Cheering for a mom who's on an Orgasm Quest

She's determined to conquer the sexual side effects of taking antidepressants.

Crista Anne, who is blogging about her Orgasm Quest at cristaanne.com

When I read that my friend Crista Anne, foundress of the sex-toy-safety testing site Dildology, was on an "OrgasmQuest," chronicling her once easily procured but now fleeting orgasm due to a new antidepressant, I had to know more.

So what exactly is OrgasmQuest? While it may sound like a sexy video game, it's far more serious: She's fighting mental illness one climax at a time. As she puts it, "Orgasm isn't necessarily sexual to me; it's much more a life hack." So she's blogging her way to the Big O at cristaanne.com and highlighting the common problem of sexual side effects of antidepressants.

Crista says she cannot remember a time when she wasn't haunted by depression. She first attempted suicide at age 7, and was on Prozac from ages 8 to 17. She switched to Effexor, but couldn't handle its side effects, then didn't have health insurance so wasn't on any medications.

Now at age 32, she's in a long-term polyamorous relationship, part of a blended family raising four small kids. After recently regaining medical coverage, she went on a new antidepressant, amitriptyline. Though it took some adjusting, its mental-health benefits have been extraordinary. "I actually enjoy being alive for the first time that I can remember," she reports.

The sexual side effects, however, leave much to be desired. For Crista, who also has fibromyalgia, gaining a medical benefit while losing her ability to feel orgasms intensely isn't a trade-off she wants to make. "Sex and masturbation have been my saviors for combating depression," she says.

What's interesting is that Crista can still come from partner sex, albeit not as strongly as she did before. "The orgasms are overall not as intense, often a sense of gentle waves instead of the universe-creating, all-powerful explosions." However, she calls her partnered sex life "ideal," more focused on connection than goal-oriented.

What led to her quest wasn't a lack of partnered pleasure, but solo sexual satisfaction, an issue which is far from frivolous. "Before this, I had always been able to orgasm," she explains. "Being able to orgasm in minutes keeps my stress and anxiety down. Orgasm is my best migraine stopper and helps with fibromyalgia flares. Suddenly not being able to orgasm whenever the heck I wanted to was a massive blow to the core of my identity. I find it completely unacceptable. I would rather orgasm than need to take a pill for panic attacks."

Going public is about education more than exhibitionism; by sharing her orgasm highlights via Twitter @pinkness, she wants to help others feel less alone. "I refuse to accept that I have to sacrifice my orgasm to find relief from my depression," she says. "It's an illness just like any other.

Every single day I've gotten a kind message from someone letting me know I've helped them."

If this were a video game, her results in the three weeks she's been masturbating almost daily might not win any records, but they are a personal victory. "I've had one masturbation-based orgasm with the We-Vibe Tango vibrator for clitoral stimulation — fueled by an intimate encounter I was going to have later that night with someone I'd been into for years."

Yet, despite a dozen attempts, the Magic Wand vibrator, the classic plug-in model, hasn't done it for her yet. "The incredibly intense vibrations from the wand should eventually help get my clitoral nerves going again, but that's going to take more dedication than I previously thought," she admits.

With the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimating that one in 10 American adults report having depression, the effect of medication on our sex lives isn't an isolated concern. Moreover, the way Crista values masturbation is a model more of us could stand to follow. By privileging her solo sex life, she's showing up powerfully in the rest of her life. For her, it's about regaining her lost orgasm to be the best person she can be; for someone else, it might be about remembering the need to take a few minutes (or hours!) to get lost in yourself. Go ahead, give yourself a hand (or toy, or fantasy). You deserve it.

 Rachel Kramer Bussel is the author of the essay collection Sex & Cupcakes and editor of over 50 erotica anthologies, most recently Hungry for More and The Big Book of Submission. She tweets @raquelita.