Lee Suckling: The new etiquette of vaping after sex

If you're going to vape in bed, you must - I repeat, must - be willing to share. Photo / Getty Images

Smoking campaigns may have stubbed out the post coital puff but, Lee Suckling asks, what about vaping?

Thanks to Hollywood movies from The Graduate to Pulp Fiction (and some serious influence from the tobacco industry), smoking after sex was a 20th century phenomenon.

When sexy post-coitus people (usually women) draped in a mere sheet lit up a slender cigarette in bed, it sent society a clear message. Smoking is what you do after you orgasm.

The anti-smoking campaign of the 21st century has been wildly successful in stubbing out those smokes from our bedrooms. Nobody would dare smoke inside – in bed – anymore, would they? Not even James Bond or Carrie Bradshaw could get away with it now.

Yet the proliferation of vaping may have re-ignited this trend. Yes, vaping after sex is a thing.

I spent a week talking to vapers and the overwhelming opinion is that a cheeky vape after orgasm is a wonderful add-on to sex.

Here's why they think so:

Sharing your vape pen with somebody is a bonding experience. You're already high on oxytocin, the love chemical in your brain, when you finish having sex. Passing a vape between the two of you further makes your experience intimate and you suck in the sugary e-liquid together and puff it out towards the bedroom ceiling. You're both left lying on your back, overwhelmed with pleasure, feeling ever-so-close to each other.

I don't regularly vape, but this all makes sense to me. I can see how the experience would be enjoyable because the logistics of smoking something still conjure up feelings of glamour and intimacy. The coy appeal of holding your fingers to your mouth, then blowing a smooth cloud of smoke through your lips is sexy. It's even a fetish for some. And now the smell is sweet and fruity and not of nasty, charcoal-y tobacco, what's not to like?

This brings us to the etiquette of vaping after sex. Don't vape in bed with a non-vaper beside you. It feels like you're taking over the space and making it yours. It's dominating. It's non-inclusive. It reads like an exertion of power, not something to bond you and achieve feelings of closeness. Further, while you think the smell of Sex on the Beach (an actual e-juice flavour) is appealing, it's not for everyone. For some, it's sickly.

Vaping after sex isn't discreet, so there's no point in pretending it is. Don't vape under the sheets, don't insist it has no smell, and don't get up and shamefully vape elsewhere in the room/house post-sex so as not to offend your non-vaping partner.

If you're going to vape in bed, you must – I repeat, must – be willing to share. Some people are funny and protective about their vaping devices and while that's fair enough in a regular context, it's not okay when you've just been inside each other. Sharing is caring, people.

Allegedly, actor Leonardo DiCaprio likes to vape DURING sex.

And when you hit up internet forums like Reddit, it seems others do too. If you must, vaping during sex is at least safer than smoking during sex, I'll give you that. Thankfully there's little chance of lighting your bed on fire.

Apparently, it can heighten sexual pleasure. If this is your thing, again, make sure it's a shared experience. It would be terribly rude for one person to vape alone whilst actually having sex with another – it's a bit like playing on your iPhone. It will make the other person wonder if they're straining your attention with sex; keeping you away from what you really want to be doing.

I think it would be pretty impossible to have fully-intimate, high-participation sex while vaping. If you have a vape pen in one hand and a penis in the other, are you really going to giving your all to both? Vaping is a bit disengaging. It seems like a good way to fall down the trap of being lazy in bed.

If you find vaping genuinely arousing, by all means go forth and vape after or even during sex. I won't be trying or even advocating it, but the only permission you need is from the other naked person beside you.