Unintentionally abstaining

[Verena]

Hi atomic and everyone else,

my husband and I are not frequent BD people. I don't know what hubby does on it's own, but I don't think that he releases that often. We are both 35 and I read somewhere that it is potentially harmful to abstain. Should we try to make him release more often prior to our attempt? We are planning one attempt at +opk. If so, when should we start and how often should he release? What could happen if he keeps abstaining, just decreasing chances for conception or are there risks for the baby? [emoji47]

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[atomic sagebrush]

I have an essay about it here articles and studies about why abstain is not good for males over 35

but let me stress, the risks are MINIMAL. There is a huge, huge difference between me saying "Hmm, there are some very small risks associated with abstaining, let's not use that for swaying for guys over 35" and then making the jump to "anyone who conceives after an abstain will have a baby with issues". This simply isn't the case. I choose not to ask you guys to take the very very small and minimal risk for swaying (especially given that it doesn't work anyway) but if you accidentally end up with a longer abstain than you'd like, the vast, vast majority of the time nothing bad would even happen. Maybe you wouldn't conceive (because it does cut odds of conception). Even if you did, if the sperm's DNA was actually damaged, the vast majority of the time the fertilization process would stop early on. It's just that I figure, why take even a miniscule risk for something that doesn't even work for swaying anyway?

For a guy like your husband what I'd have him do is just release on his own or with you, with a condom every 2-4 days. He would never be able to stick to the daily release/FR method so just have him do that. Don't worry if it gets a little longer than 4 days, we just want him to "clean the pipes" regularly and that will make healthy sperm for you to conceive.

[Verena]

I have an essay about it here articles and studies about why abstain is not good for males over 35

but let me stress, the risks are MINIMAL. There is a huge, huge difference between me saying "Hmm, there are some very small risks associated with abstaining, let's not use that for swaying for guys over 35" and then making the jump to "anyone who conceives after an abstain will have a baby with issues". This simply isn't the case. I choose not to ask you guys to take the very very small and minimal risk for swaying (especially given that it doesn't work anyway) but if you accidentally end up with a longer abstain than you'd like, the vast, vast majority of the time nothing bad would even happen. Maybe you wouldn't conceive (because it does cut odds of conception). Even if you did, if the sperm's DNA was actually damaged, the vast majority of the time the fertilization process would stop early on. It's just that I figure, why take even a miniscule risk for something that doesn't even work for swaying anyway?

For a guy like your husband what I'd have him do is just release on his own or with you, with a condom every 2-4 days. He would never be able to stick to the daily release/FR method so just have him do that. Don't worry if it gets a little longer than 4 days, we just want him to "clean the pipes" regularly and that will make healthy sperm for you to conceive.

Thank you so much atomic!! I don't think he will be happy if I tell him to release on his own every 2-4 days. Would it be enough if he did it once some days before our attempt or does he really have to do it regularly?

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[atomic sagebrush]

It really needs to be regularly to make the best amount of healthy sperm.