Blog: Wank dispatches – a Titanic discovery

Alex Chenery-Howes fantasy, gay, LGBTQ+, masturbation, Puberty, Sex, wanking

In this personal piece, our blogger shares his masturbatory discovery, featuring Leonardo DiCaprio

Getting a grip on how to wank is a serious business. I know someone who had to go to A&E after something unfortunate happened to his penis during a mishandled session. To be clear, this happened to a friend. Someone I know, who isn’t me (honestly) tore his frenulum masturbating too vigorously. Thankfully I’ve never had such an accident, but as a teenager, I could hardly claim to be a wanking virtuoso either. In fact, I discovered wanking almost by mistake.

diagram of circumcised and uncircumcised penis

I think there’s an element of the random in learning to wank. It’s not something people regularly discuss, but from the snippets I’ve heard, everyone seems to pick up how to masturbate through trial and error, and at some point the majority discover what works for them. So my top (and only, really) tip on how to wank is: relax and explore.

A lot of my early exploring was done thinking about Leonardo DiCaprio. I can’t remember exactly when I masturbated for the first time. I must have been around 12, because back then I slept in a cabin bed, the kind you have in middle school. This was also around the time I began to suspect I might be gay. I honestly didn’t even know how two men could have sex (how I imagined it at the time is something I now know to be called docking). As a result, my first masturbatory fantasies were hilariously tepid, and they all centred around Leonardo DiCaprio in Titanic.

Exploring how to wank

My working method – if you could call it that – was lying on my side and thrusting, with my penis receiving the resultant friction from my mattress. I honestly didn’t give much thought as to whether I was doing it ‘right’, all I knew was that it felt good. Really good. So me and Leonardo were kissing, and I started to break out in a sweat from all the exertion. Of course, the better it felt the more vigorous I continued to thrust. Faster and harder until… something comes out of my penis and it’s much thicker than urine. I didn’t mention this phenomenon until over ten years later, when I found out through male friends that it is actually a relatively common reaction to a first wank. My first – and only – thought was, ‘I think I might have broken my dick’.

I began to panic. I had absolutely no idea how to process what had just occurred. My dad was working abroad at the time, so the only person I could think of asking for help was my mum. But then I’d have to tell her about me and Leo, and that would just open up a whole other can of worms. So instead, I went back to sleep and didn’t tell anyone.

In hindsight, my mum would’ve been able to immediately reassure me. It’s so common to feel embarrassment with the panic, when we’re first going through puberty or discovering parts of our sexuality, and to not say anything – only to realise years later that a lot of us went through something similar! It’s not often easy to talk about, but it’s worth doing for that reassurance (or at least looking this stuff up on trustworthy sites like Fumble).