Keeping Your Marriage Alive and Strong After Kids
As you get older, get married, and have children, things start to change. You bear new responsibilities, juggling work life with parent life, leaving you with less time for things like romance.
It isn’t easy to keep up with your marriage, and all adult responsibilities, especially with the added pressures that the pandemic has introduced, such as working from home and homeschooling. This has added unavoidable stress in many households which, unfortunately, can lead to a negative impact on your health, wellbeing as well as your marriage.
One common men’s health issue that the rise in stress in households can cause is Erectile Dysfunction (ED). While ED can be tricky to navigate, it is important to keep your marriage strong.
How can stress cause ED?
ED is commonly associated with age, when in fact, there are many other causes that affect millions of people per year, including stress and anxiety. With the increased stress and uncertainty the pandemic has caused within families, it is possible that ED is becoming more common.
ED typically occurs due to a disruption in your nervous system, blood vessels, muscles, hormones, or emotions, often triggered by psychological, environmental, emotional or biological factors.
Couples are inevitably going to be feeling extra stress and anxiety with the pandemic, and ED is a common and normal response.
How can ED impact your marriage?
In the unfortunate event that ED occurs within your marriage, it can spark feelings of a loss of intimacy and distance within families. ED can affect both partners within a marriage, so it is important to address the issue with compassion and work towards keeping your marriage alive. Once the problem has been identified, it doesn’t have to remain a problem, as there are many options to treat ED in marriage.
Ways to keep the marriage alive
While ED in marriage is not easy for everyone involved, there are other ways you can keep your marriage alive until an effective treatment has been sought. It is important to be kind and supportive to your partner with ED, communicate your feelings, and move forward with other ways to be intimate. ED is not a failure nor a setback and can be viewed as an opportunity to try something new. For example:
- Take the whole family out for a day of fun
- Go on a date
- Make time to laugh with each other every day
- Find new and exciting activities you can try together
- Check out these 5 ways to spice up your marriage
Possible treatments for ED
There are different treatments available for ED in marriage. It is good practice to speak to your GP or pharmacist for the best way to move forward as the cause may affect which treatment is more suitable for you. Before any treatment is prescribed, the relevant practitioner will obtain information about your health, life, and relationships as well as carry out health checks to ensure there is no serious, underlying condition. You can then move forward with treatment and bring life back into your marriage. Below you will find some of the possible treatment options.
Medication
There are many different safe, trusted, and effective medications that are on the market and available for ED, for example, Sildenafil. Medication can be prescribed to help treat ED by relaxing the muscles in the blood vessels’ walls and increasing blood flow.
Therapy
If you and your family are under a lot of stress and pressure, therapy is a good option to go for, on its own or in addition to another treatment. As ED can be caused by psychological and environmental issues, a therapist can help you to address the issues, work through the stress and anxiety you are experiencing and equip you with ways to manage it day-to-day. There are many different options when it comes to therapy depending on the root cause of your ED in marriage. These include general counseling, sexual therapy, and psychodynamic therapy.
Lifestyle changes
Many environmental and lifestyle factors could be hindering your romance. It is recommended that you:
- Keep stress to a minimum/find ways to manage stress effectively
- Reduce alcohol consumption
- Quit smoking
- Eat a nutritious diet
- Exercise regularly
Alternatively, there are many modern-day therapies that people are choosing to go through, that you and your partner can do together including meditation, yoga, and acupuncture. This takes you on a journey to bring more calm and relaxation into your life, while still keeping the marriage alive and doing different activities together.
The best treatment to choose will depend on what has caused the ED in marriage. It is important you speak with your GP who can help you identify the best treatment and manage your overall health accordingly.