Recovering Your Sexuality After Cancer Treatment

By Rob Lester

A diagnosis of cancer and it subsequent treatment can have devastating psychological and physical effects on a patient's sexuality. The subject of sex after cancer is often overlooked in the process of trying to stop the cancer. Fortunately, there are things you as a cancer patient or a patient's significant other can do to recover sexual intimacy after cancer treatment.

Cancer treatment can cause many changes in a person's body, some of which have a direct impact on sex. Enjoying a healthy and pleasurable sex life is an achievable goal. There are a number of steps you can take to speed the process.

First, it is important to understand and accept what you have been through, and to be able to talk with your partner about it. The National Cancer Institute has published some excellent information and advice for cancer survivors in a booklet called, "Facing Forward: Life After Cancer Treatment." The booklet includes a section on body changes and intimacy including suggestions about how to talk with your partner.

If you want to take things gradually, one way to get back into a relaxed and positive frame of mind is to ask your partner to try out some of the wonderful scented and flavored massage oils that are available. You can start with simple relaxing massages and later agree to let them become more and more erotic. A key step is to get physical with your partner even if you delay traditional sex for a while.

Sometimes the physical side-effects of chemotherapy cause problems that get in the way of easily resuming a good sex life. For example, a very common result of chemotherapy for breast cancer is vaginal dryness that persists long after the treatment has ended. This can lead to pain during sex or reduce the pleasure that one normally expects to experience. A simple, but effective solution to this problem, is to keep personal lubricants handy to use before and during sex.

It is important to use water-based lubricants or silicon-based lubricants if condoms are also being used, since oil-based lubricants can dissolve latex and lead to condom failure. Water- or silicon-based are generally the most popular types of lubricants used to enhance the experience of, sex whether someone has had cancer or not, and they even come in a variety of fragrances and flavors. Oil-based lubricants can be useful as well. If condoms are unnecessary, a combination of an oil-based lubricant followed by a water-based variety can be particular effective for some couples.

Try a variety of approaches and products to see which works best. This experimentation will be helpful in figuring out what gives you the most pleasure, and the experiments themselves might be more fun than you expect!

There is an astonishing variety of personal lubricants, massage oils, condoms, and other sexual health products available for purchase online. You can shop with complete privacy and security from your own home and get discrete delivery to your front door, usually at prices far below retail. Visit the following link for more information about what is available: Sex After Cancer. Intimacy After Cancer is a good starting point to discover information sources and products you can access on your own, in the privacy of your own home, that may be helpful as you explore both yourself and your relationships with other people in your new after-cancer life.