And not only is everyone leaping back in the sexual saddle, they’re all happily shouting ‘Yee-har’ as they do it: 94 per cent of respondents said they’re happy with their sex life and 54 per cent actually thought it had improved since having kids.
Against this buckaroo background, it’s hard to be the only cowgirl who owns up to a horse allergy. But here goes.
After I’d had my first baby, sex was the absolute last thing on my list for a very, VERY long time.
Three weeks after delivery? I’d only just got to grips with breastfeeding, I’d barely had two hours consecutive sleep since the birth, and my episiotomy scar was angry and weeping – as was I. If Richard Gere had turned up with roses between his teeth and La Traviata on the stereo, I’d have pushed him off the balcony and told him he was an insensitive bastard.
A few weeks after that, around the apparently ‘average’ 58 day mark, I was amazed when the doctor at my routine postnatal check asked me what I was doing about contraception.
Having sex? I could barely see how that was possible with a colicky new born permanently attached to my breast and my nether regions refusing to heal. The only thing I had an appetite for was the good night’s sleep - and I was never going to get that.
Like many new mums, I was traumatised by my birth experience, and totally lost in the alien landscape of motherhood. I felt like one of those film characters who have their identity erased and are given a new passport, and the keys to a new flat in a new city. Alert and excited perhaps, but ultimately, alone and totally lost.
I didn’t recognise myself: emotionally and physically I was forever altered. And while fatherhood undoubtedly brings a big transformation to a man’s life too, I don’t think it’s as seismic. My partner’s body, career, and social life didn’t seem to have taken nearly so much of a battering.
For a time, these differences grated. I can’t be the only mum who felt real resentment as she watched her partner sleeping happily, while she tended to the baby. Or felt a real twinge of jealousy seeing him dressed up smartly and leaving for work, while she’s still in sick spattered PJs.
Sex might have been a great way to reconnect, but I just really didn’t feel like it. It’s possible that breastfeeding may have played a part, as some claim that the hormones suppress libido.
I’m certainly not the only woman to have felt this way – I asked a group of mothers to share their experiences anonymously.
“Since giving birth, I have had absolutely zero sex drive. My husband is still as gorgeous, kind, funny, sensitive and attractive, but I have absolutely no interest whatsoever. It is like a switch has been flicked to 'off'”, one told me.
Another said: “Sex? Not a lot of that going on here. Baby is 17 months and we've managed two attempts. I love my husband and he's still sexy to me, but after a day (and night) of breastfeeding, cuddles and wiping up poo and sick, all I really want to do is sleep with no one touching me.”
Others found that tears or episiotomy scars made sex physically uncomfortable.
“I had a small internal tear that made intercourse impossible at first”, one mum explained. “Sex was uncomfortable and tentative for months. We decided to wait it out and be very careful when attempting to have sex - after 9 months or so we figured out how we could manage it.”
Another explained, how, like me, her episiotomy did not heal correctly making sex painful.
“It hurt, but also brought back unhappy memories of the birth”, she said. “I’ve been offered surgery to correct it but I’ve found that it’s got better by itself over time and with a subsequent baby. The emotional scars have also improved.”
Many felt guilty or suffer in silence. “I thought there was something wrong with me”, was a common refrain. Some say they were able to return to sex after several months or even years, while others have found intimacy in other ways. “I think my partner and I find happiness through our children and intimacy has become irrelevant now. I feel content with cuddles”, said one, adding, “I also don't feel confident and think I am slightly scared.”
For many of us, it seems, post-birth sex is a tender and complicated affair. I spoke to Siobhan Freegard, founder of Channel Mum, who acknowledged this:
“There is no right time to resume the romance; it’s different for every couple and after each birth. If you’ve had a difficult birth, there may well by physical and emotional issues to resolve before you can even think about being intimate again. But there are lots of other ways to show you care and to nurture your relationship. The key is to look after each other - and yourself - until you feel ready again.”
Not being up for sex, struggling with new motherhood, being less than happy with your post-baby body: somehow these subjects have become taboo in a time when we’re meant to be ‘having it all’.
Those of us who took months or even years to feel remotely frisky tend to stay silent, and probably wouldn’t have been able to respond honestly to the Channel Mum survey - given that most of our answers would be, “It’s complicated.”
The good news? All this complication brings a lot more intimacy, which in the long run, often brings better sex. Just be prepared: it might take a lot longer than 58 days to achieve it.
Interesting and useful post for many people! But I think that you shouldn't scare but I read another article https://kovla.com/blog/10-bad-advices-that-will-improve-your-sex-life/ and it's better not to use these ways) But now you know what you should do and more important what you should NOT!)
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