Low libido woes got you down? Your daily diet and exercise plans are crucial to sexual health.
A nutritious diet contains a healthy balance of lean proteins, healthy fats, and simple carbohydrates. Lean proteins can come from animal sources like grass fed meats, free range eggs, and raw dairy products. They can also come from vegan sources such as beans, legumes, nuts, and seeds. Healthy fats include coconuts and coconut oil, olive oil, avocados, nuts, raw butter, and small amounts of animal fat. The best sources of carbohydrates are a variety of vegetables and fruits. Whole grains such as brown rice and quinoa may be included for extra calories.
Adding specific foods to your diet is a good way of boosting your sex drive. Enjoy some of these:
Oysters are considered a traditional aphrodisiac thanks to their rich zinc content. Zinc is good for the prostate, and causes extra testosterone to be released. This is great news for guys as it boosts male libido, and also for girls because testosterone is proven to have positive effects on female sex drive too.
Nuts like pumpkin seeds, almonds and Brazil nuts are known to promote blood-flow to the genitals.
Chocolate and its mood-enhancing phenethylamine make it a sexy treat as well as a tasty indulgence.
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Wine can do wonders for romance, but make sure you don’t binge. Being drunk reduces the pleasure of sex for women, and threatens male erectile function but one glass can help both sexes relax and enjoy romantic times.
Exercise, Weight and Libido
Exercise improves blood circulation to the entire body, delivers nutrients where they are needed, and releases endorphins. Endorphins are brain chemicals called neurotransmitters. They reduce the brain’s perception of pain, enhance the body’s immune response, regulate the appetite, elevate the mood, and release sex hormones.
Fitness experts recommend working out six days a week for an hour each day. This may be difficult for beginning athletes, so it is important to work up to this level of activity. Consistency is key. Once a workout seems easy, it is time to add more intensity to it.
Obsessing about your weight can be a major turnoff and many men and women lose their sexual confidence when they put on weight or are too thin. Studies show that having a body mass index (BMI) that’s too high or too low messes with your mojo. When you gain or lose body fat, hormones affecting your libido are thrown out of whack and your levels of a natural chemical known as sex-hormone-binding globulin increase, which causes bioavailable testosterone, the hormone that stimulates sexual desire, to fall. In addition, high cholesterol associated with obesity can lead to plaque buildup in the blood vessels that supply the pelvic region, slowing blood flow to the genitals and annihilating sexual arousal.
Yet even more potent than the physiological effect of your weight is how you feel about having sex with your partner if you are insecure and overly focused on the way your body looks during sex. Research has shown that a woman’s sex drive is strongly linked to body confidence — specifically her perception of the areas of her body that can be easily seen by others (think stomach and thighs) — rather than her BMI.
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