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The question around nocturnal erections (NE) has been puzzling me for a long time.
(Context: I've had ED all my life, since my cancer that was removed when i was one year old.)

When i was in my late teens i would get NE pretty "often". (I put it in quotes since it was probably way less than healthy teenagers get them.) When i woke up in the middle of the night with one of these erections, they were hard enough to actually be called erection, the penis standing firmly up, hard and in it's "erect shape" (i have a pretty strong curve). They usually didn't last very long once awake, not enough to allow me to masturbate successfully for example, except a couple of times. Usually once i started to "mess" with it, it would subside. This is one of the things that has always bugged and annoyed me - why would my body create a spontaneous erection while sleeping and then when i kept stimulating it it would go away?

With age, these episodes generally disappeared, nowadays i generally wake up (middle of the night or morning) with a slightly fuller penis than the base level, but nothing i'd call an "erection". Apparently this is normal and happens with every man.

When i talked about this with my urologue, he always told me that the "normal" (reflex) erection and the nocturnal one are two completely different systems and just because one works it doesn't mean the other will too. Reading on wikipedia, there's practically no information on how exactly this all works or anything other than some super old studies...

What i've been pondering lately is - if for cases like mine, where normal erection doesn't work because of nervous system damage, but nocturnal erection does (or did) work pretty well, why couldn't we "exploit" that and trick the body into producing an erection by simulating the nocturnal one's mechanisms? It is, after all, a process in the body that's based around chemicals... But maybe it doesn't really work like that and doctors just don't know much.

I am trying to get some more insight into this process, so here's a poll with a few options. I know that most of you here have developed ED in a later stage of life, unlike me, so this is a completely different perspective than mine...
So, what is your experience with this and ED?

You left off an option in your poll. I have not had an NE since my RP. I did have NEs prior to the RP.

bldoink wrote:You left off an option in your poll. I have not had an NE since my RP. I did have NEs prior to the RP.

Isn't that the same as "lost after ED kicked in" ?

I still have Nocturnal Erections.

Why is that not a choice?

sogwap wrote:I still have Nocturnal Erections.

Why is that not a choice?

There is, "I used to have regular NE and ED hasn't changed anything"

Hunchback wrote:Isn't that the same as "lost after ED kicked in" ?

I guess you could look at it that way.

From the Cleveland Clinic:

The sacral nerve, part of your parasympathetic nervous system, controls erections.

The sympathetic nervous system is what prepares you for action — the fight or flight response. The parasympathetic nervous system, on the other hand, is what’s active while your body rests and repairs itself. It’s responsible for things like digestion, getting rid of waste, and sexual arousal.

The parasympathetic nervous system is active when you’re asleep, so erections sometimes happen in your sleep. The term “morning wood” is actually a misnomer; penises can become erect and then flaccid again several times in the course of one night. You’re just more likely to notice it when you wake up.

The challenge is humans really can't access the parasympathetic nervous system while conscious. (At least not that I know of). It's the sympathetic nerves that control sexual response when awake.

SLKA317 wrote:From the Cleveland Clinic:

The sacral nerve, part of your parasympathetic nervous system, controls erections.

The sympathetic nervous system is what prepares you for action — the fight or flight response. The parasympathetic nervous system, on the other hand, is what’s active while your body rests and repairs itself. It’s responsible for things like digestion, getting rid of waste, and sexual arousal.

The parasympathetic nervous system is active when you’re asleep, so erections sometimes happen in your sleep. The term “morning wood” is actually a misnomer; penises can become erect and then flaccid again several times in the course of one night. You’re just more likely to notice it when you wake up.

The challenge is humans really can't access the parasympathetic nervous system while conscious. (At least not that I know of). It's the sympathetic nerves that control sexual response when awake.

Video of above description: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33m9pN_vAI4

bldoink wrote:You left off an option in your poll. I have not had an NE since my RP. I did have NEs prior to the RP.

Exactly the same for me. I used the first option "I used to have regular NE but after I got ED they stopped".
That's the closest fit as my ED happened immediately post surgery and that's when the NEs stopped (and all erections of any type or quality).

Hunchback wrote:

sogwap wrote:I still have Nocturnal Erections.

Why is that not a choice?

There is, "I used to have regular NE and ED hasn't changed anything"

Stating "I used to have NE" implies you no longer have NE.

Wouldnt it make more sense to say.
I have always had NE and still do, even with ED.