Friday, December 12, 2008

Fertility and Your Sex Life

What sex life?
For couples who are trying to conceive, sex can become a mechanical process. One of the challenges couples face is the loss of spontaneity and romance when it comes to having sex while they are trying to have a baby. Fertility treatment can also change a couple's sex life.


When trying to have a baby, sex becomes a task necessary for conception. This "conception sex" can involve scheduled sex and specific sexual positions that are believed to improve the chances of getting pregnant. For many couples, these factors can make sex feel like a chore.

A couple who has been trying to conceive for some time may forget that sex can be intimate and that there is a difference between sex for pleasure and sex for conception. Couples need to recognize that the ability to conceive does not define their sexuality.

Feelings of intimacy and privacy can be lost once a couple undergoes fertility treatment. These issues often come up when discussing personal details of their sex life with their doctor, or when undergoing tests such as a semen analysis (to measure sperm counts) or the post-coital test (to assess the interaction between the sperm and the cervical mucus). Keeping a sense of humour can go a long way to help ease the frustrations and challenges you may be going through.

A couple's sex life doesn't have to suffer and become unromantic when they are trying to conceive. Communicate with your partner about your sexual desires and needs. Continue having spontaneous sex during the rest of the month, as if you weren't trying to have sex to conceive a baby. Couples who communicate and stay physically and emotionally connected can continue to have a healthy sex life.

Your doctor or fertility specialist can answer any concerns you may have about fertility and your sex life. Though it may be uncomfortable to talk to your fertility specialist about it, they are trained experts who can help with some of the challenges that couples may face while going through fertility treatment.

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