Reducing alcohol intake will help improve your sex life

* My husband and I just did "Dry January", and after the second week the sex was amazing.

Now that we’re drinking again (he drinks way more than me), the sex has become lacklustre, even on the nights when he hasn’t drunk a drop. I feel that I was spoilt and I want to get that back.

>> Long-term, heavy drinking has a pretty terrible effect on male sexual function. It depresses libido, decreases arousal and diminishes the intensity of orgasm. It can also cause damage to the peripheral nerves which transmit signals between the body, the spinal cord and the brain. In men, this can affect the neurons that connect the penis to the brain and cause erectile dysfunction.

Some men who suffer from premature ejaculation find that alcohol helps delay orgasm, but for men without the condition, it can inhibit orgasm completely.

The majority of people drink alcohol but many, myself included, would admit to having a paradoxical relationship with the stuff. We know that in excess it will, at best, age us and make us fat, at worst, it will kill us. Yet alcohol is so deeply embedded in our social culture that no occasion is complete without it. We love alcohol because, in moderation, it helps us to feel less inhibited and more convivial and can make us much more sexually receptive, particularly at the start of a new relationship.

Disinhibition is a pharmacological transformation that occurs as a result of cognitive impairment, but there is a strong psychological element to our habitual relationship with alcohol. This means that mental links are formed between the context (getting home from work, say) and your response to that context (a glass of wine). It can become a symbol for relaxation, and our expectation of disinhibition can strengthen our “need” for a drink.

If your husband feels tired, anxious or depressed at the end of the day, his first drink might improve his mood, but after that, the effect is increasingly counter-productive. The “pleasure zone” for alcohol is a blood alcohol concentration of 0.030%–0.059%, which equates to just one alcoholic drink for a man weighing 12st 12lb (82kg). Try to catch him at that precise moment — it is the ideal time for sex to sizzle, but as soon as his blood alcohol concentration is over 0.06% (three units of alcohol), the motivation to drink outweighs the motivation to have sex.

As your husband has managed to get through 30 days without drinking, he is obviously capable of cutting back and it would be hugely beneficial for his health and your sex life if he could continue to do that.

Results from a research project carried out by journalists at the New Scientist magazine, and Professor Rajiv Jalan at the Institute for Liver and Digestive Health at University College London Medical School, show that abstaining from alcohol for 30 days has real health benefits.

After a month of abstinence, ten participants had reduced the amount of fat in their livers by an average of 15% and their cholesterol levels and blood sugar levels also improved.

If he needs support, there is lots available (drinkaware.ie) on the internet, and Georgia Foster sells a hypnotherapy programme (howtodrinkless.com) that promises to help people to reduce their alcohol intake by 50% in 21 days.

Your husband should aim for three consecutive alcohol-free days a week and, as it takes 66 days for a habit to form, you should be swinging from the chandeliers by August.

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