Impotence? Physical Or Mental Problem? At 23

For got to add, during intercourse, usually I can maintain an erection firm enough for sex and for her to orgasm, but the erection is no where as hard as from watching porn, or self masterbation,

and the other 20% of the time, it just goes competely limp during sex only.

Ok... Where do I start. Lets consider me a layman because that is what I am! I am an emt, and work as an emt so I do have limited medical knowledge... But its aimed at emergency medicine, not sexual health.

Ok... Got that out of the way. I also have similar problems. However I am 37 years old now. I have been married for over 10 years. When I was dating my wife I had this problem and it hasn't gotten any better. I am a bit overweight and a bit out of shape. I would say that I can have sex with my wife and ejaculate about 1/3 of the time for "normal" sex.

So what I can state is my observations being that I have dealt with this for quite a while.

1. I suspect that you are out of shape like me. I think this directly impacts our problem. What happens with me is that "normal" sex requires alot more physical exersion than masterbation. I alot of times will get winded during normal sex and that completely distracts and thus forces me to become limp without ejaculation. If I give myself 5 or 10 minutes to recover then I can start again... But not usualy with any better results. See if this sounds like what might be happening to you also.

2. You mentioned that you were not as arroused by your girl friend and that plays an impact. Well... That sounds like labido and not necessarily a physical disfunction. I would consider labido a mental state more than anything. Again, this also is true with me. My wife is not the young woman that she was 12 years ago. The attractiveness is slipping away. I also find it hard to get the same arrousal factor from my 35 year old wife after 2 kids and a few extra pounds as I do from the tight body 18 year old blondes on a porno. I suspect this is partially just nature and human attraction at work. I really don't have a solution to this except that within 24 hours of masterbation a mans natural labido will be quite a bit less than lets say 48 or 72 hours later. Maybe curtailing the masterbation a bit... And maybe more planned timing of your masterbation so that it is not withing 1 or 2 days of being with your girl friend might help a bit. By the way... Masterbation is completely natural and normal. With very little exception... All guys masterbate. Don't be ashamed of it... Just try to not let it interfere with your normal sex lilfe.

The above 2 things kind of sum up my problems and my observations. I hope anything that I have said above helps a little. I would like to add one more thing...

Lavitra, cialis and viagra are potential medications to help with our problem. I have tried viagra with success. But let me help with one very common misconception about these drugs. These are for "erectile disfunction" and not a labido enhancer like the fabeled "spanish fly" or oysters or green m&ms. These drugs allow for more blood flow to the penis and typicaly drop your blood pressure. They do not do anything for labido. If I take a viagra and then wait for about 1 hour and then have sex... So long as I was arroused enough to get a hard on then the viagra helped me maintain the errection until ejaculation. The errection was also noticibly harder that both my wife and I noticed until ejaculation.

Don't know if any of this helps, but please let me know if I was on track with your problem, or if I am experiencing something completely different.

Thanks for the input keithmon, well I think in some aspects it similar, but

keithmon, do you experince mourning erections/ones during sleep?


I can stay very hard for as long as I want with self masterbation and porn combanation, just not in sex most of the time.

I mean I get hard from kissing, and touching, and stays for a bit till actual sex, that or putting on a condom just kills it 100%.


Reason my experince is odd compared to most people's is, I can get very hard for as long as a masterbate with porn, numerous times a day with out problems,

and in actual sex I cant most of the time, it cant be mental for the simple reason, I dont feel nervous or anything during it cause I know I can perform enough to get her off, and such

the other aspect is, I dont have erections in the mourning ever!!! Nor at night time when im asleep (im assueming) cause years ago I would wake up at night and have erections and mourning thats gone!!!


So physcially something may be wrong when I think about not having mourning erections and nocturnal ones!

But then again I can stay hard and maintain it with porn and self masterbation, just cant in sex.

Its werid I know, my girlfriend assures me im fine and dont have ed, but my penis isnt working the same as it was when I was in my late teens I noticed,

again need to add that, I can get off myself, but during sex I always need to get myself off too, yet an other thing.



So really, I think that the cronic masterbation over the years and dependancy of porn, is really affecting me!! Not is the out of shape part and smoking helping me, I think these 4 things are whats causing my problems,

To answer your question. No, I do not get night time or morning errections. I haven't since at least my early 20's if not my teens. I know that part of this is just about getting older. Our testosterone levels drop quite a bit after the sexually formative teenage years. I even had my doctor run a "free testosterone" check on my blood. It came back normal for my age.

Sounds to me like you may be a good candidate for viagra, cialis or lavitra. Talk to your doctor and see what he/she thinks. Of course, I imagine that you have a male doctor... Just because I would have alot more trouble going to a female with these problems than a male.

Good luck to you.

Thanks for the reponse,

i refuse to belive I have ed for the simple fact, that during masterbation I can be erect 100% during duration of the period.

I do require some help it seems, cause

1) no mourning erections (which is odd)
2) no night time erections (which is even odder)

these usually present physical signs of problems for ed so ive read, 100's of sites and even a few books.

Yet why am I able to have erections with masterbation+porn so easyly and maintain it 100% (as many times a day or as long as I need)

yet in actual sex I cant,


but viagara and other medication I refuse to take, just knowing the fact I have to take meds to even have sex for the rest of my life would really depress me, =/


im still thinking of trying getting in better shape/quit smoking/ and quit masterbation and porn all together, we;ll see how that goes,

if that doesnt work, well I give up.

My doctor when I asked him, said at my age I shouldnt be having problems, I dont have anything like highblood pressure to cause ed or any other conditions from the tests, and also told me quitting smoking and getting some cardo would work, and to stop masterbation and porn,


im gona try some herbal items, and vitimains, we;ll see how that goes,


thanks for your input,

Sorry for the late reply. I'm just flipping through these.

If you get erections during masturbation, you can get erections. That's just a fact.

I'd start keeping a log about the morning erections. I'd bet you're currently noticing a lack of them, but you need hard data. As for the night ones, dude, you're asleep when they happen. Don't make any assumptions unless you wear something that monitors them (yeah, they make these things).

It sounds like you've developed a form of performance anxiety, or at least "performance expectation". When you're trying to have sex, are you thinking about the problem? I would bet you are. That's not going to help.

I'd cut back on the jerking off and the porn. Only to bring up the urge a bit. Personally, I do at least once a day, and I'm 31. I've already done it twice today, and I'll probably have another round later. Don't worry about that too much, but for now, give that a shot.

I had a very similar situation as you. first real relationship at about 23. Erections, except when it was time for sex. A little overweight, smoker, etc. Even with all those bad marks, as soon as I got past the performance anxiety, I could smoke a pack of cigarettes, be really hung over, haven't hit the gym is 6 months, and still go 3 rounds in a night. It was all in my head.

If you're thinking about it a lot, the harder you try, the worse its going to be. Here's what I did:

1) The first girl and I broke up. Didn't date for a year.

2) New girl, same problem. However, I had learned a bunch (the internet rules). Sat down and explained that I'm just worried about it and we need to relax and try to make it work.

3) After a few sessions, did just barely get it to happen. Next time, a lot better. After that, she got annoyed because she has a significantly lower sex drive than I did.

Yo noted that you aren't that excited around her. You should consider that deep down you are probably anticipating problems, and that will kill excitement. This has happened to me. If the girl digs you, I'd suggest you told her exactly what I said. Its just a temporary situation, mostly subconscious. After you get some "success", things will be better. Instead of trying to have sex, do other stuff. Oral, etc. Have fun. Try your best to keep it from being a "big deal". Some girls are relaxed and can accept that guys aren't perfect sex machines. Some girls internalize it. "Oh, he must not be attracted to me". Etc. Since she's joking about it, she's probably the former.

Joking about it, by the way, might hurt, but I'd try that. Make a joke about it yourself, especially when you're both fooling around. Its a tough thing while its going on, but after you sort it out, you'll look back and almost laugh about it. Almost.

Me a few weeks ago:

http://ehealthfor um.com/health/topic83231.html


Seriously I was feeling so bad back then, I just laugh about it now. It's just so surreal. I just wish I could tell you about some secret formula, some magic potion I took to fix things. But there were no such things. Heck I didn't take Viagra, Cialis or any of that. So I guess it was psychological, but I think it was so deeply buried in my uncouncious that I still have no clue about what/how/when things got better.

My girlfriend didn't help that's for sure. She was putting lots of pressure. Not because she wanted to but she was suffering from it too as it's the 1st time she was confronted to this. I mean she frickin cried a couple time. Imagine how this made me feel back then. She could've frickin castrated me that it wouldn't have made a difference. Every single time we went to bed I was obsessed with the idea of not getting an erection which of course resulted the same way every single time.

But you know something? It got better gradually. I have NO IDEA how. But it did. I stopped porn completely, I stopped masturbating. Only did it 2 times while thinking about HER before I finally managed to have intercourse with her. I just wish I could give you some better advice but it's just like I said, it got better on its own... The situation didn't help, I was on my own, really close to losing my girlfriend and bam things changed. We actually (not exagerating) did it 8 times on between Thursday night and Friday noon as she had to fly to Australia for a week. That's the same guy who couldn't get it up at all a couple weeks before...

All I can say is don't give up... I know it's tough but you gotta try to think positively or else you'll just end up depressed. And I DO know what I am talking about... Best of luck to you!

Hi, i have never mentioned this to anyone before (and ive just had to re-write this after taking so long first time my username had logged out and i lost everything when i tried to post) except my doctor who although sympathetic did not actually help me resolve the situation. I did not masterbate at all when i was younger (maybe once or twice) mainly due to family living circumstances, but for reasons i do not understand now when i was younger i just didnt want to do it. When i had my first girlfriend after a few months we tried to take things further and in all honesty i didnt know what i was doing for a start, i did not masterbate at the time either so as you can imagine it was a disaster when we tried to do it. Although we had done foreplay a few times previous, despite being hard on all occasions i was i never ejaculated or even came close to. A number of times she gave me oral sex one time i can remember for over half an hour probably longer it seemed like forever, i was rock hard the whole time but just didnt cum. When we tried to do it i went soft every time, i couldnt have asked for a better girlfriend she was very understanding. We tried and failed to have sex over 10 times, every time i made an excuse (condoms, nervous, moment not special enough, worried someone might come home/ in room) she was very understanding. I just couldnt understand it, i really am not exaggerating but she was an absolute stunner everyone was jealouse of me. For a period she even said she didnt want sex anyway just me, i mean it i really fell for that girl. We never rushed things always slow, foreplay but when it came down to it i just went soft. After about another 5 months she ended it, was with another guy soon after (wouldnt be suprised if she had cheated, but i wouldnt blame her) I also respect the fact that (to my knowledge) she told nobody about the problems. What made it very difficult is that our families are close friends (parents, brothers, sisters) same circle of friends. It really does make it more difficult thinking someone might know. When she ended things it affected me big time (big weight game, left college, very depressed) and for a period of about 2 years i did not go on a date at all (drunken kisses aside) I was just fearful of what would happen. Soon after this relationship ended i really focused on learning to masterbate more, and after a few intial problems with the help of lubrication i have overcame this. Since then I have even turned down some fantastic girls (and im not talking looks, i just mean really great girls) not wanting to be found out. The dates that i did go on were usually girls who id met it a club who i (or anybody i know) did not know, as i was more comfortable with this, but even then i made excuses for us not to take things further. (turning up late, not returning calls, and generally being a bit boring on dates) What makes it more difficult is that any girls that i seem to date want to have sex pretty much straight away (after one or two dates) and i am just scared of this. At the same time i didnt want to get to know them further incase i started to like them, as if i had problems then it would affect me bigtime. In the last year i decided to try the internet (although not ideal, i was more comfortable with this) and met 3 people off this. They all were alot more forward than anyone else ive met, but after speak to them on email and msn for a bit beforehand it was a bit of a weird situation) The first was in my car and after a bit of foreplay we went to penetrate and i went soft (using the excuse i was uncomfortable in my car) second one came to my house who just gave me oral sex although i was rock hard for the whole time i didnt cum (despite being able to cum on my own now) and eventually told her i 'forgot' my sister was coming home early. Third was 'better' i was looking after a friends house for the weekend and after a few hours of foreplay i managed to penetrate (we are talking 20 seconds no joke) and then i went soft, i then made the excuse i didnt want to take advantage (we were both drunk) I am only 24 i dont smoke rarely drink, testosterone levels were tested all ok, i am also very fit (i compete to a fairly high level in soccer - before i was with the girlfriend and restarted 2 years after, it is now 5 years since then) I dont know if there is an issue with my erection, i can only seem to masterbate lying down. If i am standing up i just cant sustain it, also my erection only seems to go 90 degrees no higher, is this a muscle problem that can be fixed? as i think this would limit the amount of positions i could possibly have sex with anyway. I cant even get an erection after a bit of alcohol, which rules out getting drunk on a date to calm my nerves and also a social aspect of dating less fun. When i was really depressed soon after the split with the girl and after i had started to masterbate regularly, i even picked up a prostitute after i went to club but as i was drunk i couldnt even get it up. Also i have never been able to masterbate twice in a row, is this normal? it just goes soft straight away, whereas i hear alot of people saying they can have sex a number of times. I am rarely rock hard when i masterbate but usually have no problems ejaculating. I really am sorry for writing an essay but i am struggling to cope with this and cant see myself resolving it. I have even started to stop going to parties, or social occasions as i dont see the point, all of my friends have boyfriends and girlfriends so i feel the odd one out. At the same time i just dont want to get close to anyone as i would not be able to deal with another setback, so i am starting to think i am better off on my own without any potential problems. I really would do anything to resolve this but i cant see it getting any better, i honestly doubt whether i can overcome this, any help really would be appreciated