Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I’m sixty-four? The Beatles addressed this important topic on their Sgt. Pepper album in 1967 and in today’s episode Laurie and George are giving listeners the answers. Join us as we answer the burning questions related to sex and older age; what to expect and how to talk about it. Aging is an inevitable fact of life and while often associated with problems, it can actually bring a lot of opportunity for healthy change in your relationship.
Desire differences often driven by changes in hormones will have partners seeking new ways to connect, inspiring more creativity and playfulness. Our hosts guide listeners through the essential conversation to have with your partner and specific questions to ask each other. It’s so important that we name aging out loud and put heads and hearts together to navigate this phase of life. Be brave lovers and keep it hot, y’all!
Transcript
Laurie Watson, PhD (00:03.448)
George, let’s talk about aging and desire and whether or not we can still have a good sex life as we get a little bit older.
George (00:24.29)
Hmm. I don’t know. Does it still work, Laurie, is what I’m thinking about as we get older. this is a…
Laurie Watson, PhD (00:30.03)
I’m worried about like, do you still want me? You know, like, is my partner still gonna find me desirable? Those are the things I worry about. I think the working thing, yes, we can make it all work. So hang in there, everybody. Let’s talk about it.
George (00:48.578)
All right, agent is definitely for the brave, Laurie. It’s not easy as body parts start breaking down and we start sailing into the sunset. We’re like… No. No.
Laurie Watson, PhD (01:00.908)
Not for the faint of heart for sure. I find getting up from my chair when I’ve been sitting for a long time like a little creaky. Little creaky.
George (01:10.35)
Creaky.
I never thought about my age and now, like you said, it gives you little reminders every couple of moments you get up and your feet are numb. I look at a mirror, your brain still thinks you’re 20 years younger. And then all of a sudden, I know playing pickleball, I played the other day and it’s like, I can make that. like my brain thinks I can, but my body’s just a little behind.
Laurie Watson, PhD (01:32.878)
That’s funny.
It’s hard. I think that the biggest difficulty is there are so many changes that face us at midlife. Our relationship has changed often if we’ve had children. Children are leaving the home and that actually changes our sex life. Just kind of the watching of the next generation and all their possibility, right? All their…
possibility about life, but also their possibility sexually. They’re young, they’re vibrant, and they’re full of that sexual chemistry and energy for each other. sometimes we can envy that. It’s like, wow, I remember having that. And it’s so exciting. And suddenly we’re in a long-term marriage with maybe some of that early chemistry gone. And it can feel difficult, like facing this
stage in life, how it impacts us sexually when we’re comparing that to either what used to be for ourselves or what is for our children. And there’s kind of that sense of how do I age gracefully, enjoy all that for them and have some hope for what I can have in my relationship.
George (02:54.37)
Yeah, I definitely think a healthy part of aging is dealing with the loss of youth, the loss of a lot of that energy vitality, not to be depressed about it, but just there’s a grief to not accessing some of that. And how do you transition into a new phase? Right? I mean, I think that’s the key of what we’re always trying to encourage. How do you have conversations that are about
how you’re both changing instead of hoping to be the people you were 20 years ago.
Laurie Watson, PhD (03:27.564)
Yeah, exactly. And Esther Perel has that beautiful, pithy little statement where she says, you know, expect two marriages in every lifetime, sometimes to the same person. Because at midlife, know, lots of things, the change means we have to re-examine who we are. And are we going to have what we need in this relationship? It’s going to require a lot of talking.
George (03:40.067)
Hmm.
George (03:56.002)
We definitely gonna have her on our show. I’ll see you next week. you know, she has a lot of those witty sayings that get us to kind of challenge sometimes how we see things. But I know that that line makes you optimistic and it makes me optimistic, right? Because we really believe that if two people face changes together.
they’re gonna grow and transform. There’s something beautiful and redemptive about the process. And aging is just another one of those opportunities, right? But if you can’t talk about it, then you’re really set up for negative cycles and trouble. I have a friend who is, you know, this huge muscle kind of macho dude who’s, you know, less interested in sex now than he has been his whole life. And he…
I’m sure that has something to do with a drop in testosterone, but he has no idea how to talk about it. He made a flippant remark. I’m sure his, his wife notices something’s going on and yet they don’t know how to talk about these things. And I could just see like the pressure mounting and you know, if we can’t talk about it, does she take it as not interested in her and rejection? She feels more pressure. He feels more pressure. ED kicks in. Who knows where this stuff goes, but this is what the lack of conversation produces.
Laurie Watson, PhD (05:18.254)
Many people experience a difference in desire just with the drop in hormones. Women have a precipitous drop in hormones at menopause and that often creates much lower desire not to mention physiological changes like vaginal dryness and slower arousal. I had a woman who was menopausal, I did an intake for her and she’s like, yeah, it takes me twice as long. And I’m like, how long is that? She’s like, it takes me 20 minutes. And I was like, that’s excellent.
George (05:24.257)
Yeah.
Laurie Watson, PhD (05:48.16)
for a menopausal woman. That’s amazing, you know, if it takes you 20 minutes. She didn’t know that. She also didn’t use vibrators. like, girl, you know, if you want to speed it up, here you go. But anyway, I think that’s difficult. And I think men, many men have a drop in testosterone.
George (05:55.191)
Right.
Laurie Watson, PhD (06:07.126)
And if they’re not getting tested, they don’t know what’s happening to their bodies. And a drop in desire is kind of a significant health problem for a male, because it could be just idiopathic testosterone drops. They don’t know why. But it could signify something’s going on that they need to kind of get to the bottom of. So you got to tell your buddy, you should go to the urologist. Get that checked out,
George (06:27.437)
Yeah.
George (06:31.97)
Yeah, well, it’s not to be dramatic, but you know, for a lot of men, it is a true identity crisis, right? It’s something that they so depend on and how they see themselves. And all of a sudden it’s not so dependable anymore. Right. And that’s that forces you to have to face fears and vulnerability. And if you have a lifetime of avoiding that, then guess what? You’re just going to try. And I was shocked, but now it’s it’s actually predictable. It’s mostly men who stop having sex.
Laurie Watson, PhD (07:01.742)
It is that, and I know that certainly one listener’s not gonna believe this, they write us all the time about menopause and how awful it is when women stop having sex because of menopause. And we agree 100 % that any unilateral decision to stop having sex is wrong and enraging. But you are right, that statistically it’s men who shut down sex more firmly, no pun intended, than women.
George (07:02.072)
Right?
George (07:30.254)
That firm has something to do with it, right?
Laurie Watson, PhD (07:31.696)
Yeah, think so. mean, because a lot of men have desire, but once they get ED, they’re humiliated by that. And so they just don’t want to try because they don’t want to face not even what their partner will feel about it, but what they will feel about having ED.
George (07:49.933)
That’s the sad setup for so many men. It’s because of the emotional avoidance that they’ve, you know, in the emotional cycle, they’ve just been raised to not face vulnerability, fears, insecurities, right? So, and they don’t have to deal with that in the sexual cycle because the testosterone is so dependable and strong. And like now when it finally hits some of these vulnerabilities,
They really only know how to avoid it, which just means losing a part of themselves that’s such a rich source of how they connect in a world. It really is a tragic setup.
Laurie Watson, PhD (08:24.952)
Right, because they see their role as often sexual performers, right? That they have to make their partner happy or that they have to have great erections, instant great erections, and they have to have a lot of desire. And I think many men, as desire falls, it doesn’t mean that they can’t enjoy a sexual encounter just as much as they did, but they don’t have that same impetus like to start the incident.
George (08:55.074)
Well, when you don’t have to think about your erection, you can be in a present moment. Like you’re just enjoying it. But when that fear creeps in and your brain’s like, is it going to stay hard? that like, that’s that it’s hard to enjoy it as much, you know? So this is, it’s, it’s, it is like a bucket of cold water. gets poured on top of you.
And you really got to be able to face that and communicate that with your partner and figure out, you know, ways of dealing with that threat response. And because you don’t have, a lot of men don’t have practice doing that. They just face it alone and they could get lost. mean, it’s hard to not equate aging with ED because like you said, the body is going in that direction anyway. And now they don’t have the tools to deal with it. So it really becomes a crisis point.
Laurie Watson, PhD (09:41.078)
I agree. I mean, I can imagine how difficult it is. I think that for women, because they can have a fulfilling sexual encounter, whether they’re very aroused or not, I mean, certainly they need to be aroused enough, lubricated enough, all that. I’m not saying women should just lie there, but I think that they can receive intercourse, therefore do their part so their performance anxiety is much lower.
But I also think that women struggle with, like in certain cycles in relationships, right, if the man wants her to get into it just as much as he’s into it and she’s like, you know, I’m tired, I’m in menopause.
I want to make love to you, I want to be close to you, but it’s not my night. You know, I’m not going to have an orgasm. I need too much internal energy to do that. And if the cycle says, you know, okay, now you’re a failure, she too faces some performance anxiety as well.
George (10:42.574)
Yeah. It’s, it’s, we almost should do a comedy skit where, know, you can see a couple of their thirties and forties and you got the, the husbands pushing the wives have sex and wives like, whatever. don’t really care if you have the, before, you know, it, it’s like the fifties and sixties. now the men are kind of agreeing with the wives. It’s not that big of a deal. And it’s like, what is happening here? You know, to couples that are losing this huge way into connection.
just because they don’t know how to talk about these changes in their bodies and how that’s impacting everything, right? It doesn’t need to be that way.
Laurie Watson, PhD (11:19.47)
I agree. I agree. The anxiety about that, I think really causes, you know, people to sort of have dwindling vitality in their sex life, because they, they don’t want to talk about it. So they feel that pressure. And then they just avoid it. And imagine two people, we wrote about this in our book, two kind of emotional avoiders.
you know, who have a decent sex life, but then they hit menopause and that’s a big menopause and aging for him as well. And it’s a big bump in the road. You know, it can really shut down their sexual connection. And I think that it’s disappointing if you’re like always wanting fantastic sex every single time, like thinking about, and I know I used to think about this. Well, let’s come back. I have so many thoughts, George. Let’s come back and talk about this.
George (11:55.01)
Yeah.
Laurie Watson, PhD (12:15.554)
So I just, I think when I was younger, the idea of having sex as an older person and it not being hot every single time or it being just loving, I don’t know, that was kind of a drip to me. It was like, that didn’t feel as good, like thinking about that.
George (12:37.868)
Yeah, I don’t think it’s the destiny. mean, it’s almost like there’s this belief out there that it’s just sex is gonna suck as you get older, right? It’s like, it’s just doomed. And that’s not actually the research, there’s so many people, know, older people have an amazing sex. Some of the best sex in the world are happening by older people, right? They have less inhibitions, they have more practice, they’re more in their bodies, they’re more priminous, so many elements they could tap into. They’re more connected, right?
Right. So it is, it’s just for me, how do you transition from these changes that mean both partners have to do something differently, right? They have to be able to communicate about these changes. If you can communicate, you can pivot together and use that these changes as a way of knowing each other more deeply, more intimately. That’s, that’s the opportunity in aging that I don’t think a lot of people recognize. They just see the problems with aging.
And, and the setup to kind of have lower desire or whatever else they don’t see the, the, the hopeful side that I think me and you do see with a lot of couples.
Laurie Watson, PhD (13:45.102)
Right, exactly. So let’s talk about what people need to do. think we have one minute. Okay. Okay, so first, I think what you are reiterating here is we need to acknowledge these changes openly.
George (13:52.033)
No, no, it’s just the sound went out. cut that out,
Pause,
George (14:08.76)
Keep talking, sir, if I see what happened here.
George (14:18.038)
You can hear me.
George (14:27.15)
Now go ahead, now I can hear you. thing got unplugged. Pick that up. Sorry, Joe. All right.
Laurie Watson, PhD (14:30.686)
Okay, okay, good. Sorry, Joe. No big deal. Okay, so let’s talk about what people need to do. And you’re saying and have been saying throughout this episode, first, we need to acknowledge the change openly, right? We need to say we’re getting older. How is this changing us? Let’s talk about it instead of hiding.
George (14:45.838)
Mm-hmm.
Laurie Watson, PhD (14:53.282)
you know maybe I don’t feel as much desire, my arousal is slower, my hormones have shifted, know fatigue gets in the way or I have ED or I have delayed ejaculation, you know like let’s talk about it so that we can put our brains together and figure it out and not have shame over things that are actually normal for our age.
George (15:16.536)
Yeah, good stuff.
Laurie Watson, PhD (15:19.838)
And I think too, certainly for women, a bigger aspect is the change in their appearance, right? That, you know, we’re aging. And I think that the world is quite a bit harder on aging women than on aging men. I mean, when we look at the movies, right, there’s 70-year-old men being partnered with 35-year-old female lead actresses, right? And that’s kind of normalized.
George (15:47.587)
Yeah.
Laurie Watson, PhD (15:48.204)
You know, so it’s like being partnered at, you know, with somebody your own age, it’s like that’s really different than what we see in Hollywood. And so it’s a little scary. Like how does my attractiveness now…
George (16:28.276)
Hey, we’re all share some of there’s a lot of pressure to be young in our culture, right? So getting old is is it is a hard job. So that’s why it’s even more important to have to talk about. we want I want to read a couple of questions just for our listeners to think about, Laurie, you know, to talk about. So have you noticed anything changing in how your body works or how it gets aroused or how it responds to to talk directly about your body?
Are you satisfied with how your sex life has evolved over time? Is there anything you miss from an earlier point in your sex life? Are there things you worry about in the future with your sex life? Is there something exciting that you might be looking forward to in the future together?
George (17:34.217)
It’s such a beautiful opportunity for people to reflect together. know, what can you learn about each other? Experience aging and sexually who you become. And more importantly, how do you support these changes? How do you kind of give care given to somebody? I mean, I don’t know what gets more insecure when we’re facing a body that we don’t like as much, right? That’s a little bit more difficult.
This is where we’re going to need support from our partner the most, but not if we don’t know how to talk about it. And then can you see the opportunities in these conversations of aging together?
Laurie Watson, PhD (18:12.876)
Right. I think we need to share our fears with each other rather than protecting ourselves, withdrawing from these conversations, because we know that that vulnerability brings empathy from our partner, which makes us closer. And the closer we feel, we have more freedom for eroticism that is changing. And maybe eroticism is not always penis and vagina sex. Maybe it’s more oral sex or manual sex.
George (18:35.852)
Yeah, that’s.
Laurie Watson, PhD (18:42.8)
stimulation or mutual masturbation, cuddling together naked and exploring our minds like with role play and erotic storytelling and just things that, you know, maybe make it hotter between us but different.
George (18:49.517)
Mm-hmm.
George (18:59.938)
Yeah, it’s hard work to resist the urge of your defensive move. You know, I can see this in my relationship. I teach this all over the world and sometimes I’m laid in bed and I’m like, I should just say something. And that, that, that, pressure to just avoid a conflict, to just not hurt someone’s feelings, to not like, we have all these good reasons to defend ourselves, right? But I always remind myself anytime we defend ourselves and it feels in a short term, like it’s protecting us, which it is.
Right. In the long term, it’s, guaranteeing that we have unmet needs, that there’s some need inside of us that is not being responded to. Right. And that is really the definition of a negative cycle, right? Unmet needs, neither part to get in caregiving. If you don’t ask or you don’t talk about it, guess what? You’re definitely not getting what you need in those places.
So to avoid a fight, you settle for more distance. You settle for somebody not knowing you. Even if you’re part of the cat respond, I think there’s something so important about kind of sending a direct signal. Like this is my truth. This is what I need. This is where I’m at. And do you want to know me here?
Laurie Watson, PhD (20:12.002)
Yeah. And here, think kind of one thing I want to add before we leave that the here is that, especially in long term relationship, not only is sex changing, and our relationship needs new definition, but we’re approaching a time that, you know, friends and relatives are starting to age, have disease, die. I was laying in bed the other night.
And it was kind of the middle of the night. I don’t know what time it was. Maybe four in the morning or something. And I was just aware of my husband laying next to me and I reached out and stroked him several times. He says in the morning, he said he remembered me doing that. But it was kind of this sense of you’re not always going to be here. You know, like.
Like, are you still alive? Are we still together? And I mean, for all I know, I’ll die first. But there is this sense of facing that mortality together, I think, that brings to life more of what we have now. It’s like it’s not forever. You know, we are going to lose each other. And so we want to be as involved with each other as we can while we have each other. And it’s such a risk, I think, to…
George (21:20.258)
Mm-hmm.
Laurie Watson, PhD (21:31.438)
give over and surrender to a love, a long love, it’s easier to kind of protect yourself and pull back a little bit, you know, not give as much because oh my gosh, we’re gonna, we’re gonna lose that love, you know, and I always say that, you know, the greater the love story, the worse the ending.
Right, the more you surrender and love your partner, the worse it is when they die. We were with friends last night and she has just been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. And these people are the most loving people I know. They’re hilarious, but they’ve been married for 50 years and we always ask them, how do y’all keep it so together and love each other so much? And they’re like, we keep the weapons out of the house. They’re really funny, but they clearly
George (22:18.766)
All right.
Laurie Watson, PhD (22:21.2)
have loved each other and loved their children all these years. They’re still in love, even with this diagnosis. And you see that and you’re just like, wow, that’s 10 more years for us.
George (22:27.918)
Mm.
George (22:36.63)
It reminds me after September 11th, you know, as a new therapist, besides working at Ground Zero, I ran a group, a support group for parents who lost their sons in 9-11. So there were like six or seven couples who would meet religiously every Thursday for years, for at least five years, right? And it felt like I didn’t really, I didn’t know what I was doing. I was really doing much. It was really the support that they were offering to each other.
Like it was a place they could come together and share the loss and not have to worry about, you know, other people or any. And it was just so bonding, which is what makes me think about these conversations. It’s like. This is where we need people to most are part of the most. And when we could show up for each other, I mean, the story you told that her husband can support her in her challenge. She’s not wanting Alzheimer’s. It’s.
It’s been forced upon them. This is what life is throwing their way, but they’re willing to grab each other’s hand and say, all right, how is this going to change things? And how do we face this? And let’s do this together. And there’s something so powerful about
Laurie Watson, PhD (23:44.938)
I know, I know. It’s so sweet and so powerful and I gotta say they’re still telling dirty jokes, they’re so funny. know, they really are a lovely, lovely couple and I’d love to dedicate this episode to Coach Lou and to Nora, people who have been surrogate parents to my husband and sort of the greatest love story I’ve seen lived out in front of me and so beautiful, beautiful people and.
George (23:52.792)
Haha
Laurie Watson, PhD (24:15.63)
pray for health and holding and healing during this time. Yeah, and then that what a lovely thing, right? To have somebody before you who has walked it before you and stayed in love and stayed hot. And hopefully some of you have that in your lives as well. It’s a good role model.
George (24:38.04)
Yeah. And laugh, please, everyone, as we age. Don’t take ourselves too seriously. I think that’s a nice part that we could find when there’s lower expectations and we’re in the same mess together. It can be really enjoyable.
Laurie Watson, PhD (24:54.312)
Exactly. Okay, thanks for listening.
George (24:58.072)
Keep it hot, y’all.
