Growing up, I often sat in between my mother’s legs on weekends while she weaved my hair into tight cornrows for school. During those moments, with other women from the neighborhood present, conversations flowed from erring children to the best markets to buy food items for the home.
It was on days like these that I overheard conversations between my mother and the other women debating how soon to resume bedroom activities after childbirth. One of the women shared out of frustration that it had been a year after giving birth and she had no desire for sexual intimacy. At the time I didn’t fully comprehend, but years later I learned she was experiencing a condition most women postpartum go through – postpartum libido loss.
After childbirth, women often experience a significant drop in sex drive, which doesn’t return to normal immediately. Factors like hormonal shifts, exhaustion, physical changes, and even postpartum depression all play a role.