AUNT TRUPHENA: My boyfriend cannot get it up

Q: I have been dating a lovely man but our relationship is suffering because of one problem: he cannot get it up. He is a romantic guy, and he fancies me and always turns me on, but something is wrong on his end. Sometimes he gets hard but when we try for sex he loses his erection. On the few occasions he has got hard, he doesn’t orgasm. Sometimes I think am not attractive enough for him, or maybe I am incapable of turning him on the way he does me. I fear talking to him about this because I love him so much and I don’t want to hurt him with such a discussion. What should I do to have proper sex with him? Help.

A: Your relationship may be suffering a sex problem, but what is unfortunate about this situation is that you are reacting to your partner’s erection problems with self-blame. This is evident when you say that maybe you are not attractive enough to turn him on. While these may seem understandable reasons, please know they are do not help the situation, and only add to an already anxiety-ridden situation. Additionally, this is making your communication difficult – because you don’t want to ask him if you are the problem. Accepting that his lack of erection is a problem and then figuring out how to face it head on is the first step to saving your relationship. Perhaps your man is suffering some sort of anxiety problem that is causing his lack of erection. Maybe he fancies you and wants to turn you on but he is also worried he might not get, or keep, his erection, particularly if he really likes you and if this has been a problem in past relationships. These worries mean will affect his performance. This is a cause which can fully be solved if you just communicate with each other. Let him know that you still love him and would like to handle the erection problem together as a team. At this point, you both may need to redefine sex, so you take away the pressure of your orgasm or his erections as being the goal of all sexual experiences. If this continues and he is distressed by it then he may want to speak to a doctor who can rule out other health issues contributing to his sexual problem and/or refer him to a psychosexual therapist. Wishing you success.