Here's some news that may not surprise you: women who have chronic headaches also tend to be less satisfied with their sex lives. Maybe because it's hard to feel sexy when your head is killing you.
According to LiveScience, researchers at the University of Pavia surveyed 100 women who were being treated for chronic headaches or migraines. Ninety-one of the women reported more problems with their sex lives than the average non-headachey lady, and twenty of them were bothered by their lack of sex drive. The study authors had a number of possible explanations for this. Not surprisingly, chronic pain can affect desire and arousal. Headache medication can also cause sex problems. And headaches can make people depressed, which is bad for their sex drive, as is the medication that treats that. So a pain in the head is a multi-pronged libido-killer.
The study authors caution that their subjects were women with a long history of severe headaches — just having a little pain every once in a while might not be enough to ruin your sex life. That said, they say their study is evidence that doctors should be screening for sex problems when they treat women for headaches. The flip side is also true — when researchers and doctors look at sexual dysfunction, they should be considering the effects of other health problems too.
Not Tonight, Dear: Women's Sex Problems Linked to Headaches [LiveScience]
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