My Partner Has Erectile Dysfunction: Here’s What To Do

If you’ve got a partner that’s suffering with erectile dysfunction, it can be really difficult to know what to do.

How do you talk to them about it without them feeling embarrassed? How do you keep your sex going and keep having a great sex life even if your partner has erectile dysfunction? Well, that’s what we’re going to talk about in today’s article.

Hey, I’m Phoenix Blake, sex coach and educator, and I personally suffered with erectile dysfunction, so I know how difficult it can be, and I help men regain their erections, but I also help them to have amazing sex lives, even if they’re suffering with erectile dysfunction.

1. Talk To Them About It

Many guys are so ashamed of their erectile dysfunction, and for many of us, our manhood is locked up and intertwined with our ability to get an erection.

For many men, they suffer with erectile dysfunction and they don’t tell anyone about it. They don’t talk to their partner about it. They don’t go to a doctor about it.

They just suffer in silence, and many men will avoid having sex altogether because of this erectile dysfunction.

If you think that that’s happening with your partner, or even if you’ve just started noticing their erectile dysfunction, it’s important to actually bring this out in the open and have a conversation with them.

Now, when you’re approaching this conversation, I advise that you do it outside of the bedroom, not when you’re in a sexual interaction and they’re unable to get it up, because they’re likely going to be very vulnerable in these moments, but just say to them outside of the bedroom:

“Hey babe, I’ve noticed that the last few times we’ve connected, you’ve struggled to get an erection. I’d really like to talk to you more about that, talk to you about erectile dysfunction, what we can do, and also how we can still connect sexually even if you’re unable to get it up, because I don’t need you to get a hard penis every single time I want to connect with you.”

2. Don’t Shame Or Blame Your Partner

You might have some feelings of, “Oh my god, they’re not attracted to me, they’re not into me,” but chances are that’s not the cause of the erectile dysfunction.

It’s likely health-related or cardiovascular-related, or it could be something mental such as stress or anxiety or performance anxiety, where they want to perform for you but they’re unable to.

And often as men, if we’ve had an issue with erectile dysfunction once, we’re going into sexual situations with our partners stressing about the fact that we might not get it up again.

And this stress causes us to lose our erections because we’re so worried, and it activates our sympathetic nervous system and releases adrenaline into our body, which constricts our blood vessels and makes it hard for us to get erections.

More often than not, it’s no one’s fault that the erectile dysfunction is happening.

While you may have those feelings, don’t go into the conversation blaming your partner, but go into the conversation with a lot of grace, trying to understand what they’re going through and trying to work through a solution together, letting them know that you still really want to connect with them sexually and that they don’t actually have to get a hard penis every time you’re in bed together in order for the two of you to have a lot of fun.

Reassure them that you want to still connect sexually and also use this as an opportunity to begin to redefine sex for the both of you.

3. Redefine Sex For The Both Of You

So often, we think of sex as penis goes in vagina, but sex can be so much more than that, so much more diverse, so much more vibrant, and there’s so many different ways that we can give pleasure to our partners and that we can receive pleasure ourselves that we can call sex and can still be an experience that we have together.

I’ve got a full video on soft penis play and some ideas on how you can do that if you’re interested, but what we want to do is get away from the idea that sex requires a hard penis or that sex has to be penetration, and we want to open things up and begin to explore different ways that we can give each other pleasure.

When you’re talking to your partner, talk to them about different ways that you might be able to please them even if they’re unable to get an erection, and talk about different ways that they might be able to please you that you want to explore as well.

4. Encourage Lifestyle Improvements And Treatment

Often, pills like Viagra and Cialis do work really well to overcome erectile dysfunction, but in many cases, erectile dysfunction is the canary in the coal mine that’s indicating some other underlying health issue, and one of the biggest things that has an impact on erectile function is actually your cardiovascular health.

Things like how much you exercise, your diet, as well as supplements that you take all play a major role in how strong your erections are going to be.

There’s actually so many different things you can do to get harder erections, and if you want to learn what they are, then I’ve got a free ED toolkit that I’ve created that shares the best tips for getting and maintaining stronger erections.

Simply go to passionately.com/ed to get access to that free toolkit. That will also sign you up for my free newsletter where you can get regular tips from me about how to improve your sex life, and many of those tips I don’t share on YouTube.

5. Workshop Ways To Maintain Erections

Maybe in the past, the wind would blow and he would get an erection, but maybe he needs a little bit more now in order to get it up.

I remember I was connecting with a new partner of mine and I noticed that I was constantly losing my erections whenever I would go to put the condom on.

So I talked to my partner about this and I let them know that I was having this issue, and we talked about different ways that could help me to maintain my erection through the process of putting the condom on.

We came up with a variety of ideas, from her touching me while I’m unwrapping the condom, because often women will stop touching you while you’re getting the condom out, to even her putting the condom on with her mouth, and overall it just became this really sexy experience that we got to do together, and because we talked about it as well, it relieved some of my anxiety, which allowed me to get and maintain erections easier.

Talk to your partner about the things that they like that could turn them on or help them to get erect.

Maybe blowjobs are a really great way to do it, because often as guys that takes the pressure off us and we just get to enjoy how things feel and how they look. Maybe he wants you to wear some lingerie and he really enjoys that, or maybe he has certain things that really arouse him.

Maybe he’s an ass man and he absolutely loves licking ass and that is his thing to help him get hard, or maybe you just want to take the pressure off him getting an erection and you can play the game that you’re not allowed to get hard.

You touch him and it’s his goal to actually not get hard, so he needs to relax and try not to get an erection, and you’re there just touching him, enjoying his soft penis, but at the same time maybe he’ll get an erection through this because the pressure isn’t there to get an erection and there’s no rush.

Often if you talk about it, you can find things that really work for him that help him to get an erection.

6. Explore Penis Pumps And Cock Rings

You can also explore things like penis pumps, which you can use to actually induce an erection, or you could explore things like cock rings, which go around the outside of the penis.

If he’s able to get an erection but he’s losing it quite quickly, that can help to keep the blood in the penis and stop it from draining out.

Penis pumps and cock rings are something that you can make sexy if you put effort into it. It doesn’t need to be something that he’s embarrassed about and he’s got to quickly go away to use his pump to get his penis erect.

No, if he’s having issues you can use the pump and you can do it together. It can be really sexy to watch him get an erection from it and enjoy that.

The same with cock rings. He doesn’t have to go to the side to put it on. You could maybe put it on for him or just allow him to put it on but watch him, and let it be a sexy experience and don’t make it an embarrassing experience.

7. Still Play With His Soft Penis

If he’s taking a long time to get it up or if he’s unable to get it up, then still play with his soft penis.

One of the biggest mistakes that women have made with me is that if I’m not getting it up straight away, they’ll just stop touching me completely. Not only do they stop touching my penis, but they just literally stop touching me and my body at all.

However, it still feels really great to be touched even if you’re not getting erect.

Touching your partner’s body, playing with their soft penis can still feel really good for them, can still be a way for you to connect sexually even if an erection never comes, and you can go ahead and check out that video on soft penis play if you want to learn some more ideas about how to do that.

8. Have Sex With A Semi-Hard Or Soft Penis

If he’s unable to get it up at all, you can actually smoosh his penis inside you and hold it inside you and then do some grinding sex.

Rather than the sex focusing on the in-out motion, what you can do is get him inside you, whether he’s soft or semi-hard, and then focus on this kind of up-down grinding.

What you do is rub and grind your clitoris up against his pubic bone.

You don’t want to be going in and out, because if you do that his penis is going to bend and fold on the way back in and you won’t be able to get it back in.

With a semi-hard penis, he should still be able to penetrate you if he supports his penis with his hand. You can also support his penis with your hand as well.

What you want to do is put your hand around the base of the penis and then circle your fingers around the top and put your hand right against your vulva, and then as he slides in, your hand moves back and supports less and less because it’s inside you, and then as he comes out, the hand supports the penis.

Don’t come all the way out and then go back in.

He can do this with his hand or you can actually use your hand as well to support his penis as it’s going inside you. But again, if his penis is semi-hard, focus less on the in-out motion and focus more on the grinding motion.

9. Try Different Positions

Some guys are more likely to maintain erections in certain positions.

For example, if you’re lying down and gravity is working against you, it can be harder to keep an erection. However, if he’s on top then sometimes that can be easier to keep the erection, or sometimes if he’s sitting up and there’s some pressure against his perineum, that can help to maintain the erection as well.

Explore different positions to help him get and maintain erections.

10. Explore Each Other’s Bodies

Because we so often get fixated on penis-vagina penetration, often we’re not there touching our partner’s bodies in new and unique ways.

And so the fact that you can’t have penetrative sex can be a good thing and can allow you to explore touching each other in new and unique ways.

Maybe you want to explore Tantra or erotic massage or light touch on each other. Maybe he really likes his nipples played with or his stomach touched or his perineum or his anus played with.

You can explore prostate play, and you can actually give your partner orgasms through massaging their prostate even if they’re unable to get an erection.

There’s lots of different ways that you can explore each other’s bodies. You can explore his and what feels good for him, but he can explore your body as well and what feels good for you.

And that’s a really big tip as well, because yes, obviously you want to please your partner, but often as men we feel very masculine. We feel very good about ourselves if we’re able to please our partner and if we’re able to give you orgasms and give you pleasure.

When I’m able to give my partner multiple orgasms, I feel like I can take on the fucking world, and whatever issues that I have at work or financial or whatever’s going on doesn’t matter because I was able to please my partner.

Take some time to explore what feels good for you as well. I’ve got loads of free content on my YouTube channel about how to give pleasure to vulvas, how to do fingering techniques and oral sex techniques.

Go ahead and check them out or get your partner to watch them and to learn, or you can head over to my website at passionately.com and I’ve got more in-depth courses over there about things like fingering, squirting and oral sex.

You can go through those courses together and try the different techniques together and find out which techniques that you like and allow your partner to give you some incredible orgasms.

11. Completely Reinvent Your Sex Life

Try new things with your partner, open up and discuss different fantasies that the two of you may have, different kinks that you might be into or things that you want to explore.

This could be anything from things like going swinging and connecting with other people or doing impact play or rope play and restraints, or there may be some more vanilla things that you just want to try.

But this can be a great opportunity to open up to your partner and each of you share what your desires are. Just make sure that you don’t shame your partner for his desires and don’t allow him to shame you for your desires either.

All of our desires are incredibly beautiful. We might not want to do everything with each other or be into everything that the other person is into. But if we open up, then we can find different things that, yes, we are both into these things, so we can try them together.

Remember, sex is about connection, it’s not about hard penises.

Just because your partner suffers with erectile dysfunction doesn’t mean your sex has to stop, doesn’t mean it’s the end of your sex life. In fact, it can be the beginning.

For more tips, go ahead and read this article on how you can use erectile dysfunction as a way to completely reinvent your sex life, or go ahead and get access to the free ED toolkit to learn the different ways that men can improve their erections and get harder erections than they’ve had in years.