For many women, the area "down there" is a bit of a mystery, and a big reason is that our most personal questions can be hard -- or just too embarrassing -- to ask our doctors. In her new book, Ask Dr. Marie: Straight Talk & Reassuring Answers to Your Most Private Questions, Marie Savard, M.D., ABC News Medical Contributor, explains what's normal and what's not when it comes to women's health.

Read the excerpt below to see Dr. Marie's answers to the private questions you've always wanted to ask.

How Often is Often Enough?

Most people think other people are having more sex than they are. In truth, the only people having a whole lot of sex are those in that dizzying first phase of romantic love when you are literally drugged by your own hormones and just can't keep your hands off each other. There's an old saying that goes, "Before you get married, put a bead in a big jar every time you have sex. Soon you will fill the jar. After you get married, take out a bead every time you have sex. You will never empty that jar." Scientifically, the reason this is true is that when you move from the giddy throes of falling in love to the comfy Sunday-morning-with-pancakes-and-the-paper stage of a relationship, a different hormone takes over. You don't get a rush of adrenaline and other inner opiates that makes you crave a sexual encounter anymore. What you do get is a steady stream of the bonding hormone oxytocin. (It's the same one that pumps copiously when a woman is in labor or breastfeeding.) In other words, the neighbors probably aren't doing it any more than you are if you've been together for a while -- and that's just fine.

Here is some hard data about the frequency of sexual encounters. According to a University of Chicago National Opinion Research Center General Survey in 2005, the number of reported episodes of intercourse go down with each decade of life:

Ages 18–29: a mean of 84 episodes per year Ages 30–39: a mean of 80 episodes per year Ages 40–49: a mean of 63.5 episodes per year Ages 50–59: a mean of 45.8 episodes per year Ages 60–69: a mean of 27.1 episodes per year Ages 70 and older: a mean of 10.4 episodes per year

What's the Best Way to Keep My Genital Area Clean?

Right after my first son was born, I discovered that the hypoallergenic baby wipes I had bought for him were also perfect for keeping my own "private parts" clean. The French have the bidet and at least one American company is now making a toilet seat that doubles as a bidet, but I simply use my wipes. They're soothing, effective, and portable. I keep containers of them in the bathrooms and the powder room in my house and I carry a travel-size packet in my purse. Toilet paper is dry and irritating. It doesn't cleanse your vulvar area well at all. In fact, a report published in the prestigious Journal of the American Medical Association confirms this. Think about all that happens in such a small area "down there" -- we have sex, we urinate, and we have bowel movements. Baby wipes clean best and they moisturize delicate tissues. My personal favorites are wipes infused with aloe, but use any brand that feels good to you. However, stay away from scented wipes that can cause allergic reactions. Also, even if your brand claims to be "flushable," don't risk backing up the plumbing.

Can I Catch STIs or Get Pregnant from Toilet Seats?

Let me dispel a decades-old myth. When I entered nursing school way back in 1967, the head nurse advised us girls (our class was all "girls" in those days) to beware of toilet seats. "When it comes to getting pregnant," she warned, "you never know how close is too close." She further explained that toilet seats might contain the "seeds" to start a pregnancy. She was wrong, but we believed her. And back then it never entered our minds that we might get an STI from a toilet seat. Pregnancy was the big scare when it came to messing around with boys or sitting on wet toilet seats. Today, when women get an unusual rash "down there," they may worry that they got the infection from a dirty public toilet seat. Trust me, that's virtually impossible. Viruses can't live very long outside the body. I have never seen a study reporting any toilet-seat-related disease. You can use those paper toilet seat covers if they make you feel better or you can lift up the seat and "hover" if you're good at it, but personally I just sit down. For obvious reasons, I wipe off a wet seat but I rarely try to balance myself in that "squat and hang" position, especially not in the bathroom of a moving airplane or train. As you know if you've tried that, one lurch of the vehicle can mean that you're guaranteed to miss your mark. My advice is wipe it down, sit, and be comfortable.

Should I Douche?

I suspect that nothing tempts a woman to douche more than the embarrassing fishy odor that is the most prevalent symptom of BV [bacterial vaginosis],especially right after sex. Yet ironically, douching can cause BV and also make it worse by further upsetting the balance of healthy and harmful bacteria. Douching is a very bad idea! Don't do it.

What Can I Do to Clear Up My Yeast Infection Faster? These are simple steps you can take to speed your recovery and keep infections from recurring:

Don't use tampons while you're being treated for a yeast infection.

Even after the infection is gone, don't use super absorbent tampons.

While you're being treated, change your sanitary pads frequently.

Wear cotton underwear, or panties and pantyhose with cotton crotches. Synthetic fabrics don't wick up moisture. That leads to "maceration" or "soaking and softening" of tissues. This in turn encourages fungal overgrowth.

Don't wear tight jeans.

Use baby wipes after each bowel movement. Be sure to wipe from front to back.

Do not douche.

If you use a diaphragm, rinse it off after each use and never leave it in for days at a time as I once did when I was on call as a medical resident.

Don't stop taking or applying your prescribed medication just because you feel better. If you do, you may increase the chance of the infection coming back.

Can I Get Hemorrhoids from Sitting on Cold Surfaces?

No, although sitting for long periods on cold surfaces such as a bench at a football game or a curb to watch a parade can make symptoms worse if you already have hemorrhoids. At first the low temperature will shrink the swollen veins but eventually your body will react by sending blood to warm your bottom. That makes your veins fill up even more than before. My mother, who was a nurse, always warned me not to sit on cold surfaces. As a little girl, I privately thought this advice was crazy. I later learned that mom was right after all! Of course, sitting on any hard surface, cold or not, isn't a good idea for more than a little while.

What is Bowel Incontinence?

Any time you can't hold a bowel movement in, such as during a bout of acute diarrhea, is an episode of bowel incontinence. However, for some people the condition, also called fecal incontinence, is chronic. One cause is nerve damage sustained during childbirth and another is weakening of the anal sphincters ("pinch tight" muscles) due to aging. However, the most common cause of stool accidents, whether occasional leaks or total loss of control, is a routine episiotomy during childbirth. In December of 2007, the National Institutes of Health issued a recommendation that episiotomies should only be performed when there are signs of fetal distress, meaning that the baby needs to be born quickly to avoid problems. If labor is proceeding normally, an episiotomy to cut vaginal tissues is unwarranted. If you have bowel incontinence, talk with your doctor about finding a specialist in bowel training. For many patients, the strength of the anal sphincter muscles can be improved through exercise. Surgery is available but only for severe cases.

Are Birth Control Pills a Good Option for Menopausal Women?

No, although some doctors assure perimenopausal women the pills are safe and can be taken right up to menopause.The trouble is that the amount of estrogen and progesterone required to shut down ovulation is too high for a woman whose ovulation is already shutting down on its own. Taking the Pill to regulate the erratic, heavy periods typical of perimenopause does work, and, of course, it also protects you against unplanned pregnancies. However, as I found out when I took the Pill to manage heavy periods in my mid-forties, there are risks even with a low-dose version of the Pill. My blood pressure went up for the first time in my life. It went back down again after I stopped the Pill. I eventually switched to HT when I began experiencing insomnia and nighttime hot flashes and that controlled my symptoms without raising my blood pressure. Also, no woman who smokes should consider the Pill. The risks of blood clots, heart attacks, and strokes are too high.

Will I Go into Menopause If I Have a Hysterectomy?

That depends. If you have the kind of surgery that leaves your ovaries intact, they will shut down their hormone production gradually just as they would have if you still had a uterus. The process may be a little faster than it would have been. You obviously won't have periods and you won't be able to get pregnant. Otherwise, you'll experience perimenopause in pretty much the same way as anybody else might.If you have your ovaries removed, however, you'll go into instant and complete "surgical menopause." The symptoms, including frequent hot flashes, are predictably severe. I recommend having a transdermal HT [hormone therapy] patch applied before you're wheeled into the OR unless hormones are contraindicated. That way when your endogenous (internal) hormone levels suddenly plummet, you'll have exogenous (from the outside) hormones already circulating in your bloodstream. What I really recommend, though, is that you avoid an oophorectomy—the removal of your ovaries—if at all possible. After your eggs are gone, your ovaries continue to make hormones vital to your well-being, although in lesser amounts than when you were fertile.

Is Female Sexual Dysfunction the Same as Male Erectile Dysfunction?

The comparison between female sexual dysfunction (FSD) and male erectile dysfunction (ED) is disturbing to me. The word "dysfunction" -- medical speak for anything that doesn't work the way it should -- implies that we fully understand what is normal for women. That couldn't be further from the truth. Unlike men, who have an obvious erection and a quantifiable response (ejaculation), women have no such way to measure how things are working. In a summary of his 1999 article entitled "The Making of a Disease," published in the British Medical Journal, Ray Moynihan wrote: "Researchers with close ties to drug companies are defining and classifying a new medical disorder at company sponsored meetings. The corporate sponsored definitions of 'female sexual dysfunction' are being criticized as misleading and potentially dangerous. Commonly cited prevalence estimates, which indicate that 43% of women have 'female sexual dysfunction,' are described as exaggerated and are being questioned by leading researchers." The medicalization of female sexual dysfunction with its array of labels seems self-serving to me on the part of doctors. There is an entire section for sexual dysfunction in the American Psychiatric Association's "bible" of disorders, with codes that let physicians get paid. As far as I'm concerned, if you are not troubled by your sex life or lack of a sex life, there is nothing wrong with you. However, here is a list of the "definitions of sexual dysfunction," so you can assess your own situation, your needs, and your wishes—and use any of this information only if it makes sense to you.

Hypoactive Sexual Disorder A deficiency or absence of sexual fantasies and desire for sexual activity. Judgment of deficiency is made by the clinician taking into account the person's age and the context of her life.

Female Sexual Arousal Disorder A disorder characterized by a persistent inability to attain, or to maintain until completion of sexual activity, adequate lubrication and swelling response of sexual excitement.

Female Orgasmic Disorder A disorder characterized by a persistent or recurrent delay or absence of orgasm after a normal excitement phase.