emily podcast featuring an anal surgeon that confirmed what we'd already learned the hard way. There's an actual physiological reason rushing doesn't work, and a genuine preparation process the body needs before anything feels good. It was validating to hear a medical professional describe, in clinical terms, the same patience we'd arrived at through years of trial and error.
A few other things we learned along the way, all in service of that same patience. The anus doesn't lubricate itself the way other parts of the body do, which is exactly why generous lube matters as much as it does. Every time, before inserting anything at all, fingers, a plug, anything. My wife showers and is completely clean beforehand, every time, without exception. And more than any of that, you have to read your partner. Her body, her verbal cues, the small signals that tell you whether to keep going or ease back. Communication isn't optional here. It's the entire foundation the rest of it stands on.
Why This Isn't a Checkbox
Anal sex gets treated, culturally, like something to just try, another item on a list. I don't think that's right. What we've learned across two decades together is that it's advanced lovemaking, maybe the most sensual thing we do together, and it only works because we approached it with genuine care and tenderness rather than urgency. The couples who struggle with this, I suspect, are usually the ones who skip straight to penetration and skip the years of trust-building that actually make it good. We didn't skip that part. That's probably the whole reason any of this worked.
I've come to believe her initial hesitancy is actually the reason this became such a sensual part of our lovemaking in the first place. It forced me to learn her body with real care, long before I ever inserted anything into her. That slowness wasn't a delay we had to push through. It was the thing that let us find meaningful ways to enhance the practice over time, until it became the standard, trusted part of what we do now. If she'd said yes right away, I don't think we would have built any of this the same way.
If any of this makes you curious about trying anal exploration together, know that patience is the whole game. We put together a free guide called The Five Intimacy Truths Nobody Tells Long Married Couples. It draws on 27 years of real marriage and includes five action steps you can use right now, the same kind of slow, deliberate approach that made this practice something we both love. It's a good place to start.
