Common sexual problems and what to do about them
Bettina Arndt, former sex therapist and current online dating coach, talks through the common sexual problems over-60s might encounter and ways to overcome them.
On health problems…
There is a long list of physical conditions that are known to affect sexual drive, including fatigue, physical tension, acute and chronic pain, chronic heart or lung disease, acute or chronic infection, auto-immune disease, recurrent urinary tract and vaginal infections, kidney, thyroid and liver disease, cancer, blood disorders, metabolic disease, hormone disturbance and chromosomal abnormalities. You can add to these the known sexual hazards of indulging in too much alcohol, smoking, taking various illicit drugs and becoming severely overweight.
Oh yes, there are plenty of good health-related reasons for going off sex, but over the years I have watched so many women friends with health problems who still cope when they have to, when they are tackling something they really want to do. Her back is killing her and she couldn’t possibly make love, yet somehow she manages to stagger around the house and cook her children’s dinner. Despite that dreadful arthritis, another woman is able to pick up her son from rugby practice and help him work on his science project. Even with her heart condition, a third still rushes around and cleans up the house when her mother-in-law pays a visit. Bad health does impose limitations, but we find a way around these when it really matters. How come lovemaking isn’t a similar priority?
Men are just the same. A man’s depression may not be enough to stop him cleaning his new car or spending hours comparison-shopping for the latest techno boy toy, but he simply doesn’t have the energy to spend ten, twenty minutes lying down caressing his wife. Does this really make sense?
On men’s problems…
Roughly 60 per cent of men over sixty experience problems with erections - the numbers climb steadily as men age. The large numbers of men diagnosed each year with prostate cancer – nearly 20,000 in Australia annually – are part of the story, with prostate cancer treatments often leading to erectile dysfunction. There’s still much work needed to make sure all men in this situation have access to proper “penile rehabilitation.”
The good news is we now live in the age of Viagra, with a large range of possible treatments to help older men achieve erections. The challenge is getting men to seek proper help, with many preferring to pay out thousands of dollars to clinics which offer useless treatments because they are too embarrassed to see their local doctor. I regularly receive letters from older women who are tearing their hair out because their men won’t even hug them anymore – they are so afraid of failing to perform during sex that they avoid all intimacy.
On women’s problems…
But the most common sexual problem in this older age group is mismatched desire. Some older women have less interest in sex than their partners which causes great tension in many relationships - as I explain in my book, The Sex Diaries. The problem seems to be hard-wired – most women have a fragile, distractible libido which means they need perfect conditions to get fired up. It’s common for married women to go for years with no interest in sex, and loss of oestrogen after menopause often leads to a further drop in desire.
Yet there are still older women who are keen for their sex lives to flourish and it’s a great shame that many find themselves experiencing painful intercourse, due to the dryness and thinning of the vaginal walls which can result from oestrogen deprivation. Despite all the media stories which have scared women off hormone replacement therapy, most women can use oestrogen therapy safely – if necessary using local applications of oestrogen creams or pessaries which rarely pose any real risk. Do talk to your doctor if you are concerned about this issue.
Related links:
7 reasons to have more sex after 60