Intimacy can improve mental and physical health in middle age and beyond.
As we move from middle age into old age, we tend to have sex less often, if at all. But that doesn’t have to be true for you.
A study conducted by Stacey Lindau, M.D., and colleagues, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, shows that out of 3,005 US participants (men and women), 73 percent were still sexually active between 57 and 64 years of age, but only 53 percent were still sexually active among those 65 to 74 years of age, with the rate falling to only 26 percent among those 75 to 85 years old.
Women were significantly less likely than men at all ages to report being sexually active, but few talked about this to their therapist or their physician.
Yet sexual intimacy with a partner could be important for a satisfying emotional relationship and a satisfying emotional relationship could be important for happiness, as well as good health. So, how can we keep having a satisfying sexual intimacy with our partner as we get older?
Try these four tips for great sex after 50:
1: Know the female physiology of aging and act as soon as you can.
When women go through menopause, their body starts secreting less estrogen, which can trigger hot flashes. Those hot flashes tend to decrease as years go by. What doesn’t decrease is vaginal dryness.