Womanizing Viagra, What started as an impotence drug for men is getting good reviews from women who want heightened feeling
by Jenice M. Armstrong
February 18, 1999
Philadelphia Daily News
Daily News Staff Writer
After years of searching, Elizabeth Belt finally met the man of her
dreams. Not only was he handsome and kind, but he also got along
well with her three children. Theirs was a storybook romance.
Except for one thing: Belt couldn't feel anything sexually. At first, she
tried to hide it. The couple would make love and no matter what
Frank Woods tried, she couldn't feel it.
"He would ask me, 'Did that feel good?' and I would say, 'Oh, yes.'
But it didn't," Belt said yesterday. "Then, finally, I had to tell him the
truth.
"One day he was doing it to me and I said, 'Frank, I can't feel it at
all,' " she said. "I was devastated and upset."
Belt's lack of feeling stemmed from a past medical problem.
Together, they sought help and eventually found a doctor with an
answer to their problems - Viagra. Yes, Viagra, the anti-impotence
drug that caused a firestorm last spring after the Food and Drug
Administration approved its use for men.
Although the drug has yet to be approved for women, some women
are conducting their own private experiments with it.
Some such as Karen Brash, a Cherry Hill-based sex therapist, have
dipped into their husband's supply. Others get theirs from friends.
Then, there are those like Belt who go to the doctor and get their own
prescriptions.
"They come in and say, 'My husband is on Viagra . . . and I'm either
having pain or tenderness or dryness and it's just not happening for
me and I need some help,' " explained Dr. Steven Lamm, author of
"The Virility Solution."
"Women are saying, 'I want something and I want something now,' "
said Lamm, who has prescribed Viagra for some of his patients,
including a 38-year-old just yesterday.
Some women have amazing reactions to it. Belt took two Viagra
tablets last week and for the first time in a year, she could actually feel
it when her boyfriend stimulated her.
"It felt good again like it used to," she said. "Just to be able to feel
what he was doing to me, it was wonderful."
Kaye Renshaw, a Texas woman who began having sexual problems
following a hysterectomy four years ago, also has had good results.
"I was very excited with the changes I experienced even with the first
use," she said yesterday. "When I use the Viagra now in comparison
to when I don't, there's a night-and-day difference in the intensity of
the orgasms.
"I can still be orgasmic without it, but it's not nearly as intense or as
enjoyable without it," said Renshaw, a clinical sexologist. "And my
partner can also tell a big difference."
Doctors say their responses are typical.
"They report increased lubrication, increased engorgement and
increased sensitivity and ease in reaching orgasm," said Laura A.
Berman, a sex therapist, who along with her sister, a urologist, runs
the Women's Sexual Health Clinic at Boston University Medical
Center.
Since July, her clinic has prescribed Viagra for about 50 women,
including Belt. They are mostly cancer survivors, victims of pelvic
trauma in biking and other accidents, women who've had
hysterectomies and post-menopausal women.
"Most of the women Viagra tends to work best on are women who
were functioning before and now are not," Berman said. "Viagra is
not a desire pill. It's not an aphrodisiac."
"You could take Viagra and watch a documentary about snails and
nothing would happen," she said. "All it does is increase what would
naturally happen with arousal. You're not going to become aroused
just by taking the pill."
"It simply increases blood flow to the genitals and increases smooth
muscle relaxation," Berman said. "That means the vagina can relax
and lengthen and that's necessary for arousal and orgasm to occur."
As with men, not everyone is a good candidate for Viagra. Those on
certain medications, particularly those containing nitrates, should
avoid Viagra. More than 130 Americans who took Viagra have died
since the drug hit the market, but the FDA stresses that there's no
proof that the drug caused the deaths.
Some people on Viagra experience side effects, including facial
flushing, blurred vision, headaches, stuffiness and other discomforts,
experts say.
Brash, the Cherry Hill psychiatrist who experimented with some of
her husband's Viagra, was so uncomfortable after she took Viagra
that she doubts she'll do it again. "It was the usual good experience
except for a headache," said Brash, who has normal sexual
functioning.
Carol Brietzke feels the same way. About 45 minutes after taking
Viagra as an experiment for a Cosmopolitan magazine article, she felt
the pill begin to work. "I started to feel almost like the heat you feel in
your face when you blush," but in more intimate areas.
"Having that happen made me feel aroused . . . So, that was nice.
Then I had the hypersensitivity where he had to be a lot more gentle,"
Brietzke added. "Everything had to be feathery light. I didn't want
biting or anything."
"I had an orgasm but it wasn't anything unusual or remarkable in any
way. And then I had a headache. And I felt just kind of dizzy. I
thought 'I wouldn't do it again.' "
Then, she got a headache that lasted for nearly two hours. "It wasn't
debilitating, and I didn't have the blue vision. My vision was fine," she
said. "It was just kind of faintly unpleasant.
"I didn't like it all really," Brietzke said. "It kind of made me feel not
quite myself."
Another complaint that some women had was that they continued to
feel aroused even after they've climaxed, said Dr. Susan C. Vaughan,
a psychiatrist and author of "Viagra: A Guide to the Phenomenal
Potency-Promoting Drug."
"They were sitting at dinner feeling bothered by their continued
arousal," she said.
Pfizer, the drug's maker, said women shouldn't be taking Viagra,
anyway. "We certainly don't think it's a good idea to prescribe a drug
for a population in which it has not been tested," said Mariann
Caprino. "The only time people should use it is when the FDA
[brands] Viagra for use as a safe and effective therapy for feminine
sexual dysfunction.
"We still have a lot to learn as to how it should be used, when it
should be used, whether it should be used and if it should be used,"
she said.
There are a number of trials already under way in Europe, plus testing
in the United States, she said.
Meanwhile, many women like Renshaw, who's threatening to buy it
on the black market if she has to, will continue to take Viagra.
Belt, an Indiana factory worker, said it has done wonders for her
relationship. She was often depressed and moody and Woods had
threatened to leave on a number of occasions.
And she'd felt compelled to turn down her boyfriend's repeated
requests to marry her.
"I didn't have any idea how I could be his wife if I couldn't respond to
him. I told him I wanted to be able to feel him make love to me on his
wedding night."
Now, that she's enjoying sex again, the couple's planning to marry
sometime in June.
"When I first heard about Viagra, I thought, 'Wow, great. They've
got something to help men.' I never dreamed that it could help
women," Belt said.
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