Health Organization for Pudendal Education

http://goalistics.com/2013/03/coping-chronic-pain-sex/

Thought this Goalistics (on line pain management) blog was particularly appropriate.

Thanks for sharing this article, Helen.. Definitely hits home with me.

I never know when having sex might set off a pain cycle for me. Sometimes it takes very little to have a long, drawn-out bout of pain, and other times we have an almost-normal sex life with no consequences..

Hubby's definitely leery of hurting me. That'd be the last thing he'd want.

It can cause such difficulties can't it. . . . .the potential for causing pain is massively compromising for partners.

Thanks for sharing the link. Great to see the issue addressed, however the "solution" of communication seems to be oversimplified. My late husband and I were able to openly discuss, and even went through professional counseling. However I think that sex (or lack of) was one of the biggest barriers in our relationship.

I also find it interesting the social pressure that is associated with a healthy sex life equating to a healthy relationship. I even had a doctor who focused his measure of my quality of life based on pain with intercourse. He was suggesting compromising my lifestyle as a whole to fix one aspect of it (sex), and implied how grateful I should be to him if he could give that back to me.

I won't go in to the long and drawn out details of my marriage, but suffice it to say that dealing with the pain almost destroyed both of us. After being widowed almost three years now, I'm testing the dating waters once again. Needless to say, even thnking about a physical relationship again is very stressful. The blog illustrates how difficult it is to discuss with a long-term partner/spouse. Multiply that a few times over to figure out when it's appropriate to bring up the topic with somebody new. I've discussed the topic with my doctor, and a counselor, but it's way different to put into practice when faced with a scenario in real life!