Other patients have difficulty seeing themselves as sexual once they become parents. They cannot imagine their own parents behaving sexually (although intellectually they know they must have done so), and have problems re-establishing sexual activity for pleasure after delivery. The emotional demands a new baby makes on the mother, and the intense bonding that occurs, the physical tiredness, the hormonal changes and even depression, all conspire to exclude the husband and diminish the wife’s desire for closeness with him. Some mothers may even say they do not need birth control, and not use it or refuse intercourse until they want to become pregnant again. For some, motherhood is the only role in which they feel fulfilled.
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