These Ben Wa Balls are designed to work as a weight to exercise your kegels, which are the muscles along your pelvic floor. These muscles are the same ones that will contract during orgasm so strengthening them will, in turn, strengthen your orgasms; they will also help prevent urinary incontinence as you age. To identify your kegel muscles in women try to stop the flow of urine mid-stream, these are the same muscles you will clench to exercise with the Ben Wa Balls. Try to identify the specific muscles and clench only these, not your entire pelvic floor, your sphincter should not be tightening when you clench your kegels. Once you practice exercising without weights you can add a weight, just like any other exercise, with these Ben Wa Balls. Once they are inserted you can go about your day and focus on holding them in place. They are not designed to provide pleasure the way many other exercisers do, and I would not recommend them for beginners since they are so small. These Ben Wa Balls should only be used vaginally, NEVER anally because once they are inserted anally there is no reliable way to retrieve them so it will almost undoubtedly require a trip to the ER.

The product page lists these as plastic but after holding them in my hand they feel like they can't be anything other than a metal, they are heavy, shiny, firm and smooth. Since they are so small and smooth it adds to the challenge of keeping them inserted, they have zero drag so I did not require even a small amount of lube to insert them. They also have no smell or taste. Based on the price I would assume they are not real gold but simply have a gold colored finish, during use I have not noticed this finish wearing away or chipping and they both still seem as good as new. If they are metal as I am lead to believe they are totally non-porous and can be sanitized by boiling or washing in a 10% bleach solution. Metal is also wonderful at holding temperature, the balls could be dropped in a cup of cold or warm water before use for some interesting sensations but never microwave or place in the freezer because that will make them dangerously hot or cold and unsafe for use.

This set is made up of two small spheres, each about 3/4" in diameter (about the size of a small marble) and considerably smaller than many of the other vaginal exercisers on the market. This makes them ideal for the more advanced user but a little difficult for the beginner. They are very easy to travel with and could be kept in the box they arrive in or in a small cloth pouch in the bottom of a bag. If anyone were to stumble across them I doubt they would know what they are used for and wouldn't think twice. According to the product page they weight about .2 lbs and I'm going to have to just assume that this is correct because I don't have a scale that will register that small of a weight, then again the product page also says they are plastic so who knows. What I can say is that when you hold them in your hand they are certainly heavier than you would expect due to their small size, I would attribute this to the dense metal that they are made of but this weight is ideal for their intended purpose.

The world of kegel exercisers saw a surge of interest with the popularity of the E.L. James book 50 Shades of Grey in which the lead is introduced to vaginal exercisers by her partner and describes the overwhelming sensations of wearing them as she walks through the house and later the party they attend. If these strong sensations are what you are looking for this is not the set to invest in. Once inserted I could barely feel the balls at all, which made it difficult to focus on clenching my muscles around them. I found that there were times when I felt that by clenching my kegels I was pushing the balls out of my body instead of keeping them in. The only time I was able to feel them was if they were about to fall out at which point they almost felt like an air bubble in my vaginal canal. I feel that with more use I may be able to better identify the specific location of the balls and focus those muscles; I would consider myself an intermediate user of kegel exercisers and I still struggle with these. I can easily hold one ball in place but it is when I add the second that it becomes challenging, I find that when the balls are cold it makes them easier to locate and focus my muscles on but once they have warmed to my body it makes it much more difficult. They are easy to wear in public but only if you are comfortable enough that they will stay in place, they make no noise while inserted but if they fall out while you're walking down the whole foods isle someone might notice!

These are very easy to care for, simply rinse them off before and after use with warm soap and water, they can also be boiled or wiped down with a 10% bleach solution to sanitize them. They can be stored in the case they came in or in a small cloth pouch but I would recommend having some sort of protection over them when storing them so as to protect them from any chips or scratches. It is compatible with any lubricant but I would recommend using very little if any because the more you add the more difficult it will be to keep in place.

These Ben Wa Balls come in a rather fancy treasure chest type box. It is is made of a clear hard plastic and you can lift the lid to reveal a red foam stand with two cut outs for the balls to sit in. This makes a lovely display case and the lid is heavy enough that if you were to throw it in a bag or hang it upside down and it will not open on it's own. It does feel a little dollar-store-ish in that it is a little cheesy, it feels like they took cheep materials and tried to make them look expensive but since the entire set is so cheep I can't really complain.

This is a really nice set that I will have to work my way up to using successfully, and I find the biggest concern I hear about products like this is that they do not have a retrieval cord. Since you are using them vaginally there is no risk of them getting "lost." Your cervix functions as an "end" to your vaginal canal so there really isn't anywhere for it to go, if you have trouble locating them with your fingers you can simply bare down with your muscles (think like a pregnant woman and PUUUUUSH) and that will push them closer to the vaginal opening. Trust me you'll be more worried about keeping them in than getting them out!