'I didn't feel sexy.' Deborah had sex with her partner just two hours after birth.

Just two hours after giving birth to her fourth child in 2013, Deborah Hodge and her partner had sex.

It was very soon – but for Hodge, a 44-year-old writer, it wasn’t totally unusual. The London mother-of-four told The Sun she had sex within a fortnight of each of her previous three births.

Hodge explained that she and her now ex-partner were sexually active throughout her pregnancy, having sex three or four times a week for the nine months.

She went into labour four days after her due date and required an emergency caesarean.

After her newborn daughter Amelia was born, Hodge was given a private room to recover.

“As Amelia lay in her cot, my partner and I were having a cuddle on the bed, when before I knew it we were having sex,” she said.

Listen to Zoe Marshall and Sean Szeps discuss ‘getting it on’ post-birth. Post continues after audio.

“There was just this incredible closeness between us. I didn’t feel sexy, but I did feel special.”

Hodge said she didn’t feel any discomfort, but said that could’ve been because she’d had an epidural: “I couldn’t believe we’d done it – I put it down to all the drugs I was on!”

Hodge and Amelia returned home three days later, where she and Amelia’s father got back to it.

“When I returned home three days later, we made love again. It felt OK and we experimented with different positions to avoid putting pressure on my stitches.

“We were quite inventive in order to avoid the risk of them splitting.”

Hodge and her ex were clearly compatible in bed, but the pair didn’t have much in common outside of it and decided to split when Amelia was a few months old.

She wanted to share her experience with sex after child birth to break the taboo.

Her advice to new mums is to just get back to it.

“I do think new mums should get back into the saddle when it comes to sex – putting it off isn’t a good idea,” she said.

The Mayo Clinic’s advice for sex after child birth is to “set your own timeline”.

It says there is no required waiting period, though your health care provider may recommend waiting until four to six weeks after delivery, regardless of the delivery method.

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