If you’ve ever felt like you spent the whole next day after sex dashing to the bathroom and wincing as you pee, you are already more familiar with urinary tract infections than you’d like to be.
More than half of adult women get at least one in their life, and they often feel like a sore reminder of your last sexual encounter.
Sex is one of the most common triggers for the pain, burning and frequent trips to the bathroom that let you know you have a urinary tract infection (UTI).
Dr Lauren Streicher, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Northwestern University explain why sex can come at such a price, and how to avoid spending a week with bladder infection after spending a night with someone else.
Between 50 and 60 percent of women get urinary tract infections that make peeing painful, and for many it happens after sex because bacteria gets jostled into the urinary tract
WHY ME? UTIS CAN STRIKE ANYONE AND SOME ARE SIMPLY MORE PRONE
Urinary tract infections can happen to anyone, no matter what sex or gender you are.
But female anatomy is sort of built for them.
Any bacteria that doesn’t belong in the urinary tract – which consists of urethra, bladder and kidneys – can spark an infection.
This pipeline is shaped differently in people with male and female anatomy. In those with vaginas, the urinary tract is much shorter, so wayward bacteria don’t have to travel as far.
The usual suspects are E. coli bacteria that make their way from the digestive tract into the urinary one.
E. coli are to blame for about 90 percent of urinary tract infections, whether the problem is related to sex or not.
‘We don’t know why some women have a tendency to get them, but it has to do with what someone’s normal colonization of bacteria is,’ says Dr Streicher.
‘It might be that that some women have a propensity to have more E. coli in their digestive or vaginal tract.’
All the commotion and contact involved in sex can really shake things up for the worse for women, jostling some E. coli out of place and into the sensitive urethra where the multiply and can move up the tract.
‘The reason it happens during sex is simply the manipulation of tissue,’ explains Dr Streicher.
HOW BAD IS IT? HOW PAINFUL PEEING CAN TURN INTO A KIDNEY INFECTION
The first sign of a UTI usually rears its head while you are in the bathroom. Suddenly, the relief of peeing is accompanied by a sharp burning sensation.
It’s not uncommon for this to start the day after having sex, according to Dr Streicher.
At this point, the infection is pretty well confined to the urethra, the short opening at the end of the urinary tract.
But if you don’t start killing off that bacteria quickly enough, they will just multiply and migrate up toward the bladder.
Once the bladder catches it, the infection really starts to twist the proverbial knife, causing pressure and low-grade pain down low in your abdomen. Because the vessel that carries urine is irritated, you’ll have to pee more often and might even see some blood.
In severe cases, the infection can spread all the way up to the kidneys, the body’s filtration system.
This is one of the rare times you will actually feel the presence of these organs, aching in your upper middle back. The body starts to really mount a counter attack at this point, and that can even result in a fever and chills, nausea and vomiting.
Doctors recommend that you get to the doctor as soon as you notice the first sting of a UTI, but if the infection goes on long enough to reach your kidneys, it’s definitely time to see a physician, as this can eventually permanently damage the organs.
‘It’s not like it’s going to get to the kidneys instantaneously, but don’t mess around with this, especially if you have a fever or blood in the urine,’ says Dr Streicher.
Plus, letting the bacteria stick around will make you more prone to another UTI down the line.
MAKE IT STOP: TREATING A UTI IS EASY – BUT NOT AS EASY AS DRINKING CRANBERRY JUICE
The good news is that UTIs are very treatable. Any one of several common antibiotics, like Bactrim and Macrobid, can clear up the infection within a few days if it hasn’t gotten too bad, and the pain tends to disappear even sooner.
But you definitely should not try sex again for those few days. In fact, even up to a week after you start treatment, your urethra is still fragile, recovering and vulnerable to additional bacteria.
That doesn’t mean you should never have sex again, though. Miserable though they are, UTIs don’t happen most of the times you have sex.
Getting one also doesn’t mean you did anything wrong during or after sex; some women are just more prone to UTIs than others.
‘For some people, the bacteria just kind of sticks to their uterine tract,’ says Dr Streicher.
‘If they get another infection, it’s usually not new, it’s a recurrence that happens after something – including sex – makes it able to proliferate again.’
Having a normal vaginal pH is the best prevention for a UTI, and if you think yours is out of whack, Dr Streicher recommends a gel called RePhresh, which can help you get things back in balance.
It’s commonly said that peeing after sex can prevent a UTI, but there isn’t a great deal of evidence to support that. The theory is that by clearing your urethra will help flush out any bacteria that may have made its way there during sex.
‘You hear a lot about “you should pee before sex, you should pee after sex, but there’s really no evidence that that’s going to make a big difference,’ says Dr Streicher.
‘It’s never a bad idea to stay hydrated, but science hasn’t really shown that it’s going to reduce the risk of a urinary tract infection.’
Same goes for cranberry juice, she says.
The only treatment is antibiotics, and for women who have them very frequently after sex, Dr Streicher says that taking one antibiotic after sex will keep the bacteria at bay for 24 hours – but you’ll have to call your doctor.
‘There are no over the counter treatments. the AZO stuff you hear about is a local anesthetic,’ she explains.
‘It will help the symptoms and may help with the awful gotta go feeling, but it will by no means eradicate the infection.’