Fasting of any kind, whether bound by certain rituals or just because you are following intermittent fasting diets such as 5:2 diet, can be taxing. Unless you plan certain part of your day with something nutritious (during partial fasting) your body is deprived of essential nutrients and electrolytes. But should you have sex while fasting? People fasting with reasons that have to do with rituals and religious limitation may have their own explanation, but when it comes to health and body functioning, fasting can affect your sex life. If you go without food and water for a day or two, you won't have a lot of energy left for physical activity. And sex is a physical activity for real.  Fasting has its own set of side-effects. It may make you tired, irritable, lightheaded, thirsty and even nauseous and make you collapse if you have diabetes. Your sex drive highly depends on what you eat and nutrient deprivation is no good news.  Consuming a balanced diet is very important to have enough energy to have sex. Sex does burn quite some calories (which makes it a great form of weight loss exercise as well). Let's check out how many calories does sex burn.

How Many Calories Do You Burn While Having Sex

Sex is said to be a strenuous exercise, and studies have it that on an average of having sexual intercourse for about 19-20 minutes, and an average Indian man weighing 60 kgs and an average Indian woman weighs 45 kgs can burn quite a lot of calories. With calculations, an Indian woman burns 18.85 calories in a 19 minutes session of intercourse in the missionary position whereas a man burns 62.83 calories. This equals to 10 minutes of cycling for the woman and 33 minutes of cycling for the man! Read more about it here:  How Many Calories Do You Burn When You Have Sex? Find Out Which Position Is Good for Weight Loss.

If you are only fasting partially, meaning you don't go the whole day without food and drinks, you can try drinking a glass of Kesardoodh (milk infused with saffron) before sleeping to increase your sex drive while giving you the energy you need. While ginseng, the love herb is known to be the best aphrodisiac, saffron is no less. This can be a natural way of improving your sex drive, making you last longer in bed even if you have fasted for the whole day.

Sex is important, and for a good sex drive, you must follow a balanced healthy diet and that includes different types of fibre-rich whole grains, vegetable, fruits, etc. Check out natural aphrodisiacs to include in your diet for better sex.  According to research found in the Journal of the American Medical Association done at the Tufts University and the Havard School of Public Health in Boston has been linked sex deprivation as well because lack of sex means a lack of physical activity, it is a very well known fact that sex does help burn a lot of calories and is a good form of physical exercise.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Oct 17, 2019 09:13 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).