Talking with your doctor isn’t always easy. Whether you are afraid she will judge you, you just don’t feel comfortable sharing the intimate details of your life between the sheets, or you can’t think straight with a speculum between your legs, many people get tight lipped in the doctor’s office. But that doesn’t mean you don’t have questions.

We thought we’d help and every Thursday our friend Dr. Lissa Rankin will be answering your questions. The ones you couldn’t ask your doctor in person. Just leave your questions in the comments, or send em over to us. (We’ll keep it all anonymous for you.) Dr. Lissa will answer anything – really, anything – about sex and other lady things. Don’t be shy; she’s waiting for ya!

Q: A few months ago I was sitting with my BF and he thought I had something on my cheek. He went to pull it off and…it was a long, dark hair….growing out of my face. I was mortified, but figured it was a one-time deal. But now I’m finding these hairs popping up more often. They are dark and big and show up on my cheek and neck. Do I have too much testosterone or something? Is this fixable??

Help – it’s really embarrassing.

A: I know how you feel. In fact, I have a few sprouters myself.  Nothing like a big black facial hair to spoil the mood. I wish I knew more about what else is going on with your hair growth. Are the hairs growing out of moles? How many are there? Do you have hair on your chest, under your belly button, or around your nipples? Are your arms hairier than normal? Do you tend to get acne?  These would all give me some idea of how much testosterone you may have in your body. Read More »

This month, Cosmo was especially recession conscious (there were, like, 6 whole articles!), featured a slightly disappointing interview with Leighton Meester (she’s just not as bitchy as Blair Waldorf) and their first ever scratch-n-sniff! But, by far the most…interesting article I read was “The Sex Detective is in!”

Now, the woman-in-trench-coat-peeping-through-blinds picture that accompanied the headline immediately got me excited for the juicy confessions of some private investigator. Boy was I wrong. Instead, Dr. Harry Fisch, author of Size Matters, decoded what size, shape, texture and taste (!!) mean when it comes to a guy’s libido. So, read on to find out what it means if…

…He’s Trim Around the Middle.

Cosmo Says: If the guy’s got a spare tire, all that extra fat will break down testosterone much faster than lean muscle, and “testosterone is the gas that drives the car. If it’s low…he’ll be tired, he’s not going to be able to exercise very much, he’s less likely to be in the mood, and his fertility will be lower.”

Kari Says: Interesting. I didn’t know a little extra padding could be so detrimental to a guy’s sex life. I mean, a huge potbelly is definitely going to lower a guy’s chances of getting laid, but I had no clue it would affect his performance/ potency when he eventually does bed someone. Testosterone must be pretty damn important.

…He’s Got Guns.

Cosmo Says: Yes, Kari, testosterone is pretty damn important. If you want to have great sex, find a guy who’s “trim and jacked” because all those muscles mean more testosterone. Also, tall, thin guys with bodies like noodles don’t produce as much, and some guys won’t produce a lot no matter how much they workout, those hopeless wimps.

Kari Says: Ugh, it’s nice to look at all those fake baked guidos glistening while they spot each other at the gym, but it’s another thing entirely to want to sleep with them. Even if they are producing mucho testosterone (and I’m not sure how black market steroids affect that hormone post-cycle), I think I might rather sleep with noodle boy and have mediocre sex than get my bump and grind on while jamming to house music. Just sayin’. Read More »

Any shared activity among a couple is likely to bring that couple closer together. Hobbies such as painting, gardening, cooking a meal together, or taking a weekly jog together could all romantically benefit relationships. This rule idea applies to couples both in and out of the bedroom where, ironically enough, sadomasochistic (S&M) type of activities are shown to promote bonding.

The New Scientist is reporting that S&M (including spanking, bondage, and flogging), although stressful at first, could bring couples closer together.

In a study, researchers at Northern Illinois University measured the stress hormone cortisol in 13 men and women at an S&M party. “During S&M scenes, cortisol rose significantly in those receiving stimulation, but dropped back to normal within 40 minutes if the scene went well”. At another event, testosterone was measured in 45 men and women and reportedly “increased significantly in receiving women only”. This fluctuation in hormones is understood to help women cope with the stressful nature of the activities.

In both studies, hormone levels returned to normal in couples who enjoyed the experience. The couples who reported the party as a success also “reported an increases in relationship closeness”. These new findings show that “when sexual intercourse is consensual it is not stressful – even if it is extreme sex”.

Not ready for nipple clamps, whips and chains? Don’t worry about it, an activity as simple as cleaning the apartment together could promote closeness withing a couple. Then again, nothing brings a couple closer together than a pair of handcuffs.

Lots of action movies suck. Sure, some of them are worth their $20 million plus budgets, but most are products of testosterone, half-baked skills, and a complete miscalculation of how stupid the movie-going audience is.

So yes, lots of action movies suck, but every once in a while, there comes along a film so sh*tastic that it makes movies like Swordfish seem like Citizen freaking Kane. The Day After Tomorrow is one of those sh*tastic sh*t fests. In fact, I think The Day After Tomorrow is probably the worst movie that has been made in the last 6 years (and yes, I’m lumping in SuperBabies: Baby Geniuses 2). Need proof? Here’s a list.

5th Reason This Movie Blows: Lame 2 Syllable Or Less Names

Let’s run through a short cast of characters, shall we? Jack Hall, Sam Hall, Lucy Hall, Jason, Frank, J.D, and Brian. I mean, where’s John Johnson? Bob Smith? Usually, I don’t give a flying eff about character names, but when you have people saying each other’s names every.other.second, the exhaustingly uncreativeness starts to eat away at you.

4th Reason This Movie Blows: Nobody Cares About Their Damn Family (Except the Angelic Hall Family Who Are So Angelic They Might Be Decedents Of Jesus)

So, if you’ve never seen this movie I’m about to ruin it for you…not like there’s much to ruin…but basically, thirty minutes into the film the earth flips out for no reason and sh*t gets majorly destroyed and the top half of the U.S is frozen over. There’s a few people taking refuge in the Manhattan Public library (including Sam Hall [Jake Gyllenhaal acting his ass off to make his character interesting], his love interest, some friends, and a few randoms), and when they realize that most of the nation is destroyed…they’re kind of upset and stuff, but that’s about it. Read More »

Apparently, a lot of women suffer from low libido.

According to ABC News, hypoactive sexual desire disorder, which sounds very clinical but for the most part I’m pretty sure refers to a lowered sex drive caused by life (hormones, supplements, exhaustion), affects about one-third of American women. That’s a lot of headaches.

Deciding that it just isn’t fair women still get the short end of the stick (ha ha) when it comes to sexual desire later on in life, scientists have been busy developing a Viagra-like product called LibiGel. Although it’s still in the testing stage, LibiGel had a reportedly “283 percent increase of satisfying sexual encounters for the women taking the drug” in trials at 17 different institutions.

The gel comes in a pump bottle, and a small amount is rubbed into the skin of a woman’s upper arm. Over a period of 24 hours, “the gel’s testosterone seeps into her bloodstream, boosting her energy and libido.” Read More »

The dudes over at Truckblogs (no, I don’t usually frequent a site dedicated to all things vehicle, I was given the address by a friend) think they’ve discovered the secret behind that Dodge ram symbol.According to these dudes who like cars, the symbol is way more feminine than anyone has ever given it credit for.

I only wish this graphic had been around while I was still in high school, so I could stick it to the dashboard of all those obnoxious guys who revved their engines in the school parking lot at 7:15 AM.

…Nothing strikes more fear into a high school boy than the inner workings of a woman’s vagina.

For the longest time, I stayed away from the weight room at my gym.

Not because I’m a weakling who can hardly lift 50 pounds (I mean…I really don’t have any muscles…but that’s not the reason), but because the weight room is traditionally a breeding ground for testosterone. A box full of dudes grunting and veins popping and machines clanking. A place where a tiny redhead listening to Kelly Clarkson on her iPod kinda sticks out.

Even though I wanted to do more than cardio, I was resigned to the fact that I would never visit such a room. That was until a friend of mine changed me forever.

Sara is a lesbian. Therefore she’s not really intimidated by dudes. Thus, the weight room isn’t a scary place for her. Consequently, she told me we were going to start going there. Read More »