Sleep Priapism: how to prevent sleep erections?

[MagnusMessi]

Hey,

I have been living with priapism for over 5 years now and although it has settled down, but not completely.

My main issue right now is I am getting continuous erections during sleep with most days resulting in a wet dream. These erections are not due to sexual thoughts but because of priapism. I have no symptoms during the day.

I recently saw a urologist and he recommended flow rate and residue test as he believed that these erections could be due to overactive bladder. I understood his point of view, however, what I do know is my bladder is not the cause of the issue although it can be a trigger. The cause is blood trapped somewhere at base of my penis and I am confident of it.

Do you know if there is anything I can do to prevent these daily sleep erections? Like eating any specific food or performing any particular stretching or exercises before sleep? I am also open to discuss any medications with my urologist.

Just to point out that I do not suffer from sickle cell as my full blood count blood test came normal (although it was sometime ago, however after my priapism episodes started). I also had ultrasound without Doppler which also came normal.

Any kind of help would be much appreciated.

[Norwich1 Moderator]

How do you know that you have priapism when you are asleep?

[MagnusMessi in reply to Norwich1]

Because the erection does not go down, I either have to get up or relax while lying in bed for it to go down.

[Norwich1 Moderator in reply to MagnusMessi]

But you have to be awake for you to know that you have an erection! Priapism is usually a very sustained erection that is also painful and requires hospital treatment. The ability to remain erect after orgasm is not necessarily priapism.

[MagnusMessi in reply to Norwich1]

Thank you for taking interest in this post Norwich1 .

You are right about Priapism symptoms. Because my priapism is pretty much a settled one (I have lived with some of the symptoms when the episodes started 5 years back), I only get the symptoms at night, although it is not painful. What I am really looking forward to is finding something which can just completely prevent night time erections, as they affect my sleep and also causing me sleep anxiety.

[Norwich1 Moderator]

so how long does your penis stay erect?

[MagnusMessi in reply to Norwich1]

The moment I go in deep sleep the erection starts and stays on until I get woken up by it.

[Norwich1 Moderator]

Have you been told this?

[MagnusMessi in reply to Norwich1]

No I have not been, but I had the symptoms 5 years back and now it is settled.

[Norwich1 Moderator]

I would suggest that you go to see a doctor. I suspect that you do not have priapism- which is always a serious emergency.

[MagnusMessi in reply to Norwich1]

I understand, but my situation is unique. Because it is settled, by just examining the genital no doctor can diagnose it. The reason why I get continuous erection at night is simply because of increased blood flow to the penis (which everyone gets while they sleep) and because there is blood trapped at the base of my penis the erection remains as I will be in deep sleep. If there was no trapped blood my erections would be on and off and not continuous.

[Norwich1 Moderator]

I guess the doctors are right in not being able to diagnose priapism. Priapism is a defined problem and you do not meet the criteria of needing medical intervention to deal with an occurrence

[Norwich1 Moderator in reply to Norwich1]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priapism

[MagnusMessi in reply to Norwich1]

I would say there isn't enough medical research and treatments with what I am living with.

[Norwich1 Moderator]

Try not to get too hung up on the word priapism. You are living with nothing compared to someone with a rare leukaemia. Believe me.

[MagnusMessi in reply to Norwich1]

Thanks mate. I do not have enough knowledge of leukaemia and I agree that my health thingy would not be as bad what others live with.

[AsianGuy]

I read your post several times to make sure I got your issue here is. My wonder is if you have had enough sex for yourself, or even how often do you have your self-time? I mean (most of) men get hard when we are sleeping consciously or unconsciously, and if there is no pain during that, I don't think it is an issue to have a hard dick during sleeping.

[MagnusMessi in reply to AsianGuy]

I agree that sleep erections are normal, but my sleep erections are persistent and sleep disturbing. When I get a sleep erection, it is very hard, I am sure it is not normal.It is just that some blood is trapped somewhere at the base of my penis and because during sleep, blood flow increases to the penis, the erection is harder than it should be. And yes, it is not painful.