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Infant feeding

Get advice and support with infant feeding from other users here.

Original poster

Breastfeeding affecting sex drive?

11 replies

Aishling · 04/02/2007 01:12

Hi there
baby girl is now 6 months old and I have started weaning her off the boobs. Did anyone find that breastfeeding completely destroyed any kind of sex drive? I'm not talking about the tiredness or the sore boobs (although they don't help dammit!). I have absolutely no sex drive and view it as another chore. Feel bad for hubby who has been a star but I just can't work up any enthusiasm at all. One of my friends breastfed til her son was 10 months and told me she thought the b/feeding hormones had the same affect on her.

OP posts:
chipmonkey · 04/02/2007 02:18

Definitely agree! I think it's to stop you going and having another one when babs is still small.

pinkdolly · 04/02/2007 08:07

dont think i ever had much sex drive in the first place (lol) surprised i got 3 kids really.
Seriously, i agree i'm still so tired with dd3 6 months that there is no energy left for sex.

pigsinmud · 04/02/2007 10:13

Same here ... although along the lines of pinkdolly as was not great in the beginning! Dd2 is 7 months and only just stopped breastfeeding - have no sex drive at all. Dh is taking it personally as usual. Not just the bf for me - I have 4 children and as pinkdolly said just too darn exhausted to bother.

determination · 04/02/2007 18:52

Chip monkey definately got it right i think ;) I also found that whilst BFing i was so dry that it would actually hurt badly regardless of how much foreplay there was. Then i invested in some of this and it made it so much more pleasurable. Does it effect all BFing mums in the same way?.. i wonder..

yellowrose · 04/02/2007 19:49

It would be difficult to separate the lack of energy (due to lack of sleep) from lack of a drive !

There must be a biological reason though, evolution and all that, to allow natural spacing of children.

DollyPopsOut · 04/02/2007 19:50

Absolutely! I bf exclusively til DD was about 7months and DH and I managed it a grand total of 5 times. I used a product called replens (designed for post menopausal women) as my fanny was dry as a bone however much I was up for it and that did help. However, the tirednes and physicality of feeding for the first few months meant that it was 3 months before we even tried. Once I cut bakc on the feeding, the libido came back. By the time DD was 9 months old (still having 2 BFs a day) I was pretty much back to normal.

HTH.

DizzyBint · 04/02/2007 19:54

yes very much so. i believe it is to act as a natural contraception sort of a thing. i mean, while you are bfing you probably don't want to be pregnant again, or to have a newborn. so it's like your body saying you aren't ready for another baby yet, until you've taken care of this one....although lots of women get pregnant when bfing, and often their baby weans themself off bf in time for the new baby arriving. clever!

Loopymumsy · 04/02/2007 19:58

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

burstingbug · 04/02/2007 19:58

Never had a problem with dryness . Currently bf ds2 who's 5.5 mths and only just started to get my sex drive back in the past few weeks. We can never find the right time for sex atm, either too tired at night or feeding, in the morning ds1 (almost 2) comes into our room and wakes us up.

Judy1234 · 04/02/2007 20:52

I always felt sex when pregnant and then not at all whilst breastfeeding at least for the first six months although we did do it. It wasn't just that I was tired feeding twins. It was a definite lack of sex drive and I felt it was linked to hormones. Feeding and the sort of build up to milk let down, release of oxytocin and relaxation when that happens for me always seemed very similar to the process of arousal and then orgasming although not the same and it was if that took the place of the other. It didn't matter- we go on with it and then very soon after it all came back fine.

I think by the time I had got to babies 4 and 5 I could distinguish between the exhaustion of tiredness and lack of sex drive. But I do know a lot of mothers who don't have this by the way so perhaps it just depends on the mother.

TeeCee · 04/02/2007 21:04

Yes I found my sex drive diminish while I was breastfeeding. Didn't notice it with my first DD but very much so with my 2nd. I have quite a high sex drive and it went off the scale when I was pregnant. It was therefore very much missed when it disappeared once dd2 was here. It came back though and as I'm pregnant again looks like it might be getting ready to go through the roof again!

Don't beat yourself up about it, expalin to your DH that this happens sometimes and it'll come back and just reassure him that it's normal and that you love him so you can give yourself some space from him for a bit. Don't worry

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