sex after childbirth: a user case study
Long-time readers of this blog will remember when I wrote about my half-assed diagnosis of vaginismus. After that post I didn't blog about the issue very much, not because it magically resolved itself, but because whenever I make a joke in public about our sex life my husband's eyes pop out of his head and roll across the floor. And I don't want to put him through that sort of trauma for nothing. Not unless the humor content of the post exceeds the grossness content by a factor of 2:1. I believe I have finally reached that level.
So for anyone who's had trouble getting back to sex after childbirth, or was wary about sex after pregnancy, or even outright dreaded intercourse after childbirth * let me be the first to tell you that you're not alone. Even though your friends and neighbors seem to keep getting pregnant mere days after they deliver... Even though your hair dresser reams you out for being cruel to your husband, and all the ladies in the salon chime in, and then you can never go back to get your hair cut ever again... Even though you think all the world except you is having fantastic mind-blowing sex every time their babies take a nap, while and all you and your husband do is go into separate rooms and surf the internet... Even so, it's okay. It's normal!
It's even expected! What to Expect says that most moms aren't up for sex during the post-partum period. Scanning their article, it appears that the factors are stacked against us: Lack of sleep, hormones for breast-feeding, soreness after delivery... wait what? How long are they talking about waiting here? Oh... SIX WEEKS??? Where's the entry for "I haven't had sex in seven months and there are climbing vines growing over the entrance to my secret garden?"
I typed that string into google, but it came back with zero results. So okay, I haven't had sex in eight months. I guess I am totally alone.
What happened is this. First the midwife suggested that my complaint of unbearable pain with intercourse was a symptom of vaginismus, a disease that may or may not be made up, with the only symptom being pain with intercourse. Which actually makes the picture seem more rosy than it is. After all, I had pain with childbirth but the kid still got out into the air okay. Sex, on the other hand, is completely non-starter for us these days. Dan so much as looks at me lustily and I start sobbing in anticipation. But I'm getting ahead of the story, because it turns out that this possibly made up frigidity disease? I don't actually have it.
You see, after going to the gynecologist for an exam, the doctor decided that I don't actually have vaginismus, but a lack of estrogen due to breast-feeding. She proscribed a topical estrogen cream (which didn't work) and also said the situation might improve when the baby started solid foods (it didn't). Then she said to come back in a month if the matter didn't "clear up," but she cancelled that follow-up appointment because her son was sick that day. Really I think she was so jazzed up with her estrogen cream that she called in sick so her husband and her could do it all afternoon in the car. But that's just my opinion.
If I was the kind of person who liked doctors (or at least didn't harbor a pathological fear of them) I would have called to reschedule the appointment, and I even dialed half the number a few times, but I couldn't think of what to say to the receptionist.
"Hi I'd like to make an appointment with Dr. Jones."
"Okay, what's the appointment about."
"Um, er, I haven't had sex in eight months."
I don't know whether the receptionist would gasp and say "egads!" or roll her eyes and say "so?" Maybe depends on the last time she had a little date time with her husband in the car.
For the record, I wasn't always so frigid. See this post about the full-page spread I got in my high school yearbook.** Plus, I know people who are frigid, and they don't make scarves embroidered with porn (NSFW, unless you work for ETSY's underground cousin SKETCHSY). So when the doctor told me in that first appointment that "it could be you just don't want to have sex right now" I was all, whaaaa? Meeee? I'm all about the liking sex. Insert dirty joke here!
But then secretly in my brain I'm all, sex makes owies and yelling things. Let's just lie in bed and read separate issues of the Economist.
So here I am at a standstill. Do I wait until the baby is weaned to see if my normal hormones kick in again? Do I visit a (gasp) therapist to talk about my newfound feelings of complete and absolute terror of intimacy? Do I start the search process for a second wife for our marriage? (Note: must have income and be willing to sleep in the basement.) Or do I just act like it doesn't matter, many people have sexless marriages, look at the Clintons. I don't know folks. I don't know.
*Hi google searchers! This blog is funny! Please stay!
** But that was the ONLY sort of spread I did in High School! Don't get to thinking otherwise.
comments
You crack me up!! You are an amazing writer.
I don't think you have any vaginal 'disease'...I just think after delivering a child mid-evil style, your vagina is communicating with your brain everytime it sees Dan and says "AHH! That's him!! That's the man who caused this life-threatening pain!! RUNNNNN" Just kidding!!!
Dave and I haven't been intimate in 7 months either, and there doesn't seem to be much of a reason, i.e. child. Hang in there...hopefully your desire for intimacy will rekindle in the near future. I admire your strength in not forcing yourself to be intimate even though you don't desire to.
I hope to see you guys soon.
Lots of love <3
Teehee, that's the first I've seen of said scarf. Here's what went through my head on the flickr slideshow:
1) she's a very talented gal
2) Dan looks adorable in that scarf, but that's NOT the right word to use when I see it in detail... what IS the right word??
3) (as my head slowly leaned to one side and my eyes squinted a bit) is that even possi — oh, I see...
In all seriousness, I admire your honesty. And if all else fails and you lose courage in talking to that receptionist, just say: "I'd like to make an appointment with Dr. Jones... Why? Please see my blog. Thank you."