I (30m) have been dating my girlfriend (34F) for a little over a year. I thought we had a pretty healthy sex life up until about ~5 months ago when she started to not feel well. We had just gotten back from a week long trip to the Caribbean(no idea if that is relevant to this at all, but figured id include it. I think we only had sex once during that trip because she was not on birth control and it was a fertile time of the month). As far as I know this is around when her problems started. At first I was not aware she was not feeling well. She was stressed, quiet and closed herself off. I thought there were issues with our relationship and we were about to break up. But once we talked she opened up to me about issues she has been having and how things weren’t getting better. She has always said, even now, she feels good some days but also has bad days.
She has seen a number of doctors though all this and I believe has been mis-diagnosed at least once.
– We are both hygienically clean. Shower daily, nails trimmed/cleaned, wash hands regularly… etc.
– I believe she knows she is sensitive in that area and was already using fragrant free soap. I have also switched to using a fragrant and dye free soap.
– She is using the bathroom right after sex.
– She drinks plenty of water, has stopped drinking coffee, is taking supplements, cranberries etc…
– We havnt had sex with condoms in a while and when we use lube (not often) its the brand her doctor suggested, Astro Glide water based.
– I believe at the beginning of all this she had Ureaplasma and initially thought it was a UTI or something else and was treated for something else not Ureaplasma.
– I am still not really sure where Ureaplasma came from as it wasn’t an issue for the first ~6 months of our relationship and I have stayed faithful to the relationship and she was the only person I had slept with since my last relationship ended 8 months prior. I don’t believe she has been unfaithful. But regardless the Ureaplasma colony formed and she wasn’t correctly or fully treated for Ureaplasma the first time.
– I am not sure exactly all her treatments but I had no symptoms but was told I should do a 14 day cycle of Doxy, which I did. This was like 6-8 weeks ago. We abstained from having sex during those 14 days.
– We already were not having a lot of sex, we were trying to give her time to get treatment, recover and to feel better.
– Almost 2 months after I finished my doxy she believes the Ureaplasma is gone. But our sex life hasn’t gotten back to what it once was and she still isn’t feeling 100%. It feels like we are stuck in this cycle of no sex so she can heal, she feels better or thinks she feels better, we have sex and she feels bad again.
– We had sex a few weeks ago and she got a UTI, believe she got it tested and confirmed with one of her doctors. We took a ~week long break from sex while she recovered. After the next time we had sex she said she wasn’t feeling well again and thought she might have another UTI. We are currently on another break from having sex.
I am posting here today to see what other couples have done in these types of situations?
I feel for her, the last thing I want is for her to have to keep dealing with this especially for months at a time. I want to do whatever I can to support her and help her get better. Even if that means I need to make some adjustments to my life.
While I want to support her I can not deny this has caused some issues in our relationship and it has me wondering about our future together and if we are compatible. She has not been good at communicating what is going on with me and that has impacted our relationship in a negative way. We have had to have several serious conversations that I had to initiate. She isn’t used to sharing with someone else or showing sadness/frustration around someone else. So when these things have happened she has gotten very cold and shut down. She even took a phone call from her doctor to confirm test results on our anniversary and after the phone call her mood did a 180 and she got in a really sour mood that ruined our entire night. This was a night I just wanted to spend with her, she had already told me earlier in the week we could not have sex. So there was no expectation for intimacy and she still shut down, said maybe were not sexually compatible and didn’t even hug me as I left her place that night. I cant help but feeling like I am what is hurting her. Like its a sign we are not compatible? Is it her body trying to tell her to reject me that we are not compatible? Is she going to be afraid to be intimate in the future?
I just feel a little lost, a little frustrated and a little hurt. I like this girl and am willing to stick it out if there is a light at the end of the tunnel. But I am just struggling to see that light right now and as more time goes on I feel like I am responsible and I also feel like I am not getting to be as intimate with my partner as I want to.
TL;DR: GF has not been feeling well for months and seems to feel worse after sex, this has put weight on our relationship and I wanted to see how other couples have dealt with this.