Many Nigerian women have perfected the art of sexual performance. Not the sexy kind, but the exhausting kind where you’re more focused on making convincing sounds than actually enjoying yourself.

We spoke to three women about the moment they decided to stop faking orgasms and start asking for what they actually wanted. Unsurprisingly, the men did not take it well.

1. “He took my honesty as a personal attack on his manhood” – Chi*, 29

I spent three years with my ex doing the most elaborate fake orgasms you’ve ever seen. I’m talking about full body shaking, the works. I convinced myself that I was being a good girlfriend by protecting his ego. The sex was fine, just very repetitive. He would do the same three moves, finish and then ask “did you come?” And I would lie every single time.

The breaking point for me was after this one time that I travelled for a work conference and met this guy at the hotel bar. We ended up talking for hours about everything, including sex. He said something that stuck with me, “How can I be good at something if nobody tells me I’m doing it wrong?”

When I got back to Lagos, my boyfriend initiated sex as usual. But this time, when he asked if I came, I said no. He sat up so fast I thought he pulled a muscle. He wanted to know why I was lying, had I been faking it before, was there someone else. It became this whole interrogation instead of a conversation.

I tried to explain that I wanted to show him what I liked, that we could figure it out together. But he took my honesty as a personal attack on his manhood. He kept saying things like “all my exes enjoyed it” and “you never complained before.” That’s when I realised that he didn’t actually care about my pleasure. He cared about feeling like he was good in bed, which is not the same thing at all.

We broke up two months later. Not specifically because of the sex talk, but once I started being honest about that, I couldn’t stop being honest about everything else. Honestly, I had been faking more than orgasms in that relationship.

Now, I’m dating someone who literally keeps a mental note of what works. The first time we had sex, he stopped multiple times to ask, “Is this okay?” and “Do you like this?” I understand that this may be a turn-off for other women, but the level of consideration was something I had never experienced before.

2. “I thought wanting pleasure made you worldly” – Peace*, 32

I got married at 26, a virgin and a very passionate church girl. My husband had more experience, so I assumed that he knew what he was doing. For four years, I thought that sex was just something you endure for your husband. I would read all these articles about how to please your man, but nobody ever talked about what women were supposed to feel.

Then my friend invited me to a women’s fellowship at her church, but it wasn’t a regular fellowship. It was just women coming together to talk about intimacy. One woman said, “If you’re not enjoying sex, you need to speak up”. Well, I had no idea that could even be a thing. I thought wanting pleasure made you worldly or something. I know it sounds cringe, but this was really me a few years ago.

Anyway, that night, I tried to talk to my husband about it. I was so nervous that I was practically whispering to him. I told him the things he was doing weren’t really working for me, and maybe we could try different positions or take more time with foreplay. This man looked at me as if I were insane. He said, “Since when did you become an expert?” with so much contempt in his voice.

He got so defensive immediately, saying that I was disrespecting him. I pointed out that I was his wife and should be able to tell him stuff like this, but somehow that made him even angrier. He didn’t touch me for three weeks after that conversation. Three whole weeks of silent treatment because, for the first time, I asked for my own pleasure to matter.

Eventually, we went for marriage counselling because the silence was killing our marriage. The counsellor, a woman, asked him directly, “Why does your wife’s pleasure threaten you?” He couldn’t answer. It took months of therapy for him to understand that my satisfaction didn’t affect his masculinity. Now our sex life is actually something I look forward to instead of a duty to perform. But I’m not going to lie, I resent that it took a stranger asking him that question for him to even consider my perspective.

3. “He told his friends I was too demanding because I tried to show him what I liked” – Feyi*, 27

I’ve always been sexually confident, or so I thought. I knew what I liked from exploring my own body, but somehow when I got into relationships, I would just go along with whatever the guy wanted to do. It felt easier than potentially making things awkward.

But there was this one time I was gisting with my younger sister. She’s 23 and so much bolder than I ever was at that age. She was telling me about her boyfriend and she casually mentioned that she tells him exactly what to do during sex. I was kind of surprised, to be honest. I asked her “doesn’t that make him feel bad?” and she said “why would it make him feel bad? He wants me to enjoy it.”

All of a sudden, I started wondering why I was so worried about protecting men’s feelings to the point of sacrificing my own pleasure? Later that weekend, I was with the guy that I had been seeing for about six months. Usually, I would just moan and let him think everything was perfect. But this time, I physically moved his hand to where I actually wanted it.

He stopped completely. He got really upset and said I was “killing the mood”. I tried to explain that I was just trying to help both of us have a better experience, but he kept saying things like “sex should be natural”. Natural for who gan gan? And what does that even mean?

Anyway, the relationship ended shortly after that. He told his friends that I was “too demanding”. Just because I tried to show him what I liked? Imagine being called demanding for wanting to actually orgasm during sex. The audacity of men? Women need to start matching it. For me right now, if your ego is too fragile to learn what I like, we’re not sexually compatible. Go and find your match in front.

The common thread in all these stories? Men who viewed women’s sexual honesty as a threat rather than an opportunity. Because when you’ve built your entire sexual identity on assumptions and performance, the truth feels like an attack on your person. The thing is intimacy requires real communication and if a man can’t handle you telling him what actually feels good, then he’s not mature enough to be having sex in the first place.

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