My rare allergy makes sex difficult, with and without condoms – we remain in the early stages

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FOLLOWING a rare diagnosis, a woman has opened up about the difficulties she experiences in the bedroom due to her semen allergy.

She also expressed fears that she might never be able to get pregnant.

Allison Tennyson is a 34-year-old from Minneapolis, Minnesota with a rare conditionCredit: Catering

Due to her painful condition, she has had to limit sexual contact with her partnerCredit: Catering

Allison Tennyson, 34, from Minneapolis, Minnesota finds it incredibly painful to have sex due to her semen allergy, forcing her to severely limit intimacy with her partner.

When she comes into contact with semen, she gets a painful burning sensation.

Using condoms is not a possible alternative because she is allergic to the materials from which they are made.

Now she feels like time is running out to get pregnant because she is terrified of coming into contact with ejaculate.

“It hurts,” Tennyson said. ‘My partner doesn’t want it. It is not attractive to hurt your partner during sex.

“We’re not intimate enough because of the allergies.

“I don’t want to get burned and he doesn’t want to make me cry – so it’s very difficult.

“It’s a battle. It’s hard to be intimate because it’s not comfortable and I can’t even use condoms.”

Allison has a condition called Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, a connective tissue disorder that affects the skin and organs.

After her diagnosis, she was tested for 160 allergens, only a few of which came back positive, including nickel and penicillin.

A semen allergy is a rare condition in which a reaction to the proteins in men’s semen causes the burning sensations that Allison first experienced more than a decade ago.

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Allison is cautious about her ability to have children, as touching semen makes her life miserable, while she is also wary of the possible risks if she were to become pregnant.

“It’s really disturbing,” she said.

“I honestly cried quite a bit about it. It makes me angry because I didn’t even know this was something that could happen because I had never heard of it before.

“I always want to have sex, so we do, but only in the beginning stages. Not experiencing the sperm is just not the same and so limiting.

“I don’t know how I can even have a baby. I don’t even know how that would work – would my body just reject the sperm completely?

Her condition resulted in a rash in response to the proteins in semen — Her condition resulted in a skin rash in response to the proteins in semenCredit: Catering

She underwent medical tests, including a skin patch test, to get to the bottom of her conditionCredit: Catering

“I also have a blood clotting disorder, so pregnancy is really risky for me.

“My partner and I did our due diligence with my doctor to make sure I would survive the pregnancy and all that.

“We’ve thought about it, but we don’t know yet.

‘I’ve always wanted one, but it would be fine not to have a baby; we keep going back and forth.

“If having a baby wasn’t an option it would be pretty heartbreaking. If I had the choice, at least it would make me feel better.

“I’m 34 now, so I’m a little older, but I still have time.”