Your Sex Life Has a Check Engine Light. Are You Ignoring It?

If your car started making a horrible noise every time you drove it, chances are you wouldn’t shrug and say, “Eh, probably just getting older.”

Yet when something changes with our sexual health, that is exactly what many of us do.

Pain during sex? Ignore it.

Sudden drop in libido? Must be age.

Trouble getting or maintaining an erection? Maybe it’ll fix itself.

Vaginal dryness? Guess this is life now.

Bleeding, pelvic discomfort, trouble reaching orgasm, changes in sensation? We wait. We Google. We convince ourselves we’re overreacting.

For World Sexual Health Day on September 4th, we’re talking about exactly this on Taboo Talk: Not Safe for Brunch: the sexual health warning signs we ignore and why we need to get better at paying attention to them.

Because sexual health is health.  Watch the Full Episode HERE!

Common Does Not Mean You Have to Live With It

Sexual difficulties aren’t rare. Approximately 40% of women and 30% of men report experiencing at least one sexual problem within a given year.

But something being common doesn’t automatically mean it should be accepted without question.

Changes in sexual function can sometimes be connected to other things happening in the body, including hormonal changes, diabetes, cardiovascular issues, medication side effects, anxiety, depression and other health concerns.

Even pain during sex, while common, isn’t something you should simply assume you have to tolerate.

That distinction between common and normal matters.

Sometimes we normalize symptoms because everyone around us has experienced them.

“My mom had horrible periods.”

“Everyone in my family has bowel problems.”

“Everyone my age loses their sex drive.”

“That’s just menopause.”

Maybe.

But maybe not.

Family history can make something more common. Aging can absolutely change our bodies. Hormones can affect sexual function.

None of that means we should automatically dismiss a new symptom without asking questions.

Stop Assuming Everything Is Aging

This becomes particularly important as we get older.

Bodies change. Hormones change. Menopause can bring vaginal dryness, changes in arousal, libido shifts and other symptoms. Men also experience hormonal changes as they age.

But “I’m getting older” shouldn’t become the answer to every new health concern.

If something changes suddenly, hurts, feels unusual or is affecting your quality of life, it deserves attention.

Some sexual-health warning signs worth discussing with a healthcare professional include pain during sex, persistent vaginal dryness, erectile difficulties, difficulty reaching orgasm, significant changes in libido, unusual bleeding or new pelvic discomfort.

Think about it this way.

If your knee hurt every single time you climbed a staircase, you’d probably consider getting it checked.

Why should pain involving your vagina, penis, pelvis or sex life somehow be less worthy of medical attention?

Your Sexual Health Isn’t Only Physical

There’s another check engine light we often miss entirely.

Your brain.

Sexual health is tied closely to emotional and mental wellbeing. Stress, anxiety, depression, body-image concerns, relationship satisfaction, trauma and plain old exhaustion can all affect intimacy.

Sometimes what looks like a libido problem is actually a stress problem.

Or a communication problem.

Or a resentment problem.

If you’re avoiding intimacy, feeling disconnected from your partner, feeling anxious about sex, experiencing sex as another chore on your to-do list or never feeling comfortable talking about what you actually want, that matters too.

Your body doesn’t exist separately from the rest of your life.

You can’t pile work stress, family responsibilities, relationship tension, a giant mental load and seventeen unfinished tasks into your brain and then necessarily expect your body to instantly scream, “LET’S HAVE SEX!”

And this is also where communication matters.

No, your partner cannot read your mind.

But partners shouldn’t be completely oblivious either.

If someone you love is clearly overwhelmed, asking “What can I do?” can go a lot further than waiting for them to finally explode.

Sex Doesn't Have to Be Spontaneous

Another idea we need to throw out?

That good sex should always happen spontaneously.

Most adults have jobs, families, appointments, responsibilities and a brain with approximately 47 tabs open.

Planning sex does not make it boring.

And even when the sex itself happens spontaneously, arousal may not.

One person might be mentally ready to go in thirty seconds while the other needs time to transition out of work mode, parent mode, stress mode or “I was literally just thinking about tomorrow’s grocery list” mode.

That doesn’t mean anything is wrong.

It means bodies respond differently.

Understanding that difference can remove a lot of unnecessary pressure from both partners.

STI Testing Is Preventative Healthcare

Worldwide, more than one million curable sexually transmitted infections are acquired every day.

And one of the biggest problems with STIs is that many can cause few symptoms or no symptoms at all.

Feeling fine does not necessarily tell you your STI status.

Testing does.

That’s particularly important when you’ve had a new partner, multiple partners, unprotected sex, uncertainty about a partner’s sexual activity or symptoms that need to be investigated.

Testing also doesn’t need to become some dramatic, shame-filled event.

For many people, it can involve a urine sample, blood work, a swab or another straightforward test depending on what is being screened for.

Knowing gives you information.

Information lets you make decisions.

And taking responsibility for your sexual health protects both you and the people you’re intimate with.

Frankly, responsibility is sexy.

Don't Forget Your Pelvic Floor

Pelvic-floor health is another part of sexual health that often gets ignored.

And yes, everyone has one.

Changes involving bladder control, pelvic pressure, pain, sexual function or other pelvic-floor symptoms deserve attention too.

Our bodies also aren’t static.

Something that worked beautifully for you last year might not work the same way today.

Maybe you need a different lubricant.

Maybe your body needs more time to become aroused.

Maybe hormones have shifted.

Maybe your pelvic floor needs attention.

Maybe there’s another medical issue entirely.

The solution isn’t always to keep doing the same thing harder and wondering why it isn’t working.

Pay attention to what changed.

Google Is a Tool. It Isn't Your Doctor.

We’re not going to pretend we’ve never Googled a symptom.

Of course we have.

Research can actually help you understand what questions to ask, determine whether something seems urgent and prepare for a conversation with your healthcare provider.

The problem comes when researching replaces getting actual medical care.

If your internet search ends with you convincing yourself that something is definitely nothing despite your body continuing to tell you otherwise, Google is no longer helping.

Sometimes the answer really is: make the appointment.

And if you’re worried you’re bothering your doctor?

That is literally part of their job.

Bring the list.

Ask the awkward question.

Say the embarrassing thing.

Tell them when something hurts.

Tell them when your libido changed.

Tell them when sex suddenly feels different.

Ask for STI testing.

Ask about pelvic-floor health.

Ask about hormonal changes.

You deserve answers about this part of your body just as much as you deserve answers about your blood pressure, your back pain or that weird mole on your shoulder.

Pay Attention to the Warning Lights

Most of us have ignored something longer than we probably should have.

Sometimes it’s embarrassment.

Sometimes we’re afraid we won’t be taken seriously.

Sometimes we genuinely think the problem will disappear.

And sometimes we just really, really don’t want to make the appointment.

But your sexual health shouldn’t be something you only think about when there’s an emergency.

Preventative sexual healthcare matters.

Testing matters.

Communication matters.

Pain matters.

Changes matter.

And when something feels off, you don’t need to convince yourself that you’re being dramatic before you’re allowed to ask about it.

If your car made a strange noise every time you drove it, eventually you’d get it checked.

Maybe it’s time we started treating our sexual health the same way.

Because unlike the car, you can’t trade this body in for a newer model.