The Second Sexual Revolution

Many things about sex have intrigued and excited me, but, until recently one of them has not been the topic 'sex and aging.' That may be changing; I am writing this article on my seventieth birthday.

It is not a topic easy to avoid. Sex and aging appears in one formulation or another, month after month, on the covers of magazines about men's health, women's health, and healthy aging. In case you haven't noticed, the sexy women featured on those covers are in their 40s, 50s, or even 60s. What editor can buck the coercive demographics? The older the age group, the more rapidly it is growing, with first prize to those over 85. And they are having sex.

Studies of sexual activity among older Americans are mostly recent—and few. But one big survey found that about three-fourths of Americans 57 to 64 reported being sexually active. Half of those 65 to 74 reported being active. And one quarter of those 75 to 85. Women reported themselves less sexually active than men, partly because their male partners die before them and partly for other reasons that we will explore.

But why all this activity? After all, there are few stereotypes more pervasive than that sex between sagging, wrinkled, bald, age-spotted, dried-up men and women is almost too revolting to contemplate. Some of those articles about women in Florida retirement communities getting dolled up for an evening of seduction come out and say "horny old babes"; it gets a laugh, though it is (only mildly) politically incorrect. For older men longing for young women, or for any sex at all, the descriptor "dirty old man" lies in wait as surely as any racial or ethnic slur.

With my seventieth birthday upon me, I am a dirty old man, but people have been saying that or implying it for years. Others have treated my sexual interest as humorous, perhaps cute, and developed little nicknames for it (e.g., 'the naked poet'). Fortunately, I do not have any of the sexual problems discussed in this article, but I do attend weekly meetings of our local chapter of Chronic Liars Anonymous.

The Rap on Sex and Aging

If you read articles on 'sex and aging,' or Google it, or go to prestige medical-information sites like the Mayo Clinic or the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions, you will discover that the topics covered, answers, and even specific language are almost identical. Then, if you visit the Web site of the National Institute on Aging (NIA), you will understand why. To tackle this sensitive topic, but remain on safe ground, other Web sites simply download what NIA says. (It is possible that NIA, too, is derivative, but if so I have not discovered the mother lode.)

Here is the party line: Sex in older age is healthy and desirable; reject stereotypes (usually no examples are given); adapt to your limitations; be aware of chronic illnesses or medications that compromise sexual function; and, above all, communicate with your partner.

The commonest problem of older women is a dry vagina, because the vagina shortens, tightens, and loses some elasticity with age. It would seem a no-brainer, but a small percentage of women take the simple step of obtaining a lubricant. Interestingly, the highlight of the action, their clitoris, becomes more sensitive with age.

Still talking about women, the chief psychological obstacle to sexual pleasure purportedly is body image. Women who spend their lives enhancing, preserving, and displaying their physical attractiveness cannot believe that their older body is attractive to men. Some men may view their wives, as I do, as remarkably attractive at 65, but find that their wives simply cannot credit the sincerity of the compliment.

For women, another frequent 'psychological' complaint, especially after menopause, is lack of interest in sex, a weak libido. The usual prescription is estrogen supplements, taken daily, or, more conveniently, as a small patch on the belly to dispense the drug over a longer period. When this doesn't do the trick, the woman's doctor may prescribe testosterone, the 'male' drug, but side effects are a problem.

For men, the stand-out difficulty is erection and, again, the solution seems a no-brainer; but a minority of men with this complaint use, say, Viagra. In the survey mentioned above, about a third of men admitted to erectile dysfunction, but only 14 percent were taking a medication for it. One barrier, it seems, is admitting to your physician that you 'can't get it up.' And so no prescription. Referring again to the survey cited above, only 40 percent of men, and half as many women, reported ever discussing sex with their physician after age 50. I hope I am reinforcing my point about stigma and taboo.

I discovered recently that the prescription drug purveyors in Canada do not require a prescription from your side. Fill out a brief information form and, as they tell it, they will submit this to a physician, who will ascertain if the drug is appropriate for you, issue a prescription, and your Viagra, or whatever, at less than a buck a pill (versus $10 a pill at your local pharmacy) will arrive from India.

Viagra, one marketing name for Sidenafil, a multi-billion-dollar home run for Pfizer, takes advantage of a crucial detail of the erectile process. Erection is a hydraulic system, a blood pump. Nitric oxide, a common and long-known chemical, binds to a certain receptor in the penis, which produces another chemical product that causes smooth-muscle relaxation of the arteries. Relaxation sounds counter-erection, but no; the relaxation causes the artery to dilate, enlarge, and more blood flows into the penis to pump up the erection. The three heroes who discovered this mechanism, all men, won a Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1998. (Perhaps the committee ought to have added the Peace Prize.)

But the story is not over. The enzyme that permits the increased blood flow, and thus the erection, is counteracted by another enzyme that degrades smooth-muscle relaxation and reduces blood flow. The special job of Sidenafil is to inhibit the action of that degrading enzyme, so that the arteries stay relaxed, blood flow continues, the erection flourishes, and the fun goes on. Without sexual stimulation, which activates the blood-flow system in the first place, Sidenafil should not cause an erection. Recall that its specialty is inhibiting the degradation of the erection enzyme.

The standard rap on sex and aging, again on the NIA Web site, moves on to illnesses and medications that may underlie sexual dysfunction. There are chronic illnesses cited as problems; some, such as arthritis or stroke, inhibit sex because they compromise all movement. I refer you to the NIA site.

Men and women who deem themselves healthy and active because their medical condition is fully treated may find that the medication is the problem. I take medication for high blood pressure; it reduces the force of blood flow (hypertension) and blood flow is the key to erection. A medication to relax the bladder for easier urine flow has the same effect. Other drugs reduce ejaculation or force the ejaculate back into the bladder; in women, some drugs worsen vaginal dryness or loss of libido. More information is readily available on the NIA Web site.

What intrigues me is the yawning gulf between older men and women who more or less accept the passing of their sex life, often as early as their 50s--or its decline into an occasional session with an uninspired mate--and those imaginative and determined individuals who pursue sexual excitement into their 70s and beyond--excitement that remains for the rest of us a memory and a fantasy. I cannot forget watching a rather short, overweight (albeit well endowed) man in his late 70s, a highly successful writer, standing naked on his dining room table with three lovely nude young women around it to support him, giggling with delight, as he changed a light bulb. He had arranged his later life to make such scenes common.

So Who Is Still Doing It?

The Kinsey Institute, scandalous and almost alone in its reports 60 years ago, continues today to provide research results and statistics on every imaginable aspect of sexual behavior. Although it conducts its own research, the comprehensive statistical profile it offers on its Web site is an interpretation of the mountains of data from the National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior and other studies. (Surveys differ in their results. For comparison's sake, see the 1999 survey conducted by Modern Maturity and the AARP Foundation.)

The survey tells us, for example, that beginning at age 50, two-thirds of single men report having had no vaginal intercourse over the past year. Starting at age 60, that goes up to almost 90 percent. Almost three-quarters of single women as early as their 30s report no vaginal sex over the past year. In their 50's and 60's, 85 percent report no vaginal sex over the past year.

Among married men in their 40s, fewer than 10 percent report no vaginal sex over the past year. By their 50s, 21 percent report no vaginal sex over the past year and in their 60s the number is 34 percent. In their 70s, the last decade reported, 54 percent of married men say they had no vaginal sex over the past year.

Among married women in their 40's, fewer than 10 percent report no vaginal sex over the past year. By their 50s, 20 percent report no vaginal sex over the past year and in their 60s that rises to 38 percent. In their 70s, 54 percent of married women say they had no vaginal sex over the past year.

I should note that I have cited only one category of reported sexual frequency--those who report no sex over the past year. I wanted to convey a picture of how many people as early as their 40s and 50's have no sex with a partner, or no vaginal sex. For single men and women that is the great majority—with 70 percent of single women and 40 percent of single men having no sexual intercourse starting in their 30s.

Specifically on the matter of sex and aging, these charts indicate that during the decade of their 70s, sexual intercourse is nonexistent among single women. And their 60s are not much better, with fewer than 10 percent 'getting any.' For married women, the situation is better (assuming more sex is better), but even infrequent sex in their 60s and 70s is reported by far less than half of them.

For single men, the situation is better, with more than half having at least very occasional intercourse in their 40s and a third having at least very occasional intercourse in their 50s. The figures for married men square with those for married women (indicating that infidelity is not a factor, or an equal factor for both sexes, or not reported to poll takers even as part of an overall percentage).

To sum up, when we talk about active sex in older years we are talking about minorities of older men and women. By their 60s, some three-quarters of men and women still are having some sexual intercourse (with the notable exception of single women, who are virtually finished with sex when they enter their 50s), but most of them only once or twice a month or less. And that is in their sixties!

This landscape of standard sexual relationships among heterosexuals, which includes singles, married couples, and 'partners' (partners behaving about like married couples) having sexual intercourse leaves me asking:

1.What keeps that minority of people having frequent sexual intercourse into their 70s (and are they having fun)?

2.What are the large percentages of people who never or very rarely have sexual intercourse after their 50s doing about sex (assuming that many still have the desire just not the opportunity)?

Dispatches from the Front

There are many gurus of hot and frequent sex at older ages like Dr. Ruth Westheimer, the wisecracking, publicity seeking, 85-year-old sex therapist who specializes in advice such as telling older women interested in fellatio to practice on a banana. A new book by Iris Krasnow, Sex After...: Women Share How Intimacy Changes as Life Changes (Gotham Books, 2014), reports interviews with 150 women from age 20 to 90. She discusses sexually active of women in their 70s and older in a chapter entitled, "Giddy Golden Girls." It is one of many such books or articles. Books by Nancy Friday pioneered the genre of frank talk by women about their sex lives.

Are there generalizations to be drawn about what keeps older women hot? One woman gets a vibrator for the first time, begins having orgasms again after many years, and has found her answer. (Women who report having their strongest orgasms starting in the 40s are describing a known phenomenon. Also, a percentage of women have a libido 'rebound' after menopause.) Another meets a childhood friend last known more than 50 years ago and reports an immediate "electric shock, like magic"—and a whole new sex life. Another, in her late 70s, reads Fifty Shades of Grey and reports more orgasms than she's had since her 30s.

Such accounts tend to emphasize, or trumpet, success stories--or no one would publish or read the books. A common theme is the reborn sexual woman who now wants others to know she's having the best sex of her life.

But I do see other commonalities—and they raise questions. For example, among women who report renewed lust and fulfillment with a partner, the story is a new relationship. From what I've seen on Web dating sites catering to older men and women, even sites emphasizing infidelity of married people, a strong theme among women is "seeking a long-term relationship." My perception, and I doubt anyone will be surprised, is that men are seeking sex; if it is stimulating, then one continuing relationship or a string of relationships are both fine. It is a difference rooted in the distinct sexual nature of males in contrast to females that tends to define the sexual relationship—and conflict.

For the older woman who has long ago satisfied her exploration of sex, just 'getting laid' makes no sense. (An attractive, very sexual British sex therapist was lamenting not finding a partner. I said, mystified, 'But you're so attractive!' She replied, patiently, 'Walter, the problem is not to get laid.' Oh.) She wants at a minimum a sustained, caring, monogamous relationship and marriage or the possibility. Considering the large percentages of single and married women who never, or rarely, have sex, I conclude that many put priority on the relationship and will provide sex, if requested. For them, the older married man seeking to continue or revive sexual excitement with other women has nothing to offer—less than nothing because of the social consequences of 'getting caught.'

And yet, the 'born again' phenomenon of women who report red-hot new relationships in their later years suggests that my generalization is merely that. For them, a new relationship later in life means above all finding sexual intimacy, again—although admittedly many emphasize aspects of that intimacy such as holding, talking, being understood, and being desired and needed.

For older women, too, there is the well-known 'sex gap,' not only because women live longer, often much longer, than their male partners, but because many men prefer and are able to attract women 10 or 20 years younger. If a man's final decade of significant sexual activity is his 70s, and he is having sex with women in their 50s, who will partner women in their 70s? Only one in five women 75 and older have a partner. Joan Rivers, always a good sport, is reported to have said: "It's so long since I had sex, I've forgotten who ties up whom."

Even in this brief, altogether informal look at sexual experiences of older individuals, I have tended to emphasize women. Reports on what women say about their sexual experience seem to be everywhere; but a bit of Google searching turned up nothing comparable about what older men say.

A Revolution in Trouble

I do not have original insights into how that minority of men and women in their 70s and beyond defy the statistics—and the taboo--to continue the adventure of sex into older age. My point is that such sex already is a strong trend, an increasingly powerful one, because people live longer, are relatively healthier, and stay more physically active. All that yoga, running, exercise class attendance, biking, and health club membership has to be good for something! And a loud consensus of publications on health and lifestyles seek to dispel myths and stigma about older people have sex, positively cheering on elder lust.

Still more important is that lust and love into older age continue what my generation, the Baby Boomers, began with the sex revolution of the 1960s and 1970s. The generation that defied conventions, took advantage of the new birth-control pill and abortion, wrote more openly about sex (the Hite report), and overcame sex taboos is now the horde approaching retirement in America. Sex always has been a crusade for them and the question now is how successful they will be in this next phase of revolution against the stereotype of horny old broads and dirty old men. Already, attention to the trend, discussion of it, and above all advice are far in advance of actual practice. Tens of millions of older men and women are reading about sex and aging, daydreaming about it, listening to Dr. Ruth—instead of seeking sex.

I believe that the trend has a long way to go, that prejudice remains remarkably strong, and that one development today, the internet, encourages a lethal sexual passivity—the worst threat to the initiative and risk-taking required for older individuals to get up and DO IT.

Put it this way: All the limitations on finding, keeping, and enjoying a sex partner mean that tens of millions of men and women, including especially those 50 and older, are seeking sexual satisfaction or at least release outside of a relationship—at least a relationship of the kind we have been discussing. We all know that; it always has been so. The woman who buys Fifty Shades of Grey and experiences reborn sexual ecstasy, and the man who scans magazine racks of publications devoted to sex to choose one for evening, are turning to the kind of sexual experience that dominates the sex lives of the majority of people: fantasy and vicarious sex.

Except that today's world of vicarious sex and fantasy would be incredible to anyone 50 years ago—or even 20 years ago.

The Kinsey Institute offers highlights from a dozen recent studies of internet sex. Unfortunately, for our purposes, there are limitations; most surveys focus teenagers because of concerns about dangers and damaging effects. But overall statistics on internet pornography indicate that it is a mind-bogglingly gigantic business, with one 2005 study reporting that half of all spending on the internet is related to sex. Internet porn revenues exceed the combined revenues of ABC, NBC, and CBS.

And that is spending on internet sex. As everyone knows, you can devote the rest of your waking life to surfing a different porn Web site every day and never pay a cent (except perhaps to have viruses removed from your computer). In another 2005 study, 25 percent of men reported visiting a pornographic Web site in the past 30 days, but only 4 percent of women did. Males are an estimated two-thirds of the users of sexually explicit sites and account for three-fourths of online time. Again, we have no way to separate out older men and women in these statistics because surveyors are worried about 16 and 17 years old boys and girls, not 70-year-old men.

Also, statistics on porn sites, paid or free, drastically understate use of the internet for vicarious sexual experiences and fantasies. Facebook is not categorized as a porn site, but how much posting, 'friending,' and surfing is motivated by sex interest? A lot.

Internet sex is more private even than buying a sex magazine at a store. It poses none of the minimal dangers of patronizing a Broadway peepshow, topless bar, or massage parlor. Indeed, you don't have to leave home—or your chair. And it is cheap—free, if you resist the drumbeat of demands that you sign up to see more. The sex you see is more graphic, close up, varied, and kinky than you ever will see on stage or movie screen. The possibilities of interacting one on one, at least verbally (via video cams, for example), far exceed any passive forms of sex entertainment. On the internet, you can watch true "amateurs," real 'people next door,' doing virtually anything in any country at any age above 17.