Has anyone seen my sex drive?

[chem-lover.livejournal.com]

I've been in a relationship for almost 2 years, and for the past year or so, my sex drive has almost disappeared. I was on the Nuvaring for a while and everything was fine, but it started making me nauseous and I was spotting for weeks so my doctor switched me to a low-dose pill. I went through a few of those, didn't really like any of them, and then got a Paragard almost a year ago (and love it!). So I've been off hormones for almost a year. I would have expected my hormones to have gone back to normal by now.

I hardly ever want sex anymore, and when I do it's mostly around the time that I'm ovulating (which makes sense). I'm not any more stressed now than I have been in the past, so I'm not sure what's going on. I'm going to ask my doctor when I have my exam next month. What exactly do they look for? Any other advice? Thanks

Comments

[isee23s.livejournal.com]

A couple of quick thoughts...

My understanding is that hormonal birth control can shut off your sex drive because it basically puts your ovaries to sleep. Ovaries are not only your source of estrogen & such, but also of testosterone, which is theorized to play a role in the female sex drive. I imagine that once your ovaries "wake up," as yours would have after you stopped the hormones, testosterone resumes. However, I have no idea how long it takes., hopefully someone else does.

The other thing is that brain-chemicals can affect your sex drive. Loss of sex drive is often seen in depressed people, because all the feel-good chemicals are out of whack. Are you experiencing any other symptoms of depression, like undue fatigue, loss of interest in other things, change in appetite, etc.? Also, you don't mention it so I doubt it's an issue, but anti-depressants and other non-hormonal medications can kill your sex drive as well.

I don't want to pry into your relationship, but for some people it is normal to lose their sex drive when a partnership has gone on for quite some time or, on the opposite end, when it isn't working at all.

Sorry I couldn't be of more help, those are just the thoughts that came to mind. Maybe other VP folks will have other ideas.

[gatehorse.livejournal.com]

HBC can also increase sex drive, so I wonder if the lack of HBC could be the problem.

[archangelbeth]

I'd check all your hormones -- TSH, adrenal, estrogen, etc. -- and vitamins, such as D, maybe B, etc. Good luck!