Good advice to new mothers? Have sex even if you don't feel ready

[shagmundfreud]

here

Or is yet another example of how this woman has completely failed to understand that motherhood is about RELATIONSHIPS, and it's not a fucking JOB.

i really don't think Gina Ford was making a judgement about men. She has written a book designed to help mothers (not fathers) and in her apparent opinion it is in the mothers' best interests to resume intimacy sooner rather than later. Not really that controversial.

Hi, we've moved this to In the News.

She hasnt had to go through the emotional & physical changes that parenthood brings for dads & mums!

How in their best interest? To stop their men straying... poppycock

what - the only reason women have sex is to stop men straying? you said it not me. funny, but I think there's something in it for the women to resume physical intimacy with her husband and not just be a mum meeting baby's needs. But as long as you're on the topic of straying ... lack of sex is certainly one reason.

for the woman

I felt soooooooooooo angry when I saw this!!

She has never even had a child (never mind two at once like me) so how the hell can she even offer an opinion on this!! The women has no idea

I personally dont agree with GF, or a lot of her ideas but part (I do stress ONLY part) of this make a bit of sense to me. I know people who have had children and who then dont have sex for a few months, and then they are so tired they dont feel like it, and then becuase its been so so long get stressed at the thought of doing it again...... A friend of mine went 11 months without having sex, after birth, not becuase physically she was unable to but because she left it so long after the birth and then it becuase this big stress, that she was scared to do.....

From that point of view, it isnt good for the mother to be stressed about not having sex and nor is it good for the father and I can see that nearly a year of not having a physical relationship with your partner would put pressure on the relationship.

so from that angle I can see that encouraging intimacy, and time out to talk about other elements of life etc could be beneficial. But I dont think it shoudl be so time focused. Soem people are happy to have sex after 3 weeks and others need to wait for several months......

But grinning and bearing it isn't doing it for the woman is it. If it was there would be no need to grin and bear it. I'm lost as to what the reason would be to have sex against your natural instincts.
And any man who is not getting sex after his partner has had a baby and isn't up for it early enough so strays isn't worth going to the pound to collect.

Loie - there is a big difference between feeling pressure to have sex before the time medical consent suggests though and a year later

what's this medical consent thing? All of my handouts said I could start back up as soon as I wanted, after both natural and section births. And didn't the story say she was saying 4-6 weeks anyway?

My mistake though I'm not sure how my bad spelling of advice turned in consent on my phone.

You know what this whole thread is fucking pointless, you don't need 5 pages of comments.

It's simply a case of mind your own fucking business, stop telling others how to live their lives.

See easy and simple, that is all that needs to be said on the matter.

I find the attitude that trying to maintain a relationship with your partner which also involves intimacy and even sex is "handmaidenism" pretty sad.

Should it really come down to one partner calling all the shots and the other having to put up with it, without even be allowed to voice their feelings? I've been in such a relationship once - it completely shot my self confidence to bits.

Mind, I don't advocate "grinning and bearing it" and I doubt the average man who is rejected for a long time post children wants their partner to just grin and bear it - they want enjoyment and pleasure for both. The suggestion that they want to just put their cock in no matter how she feels is pretty insulting.

Better than grinning and bearing it is talking about how both sides feel about the situation. What both sides miss and how to get it back.

Breastfeeding IME is not a detriment to getting away for an hour even when the baby is quite little. One of the best things my inlaws have done for us when we became parents was sending my husband and me to the village pub for an hour when the baby was just about 5 weeks old.

I do find the idea that men feel rejected because they have to go without sex for a bit quite odd really and if I was a man I'd be insulted to think people thought I was so shallow.

YuleingFanjo

Does it really make you shallow when you miss intimacy, feel simply unattractive, don't dare to even initiate a hug or kiss anymore (even if it's only the hug or kiss you're after, not anything else), because you'd be told "sorry, I'm not in the mood" every time you do? Is it really shallow to want to have a physical relationship with your partner, who you still fancy the pants off, bags under the eyes and all?

I'm all for understanding why someone is not up for sex sometimes, and even for longer stretches. But what's wrong with understanding how it makes the other person feel?

Stewie, that is ridiculous and offensive and not what she has said at all.

it makes you shallow if you feel rejected. Rejected is such a stupid thing to feel over a few weeks without penetrative sex. I wasn't talking about kisses and hugs.

Not a surprising article, coming from a paper that hates women.