The first days postpartum are a blur of breastmilk and bulky pads, middle-of-the-night wake-ups and a roller coaster of emotions. As the weeks tick on, some sense of normal slowly returns, and soon you find yourself at your six-week postpartum checkup — where your doctor suddenly announces you are "cleared for sex."
Huh? Sex? That long-forgotten concept that you used to look forward to with your partner is now the last thing on your mind, as your only drive at this point is still the need to sleep, eat a hot meal and maybe do the massive stack of dishes at some point in the near future (or not).
As a mom of soon-to-be five kids under 8, I've been through this cycle multiple times, and I'm always shocked by the concept that some people feel ready to have sex so quickly after childbirth. No shame on them, but I'm not alone: 30 percent of moms wait seven to 12 weeks after giving birth to have penetrative sex, and 16 percent wait 13 weeks or more, according to a new survey conducted by Everyday Health Group, What to Expect's parent company.[1]
In my experience, it's not that postpartum moms don't want sex, it's that they often want intimacy and connection more. They want awareness and appreciation of what their body has been through. And finally, as I've figured out with my partner, it can take quite a bit more time than we think — almost a year each time, in our case — to get back to some semblance of "normal" or better yet, a new and more intimate understanding of each other.
Here's what I've learned about postpartum sex along the way.
Foreplay starts with getting up to change 3 a.m. diapers
As teens and young adults, foreplay was the hot stuff of romance movies with lots of heavy breathing, hours of lead-up time and more. But what nobody told us as we headed into marriage and babies is that it evolves, and foreplay starts way outside the bedroom for perinatal moms.
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You can't be in the mood, or even remotely interested in your partner, if you're carrying the mental, emotional and physical load of parenting alone (or unequally) as you recover from birth yourself. How much a father contributes to infant care is the main factor in a couple perceiving overall fairness in a relationship, a 2018 study found.[2]
So, real foreplay is the stuff of 3 a.m. diaper changes, making your partner breakfast or getting the other kids out of the house so your partner can sneak in a nap. These acts, though just part of parenting and sharing the work, made me feel seen and led me to want to connect further with my partner.
Find the best time for you
Though it's far from the mystery and magic of the "before" times, strategically choosing the best times to be intimate is a must in perinatal life. Trying after 11 p.m. never worked well for me postpartum — we both felt exhausted, and though it might have been our first minute alone together all day, it was also usually the start of a long, sleepless night.
So, getting creative with times to be together — that aren't last on the agenda for the day — helped a bit, but it's definitely easier said than done.
You can be intimate without having sex
In the postpartum period, "intimacy is more important than sex" is not just a platitude. It's essential to have an emotional connection before a sexual one.
For me, for close to a year after giving birth, I craved affection that wasn't sexual — flirty attention like hand-holding, hugging, cuddling and spending quality time together. I needed to regain understanding of my body beyond a birthing, breastfeeding version of myself.
It might take a while to feel like yourselves again, and that's okay
Whether you have a C-section or vaginal birth, tearing or no tearing, an episiotomy or not, your body has been through it. Postpartum recovery involves accepting that the healing process can take time.
Even after I was cleared for sex, even after pelvic floor therapy in some cases, postpartum sex just didn't feel the same. It could feel somewhat edgy, awkward and even a bit painful for months.
Having been through this multiple times, I now see this as normal. Nothing is "wrong" — you're just healing. After all, if I had knee surgery, my knee might feel different for months. I might need to ease up on certain activities and give it time to recover. Why is the vagina any different?
Then there's the emotional healing, which is harder to do when you are sleep-deprived. For me, I felt seriously annoyed with my husband in general as my hormones leveled out, and then regained that connection slowly again.
But by being patient with where we were at the moment and trusting it would improve, it did every time. Now we're stronger now because of it.
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