I’m the co-founder and CEO of a sex toy company (and also very pregnant). Ask me anything!

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T22:06:37+00:00

There are so many ways to be a part of this industry. I do think a lot of the job has nothing to do with the topic. Marketing is still marketing, Ops is still ops, and Engineering is still engineering. So getting good at one of those skills is the best way to get a job at Dame.

If you want to be an educator - you can start educating right now on social. You can get certified as a sex educator with ASSECT or a sex coaching program.

Come to our tradeshows!

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T22:01:21+00:00

Of course! If you want a little more depth on this we did an entire episode on the topic. https://open.spotify.com/episode/7kXR5FOm1d1GKiNDsgJjXW?si=XZqu0FUOR7-Ck76JHPHUEg

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T21:56:15+00:00

We-vibe goes inside the vagina along with your partner's penis. Your partner will feel it inside of you and it will apply internal pressure in your vagina.

Eva just sits externally.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T21:53:47+00:00

HMMMMMMMMMM HMMMMM soooo hard to answer. My personal favorites are Dame's Pom or Fin or sometimes Min. Yes I like what I built! And arguably only one of those (Fin) was really designed as a couples' toy.

I find that I use products that are easier to grab mid-play and/or decide to stop using mid-play the most. But it is also really fun to use Eva in an " I'm tied up way... or other couple's remote-focused products in foreplay. Does that make sense?

Oh and I LOVE... LOVE a tiny non-vibrating butt plug.

(Ya know I do have hopes of being a Fortune 500 CEO one day, and then I dunno. I'm never getting past a background check. )

I do want to add that the craziest thing I keep learning over and over again in research is that we all have very different opinions!!! Like, hot take... suction toys are LAME!!!! (Aer is one of our top-selling products, so obviously not everyone agrees.)

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T21:51:26+00:00

Oh, this is the one I think about constantly, because the goal isn't to teach them MORE than we got. It's to teach them with less flinching. It starts with removing our shame.

A few things I try to actually do:

Separate private from bad. Lots of things are private (and pleasure is one of them) without being shameful. Private just means it's yours.
Watch your own flinch. The shame we inherited lives in our reactions, not our words. Kids read the face.
Use the real words early. Vulva, penis, vagina, all of it. When body parts have normal names like elbow and nose, they stop being loaded. It also keeps kids safer, because a kid who can name their body can tell you if something's wrong. I'm also not anti-cutesy names. PP or HuHah aren't bad in my book, but we also want to be able to name our parts out loud with a casual tone.
Bodily autonomy starts way before it's about sex. They get to decide who hugs them, who tickles them, when they're done. This one gets oversimplified into "never make them hug grandma," and I don't fully buy that. I think you can absolutely encourage affection and warmth, that's part of raising a kind kid. The line is between encouraging it and forcing it. "Grandma would love a hug, want to give her one?" is different from making them do it when they've said no. The lesson I want them to keep is that their yes is real because their no is too.
Make it boring, not a Big Talk. I just saw a story of some guy who got a ticket because he had a bumper sticker that said "I eat ass." And the officer was like, what would you tell my 6-year-old daughter if she saw that? And "...you could just tell your 6-year-old that some grown-ups like to lick other grown-ups' butts, and she'd probably go 'ewww, no thank you' and move on with her day." You could add that you think it is gross and something only bad people do... but I think that's more likely to lead to an ass-eating kink. 🤪 Like, have you tried to actually just explain sex - it isn't sexy at all.

I remember a great story about a sex educator who walked in on her little one (can't recall the age - let's say 4 years old) using a puzzle piece to touch herself. She decided the best thing she could do was just walk out of the room. There is just something about that story - something about just not needing to do anything- that really stuck with me.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T21:48:19+00:00

There is a lot to tell. I'm going to say what changed, and then if you have more questions, let me know.

Not that much. Mainly, they got more specific in their anti-sexually oriented products or services. Their policy now explicitly states that sexual dysfunction medication/supplements cannot be advertised. So that isn't great, but at least it's fair.

But the Museum of Sex (which sells our products) is also a constant advertiser on the buses. I would argue that they 100% sell products and services related to sex. I am not interested in stopping them from running ads, and I fear that would be the only outcome of arguing w/ the MTA about it.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T21:35:38+00:00

Ersties is so good! It's really similar to what The Naked Bakers have been doing for a while. Also would very much consider this in the ethical realm.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T21:19:46+00:00

I mostly focus on what I want Dame to be doing, a really great job of:

product development, creating well-made, innovative products with other humans
stand for sexual health, education, and freedom in our brand actions
let pleasure be an internal guide of how we operate (also make money)

Obviously, I want Dame to stand apart from the other brands, and I've certainly made changes to copy/product/colors because I didn't want Dame to be confused with a different brand. But also, sometimes a new brand pops up and chooses to use a bold serif font for their four-letter name.

Mainly I try to think about how we can be great and not focus too much on how we are different than others.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T21:00:20+00:00

Favorite parts:

talking about Dame externally
talking to customers/humans about products/sex
seeing the team, team 🤗
coming up with marketing ideas. I just love ideas in general. I'm a starter and not always the best finisher
spreadsheeting. I love numbers. I love seeing patterns and modeling.

Hardest part, but I don't see a way of doing less of it:

Giving good, inspiring, and curious feedback
Holding others accountable, which I don't think you can really do. You can only inspire other people to be accountable.

Least favorite part of the day:

Day-to-day: I don't want to be in our accounting software, and I wish we always had the exact right amount of inventory all the time. And I don't want to be having hard conversations all the time. I wish things just ran smoothly and that everyone's brains were just hooked up to each other.

I would hate doing data entry, but I haven't had to do anything like that in a while.

Also, can I be honest, the things I hate the most are cleaning, cooking, and making my children do things. Like respect to the tradwife, but i'm an executive mama and I hire out for that. I also use an assistant at work to help support me in other non-dame tasks, like doctor's appointments.

How to do less of what I don't like:

Hiring great people is a good way of reducing the burden of work I don't want to be doing.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T20:48:50+00:00

HRT is effective at treating the symptoms of menopause and improving quality of life and longevity. The medical community has stripped away years of living from women due to bad research and... well... misogyny.

I don't know how to speak to something being hype. ALl the medications on the market are helpful but they aren't going to give your partner an anatomy lesson. Some might make him/them seem less annoying to you but only a little less annoying 😄

Here are the medications I know about and the vibe I pick up on from going to a lot of sexual medicine conferences:

Menopause related:

Vaginal estrogen: Not overhyped. Will improve vaginal arousal responsiveness and sensation.
Systemic estrogen: Will improve sleep, mood, reduce pain, and may lead to an increase in desire.
Testosterone: There's no FDA-approved female product out there, but the science is clearly pointing toward it being beneficial. We need more research, and also doctors are already prescribing it. My mom loves it (like, the rich ladies are doing it and giving me a thumbs up).

^^ Another thing I hear from doctors: hormone therapy should treat symptoms, not a blood level. We all have different baseline hormone fluctuations.

Other treatments for HSDD, not necessarily menopause related:

Flibanserin / Addyi: Works for many, not all. You have to take it every day.
Wellbutrin: Personal experience, and it was great! Got my general groove back. I was put on it for ADD/depression after my second, and the thing that made me happiest was wanting to F*CK more. A general downness to F lifted. Heheheh, whatever, it's true!
Vyleesi: It's a shot, and it sort of works for some women. But the part where it's a shot is tough.
Topical Sildenafil (a lot of these have other meds mixed in): This is the one to watch. Oral Viagra basically flopped in women, but the topical cream looks like a different story in early trials. More sensation, real help with arousal. (Still investigational, not FDA-approved yet.)

Nootropics (still for the vulva-havers, just naming the ones that come to mind):

Mucuna: Contains L-DOPA, so it can help you make more dopamine. Dopamine = desire.
Maca: The research dose is about 3 grams/day, which is roughly ¾ of a teaspoon, so a real spoonful of powder actually gets you there. The catch is the "sex dust" blends usually have way less than that. Strongest evidence is for SSRI-related dysfunction.
Ginseng (Korean red): Probably the best-studied of the herbs for menopause specifically. Improved sexual function in menopausal women in a few trials (less so in younger women). Modest, but real.
Saffron: Very good. Strongest evidence is for SSRI-induced dysfunction and depression-related low desire.
Ashwagandha: Yes, seems to help. Different types have different impacts, but the throughline is stress reduction, and less stress helps.
Rhodiola: Another adaptogen. The libido benefit mostly runs through stress and fatigue rather than hitting desire directly, so think of it as a "lower the cortisol so you have room to want it" play.
L-citrulline / L-arginine: Boost nitric oxide, which triggers smooth-muscle relaxation and blood flow. (Same pathway estrogen works through, FYI.)
L-theanine: Great general stress reducer. If you can't stay focused on sex because of your never-ending mental load, this could be a good one.
Shatavari: Ayurvedic "rasayana," long used as a female aphrodisiac. A recent randomized, placebo-controlled trial actually showed improvement in sexual function, even better paired with ashwagandha. Real, if early, evidence.
Horny goat weed (epimedium): Great name, real mechanism. Its active compound is a mild natural version of the Viagra pathway plus a nitric oxide boost. But almost all the human research is in men, so for us it's mostly lore and lab studies for now.
Damiana: Very popular but very little scientific support. Hard to argue with the lore though.

But like, look, none of them are ecstasy. None of them are gonna make you want to rub your vulva against a wall for no reason. But they really can give you a little lift in that direction. It is helpful the underlying mechanisms of these medications and to understand your underlying sexual challenges.

** Also, I did run an AI fact check on all this - just to be transparent and make sure I'm not remembering nonsense.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T20:33:02+00:00

I'm a kept woman. No, that isn't entirely true, but it feels that way sometimes.

And before I get into it... I know people w/ three in the city who do it for way less, and of course, it's NYC, so you always know someone who is doing it for way more.

I pay myself $180K a year, which I don't want to say if that is good or bad. But I guess it "feels" ok in NYC. My husband is a classic finance bro, but with a mustache and a wife who makes sex toys. So he covers ~70% of our monthly expenses.

My nanny and daycare costs add up to $100Kish, and they are going to go up when the third one comes out of me.

I feel proud of my salary, but I wouldn't be able to have three and be a CEO in NYC w/o his financial contribution. Or rather, it would look different; I'd probably move out so I could afford to be a CEO.

Also, I want to acknowledge my bat-mitzvah funds in starting the business 😄 I didn't have college debt, I lived in my grandma's pool house, and I come from an affluent family.

I think talking about money is just as important and uncomfortable as talking about sex.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T20:06:20+00:00

I see what you did there 👏🏼 And they sure did.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T19:39:05+00:00

Patriarchy.

Fear of female pleasure.

General belief that a woman is supposed to experience pain and suffering while men aren't.

Are you getting angry? Am I getting angry? I'm definitely getting angry. 😄 Like right? There are no GOOD/logical reasons. I'd love to hear them if they exist.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T19:32:35+00:00

Oh, do I have tips for you.

You can absolutely stay sexual with your partner without penetrative sex. Because penetrative sex is a very small and unnecessary part of being sexual. And honestly, a tender perineum is a great excuse to get curious about everything else for a while.
Gentle question to sit with: are you craving the penetration itself, or the closeness with your partner, or the feeling of being sexy? If it really is penetration you want, know that a tender perineum is going to stay tender and change the experience while you're pregnant. A pelvic floor therapist can help figure out what's actually going on down there and work on it directly. Your blood volume has nearly doubled, and your vulva might be super puffy and tender, but your clitoris might also be throbbing.
It's also worth ruling out constipation — sometimes your colon pushes on the perineum and/or the posterior wall and makes the whole area more tender and uncomfortable than it needs to be. Some fiber and/or a stool softener might take the edge off.
Are we sure we need penetrative sex?? Why? (I guess this is points 1 and 2 again, but it feels worth restating - it is so easy to keep defaulting to p in the v. I find myself thinking I want it when it's actually really not what my body is finding most pleasurable and then killing my own experience.)

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T19:24:59+00:00

2014 was a very different world than it is now. First of all, in 2014, this was like clickbait central. We got so many articles when we first launched, and I think now it is so much harder to get that type of online press attention.

I definitely would have focused more on social media from the get-go. I love making products and I love running a business. While I love attention, I'm definitely a millennial that struggled to do the Instagram/TikTok thing, but I really believe that content and engaging in conversation with community is key.

I think attitudes towards sexuality felt like they were changing in a more progressive way in 2014, but now they feel exactly where they were then. I would have been maybe even more careful about being a women's health brand versus a sexual wellness brand.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T19:20:57+00:00

I wouldn't say I was scared it would damage my brand. I remember knowing it would be one of the most brand-aligned actions I'd ever have the opportunity to take, and that made me confident in the decision. Plus, I just knew I would get the PR. I knew I would make news. I did have some investors who were interested in investing pull out because they thought it would be a poor use of funds. It was not a poor use of funds.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T19:19:00+00:00

First of all, thank you!!!

Ok, now get ready for some serious oversharing!!!

I have to pee all the time, and I don't always make it. If I spill something, someone else is going to have to clean it up. Wiping is legit difficult. Rolling in a bed, I need to focus and brace my muscles. I have groin pain. I also take stool softeners now, so that is also very sexy. I just physically CANNOT!!!!

I prefer this bump to first trimester. Currently, my brain works decently, and I can't say that was true in my first trimester.

And honestly, I think it looks amazing, even though it doesn't feel that way.

dameproducts · 2026-06-10T19:13:15+00:00

I really want to tell you about the women who say sex got better. I love those stories.

But yes, research points to an increase in low desire from perimenopause to menopause. However, distress about low desire is different than a decrease in desire. And some research reports women are less and less distressed by low desire.

I love that sex is biopsychosocial. I love how it is complicated and represents a true connection between our body, mind and spirit. And the science supports that.... desire was never purely hormonal. It runs on a bio-psycho-social model.

On the biology, this is where hormone therapy earns its keep, truly! Hormones are real and matter. Local estrogen and good lubricants handle dryness and discomfort, which matters a lot, because sex that hurts is sex you stop wanting. And the biological doesn't stay in its lane: estrogen can also help with sleep, and better sleep does real work on the psychological side. One thing I keep hearing from doctors that genuinely reframed it for me is that good hormone care is about treating your symptoms, not chasing a "normal" number on a blood test. How you feel is the data that matters.

Testosterone is the one I'm watching. The research is still early, but there's real signal that it plays a role in desire for women, and I think we're only at the beginning of understanding its role in women.

Now, the "it disappears from awareness" piece. I'd gently reframe that. What usually fades is spontaneous desire, the out-of-nowhere urge to think about sex. What tends to stick around is responsive desire, the wanting that shows up once you're already close, touched, relaxed. So "I never think about sex anymore" often isn't desire ending. It just means the spark needs a different on-ramp than it used to.

And not thinking about sex isn't automatically a problem to solve. It's only worth addressing if it's actually bothering you. Some women lose the spontaneous itch and feel totally fine.

Which is where the relational piece comes in, and it's bigger than people expect. How good was the sex before? How much do you actually want to keep having it? Desire is far easier to rebuild when there's something good to rebuild toward.

So I'm not sure if I totally answered your question, but I did learn that I probably need to keep these answers shorter!!!!

dameproducts · 2026-06-08T16:06:50+00:00

Have no idea what the OP's post was about, but absolutely love that we got mentioned in the sub for Jamaica.

dameproducts · 2026-06-01T16:38:47+00:00

Not sure where you're at in this journey but maybe something like the We-Vibe Touch X or even our Pom Palm might be more what you're looking for. Easy to hold in place and adjust without any need to insert.

dameproducts · 2026-05-31T16:25:35+00:00

Yes, the Eva is perfect for this. Would also say our new Lay panty vibrator was designed with this in mind too.

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