The Brutal Truth About This Mom's First Time Having Sex After Pregnancy

Chances are, if you've ever heard anyone talk about having a newborn baby, then you've heard jokes about how that newborn completely ruined their sex life.

Babies are like little vampires that drain energy and make it impossible for anyone to muster the strength or desire to have sex, right? Well, not really. Plenty of people would like to have sex soon after giving birth.

One U.K. mom was among this group, but her advice for anyone itching to get back in the sack is to just be patient.

“There comes a time a few weeks after you’ve given birth, you’re in a room with all of your new mommy friends, and some brave soul asks the question, ‘Has anyone had sex yet?’” Riona O’Connor, who runs a Facebook blog called The Unnatural Woman, said in a recent video to her page. “A hush falls over the mommy crowd and then everyone starts talking at once because you know what? No one has!”

She goes on to explain that she was one of few women in the group to start having sex again soon after giving birth — and it did not go well.

“We discovered that downstairs is as dry as the Sahara desert," she said in the video. "Dry. Dry. Dry. Dry.”

She thinks of the dryness as Mother Nature's way of telling her to close up shop for a while. Her vagina is off-limits.

"If our vaginas didn't close up shop things could fall out," she said. "Honestly my innards became my outards for a while. Shoving anything else up in there for me that's just not a good idea."

While using plenty of lube could take care of the dryness issue O’Connor experienced, it's true that your vagina may not be ready to go right after having a baby. Most Ob-Gyns recommend no penetrative sex for the first six weeks after having a baby, but Maureen Whelihan, MD, an Ob-Gyn at the Center for Sexual Health & Education, told Glamour that some people can safely have sex earlier.

"It is important to go slow and take your time," she told Glamour. "It won't feel the same at first, but, with time, things typically go back to normal, and sex soon feels the same."

If sex feels the farthest from your mind while dealing with a brand-new newborn, then that's just as well. Let things heal, and your groove will come back soon enough.

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