Boyfriend got soft while inside

[Itsangie09]

So basically my boyfriend and I had our first time yesterday. And we used a condom as our source of protection. Anyways so he put the condom on when he got hard and he made sure he put it on right and we started to have sex. However as we were having sex he got soft and i gave him a handjob to get him hard again, it worked but it happened like 2 times. So my question is why did he lose erection during that? And is it bad that we used the same (1 condom) through out this whole thing?

[Sam W]

Hi Itsangie09,

Issues with erection can come from a few different sources. In younger people, a really common one is stress. That can be stress about their sexual "performance" or about something else. Sometimes fatigue, medication, or other health habits can play a role as well, and you can read more about those possible causes here: ED: Why You Don't Have to Get So Down About Not Getting It Up.

Ideally you would've changed the condom out for each activity, but since it didn't break or come off, you can assume it still worked as intended this time.

[Heather]

I think with this it can also help to think about how your own physical response has probably fluctuated during sex. If you aren't someone with a penis, then you probably are someone with a clitoris: during sexual activity, including masturbation, you may have already experienced that your vulva can be puffier (that's in large part about the internal structures) than not, or your clitoris can be harder or larger sometimes (it has erectile tissue, too!) and softer or smaller others. If you have a vagina, you may have noticed that you don't always self-lubricate, or have times during sexual activity where that's happening, and times when it isn't.

Point is that for all kinds of bodies, during sex how our bodies are responding is usually variable, and often that doesn't mean anything except that we have a body, because human bodies are just unreliable with certain functions like that. Penises being erect or not isn't even something that often falls under what some people call "erectile dysfunction," because there's not anything dysfunctional about our physical responses varying during sex like having an erection then not having one. That's common and normal.

[Itsangie09]

So should I be worried about a possible pregnancy from this?

[Mo]

As Sam said above, if the condom didn't come off entirely then it's likely that it did its job and worked properly.

[Itsangie09]

No the condom didn’t come off entirely but it was loose because he wasn’t hard anymore at that time. And after that I tried giving him a handjob with the same condom still on and we continued having sex. Is this necessarily bad?

[Mo]

This isn't the ideal way to use condoms; what's recommended is to use a new one each time you have (or attempt) intercourse. It doesn't mean that every time someone does what you describe, there will be a problem, but it makes it more likely. There isn't a way to pin down more exactly what your potential risk was when you had sex this weekend; all you can do right now is make sure you're well-informed so you can know what to do in the future.
Our guide to using condoms properly is here: Condom Basics: A User's Manual; that'll probably be helpful to read together before next time you need to use any.