Erectile Dysfunction
ED stands for Erectile Dysfunction, but a better phrase would be Erection Difficulty, because most men with this complaint do have some functioning, it's just that it's not reliable. Unless there has been abuse or psychological trauma, ED is normally something which affects men over 35 or 40.
There are two types of ED:
- Physical impotence - often brought on by old age, a lifetime of bad diet, excessive alcohol intake, smoking or bad circulation.
- Psychogenic impotence - this is nowadays known as performance anxiety. Sometimes there is complete failure to get it up, or else erection is lost half way through when troubling thoughts arise. In the case of performance anxiety proper, it is often the thought, "Will I lose my erection?" which has an adverse effect. This has an interesting correlation with premature ejaculation because some men experience a fear of cumming too soon while trying to last long enough for their woman to cum. Although not always the case, it is often this fear that causes tension levels to rise enough to trigger ejaculation.
Physical impotence.
Before the advent of off-the-shelf erectile drugs, impotence was
largely treated as if it were mental in origin, not physical. With the
advent of these new drugs, there has been a reversal in attitude: "Just
take this pill and the problem will go away". Well it does, because
even
if the problem is psychological, the new drugs make erection more
likely - the merest flicker of lust will produce an erection. However,
the two best-sellers are not libido enhancers; they work on blood
circulation and the smooth muscle in the penis.
There are natural ways of boosting erectile potency which fall into two camps:
- Exercises
- Keep Fit, Kegel contractions and Jelqing.
It is beyond the scope of this article to go into 'Keep Fit'; there are plenty of good sources on the subject. The basic principle is that the penis is attached to the rest of the body and that if you are unfit, your body won't be functioning optimally. Kegel contractions boost muscle tone in the pelvic floor, as well as improve blood supply. Again, there are many good sources of information on the Internet for these exercises. Jelqing is said to be an old Arabic technique, developed not so much for health, as for increasing the length and girth of the male member. If done correctly, it leads to firmer and more sustained erections provided it is not done more than 2 or 3 times per week. A good place for information on this technique is www.thundersplace.com which is a free website dedicated to natural Penis Enlargement, or PE as it is often called. Please be warned, over-zealous use of the exercises on that site can lead to injury. Light jelqing and Kegels are all that is required to improve Erection Quality (or EQ as it's known in jargon). You should read as much as you can if you intend to have a go, especially Thunder's injury forum. - Dietary measures - Healthy eating. I'm sure you already know what that means: plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables, whole grains and cereals. Not too much fatty dairy food or red meat. I would also especially recommend plenty of fresh oily fish, or fish oil supplements - (doctor's orders permitting). Cutting out nicotine is a good idea, as nicotine reduces blood circulation. Alcohol is not your penis's best friend either, as it can it be difficult to get an erection while inebriated. In addition, long-term use of alcohol is believed to have a debilitating effect on erectile capability, not least because of its effect on the liver.
Psychogenic Impotence.
As I mentioned above, before the discoveries that led to the
availability of erectile drugs, a lot of effort was spent helping
men to overcome the negative thought-patterns that hamper erection and
good sexual enjoyment. This effort has faded into the shadows somewhat
in recent years
as many people now believe that the solution to life's problems comes
from a bottle of pills. Indeed,
some men report that a short dalliance with the blue pills boosts their
confidence enough so that they never need them again. Or maybe
they keep them on hand in the drugs cabinet "just in case". If these
pills can work without even taking them, that sounds like progress to
me.
However, there are other ways of overcoming psychogenic impotence without drugs: the so-called 'talking' therapies. For some men, therapy can have a dramatic effect. A good therapist can pinpoint the source of the anxiety and help the sufferer either to release his pent-up fear or to rearrange his life to reduce the stress.
Telling the difference between mentally and physically caused ED.
Most
men under 40 who don't have physical ED get nocturnal erections. These
are often referred to as night wood or morning wood. While there are
perfectly functioning men who never observe getting night wood, if you
do get nocturnal erections, it means that you are having absolutely no
trouble getting an erection - therefore the problem is "in your head",
not in your pants. Again, if you can get hard during masturbation, then
the problem is clearly not physical.
A Third Way.
Quite by accident I discovered another way of almost guaranteeing an
erection on demand: Semen Retention. Here
is my story.
When I was younger, stress at work did not have much effect on my ability to perform during sex. Maybe I needed a minute longer to get hard, but that was about all. As I got older, I suppose the balance between sex hormones and stress levels got tipped the other way - a development no man wants to accept. Then during a difficult period in business I started to have intermittent ED problems. Eventually it reached the point where I was having problems more than 50% of the time. At this stage, I was given a contract deadline so tight that I had to work from early morning until late at night, not getting to bed until my wife had gone to sleep. Whereas normally we would be having sex 3 or 4 times a week, we were not even seeing each other enough to have any sex at all, and neither was I masturbating. This went on every day for 3 weeks straight - even weekends were ruined. I got the occasional, "We haven't done it for a while" from my wife, so one night I decided I had better deliver. Well, my mind was spinning so much with my business project that it took some time for me to get an erection - maybe ten minutes. After that, the familiar thoughts came back - "Will I lose my erection before I even get it in?, or "Will it last during sex?". But a strange thing happened. My body now seemed to have a mind of its own. After 3 weeks without sex, I now had a real hunger, and once I got it up I just mentally laughed at the intrusive thoughts. They melted away and had no power over me. I told my mind it could think what it liked, I was going to have sex and that was that.
A while after that, I realised that it was not so much the three weeks' lack of sex that had resulted in me getting so ultra-horny, it was the lack of ejaculations. Shortly after that, I experimented with cumming only every other time we had sex, and after that once a week, then once a fortnight. Finally I settled on one ejaculation a month which works great for me. Sex has been completely transformed now that ejaculation is no longer the goal. Every thrust in my new super-horny state feels like luxury. You can read more here. My wife's interest also increased - she particularly likes the fact that she more or less gets to choose when we finish - there is no pressure on her to carry on until I cum, which bizarrely has led to us often taking longer over sex and doing it most days. Women!
© MT
