It’s known that sexual satisfaction plays an important role in relationships. Researchers from the Penn State University decided to find out how new parental responsibilities affect couple’s sexual life. It turned out that women’s parental stress affects both parents satisfaction in bed.
Surprisingly, new fathers’ stress does not have the same influence on a couple’s sexual relationship. If a father is stressed, he still enjoys the sex life.
Women’s parental stress
New babies put a lot of strain on relationships. The experts monitored more than 160 pairs during 1 year after their first baby arrival. Half a year after having a baby the parents were questioned about their general state and the stress they were going through. A year later the scholars analyzed the level of satisfaction with sexual intimacy in the couples.
Being a parent is far from easy. First-time mothers usually feel stressed as they take a larger responsibility in raising a newborn child. In addition, mothers feel pressured to fulfill social expectations to be a perfect mother and a wife. As a result, they become exhausted and temporarily forget about themselves. Thus, new moms may be less interested in intimacy.
If women have less maternal stress, they are more interested in intimacy and couple’s sexual satisfaction improves.
Both partners contribute to a relationship. If one of the parents feel stressed, it correspondingly affects the pair’s emotional and physical well-being.
The study findings show that mothers feel more stressed 6 months after having a baby. Both parents are not fully pleased with their sexual relationship for about 12 months after the baby’s arrival.
69% of women state that they are somewhat or very satisfied with their sexual lives, whereas only 55% of men report the same. Women’s parental stress affects both partner’s satisfaction in bed.
However, parents should understand that it will not last forever. Things should begin to settle down into a more settled routine when mothers grow more experienced and confident in their new role.
Having a baby is quite challenging even for the best of couples. Making time for each other even for a few minutes might help new parents to cope with the parental stress and lifestyle adjustments.
Read also:
- Children of Older Mothers Are Healthier, Taller, Better Educated
- Russian Babies Have Better Immunity Than Western Infants
- What Russian Women Mean When They Say, I Want To Create a Family?
- Advanced Father’s Age Increases Birth Defects in Kids
So the moral of the story is: if you want a great sex life, don’t get children. 😉
In my opinion the baby’s birth can’t influence on the level of sexual satisfaction in the couples. It depends on how the spouses are really happy. Of course a woman is under the stress, but her sexual desire isn’t often less than her husband’s one. A man often can not accept her new role.
Having a baby doesn’t mean that parents should forget about their lives. Every person should realize that in family love and attention to each other should be in the first place and of course the couples might find time for each other even if it will be few minutes.
New parents experience stress not only after having a baby, but before its arrival as well. Most women feel more stressed than men, as they have to prepare themselves and so many things for the baby’s birth. They’re constantly thinking about myriad of details which men would never mind. These details don’t let them relax and get satisfaction from life and sexual intimacy. As a result, men often don’t feel satisfied with their sexual lives either.
I am a mother of two children with a small age difference. I couldn’t completely distract from children and pay attention to the husband. So of course women’s parental stress affects both parents satisfaction in bed. I think that both partners have to be patient and try to adjust everything. I had sexual desire, but I was so tired and ehxausted that forgot how to relax.
Practically all parents face some sex problems after the birth of their children and that is quite natural. Many couples are dissatisfied with quantity and quality of the sexual relationship during this period. However that is a short-term issue, I know it from my own experience: an intimate life gradually returns to its former rhythm (approximately in half a year) when all the care routine after the child becomes a usual practice and you stop to worry as you did it earlier, and you can dedicate more time to your partner.