What you should know about wet dreams

What you should know about wet dreams
What are wet dreams? Who has them, and why?
One of the most common topics for questions on this site is wet dreams, which are more properly called nocturnal emissions. They are also called night loss and nightfall. They are orgasms with ejaculation that happen while a male is sleeping. They occur during REM (rapid eye movement) sleep -- the kind that cause the most vivid dreams. Sexual desire is but a small cause of wet dreams; they result mostly from the body's need to eliminate the sexual fluids that have accumulated since the last ejaculation. The content of wet dreams is not necessarily sexual, although it is apt to involve the penis in some way, similar to the way people often dream about urinating if they happen to have a full bladder at that moment. Only about a third of males have ever had frequent wet dreams. About as many had a small number of wet dreams (five or fewer) when they were beginning puberty. Most males have their first ejaculation by masturbating, and nearly all of them make it such a regular habit that their body never needs to induce a wet dream. The ones who have wet dreams nearly all stop having them once they learn to masturbate. Thus, most males who have wet dreams are age 12 to 14.

What do boys dream about when they ejaculate in their sleep?
A typical wet dream plot is that something is making contact with the penis (e.g., a substance dripping onto it), and at that moment, the dreamer ejaculates. A more sexual plot is that the subject is in some way making contact with his desired partners (generally girls he knows, whether he is attracted to them or not), such as carrying them on his back, or leapfrogging them. He ejaculates at the moment his penis touches the girl in the dream (usually both are fully clothed in the dream). Very few males report having had wet dreams that were about intercourse. This is mostly due to the limited knowledge of intercourse of most males at the age of having wet dreams.

If I have a wet dream about another guy, am I gay?
Probably not. At the age most wet dreams occur, many males have too little input to accurately gauge their future sexual preference. Nevertheless, the partner contacts encapsulated in wet dreams are closely related to an individual's sexual preference. Many gay men have said they first realized they were gay as a result of wet dreams they had when they were young. However, this is not a perfect indicator; some males who are exclusively heterosexual have had wet dreams involving a same-sex contact, and vice versa.

Will I remember if I have a wet dream?
Wet dreams are somewhat easier to remember than ordinary dreams because ejaculation nearly always awakens the dreamer, at least for a moment, and as with ordinary dreams, waking up in the middle of it makes the dream easier to remember. Some males do not wake up when they ejaculate, and these males are often surprised to find their ejaculate in their bedding or clothing when they finally wake up. For more than a few younger males, the evidence that wet dreams leaves causes them worry and upset that parents or others will discover it. Some males start wearing underwear or other heavier garments to bed at this point in order to contain and conceal the ejaculate. However, this ought not be a cause of concern for boys, because parents are aware that wet dreams, ejaculation, and masturbation are normal developments for boys who are growing quickly and whose voices are changing.

How often do boys have wet dreams?
Males who have wet dreams typically experience one about every ten days, but this is by no means regular; a boy can have wet dreams two days in a row and then not again for a month. It can be a source of stress to a boy who has no other sexual outlet when he goes a longer time than usual without a wet dream. A male who sleeps late is more likely to have a wet dream than one who rises early, because those extra hours of sleep are apt to be more heavily loaded with REM sleep. Thus, wet dreams are more likely to happen on the weekend than on school days.

What does a wet dream feel like?
Physically, wet dreams feel much like other orgasms. The male feels contractions inside the pelvis for a few seconds and then ejaculates. Males who have had a number of wet dreams can recognize these feelings even as they sleep, and in fact, waking up too soon can inhibit the cycle and cause the wet dream to not happen. In many ways, the physiological response of a wet dream is a more pure orgasm than that obtained while conscious. For example, while masturbating or having intercourse, the male is aware of the movements he or his partner are causing (hand motion, stroking against genitals, thrusting, body movement, etc.), whereas in a wet dream, the only sensation is that of the sexual response.

Why don't I have wet dreams anymore? Can I do anything to bring a wet dream on?
Once a male starts masturbating, he is likely to never have another wet dream. Some males decide at some point to refrain from ejaculating for a while in an effort to bring on a wet dream, but these generally do not succeed. It is believed that the body becomes habituated to the stimulation from masturbation and/or intercourse, and thus, even when sexual fluids accumulate to the point that a wet dream would occur in a male who has never masturbated, it does not happen in the male who is experienced at masturbation. The author has heard cases of males abstaining from masturbation for up to a month and not having a wet dream. A few cases have been reported of males cutting back their masturbatory frequency greatly for two years or more before having a wet dream.

Are there adult men who have wet dreams?
There are other males who continue to have wet dreams after they begin masturbating, but the causes of this are unknown. These males generally masturbate infrequently. Perhaps there is some cardinal frequency of masturbation that inhibits wet dreams, and that males who masturbate below this frequency continue to have wet dreams periodically but males who exceed this frequency lose the ability to have wet dreams.

Are wet dreams more fun than masturbating?
Males who have never had a wet dream often desire one simply for the experience of it. But every male who formerly had them when they were young, in a sense, gave them up voluntarily by choosing to masturbate instead. Presumably, these males derive greater satisfaction from masturbating daily or more (as is typical for males learning to masturbate) than from having wet dreams a few times a month.

Is there a connection between wet dreams and TMS?
Wet dreams can contribute to Traumatic Masturbatory Syndrome (TMS), which is masturbating in the prone position. A few practitioners of TMS can recall having a wet dream in which they began thrusting against their bedding in their sleep. This gave them the idea to try thrusting while they were awake, and it led them to learn to masturbate prone. The males who reported having wet dreams with actual thrusting were sleeping nude when it happened.

Men who used to have regular wet dreams remember them happily, but would not want to return to the days when their only orgasms were dictated by chance and only happened while they were asleep.


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The following questions and answers draw on scholarly sex research:

Why is so little known about wet dreams?

Nocturnal emissions have never been an important topic for sex research. The most thorough treatment is still the chapter on them in Kinsey's 1948 work Sexual Behavior in the Human Male. Sex scientists have presumably devoted little attention to them because for most males they are a passing occurrence, and they happen in early adolescence. This is a period that people who study it are occupied by much more pressing issues, such as pregnancy, contraception, drug use, efficacy of sex education, emerging issues of sexual identity, etc.

What causes wet dreams?

No one knows. Before the landmark sex research by Alfred C. Kinsey, authors maintained that nocturnal emissions were caused by the pressures that built up from unexpended sperm and seminal fluid. However, Kinsey pointed out that there was no ready correlation between frequencies of nocturnal emission and other sources of orgasm. (Burg, p. 219)

What did Kinsey's research yield about wet dreams?

Kinsey found that 83 percent of males have had at least one wet dream, although they "never account for any large portion of the total number of orgasms experienced by the male population" (p. 519).

What did Kinsey's study find about the frequency of wet dreams?

Kinsey found a lot of variation in frequency of nocturnal emission among males. "There are males who never ejaculate in their sleep, and more males who have only a few wet dreams in their lives. ... For most males during their earlier years, nocturnal emissions are usually monthly or bi-monthly, rarely weekly or more than weekly events" (p. 521).

"In all social groups," Kinsey reports, "nocturnal emissions are primarily an outlet of younger adolescent and older teen-age boys ... If the experienced males alone are used in the calculations, the highest frequencies of nocturnal emissions occur between adolescence and fifteen, at rates of about once in three weeks. From that point, both the incidence and frequency figures go down..." (p. 523).

Did Kinsey have any idea about the cause of wet dreams?

He believed the existing theories were inadequate. He called physiological information about wet dreams "exceedingly scant" (p. 527), something that is still true today. "Certainly no interpretation is tenable," Kinsey asserted, "which depends upon the idea that the testes are the sources of the semen, and that they or other glands become so engorged with accumulating secretions that involuntary ejaculation is the result. ... If there are any pressures involved, they must arise in the seminal vesicles or in the prostate gland; but data on this point are lacking. It is more tenable to think of nervous tensions which are built up until, periodically, they precipitate an orgasm; but again the physiology is not understood. We are, in consequence, almost completely in the dark as to the possibility of a biologic mechanism which could force nocturnal emissions when other sexual outlets were insufficient." (pp. 527-528)

Kinsey cites earlier research that suggested that those without sexual outlet would be more likely to have wet dreams, but he finds that the emission frequency of church-going males are no different from those of non-church-going males (p. 528), to name just one variable influencing mode of sexual outlet.

Kinsey also suggests that if there were a physiological mechanism that produced wet dreams in the absence of other sexual outlet, that there might be psychological mechanisms that do the exact opposite. "In some individuals," Kinsey speculates, "the physiologic factors may predominate; in others, the psychologic factors may be more significant. It is quite probable that in still other cases, still other factors are involved" (p. 529).

If the "built-up pressure" theory is wrong, what did Kinsey hypothesize about the cause of wet dreams?

Kinsey found educational achievement to be the biggest variable influencing wet dream frequency. Up to age 15, boys who would go on to college had wet dreams seven times as often as as the boys who would only go as far as grade school [a large share of the male population in the pre-1948 period] and more than twice as often as the boys who would only go as far as high school (p. 521). Kinsey speculated that males who attain more educationally have greater "imaginative capacity," and this causes the dreams that result in ejaculation. "The sexual life of a male of a lower educational level," Kinsey says, "is primarily dependent upon active physical contacts. He is aroused during his waking hours by relatively few psychic stimuli, and he rarely utilizes such secondhand sources of stimulation as art, literature, nude pictures, stories, or specifically pornographic materials to accompany or substitute for overt sex acts. At night he probably does less dreaming, of any sort, than the better educated male, and his sex dreams are certainly not frequent" (p. 521).

"We do know that the frequencies of nocturnal dreams show some correlation with the level of erotic responsiveness of an individual. The boys of lower level are not so often aroused erotically, nor aroused by so many items as the boys from the upper educational levels. Nocturnal dreams may depend on imaginative capacity, in something of the same way that daytime eroticism is dependent upon the individual's capacity to project himself into a situation which is not a part of his immediate experience. It may be that a paucity of over socio-sexual experience among upper level males accounts both for their daytime eroticism and for their nocturnal dreaming" (p. 345).

What was the climate surrounding wet dreams at the time Kinsey wrote?

Kinsey made the point that wet dreams have over history commanded less condemnation than other forms of sexual expression, such as intercourse and masturbation. "By nearly all moral philosophies," Kinsey states, "nocturnal emissions provide the one form of sexual outlet for which the individual is least responsible" (p. 527).

Has headway been made on learning unanswered questions about wet dreams since Kinsey?

Unfortunately, even the contributions Kinsey made on the topic seem to have been forgotten. The most influential sex researchers since Kinsey have been Masters & Johnson, but in their book Masters and Johnson on Sex and Human Loving, they asserted the pre-Kinsey notion that wet dreams resulted as an automatic reflex whenever too much sexual fluid accumulated: "Nocturnal ejaculation provides a physiologic 'safety-valve' for accumulated sexual tension that has not been released in another fashion. Men who have reached high and sustained levels of sexual arousal without ejaculating, no matter how the arousal came about, are thus able to discharge this physiologic tension in a completely natural reflex" (pp. 297-8).

Are there case studies of men giving up masturbation in order to have wet dreams?

19th century seaman Philip C. Van Buskirk kept detailed records of his masturbation, nocturnal emission, and coital activity from age 19 in 1852 to 1858. He had 7 wet dreams in the last 17 weeks of 1852, 24 in 1853, and 39 in 1854. He masturbated 7 times in the last 17 weeks of 1852, 18 times in 1853, 21 times in the first 10 months of 1854. In November 1854, he quit masturbating altogether. In 1855, he had 42 wet dreams, only a slight increase over 1854. In 1856, he had 35 wet dreams and masturbated three times. He did not masturbate in 1857 or 1858, when he had 35 and 69 wet dreams, respectively. He had intercourse twice in this period, once in 1856 and once in 1857.

Sexual historian B.R. Burg says of Van Buskirk, "In the years when he masturbated regularly, [the rates of masturbation and nocturnal emission] correlated closely in direct contravention of theories positing a build-up of pressure as a cause of nocturnal emission. When he stopped masturbating in the fall of 1854, the rise of nocturnal emission frequency produced a clear if brief inverse correlation. Then, in the absence of any significant number of induced orgasms, the rate fluctuated erratically in a generally downward direction but remained consistently higher than in the years before 1854. In 1858, for no apparent reason, it rose very rapidly." (p. 219) Thus, concludes Burg, the case provides support for Kinsey's assertion that there is little or no regularly discernable relationship between rates of induced orgasm and frequency of nocturnal emission or involuntary orgasm.

Can someone be hypnotized into having a wet dream?

It doesn't look like it. A hypnotist tried that on some college men (who had been very hypnotizable for other purposes) in the 1970s but none of them were able to have a nocturnal emission. (O'Brien & Rabuck)

Sources:

B.R. Burg, "Nocturnal Emission and Masturbatory Frequency Relationships: A 19th-Century Account," Journal of Sex Research 24: 216-220 (1988).
Alfred C. Kinsey, Wardell B. Pomeroy, and Clyde E. Martin, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male. Philadelphia: W. B. Saunders, 1948.
William H. Masters, Virginia E. Johnson, and Robert C. Kolodny, Masters and Johnson on Sex and Human Loving. Boston: Little, Brown, 1988.
Richard M. O'Brien and Shirley J. Rabuck, "A Failure to Hypnotically Produce Nocturnal Emission," American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis 19: 182-184 (1977).
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Here are some actual questions from readers of this site and the author's replies.

I am 20 years old and in the past week I haven't masturbated, but before that I masturbated at least once a day. I am wondering if I keep not masturbating, will I be able to get a wet dream, being 20 years old. Can you please let me know if I can have a wet dream and if so, about how long would it take with me not masturbating?

You don't say if you've ever had a wet dream (like before you started masturbating), but in either case, I think it's unlikely you'll have one. You've gotten used to the stimulation of doing it yourself. There are some older males who have wet dreams, but that is kind of rare. I've heard of guys abstaining from intercourse and masturbation for as long as a month in an effort to induce a wet dream and they haven't been successful. I've heard of other experienced guys having a wet dream after only 2 nights without an ejaculation. I can imagine the appeal of trying to have a wet dream if you've never had one before, but if you get to about 25 days and then give up, you'll probably decide you've wasted a lot of time. Are you really abstaining from masturbation or just from ejaculation? If you're masturbating short of orgasm, that might be enough to inhibit a wet dream. Good luck.

You say wet dreams feel good but at the same time does masturbating feel better? I never had a wet dream so I need to know. How can I make a wet dream happen? (age 13)

I don't think you have a choice unless you've never masturbated. Once you start masturbating, you'll probably never have a wet dream again. Most guys prefer masturbating to wet dreams.

I'm an 18 year old male. I haven't had a wet dream since I was about 12 years old or so. I still sometimes have sexual dreams, however, I don't have an orgasm as a result. Is this bad?

It's normal to never have another wet dream after you start masturbating.

I'm 17 years old and I haven't masturbated for a few months. Recently I've been having problems such as wet dreams and leaking of semen when I'm not excited. Is there something wrong with me?

Wet dreams and semen leaking are normal consequences of not masturbating, especially if you've never masturbated often. If you think they're problems, you should masturbate more often. Most guys your age masturbate every day or more.

I went for 2 years without masturbating or any form of sex, and toward the end of that period I did have a few wet dreams. (age 51)

Thank you for telling guys who stop masturbating for a week or two in order to induce a wet dream how long they'll have to wait -- two years.

Can working out streneuosly (weights, running) while at the same time never masturbating cause wet dreams? I've heard from someone at school that when he works out a lot without masturbating, his body responds by eventually ejaculating in his sleep. Can this happen? I've never had a wet dream before but I'm eager to see what they are like, and I never get one. Can masturbating regularly reduce the number of erections you get at school? (age 16)

Not masturbating can bring on wet dreams, but it's unlikely you'll get one if you've never had one before if you're experienced with masturbating. Masturbating won't reduce those daily erections.

I was just wondering if the number of times I masturbate enables me to have wet dreams. I masturbate about 7 times a week when it's in the holidays and about 3 times a week when I have school and studies. I also think that I have had a wet dream even when I was masturbating. (age 14)

You think, but you're not sure? It is probable that you will never have a wet dream again now that you are used to masturbating 3-7 times a week.

I have a wet dream about every 10 days. Is it OK if I do not masturbate?

I think 3 ejaculations a month is enough to keep your body healthy. But nearly all males find masturbating to be a great source of pleasure, and you might want to become one of them.

I recently had my first wet dream. It was much better than masturbation. The only part I remember was a very hot woman laying on her front near the edge of a cliff. She offered to jump off with me on her back because she had a parachute. She began to grow impatient because I wasn't getting on her back. I got on her back. That very second I woke up and had ejaculated. I wish it had lasted longer. Do you know a way to keep myself from waking up, or how long it will be before I have another wet dream? (age 13)

That sounds like a typical wet dream plot. There's about nothing you can do to keep from waking up once you ejaculate, but you can try to go back to sleep again. When you first have them, wet dreams can be more than a month apart. If you masturbate, you might never have one again.

You asked for stories about bringing on wet dreams. I have one. I have practiced lucid dreaming, which is taking steps to control your dreams while they are happening. I have managed to bring on one wet dream. I tried to have my partner stimulate me while I was in REM sleep, but this made a difference. Based on what I know about lucid dreaming, I would estimate that 15 percent of men could bring on a wet dream this way. Thank you for your excellent site.

Hmm... I am more inclined than ever to believe that trying to bring on a wet dream is a waste of time. There might be benefits to lucid dreaming, but it doesn't appear that nocturnal emissions are one of them. I've heard of males abstaining from ejaculation for up to a month and not being able to have a wet dream. All they did was waste a month that they could have been having orgasms, not to mention the mental frustration they brought on themselves. Those who have a choice almost always choose to have orgasms while awake.

I'm 16 and I have never been able to masturbate to orgasm, despite masturbating a few times a week. I have had many wet dreams, occuring roughly once or twice every two weeks.

When you masturbate, you're obviously stopping before you get to orgasm. You can easily learn to reach orgasm through masturbation. When you do, your wet dreams will stop, unless you masturbate very infrequently. Since you're already doing it a few times a week without ejaculating, I suspect you will do it even more once you can.

How long do you have to wait to have a wet dream? (age 15)

If you're not having them at your age, I don't think you ever will.

I just wanted to let everyone know how to have a wet dream. I do not guarantee it will be successful, but it has worked twice for me. When you are about to go to sleep, masturbate hard and fast but stop when you are about to orgasm. Go to sleep. Sometime in the night you SHOULD wake up cumming. (age 14)

Thanks for the tip, but I'm not sure it will work at all for someone with more experience masturbating than you have.

How are wet dreams related to sex in dreams? Does one come with the other, and how can I have more dreams in which I have sex? (age 14)

Wet dreams are not generally sex dreams, but they sometimes are. And not very many sex dreams result in nocturnal emission. You might do some research on dreams to learn how to influence their content.

Hi I am 13 1/2. I masturbated for the first time when I was 12. I have never had a wet dream but want to see how they are. Is there any way I can try to get one?

I doubt you'll ever have a wet dream. Trying to bring one on is apt to be pointless. Just enjoy what you're doing now. It looks like you already are.

I stopped having sex and haven't masturbated for 2 weeks and can't have a wet dream. Is this normal? (age 22)

Unfortunately, yes. Trying to bring on a wet dream at your age is a waste of time. Your body is used to the stimulation it gets from masturbation and intercourse.

I'm a 16 year old guy and everything I've read says that I should have had at least one wet dream by now. But as far as I know I haven't! I thought you wake up after having a wet dream. Is this true? Then I have never had a wet dream. Is this normal?

Only about 60 percent of adult males have had ever had wet dreams. The rest started masturbating before they could ever have one. If you had a wet dream, you would know. Even if you didn't wake up right away, the semen would be around as evidence when you finally woke up.

I am 21 and I have never masturbated. I HAVE grabbed my penis when I had an erection, but have never gotten semen to come out because I never knew how. I have been having wet dreams since I was 15 or so. I get them at least a few times a week, although they have slowed down lately. I think it is because I am on a diet. My friends were talking to me about masturbating, so I looked it up on the Internet and came up with your site. Now I am getting scared. Is it very unhealthy for me not to masturbate? Is it enough to get rid of fluids with just wet dreams? I do not want to start masturbating because I find it repulsive, and I heard that I will stop having wet dreams, which I enjoy very much. What do you advise?

I wonder if you don't protest too much. Nevertheless, I will take your statement at face value and respond accordingly. Your diet makes little or no difference in having wet dreams. If you are really having them several times a week, then you are not in danger of getting the problems caused by infrequent ejaculation. It is correct that if you start masturbating, you will cease to have wet dreams. Given a choice, most men would rather masturbate, because then they get to control when they have orgasms, and most choose to have them more frequently than they were having wet dreams. And since you ask what I advise, I advise you to masturbate, because that is how people learn to respond sexually. Most males regard masturbation as one of the greatest joys of life, and you will probably regret that you waited so long to try.

I have been having wet dreams with frequency like 5 or 6 a month since beginning. And I am sick and tired of them!!! From your site I have learned that they are uncommon in boys over 15 because they start masturbation. I'm 23 and I still get them with same frequency. How can I use masturbation to get rid of wet dreams??

I think most males enjoyed wet dreams when they had them and miss them sometimes now that they don't, but enjoy being awake for orgasms now. Most males masturbate more often than you do. That's why you're still having wet dreams. Masturbating 2-3 times a week will probably put an end to them forever.

I am a 21 year old guy and I have masturbated 3-4 times a week from the age of 16 but I have been having wet dreams for a few months. At age 21, is it OK to get wet dreams? I used to have 2-3 a year.

There's nothing wrong with them, but they're kind of unusual at your age.

I have wet dreams probably more often than most, but I have never had an orgasm or ejaculated from masturbation. Sure it feels good, but nothing really happens. I don't masturbate as often as most people probably do because of this. What's the problem? (age 16)

You haven't learned to masturbate to orgasm. The important thing is to keep a mental focus on something that arouses you. With proper mental and physical stimulation, you should be able to get to orgasm in about 5 minutes.

Follow-up: I know how to and I have been trying unsuccessfully for a year to masturbate to orgasm. Is there a chance I have an actual medical problem?

It's possible. It might just be a matter of getting to orgasm the first time. Try abstaining for 5-7 days and then try again.

I was just wondering if the number of times I masturbate enables me to have wet dreams. I masturbate about 7 times a week when it's in the holidays and about 3 times a week when I have school and studies. I also think that I have had a wet dream even when I was masturating. (age 14)

You think, but you're not sure? It is probable that you will never have a wet dream again now that you are used to masturbating 3-7 times a week.

I have a wet dream about every 10 days. Is it OK if I do not masturbate?

I think 3 ejaculations a month is enough to keep your body healthy. But nearly all males find masturbating to be a great source of pleasure, and you might want to become one of them.

I still have several wet dreams a year at age 43. I wait for them rather than masturbate. I think they're more enjoyable than masturbation.

You're lucky to have that option, but most males would prefer to masturbate whenever they feel like it than to have several orgasms a year.

I am now waiting for my fifth wet dream. My last one was on October 21, 2005. It is now almost 2 months since my last wet dream. Wet dreams happen to guys that do not sexually entice themselves for a given amount of time. I'm conducting an experiment as to how frequently wet dreams occur. Wet dreams stop when men start to ejaculate in one way or another. (age 29)

I'm inclined to agree with most of what you say, but something that has happened to you four times in 16 years does not seem to be worth waiting for when an alternative means is available.

I'm 13 years old and I've been having a problem with wet dreams. Sometime they happen 2-4 times a week and one time I had one twice in the same night. They've become a nuisance and an embarrassment like the time I had one at a sleepover birthday party. (Luckily no one noticed.) Is it possible to prevent wet dreams and would masturbation prevent them?

Regular, frequent masturbation is apt to put an end to wet dreams forever. If you masturbate less frequently than you are having wet dreams (which is pretty often), you are apt to continue having wet dreams too. If you have wet dreams regularly, there is really no way to prevent one from happening on a particular night. You might try to enjoy them rather than regard them as a nuisance.

I have a problem speaking to girls who I think are pretty or who I would like to have a relationship with. I know this is entirely normal but I was wondering if you have any suggestions for relieving my problem. (age 14)

Practice being as casual around those attractive girls as you are around girls you find ordinary. Try talking to them about movies or school or something like that. You might also realize that there's more to a girl than being pretty. Try to find some other things about girls that you like. Some pretty girls at 14 become plain as they mature, and some girls who are plain at your age turn out to be knockouts later.

Do females have wet dreams? My fiancee says that she does not know. (age 25)

The "wet" in wet dream refers to ejaculation, and most authorities believe that females do not ejaculate. (This is a controversial point, since many women allege that they produce a burst of fluid at the point of orgasm.) Women report occasionally having dreams that result in orgasm, but this is much less common than the male experience (which is also less than universal), and it would not be called a wet dream or a nocturnal emission because it is dry and nothing is emitted.

I am 16 years old and masturbate once or twice a week. I had my first wet dream last night, for no apparent reason. (age 16)

Wet dreams usually don't happen for an apparent reason. I hope you enjoyed it. Masturbating once or twice a week is infrequent enough that you might have occasional wet dreams. Males who masturbate daily or close to daily usually never have them again.

I am a 25 year old guy and I still have wet dreams (although infrequently). They seem to occur less often when I am masturbating more frequently but I don't want them at all. Is there any way to get rid of wet dreams?

Masturbating daily or more for a period of time puts an end to them permanently in most men. Or, you might be one of the rare men who continues to have them periodically even when you are experienced at frequent masturbation. You might try to enjoy them.

You said in a reply to a question that "Once you start masturbating, you'll probably never have a wet dream again." That is totally wrong, I'd masturbated for a year before I had great seasons (episodes) of wet dreams in my earlier years and I've experimented that I'll have wet dreams whenever I stop masturbating for a very long time (a month or so), even though I'm 18 now.

The key word in my response is PROBABLY, Poindexter.

I have had wet dreams since early adolescence, sometimes twice in one night, even when masturbating daily for weeks. I am tired of them; they are difficult to clean up and mess up my sleep patterns. I don't enjoy having to get up early the next morning for something important and being jolted out of deep sleep twice the night before, leaving me groggy and useless with yet more dirty clothes to wash. My semen stinks and the smell stays on me for hours even after cleaning myself thoroughly. I don't believe when you say masturbating has any effect on wet dreams; maybe for most people, but I have never seen any relationship between the two for myself. I have always experienced intense guilt after masturbation or wet dreams, from childhood disapproval, but I don't think feelings of guilt have affected other people's frequency. I generally desire never to ejaculate, during night or day, except when I become aroused and begin convincing myself otherwise -- but even then I tell myself I am doing something wrong. I wonder if one's desire to have wet dreams is inversely related to the frequency with which one has them. (age 22)

I think you protest too much about your ejaculating, nocturnal and otherwise. Most males enjoy ejaculating, from whatever source derived. You have too many rationalizations for why you don't enjoy orgasm, and it leads me to question the truth of what you say about having wet dreams often. In any case, just treat the wet dream like any other sleep interruption, like an airplane or truck going by, and go back to sleep afterward