The first few months of a new marriage are supposed to be carefree ones – the ‘honeymoon phase’ some call it – filled with intimacy, passion, togetherness and sex. For some couples, however, those months can, instead, become a nightmare, as they discover that all is not well with their sexual health.
One such young couple are Jeff and Clara, who are both 35 and who had both made the decision not to have sex until their wedding night. This is a tradition observed in many cultures, as it is believed that people should not have sex outside marriage, and therefore should be virgins up until the first time they have sex with their new husband or wife.
Unfortunately, this decision affected the wellness of Clara in a way that the young couple could not have foreseen. When they came to make love for the first time, Clara experienced a very strange reaction.
After the young couple had sex, Clara experienced a variety of unpleasant symptoms, such as burning, redness and swelling of the genital area. This is something that she had not experienced before and led her to believe that her new husband may have passed on an STD to her, which must have made for some rather awkward conversations.
After seeing several gynecologists, Clara was no more enlightened, as tests showed that she did not have an STD. Every time the young couple had sex, however, the same thing happened. Finally, a doctor was able to diagnose Clara with an allergic reaction to the protein in her new husband’s semen.
This is a rare condition, affection between 20 and 40 thousand women in the USA. It is called seminal plasma hypersensitivity and has no ill effect on long term wellbeing or fertility, but can be extremely uncomfortable and make sex problematic.
Fortunately, there is an easy treatment available. Doctors can simply find out which proteins are present in the sperm and then do skin tests on the affected patient to find out which is the allergen. Once identified, they can then start to desensitise the woman to it.