Health News resources and information

By solving one problem crucial to men, modern medicine has inadvertently created a new problem for many women.

In the past 5 years, thousands of men have been able to regain their potency using one of a number of new treatments. Men who had resigned themselves to celibacy are suddenly ready to resume a full and healthy sex life.

While this development has thrilled many, it has caused numerous women anxiety and stress. They have felt unprepared for the change in intimacy. After years of sexual inactivity, suddenly their husbands have become potent again. Suddenly, sex is on the agenda. For women who have not experienced intercourse for some time and for women who have been through the menopause, this can be a daunting prospect.

A woman’s response to her partner being on treatment will often depend on how she finds out about it.

It is common for men who are planning to use treatment not to tell their partners. In some cases, their erectile difficulties are not physically induced but are related to their relationships, and they try the treatment as a ‘quick fix’. The problem with this approach is that the deeper issues are ignored.

Although treatment can be excellent, in some situations it can be destructive. There are documented cases in which treatment has exacerbated rather than solved relationship problems. It is understandable that a man might not want to disclose the fact that he is receiving treatment when he is at the beginning of a relationship. After 25 or 35 years of marriage, however, a man’s desire to hide from his wife the fact that he is receiving treatment may be an indication that the relationship is in real difficulty.

Men rarely seek advice about how women will cope with their new potency. It is something many of them don’t even consider.

Most men who use injections, for example, are 50 or over, and they find that with the injection their erection is much harder than it used to be and may last for up to an hour. For many women – especially older women – this may be too much. Being of a menopausal age, they have their own physiological issues to deal with and may be coping with a thinning of the vaginal membranes, dryness and low libido.

Recognising that both partners need to be prepared to recommence intercourse, the company that manufactures Caverject injections began supplying, on request, a free booklet for women whose partners used the product.

The booklet gives women detailed advice on how to cope with their partner’s new potency. It was produced because all the attention was on men and re-establishing their erections and no-one was focusing on how their partners would cope.

Injection therapy provides the possibility of ‘fast sex’, which just doesn’t work for women. With injections a man doesn’t need to be aroused. He can inject himself at any time and produce a robust erection. He doesn’t have to go through any build-up or arousal. Imagine where this leaves his partner.

The booklet recommends that intercourse be undertaken slowly and patiently. It also gives women a detailed description of how the injections work and an explicit account of how females become aroused.

The booklet explains that sexual inactivity can lead to a slowing of the arousal mechanism in women. Even 15 to 20 minutes of foreplay may not be sufficient to arouse a woman if she is anxious, overtired or under stress.

Anxiety can have a devastating effect on female arousal. With their husband all ready to go, many take even longer to become sexually involved. Couples planning to use treatment need a little practice to feel completely relaxed.

For comfortable intercourse at any age the woman needs to be in charge of the three Ps: pace, position and penetration of intercourse. She needs to help her partner by giving him feedback about the pace at which sexual activity proceeds, the most comfortable position for intercourse and the depth and type of penetration.

The older a woman is, the longer it takes for arousal to occur. Lubrication is diminished and takes longer to appear. She may need more stimulation to have an orgasm and find that her orgasms are not as strong as they used to be.

It is a good idea for men and women never to assume they know what their partner likes. Good lovers learn what turns their partners on by asking them, not by reading their minds.

While many women need advice on how to cope with the new potency, some need none at all. They are simply delighted at the restoration of an activity that can be so pleasurable and enriching.

One of the major reasons women go to menopause clinics is that they are experiencing difficulties with sex, such as pain, dryness or loss of libido. Previously, by the time they had been treated, their libido had returned and they were ready for sex, their ageing husbands were not up to it. Now they are!

*26\105\2*

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 12th, 2009 at 12:31 pm and is filed under Men's Health-Erectile Dysfunction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.