Have you ever experienced morning wood? Yes? That’s good.
See, morning wood (aka the erection you experience upon waking) is a rite of passage and is a good indicator of the overall health of a man.
It’s also a great indicator of health in young men especially, as its lack thereof may indicate an underlying problem.
Morning wood, known medically as nocturnal penile tumescence (NPT), are the normal erections that occur during the night (while asleep), and commonly prior to waking in the mornings – usually about 3 to 5 times over the course of sleep.
Why does this happen? Experts haven’t established a concrete argument, but what is known is that it correlates to having optimal testosterone levels in the body.
But before you start to panic because you don’t regularly see your morning wood, just know that it’s believed to be caused psychologically just as much as physiologically.
So, if you’re going through a period of worry or high stress, it’s absolutely normal to not see it for a few days.
Before you can attempt to implement a fix, you need to determine the probable cause, either on your own or with the help of a male sexual health specialist
Do not go to any random GP, or you will get messed up.
Many times, you are able to figure out some of the causes of the problem because they are typically clear cut and very distinct.
Below, you will find ways to fix your issue, corresponding to the specific cause.
If you are serious about enhancing morning wood and increasing testosterone production, then I highly recommend you check out this Free Morning Wood Ebook which can help you achieve this.
You cannot change your age. Sure, we might have Botox now, but you know your true age don’t you?
Given that your health is pristine, the effect age has on your morning wood may be less dramatic, or take a longer time to manifest.
The best way to determine this? Keep a log. Sure, it is tedious, but it can help a great deal in determining if age is a likely culprit.
You will need to keep records over many years to make this effective, but you should clearly see a decreased frequency of morning wood, simply by visual inspection.
Decreased frequency of morning wood can be observed starting at age 30 but it’s not really a cause for concern. You may have simply missed observing it, even though it still occurs through the night.
All you need to do is maintain a healthy lifestyle, and the effect of aging and lack of morning wood will not have an adverse effect on sexual function.
Sleep science is much more complicated than the average person understands, but to simplify it, if you aren’t getting enough, morning wood may start looking like a rare occurrence, partially due to decreased testosterone levels.
NPT erections occur with greater frequency during the second half of sleep (4+ hours into sleep), since it corresponds to the REM phase of sleep, which occurs more into the second half of sleep (getting 8 hours is ideal).
So, if you sleep 5 hours per night, you may experience one erection per night, and none in the morning .
If this sleeping pattern keeps up for days on end, it will have an adverse effect on health and sexuality, affecting erections throughout the day as well.
Do you absolute best to get as close to 8 hours per night as you can, and if it is all but impossible, try to sneak in a little bit during the day.
Don’t need an entire hour for lunch? Sleep for 30 minutes. It will make your sleep at night more restorative.
Also, don’t be afraid to recruit the use of natural sleep aids if you are tossing and turning at night when you should be getting sleep.
This is arguably one of the top reasons why men experience reduced morning wood erection frequency, as good blood flow is pivotal to attaining an erection.
Conditions that affect vascular health, such as high blood pressure, fatty atherosclerotic plaques on blood vessel walls, or diabetes are highly correlated with erection difficulties, including NPT.
The best way to fix these? Improve your lifestyle.
Positive lifestyle changes can help offset all of these contributors, and in conjunction with a supplement that improves blood flow, such as a nitric oxide booster, your blood flow can be improved and optimized.
We know, medication may be a part of your life that cannot be gotten rid of, but that’s not to say that substitutions can’t be made.
There are many common medications that can cause loss of morning wood, as a result of disrupting normal testosterone synthesis, impairing blood flow, or altering neurotransmitter and other hormone levels.
Among these are the well-known statins, a group of cholesterol-lowering medications that are used by millions of men over the world.
Sadly, unknown to the typical layman, they have no knowledge of the mechanism of this action.
Statins work to impair biosynthesis of cholesterol, effectively putting the brakes on testosterone synthesis (as it requires cholesterol for its synthesis).
Other common medications may include those used to treat an enlarged prostate (such as Finasteride), or common blood pressure medications.
To fix this? The first thing you need to do is let your physician know that you suspect your lack of NPT may be attributed to one of these meds.
At this point, a substitution should be made to a drug that does not have that side effect spectrum, or at a minimum a reduced tendency.
Following that, you should be making active attempts to change your lifestyle, since many of these disorders can be managed by changing the way you live.
Low testosterone is arguably the number one reason why your morning wood may have disappeared.
Men with lower levels of testosterone report fewer spontaneous erections, erectile dysfunction, and reduced NPT.
Low testosterone may be worsened in men with other metabolic disturbances (such as diabetes), as well as in those with excess body fat (as increased estrogen production occurs).
The best way to approach rectifying low testosterone levels? Given that you are a young to middle-aged man, a solid weight lifting routine is a great start.
Doing so will ramp up your body’s natural testosterone production, and in many cases can eliminate the need for exogenous testosterone administration (better known as TRT)
Many men underestimate the impact that pornography and masturbation can have on their sexual well-being, even though this is arguably the greatest threat to a young man’s erections.
Pornography and masturbation, like sex, elicits the brain’s dopamine reward pathways, with the end goal of satisfaction (in this case, an orgasm).
This is the same pathway targeted in the brain of drug addicts and can explain why it’s that hard to recover from an addiction.
The frequent stimulation of this pathway, coupled with increasing intensity of pornographic stimuli results in the brain and body not responding to usual sexual triggers.
Similar to the manner in which a gateway drug may eventually cause you to keep seeking stronger and stronger alternatives for the same high.
The only real way to combat dopaminergic desensitization and recover normal sexual appetite is by cessation of pornography viewing coupled with masturbation.
Quitting cold turkey is the only remedy for this if you are serious about regaining your normal morning wood. Masturbation by itself is not harmful but it must be without pornographic stimuli.
To recap, even though your cause is likely limited to one of the factors above, you can implement wholesome changes to cover all your bases. Be sure to combine the following:
Finally, download this Free Morning Wood Ebook which has some tips for enhancing morning wood.[simple-author-box]