A Midlife Sex Conversation

There is going to be a sex question and survey for you at the end of this post so I hope you’ll read through.

This week we are having an ongoing conversation in the WomenBloom forums about sex and midlife. We have a couple of guests in the conversation, Gayle Michaels and Jade Beaty, who between them have an amazing breadth of sexual experience and wisdom to share. Both of them are firm believers that sex is a sacred and spiritual gift that has the capacity to add enormous joy and intimacy to our lives. And, that it is all too often treated with secrecy, shame and disrespect. They are on a mission to help people experience it more deeply and joyfully.

The reason we decided to do this is because I don’t think we midlife women talk about this very much, I can pretty well guarantee not with the complete frankness Gayle and Jade do. Oh sure, the occasional semi-embarrassed giggly exchange with a girlfriend but not really conversation. Am I wrong about this?

And, am I the only middle aged woman who still has a conservative voice in my head telling me that sex is only to be enjoyed within the sanctity of a marriage? And, I better not think about enjoying that too much or, heaven forbid, having it with myself, because I’ll go crazy and end up in a mental institution. Oh, no, I think the mental institution is only reserved for those who pleasure themselves. Oh yeah, that’s right, the marriage one is primly doing the wifely duty thing but not having an orgasm. Anyway....

I even used to think that ANY physical contact even as simple as a kiss MEANT something significant, a kind of implied launch down the path to matrimony or something like that. I have a guy friend whom I met a few years ago now on Match. For various reasons, we never connected ‘romantically’ but we kept up and would occasionally get together for a glass of wine. Well, at some point I found myself making out with him in the back of a dark bar and enjoying it immensely. After the first time, I had some angst about ‘What Did It MEAN?” After it happened a couple more times, I came to see that it’s possible to just do it for the sheer pleasure of it. It doesn’t have to mean ANYthing.

I know. Duh.

My views of sex have changed quite a bit since I was married and widowed 14 years ago. Most certainly, I’ve become more curious and relaxed about it. My attitudes about sharing sexually aren’t as casual as deliciously making out in a dark bar, but if there is someone you like and respect, and there is some chemistry there, and each is free from other commitments, what is wrong with that? With all the usual warnings about STDs and safe sex and the rest, of course. Most of us aren’t gonna be doin’ the baby thing anymore so....what?

I’m told by my friend, Karen Kreps, who writes a column called True Intimacies that 50-something men tell her that us middle-aged women are pretty much rarin’ to go on the sexual front, screw long term relationship or commitment of any kind. And, if you can believe this, the men are the ones protesting, ‘hey wait a minute, can’t we connect on a deeper level before we jump in the sack?’ Hmmm.

Anyway, I’m curious how you see it. How have your views about sex changed as you reached midlife? Or, have they? I hope you’ll comment but you can also take this easy as pie survey which might be kinda fun. Or you could do both in the interests of giving me both subjective and rigorously quantitative data. hee hee.

Then, I’m off to call my guy friend for, er, a glass of wine.

Juno On Giving Away Our Power

Last week, WomenBloom published an interesting article by Rebecca Hamm, a Master Sufi and therapist, about personal power. How we give it away, or not. Basically, Rebecca explained that when we put someone else’s needs, expectations, or demands in front of our own, in a way that ignores our higher good or our own ‘truth’, we are asking for trouble.

Basically, the concept as I see it means putting the responsibility for stuff smack where it belongs. We always have a choice to keep our power even if we think we don’t. If we think we have no choice because it would upset the spouse, or disappoint our mother, or a million other things, it usually just means the choices are sucky and we don’t want to make them...but alas, it doesn’t mean they aren’t choices we have.

Dang!

I watched the movie Juno over the weekend which seemed like a great illustration of what I’m talking about here. It was a great lesson in keeping one’s power. Juno could easily have gotten an abortion and given her power away by saying she had no choice, she was only 16 and too young to be a good mother. Or, she had no choice, she couldn’t embarrass her parents by going through a pregnancy. Her choices were pretty sucky, but she didn’t blame anyone for her predicament, and she got in touch with her own ‘truth’ which was to have that baby and find a loving home for it.

That might not have been someone else’s ‘truth’ but it was hers, and she endured quite a bit of hardship for her choice, and for keeping her power. Her internal truth revealed that for her an abortion would not be in her highest good even if it might have saved her a lot of embarrassment and discomfort in the short run.

Thankfully, her parents supported her but if they hadn’t, it would have been easy for a 16 year old to put the embarrassment of her parents before the lifetime of regret she would endure for making a choice she felt wasn’t in her highest good. In other words, it would have been easy to give her power away.

Just to be clear, I intend no judgment on whether abortion is right or wrong, the answer is different for everyone. It’s about the difficult choices one young woman had before her, and whether she made the one that was right for her.

One thing Rebecca said that stuck with me was that giving our power away often comes from the assumption that we are solely responsible for someone else’s emotions and psychological well-being. That we have to control and manage their feelings because they can’t, or won’t. We treat them as if they are powerless to do that for themselves. It often means giving way to someone else’s feelings even if it means doing something we know isn’t good for us.

Juno’s parents no doubt endured some embarrassment and angst about her decision, but rightfully, they took that on as their own responsibility to deal with and trusted that their daughter was doing the right thing for her.

In the process, Juno learned some valuable lessons about love and the messiness of life.

Which begs the question....Why is it that we usually have to learn valuable life lessons in the midst of messy/painful/challenging/sucky situations?? That’s a whole other subject....sigh.