Do You Have Sex Enough?

The question your gyno asks is your sex life normal? But you want to know, what is normal? The simple answer is to have sex ‘regularly’.

The female sexual function index (FSFI) is a questionnaire that assesses sexual function in women. It has been used to validate a clinical diagnosis of female sexual arousal disorder. The questions are meant to assess your sexual feelings over the past 4 weeks. The answers range from always to never and high to low. Here are some sample questions:

1. Over the past 4 weeks, how often did you feel sexual desire or interest?
2. Over the past 4 weeks, how would you rate your level (degree) of sexual desire or interest?
3. Over the past 4 weeks, how often did you feel sexually aroused (“turned on”) during sexual activity or intercourse?
4. Over the past 4 weeks, how would you rate your level of sexual arousal (“turned on”) during sexual activity or intercourse?
5. Over the past 4 weeks, how confident were you about becoming sexually aroused during sexual activity or intercourse?

If you would like to know what your answers to these question might be and how that might explain some aspects of your health, you should schedule an appointment with your gyno.

But, women aren’t the only one with a questionnaire that assesses their sexual function. Men also have a questionnaire called sexual health inventory for men (SHIM). The SHIM assesses a man’s sexual feelings over the past 6 months. Similar to the answers to the questions for the FSFI, the answers to the SHIM questions range from always to never and high to low. Here are some sample questions:

1. How do you rate your confidence that you could keep an erection?
2. When you had erections with sexual stimulations, how often were your erections hard enough for penetration (entering your partner)?
3. During sexual intercourse, how often were you able to maintain your erection after you had penetrated (entered) your partner?
4. During sexual intercourse, how difficult was it to maintain your erection to completion of intercourse?
5. When you attempted sexual intercourse, how often was it satisfactory for you?

Again, if you would like to know what your answers to these question might be and how that might explain some aspects of your health, you should schedule an appointment with your gyno.

Both of these questionnaires can be very helpful to assess your sexual desire. At Women’s Health Practice, we have a check sheet available for our nurses if you would like to have your sexual desire evaluated.