Betty Dodson is the grandmother you always wished you had. Think kind, passionate, laidback, determined, with a tendency to drop an F-bomb here and there, and you’ve got a recipe for one tough cookie. Her constitution certainly helped pave the way for women to accept themselves as sexual creatures when no one else would educate them how. Her practical approach to aiding women experience pleasure might still be considered “nouveau” today, even though she’s been doing it for nearly 40 years.

Equipped with a Ph.D. in sexology, Dodson is more than a masturbation junkie. Responding to the call to action in the 70s (much like Phil Harvey did), she stuck to her current course after several attempts to deviate and has been helping women love themselves—one orgasm at a time.

SexHerald: The name ‘Betty Dodson’ is associated with and known for many things. You have been called the Mother of Masturbation, a feminist, a sex pioneer, and an accomplished author and artist. And you’re pretty much a fan of all things sex, including S&M. So, is there anything you won’t do or try in terms of sex?

Betty Dodson: I haven’t found it so far.

SH: You’ve done everything on the sex spectrum.

Dodson: Pretty much so. Right now, what I’m interested in doing is documenting some of my experiences. I’d guess you’d say that since I’m in my 70s, I’m kind of focused on my end game.

SH: I’m sorry to hear that.

Dodson: Well, the end game can go up to 100!

SH: At 77, you still have a youthful appearance. Is there anything special you do to maintain it?

Dodson: Everybody talks about diet and exercise and drinking a lot of water. We all have that information. The information that people leave out is being happy. I’ve been talking to a friend of mine recently and she’s in her early 70s. She did the facelift, the body modification and the dyed hair, and she goes: ‘Oh, you let your hair go natural; it’s white.’ Yeah, I said: ‘I just don’t feel the need to try to look young anymore.’ There’s this huge freedom that comes with that. I’m a senior citizen; I have wisdom. Why wouldn’t I be proud of having lived this long and learned this much? Why would I want to look like a foolish little young girl?

SH: It’s evolutionary biology: Men prefer younger women.

Dodson: Oh, not if you’re willing to be a sugar mama!

SH: In your opinion, what’s so special about masturbation that you’d create a career in encouraging women to love themselves?

Dodson: That’s kind of my stance for the whole world. Really, until we acknowledge, accept and honor masturbation as the foundation for all human sexuality, we will continue to be manipulated through sexual guilt by any authoritarian government or religion that comes along.

SH: So, it’s not just about sexual liberation but freedom in general?

Dodson: If you can free your sex energy and you can have a good sex life and you can feel good about your sexuality, that’s a free person. Absolutely.

SH: In an interview with Xtra West, you mentioned women unleashing their “pussy power.” Can you expand on that?

Dodson: Pussy power is women appreciating their sex organ, looking at it, acknowledging the beauty of it, valuing it, playing with it and enjoying it. That would totally transform women all over the world.

SH: Your main focus is women and I haven’t seen you work on men. Do you think men are less repressed than women?

Dodson: Their ding-a-ling is hanging on the outside. They have all that testosterone and their sexuality is somewhat different than ours. It’s a lot easier for them to have an orgasm so casual sex, masturbation is a piece of cake; they’re going to get off. Now, if women had a clitoris inside a nice, wet mucous membrane orifice and by moving back and forth they were assured of an orgasm, believe me women would be jumping on a lot more bodies. But, it’s not that easy for women to have an orgasm. It requires a lot of attention, focus, understanding; and because everything is happening inside the body, women have concerns about STDs, pregnancies… there’s a lot more at stake for women when they have sex than there is for men. Women are a lot more fussy.

The actual practice of masturbation is going to be how women learn about their bodies. The reason I only work with women—I have the occasional couple—but working with women makes all the sense in the world because if she figures out what works for her, she’s going to tell her partner. Whether that’s a man or another woman or a string of lovers, whatever her sex style is, if she’s now in control of her body anyone she has sex with will get her information.

SH: May is Masturbation Month. You must be thrilled.

Dodson: I’m exhausted. [both laugh]

SH: Did you participate in the Masturbate-A-Thon?

Dodson: No. Every year, they say I have to go to San Francisco and do it but I’m saying, ‘C’mon! I started it; you guys carry the ball.’

SH: You have a private practice in New York. Is it a sex therapy practice?

Dodson: I don’t call it ‘therapy’ because I do hands-on sex coaching. I’m a sexologist, not a sex therapist. I make that distinction clear, because sex therapists are licensed by the state, and if I were licensed by the state and I touched someone, I would lose my license. For the work I’m doing, there has never been a precedent set for it. I’m in a gray area.

SH: What’s the oldest client you ever had?

Dodson: I had this wonderful woman, she was like 80. She didn’t look 80, she looked very good. I’m coming up on 80, so I want to see women like this. She’s been buying sex toys for the last five years and couldn’t figure out how to use any of them. She came and had a session and had her first orgasm with her vibrator, and I got to tell you this was one happy woman.

I had a workshop woman back in San Francisco; she was 86 and a Mormon. She was single, never been married, she’s been a nurse, helping people all her life, she was diagnosed with breast cancer and didn’t have much longer to live. It blew my mind. She signed up for the workshop, came in and said, ‘I want to know what an orgasm is before I die.’ I had about nine women in the group. We all got behind her and she did; she had her orgasm. And, it was like this incredible celebration.

SH: How did you get started in helping women reach orgasm in the first place?

Dodson: It was part of my feminist commitment back in the 70s. I really thought I would just run a few workshops for maybe a year or so. Once I started, I couldn’t turn it loose; it took me over. They say your spiritual path is never something you choose; it’s chosen for you. I tried to get away from running groups. I couldn’t, because the phone would start ringing and women start calling and I would go, ‘Oh my god, this woman has never had an orgasm. I can’t stop now. Alright, I’ll do one more round.’ I’d do one more round and the same pattern would be repeated. After a while, I just surrendered. I said, ‘Okay. I’ll do my workshop. I’ll do one a month for the rest of my life.’ And, I did it until the 90s when I wore out my hip joints and I had to stop. Now, I have titanium hip joints and doing great.

SH: ‘Happiness’ seems to be the running theme in all of your answers. I take it you’re very happy and perhaps it has something to do with the fact you’re with someone who’s 47 years your junior. Are you married?

Dodson: [laughs] No.

SH: I guess you don’t believe in marriage.

Dodson: It isn’t that I don’t believe in it, it’s just that I don’t know it’s such a good idea. Who knows? Never say never. I’ve been with Eric, we’re going into our ninth year together. Throughout that period of time, we have not been monogamous. He’s taken a lot more advantage of that than I have because I’m very busy working at doing all these productions that I want to get out there while I can. He’s having a wonderful time dating women his own age. He’s gotten involved in the poly-community and the sex-positive people here in New York. He’s like an apprentice. He runs my business; I’ve turned it over to him totally. He’s very competent and I trust him completely, which is very rare. He’s very easy for me to live with. A large part of that is based on our age difference.

It’s not the standard, traditional heterosexual romantic love that then starts to slowly go away. And then you start wondering, ‘We’re not having that much sex. I wonder if he still finds me appealing. Oh, it’s getting harder to have an orgasm. Maybe there’s something wrong.’ It’s that obsession over the quality of the sex you’re having with your significant other. We don’t have that. We’re not in that kind of a space. He does his own thing, I do my own thing. We both masturbate. He has a lot of partner sex; I have a lot of productions. Every now and then when I’m in the mood, I just say: ‘Hey, kid, come here.’ And of course, he’s very, very accommodating.

SH: Do you have any children?

Dodson: I grew up in the 50s. You had to make a choice between being a mother and being a career woman. I had total clarity that I did not want to be a wife and mother; I wanted to be an artist and I chose career. And I pretty much held to that when I did get married back in 1959. I made that very clear to my then-husband. I wasn’t going to have children; he’d have to be okay with that. He said he was. The first year we were married, he started saying, ‘Aw. Let’s have kids.’ I said, ‘No. That’s not the deal.’ But, he finally did talk me into it and I miscarried. So, I thanked the divine universe for helping me keep my promise. That was the sign from above, below, wherever, that it was okay. It’s not meant to be. I’ve birthed a lot of orgasms for women. So, I am a mother. I’m the Mother of Masturbation. I think I’ve been promoted to Grandmother.

SH: What about Godmother?

Betty Dodson: I like that actually best of all. It’s got a little power in it.

SH: Were you born and bred in New York?

Dodson: I was born and raised in Wichita, Kansas. I came to New York when I was 20 years old to go to school.

SH: Where did you go to school?

Dodson: Art school. I went to the National Academy of Design and then I went to the Art Students League. I studied in Paris for a year with Andre Lhote. Mostly I sat in the café and talked about art when I was in Paris. Then I came back to New York.

Moving to New York was my childhood dream. I guess I got it from watching the movies. If there was ever a movie that had pictures or images of New York, I’d go in and see it more than once.

SH: Apart from preparing for your “end game” and documenting all your work, what can we expect from you in the future?

Dodson: I got a lot of productions cooking. I want to make a series of 15-20 minute downloadables. I‘m working on a DVD that’s me lecturing with my art that I just did in Seattle. I’ve decided that I can go back out and lecture occasionally again; I hate traveling. Everybody else has managed to get over standing in line, taking off your fucking shoes, and of course I’m metal so I get launded. I have a memoir that needs to be published. I want to do a really proper big documentary about my fabulous life. I’m not sure how I’m going to… I’ve had many offers and I’m looking for the right one.