This week’s Sex Q&A is all about the missing boner.
Welcome to the BuzzFeed Sex Q&A where you can ask us your awkward, confusing, gross, embarrassing, or thought-provoking questions, and we'll provide answers from leading sexual health experts. Have a question about sex or sexual health? Send it to sexQs@buzzfeed.com.
This week's question:
I'm a college guy who has only had sex a handful of times, and I've noticed a bit of a reccurring issue. During any foreplay and all that good stuff, I have a nice big erection, but as soon as I'm about to stick it in, the erection disappears like a frightened turtle. Then once the 30 seconds of embarrassing made-up explanations concludes, the erection is back.
My fear of this happening has prevented me from getting with girls who aren't randoms in fear that they'll tell people about it. I've been thinking that maybe I should pop a Viagra or something the next time I think I'm gonna get lucky, just to build my confidence a bit, but that's really my last resort. Is there any advice you guys might be able to give me here?
Thanks,
The Frightened Turtle
Thanks for your question, Frightened Turtle! To help answer it, we spoke with Dr. Darius Paduch, urologist and male sexual medicine specialist at New York Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center, and sex therapist Jenni Skyler, Ph.D., director of The Intimacy Institute for sex and relationship therapy in Boulder, Colorado. Here's what they had to say:
Alice Mongkongllite / BuzzFeed
SO many men — not just those over 40 — deal with some form of erectile dysfunction (ED) at least some of the time.
Try not to freak out; you and your penis are totally normal. There are a ton of different things that can affect your ability to get and maintain an erection, so we've listed a bunch of those below.
Disney / Via disney.tumblr.com
It's most likely psychological. Like your head is getting in the way of your... other head.
"It's a really common thing I see in my office," says Skyler. "It's not like typical erectile dysfunction because their penis works when they masturbate and until they get to penetration. So it's not a biological or physiological issue. That's when men know to come to sex therapy because something is getting in the way psychologically."
Any kind of anxiety, stress, pressure, or uncertainty ("Hm, do I actually want to be sleeping with this person?") can interfere with your erection, says Skyler. And when that happens once, it can create this horrible self-fulfilling prophecy where you're so worried about it happening again that it does happen again... and again, and again.
TeenNick / Via weheartit.com