Today, a 25-year-old woman probably has her first introduction to sexuality somewhere between Google, an episode of Sex and the City, TikTok, a group chat with friends and an algorithm that, without asking permission, slowly began teaching her what a body should look like. How it should move; what it meant to be attractive.

A 50-year-old woman may have grown up in an entirely different world. One where female masturbation was not even an uncomfortable conversation; it simply did not exist. A world where pleasure and women rarely appeared in the same sentence; where many learned more about shame than desire; more about caring for others than getting to know themselves.

And between both generations there is something curious: at first glance, they seem to have lived opposite stories; but perhaps they share the same question: Who taught us how to know our bodies?

Author: Claudia Valdez

From Secrecy to Self-Care

For years, we learned countless things about ourselves; we learned how to pose, correct, hide, wax, observe. We learned which part was considered “beautiful”; which needed improvement; which should stay slightly hidden.

We learned reflection but not necessarily presence; and perhaps that is why the shift surrounding female pleasure feels so interesting today. Because not only did the conversation change; the place where it happens changed too.

For years it belonged to quiet spaces; closed drawers and conversations that rarely escaped intimacy. Today it appears on TikTok, in wellness recommendations, in conversations between partners, in divorced women rediscovering their bodies, in women living alone, in women married for twenty years and in those navigating menopause who suddenly begin asking themselves something that sounds simple, but is not.

What does it feel like to inhabit my body again?

But something else changed too. Culture itself started speaking differently. While some generations grew up in complete silence around female masturbation; others grew up watching Sex and the City open conversations around vibrators and female pleasure; others arrived through Girls, Sex Education or Euphoria; series where desire, anxiety, identity and sexuality began appearing in ways that felt far more open and far less moralized.

For the first time; characters stopped talking exclusively about romance and began talking about bodies; therapy; desire; pleasure; insecurity; anxiety and different ways of inhabiting themselves. And maybe it sounds like a small thing but for decades many women learned more about desire through silence than through conversation.

Because perhaps television did something education avoided for years:

Normalize the conversation. And while taboos still exist; there is also a generation now sharing sex toy recommendations the way previous generations shared skincare products; integrating pleasure into wellness conversations and becoming increasingly interested in a different question: Not simply how to look but also how to feel.

When Pleasure Also Became Wellness

While culturally we continued treating the topic as uncomfortable; science began observing something different. A 2024 study conducted with 370 women found that 64% used masturbation primarily to relieve stress; while 55% reported experiencing happiness and relaxation afterward.

The unexpected part came next; researchers concluded that for many women it was functioning as a form of self-care; not only sexuality; but also emotional regulation and wellbeing. Recent studies also began finding associations between masturbation; greater body awareness; self-esteem and body perception.

And perhaps the most interesting part is not that it reduces stress; it is asking ourselves why a generation of women is using pleasure as a tool for emotional self-care.

Because something seems to be changing: women learned to monitor sleep; hormones; cortisol; mental health and wellbeing, but perhaps no one taught us that the body also speaks through pleasure.

What No One Taught Us

And perhaps this is where the conversation changes completely, because many of us grew up learning how to be desired; but not necessarily what gave us pleasure. We learned which version of ourselves felt attractive; which body was accepted; which pose worked; what to reveal and what to hide. We learned a lot about being seen and very little about feeling ourselves.

A recent study on the female orgasm found something fascinating: women with greater interoception, the ability to perceive internal signals such as breathing; heartbeat and bodily sensations, reported more frequent and satisfying orgasms.

Translated outside scientific language; it means something surprisingly simple: The more connected women felt to their bodies; the more satisfaction they experienced.

And while taboos still exist; another conversation is happening at the same time. The conversation of women who grew up in generations where female masturbation did not even have a name; women who spent years prioritizing children; work; relationships and responsibilities. Women who may now be 50, 55 or 60 years old and are entering an unexpected stage of life: one where, for the first time, they are asking themselves what they like; what they desire; what it feels like to return to their bodies from a completely different place.

Because perhaps rediscovery is also a form of intimacy and perhaps one of the most beautiful conversations happening today is not only young women speaking more openly about pleasure; it is also women realizing that it is never too late to find their way back to themselves.

Because perhaps female masturbation was never only about sex. It was also about permission and about something even more powerful:

The possibility of returning to a part of yourself you once thought no longer belonged to you. – Claudia Valdez