Post-Menopausal Angst: Has My Sex Life Ended? No, no, no, we're not retreating now! We were the bold settlers of the new sexual frontier. Many of us threw off our clothing along with the should-nots our parents and society tried to instill in us, while the world watched. Now we have a new frontier to explore: sexual vitality after age sixty, seventy, and why not eighty? Let's set up camp and work out solutions— as we women have always done so successfully.

We're offended by outdated stereotypes of asexual older women, and we're not going to hide behind them at this time of our lives. Specifically, we're not going to roll over and play dead when our private parts are concerned. Admittedly, there are problems with sex after menopause, but we can adjust to our post-menopausal changes without losing our sexy zest. We're bombarded with media messages that older sex is unseemly, embarrassing, pathetic, ludicrous, and altogether icky. If television and movies allude to older people having sex at all (which they usually don't), the audience is invited to shudder, laugh, or bolt. We seldom see older people celebrating their sexuality.

Maybe, just maybe, as Boomers slide into their redefinition of older-age sexuality, our culture's attitudes will change. We've made a difference in just about every other societal stereotype we've butted up against so far, why stop now?

Sexuality is Not Age-Bound. Our bodies might be aging, but great sex isn't just about body parts. When we've got wisdom, connection, logistics, time, intimacy, a sense of humor, ease of communication, resilience of body and spirit, and no kids barging in, who needs youth?

Sexual response is in our brains more than our genitals. We can have the best sex of our lives at our age, largely because we know ourselves deeply by now. We know who we are and what we want both in and out of bed. We understand intimacy and what we want in a sex partner and a life partner.



The above material is excerpted from Better Than I Ever Expected: Straight Talk About Sex After Sixty by Joan Price (Seal Press, 2006). Used with permission.


Ageless sexuality advocate Joan Price met the love of her life, artist Robert Rice when she was 57 and he was 64. She wrote Better Than I Ever Expected: Straight Talk about Sex After Sixty at age 61 to celebrate the joys and address the challenges of senior sexuality. She is currently at work on her new book, Naked at Our Age, which will be published by Seal Press in 2011. Although Robert died in 2008, Joan continues on her mission to change society's view of elder sex— one mind at a time. Joan's Better Than I Ever Expected blog is creating a community of people talking about sex and aging.