I (23, F) have been in a relationship with my boyfriend (26, M) for around six months. He’s one of the sweetest, kindest and most genuine people I’ve ever met. The problem is this - he has been suffering from erectile dysfunction (ED) the whole time I’ve been with him.
He's tried to find the underlying cause of it but there's nothing wrong medically speaking. A possible reason could be anxiety and porn use. Hard as it was I've tried to be patient about the issue. It's especially hard because I'm young and I would never have imagined that I'd be in a relationship like this, especially since I’m quite a sexual person. There are ofc other alternatives (dildos, fingering etc.) but I don't feel like they could ever serve as a replacement in the long-run.
Medications help sometimes but because they cause him mild headaches, he's reluctant to take them, and asking him to, sometimes leads to fighting. He thinks that he’s not enough without the medications, even though I reassure him that he is. he thinks that he shouldn’t be ‘forced’ to take drugs. I don’t think that I’m forcing him – his doctor prescribed them and he went to the doctor without any insistence or suggestions but seeing as it’s impossible to have a sex life without them, I feel like they’re very important.
Another issue is this; although he's temporarily stopped watching porn, he doesn't feel I should ever get upset if he uses it. I don't want to be controlling and I would like to try to keep an open mind. But in this particular case, I feel that it's offensive for him to keep using porn, firstly because it's causing the ED, (which seeing as we are in a monogamous relationship, impacts me as well), and secondly, because it feels that he prefers pornstars to me (seeing that he manages to get erections then). I was a very confident person before this, and although I've tried my best to approach it logically, it's undeniably harmed my self-esteem. I would somewhat understand if we had different sex drives but it's not the case, and I'd be very open to trying different things we could do together instead of porn. But he still thought that he should have the freedom to use porn.
Even if I manage to be ok with his porn use, I feel that he’s not trying to mitigate the effects of the ED, like through the medications and instead acts very defensive when I try to bring it up, even though I feel I’ve approached the subject well. I’m worried that the ED will never go away or that even if it does, our sex life can never be a pleasurable one since he has so many insecurities and refuses to try to tackle them.
Has anyone ever been in a similar situation? What would you do?
Tl; dr – My boyfriend has ED and refuses to stop watching porn (even though it may be porn induced) and take the meds he was prescribed. The relationship is otherwise great. What should I do?
Submitted March 02, 2021 at 07:41AM by Fancy-Zucchini5863 https://ift.tt/3kGovkW
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