I can’t promise to say everything that was discussed in last Saturday’s Men’s Conference here, if anything I promised not to. I have therefore intentionally chosen to mention only what is necessary. The Men’s Conference is a union of men that meets frequently to discuss matters that are intimately masculine.
As always there was music in the background; occasionally a waiter rushed through the tables in a zig-zag fashion to deliver plates of sizzling nyama choma. Beer and whiskey were in plenty, something that I have come to contend with as an indicator of members being very relaxed.
“How do we manage the pressure to perform on Valentine’s day?” Jack, one of the loud members, asks, “that pressure makes me nervous and last year resulted in acute failure on my side and I was accused of having an affair.”
Many members complained that they had diabetes or high blood pressure. Some had high cholesterol. They were on a number of medications, some of which reduced their libido. They regretted that when it comes to Valentine’s Day, no woman wants to understand that a disease may be taking a toll on their sexuality.
“There is a time my wife told me that she did not care how I was going to do it; that she needed her rights; that she had been warning me to stop drinking and I never listened. She declared she needed quality intimacy and I needed to ensure it happened,” Joshua said, a glass of whiskey in his hand.
“It is unfortunate that when we finally have money our bodies fail us,” Andrew shares, “when I was young and poor I was perfect in bed but I was so haggard no woman would come near me; now I have the cash and I’m a toothless bulldog.”
The lamentations went on and on. It was an interesting way to usher me to speak. Under normal circumstances, men are bold in these meetings but this issue of Valentine’s Day seemed to have brought them down. It was my role to provide urgent solutions given the short time to that the coveted lovers’ day.
I gave a number of tips to members on how to make the day a success and invited those who needed personal help to come individually to the Sexology Clinic for consultation. As mentioned earlier, the tips men received in this meeting are meant to be a surprise to the women on Valentine’s Day and so do not expect me to discuss them here.
I can however share some of the lessons that I learnt by seeing men in the clinic. The commonest sex problem inflicting members is erectile dysfunction. Most men cannot rise to the occasion. The commonest cause of the problem is unhealthy lifestyles. Alcohol, smoking, bulging tummies with high cholesterol, sedentary lifestyles, unhealthy eating characterised by overindulgence in nyama choma and huge chunks of ugali all conspire to kill a man’s erections.
A number of men do not sleep enough. If one sleeps for less than six hours they become sleep deprived, a situation where vital chemicals that are normally replenished and normalised during sleep get affected. The result is not only getting clumsy in memory but also loss of libido and erections.
“But you know we are now at the peak of our professions doctor and the demands are quite high,” John said when he came to the clinic, “I rarely sleep before 1 am and I am always up by 5 am.”
Well, one has to make the difficult decision to either chase the money or remain alive. You cannot eat your cake and have it. There is no end to the rat race and if you have to remain healthy you have to consciously trade in some of your ambitions for the sake of your health.
Other prevalent sex problems were premature ejaculation and low libido. Some men also had relationship conflicts and had lost emotional connection with their partners. A number ventured out into extramarital affairs which only served to complicate their issues further.
The last week has been quite busy preparing members of the Men’s Conference for Valentine’s Day. I am sure that this will make women realise that the Men’s Conference is not an evil meeting after all.
