Sex File: My partner wants to try new things in bed
We have always enjoyed our sex life, but now he keeps wanting to try new things, talking about fantasies of me with other men and women - including a female friend he has history with - which is turning me off.
Is there a way back to the sex we used to enjoy?
By the time men and women are in their mid to late 60s, sexual desire is usually declining and about half of all men in their 60s experience erectile dysfunction. The simplest explanation for the change in your partner's behaviour, therefore, is that he now needs stronger stimuli to achieve the same level of arousal and is using sexual fantasy to increase excitement.
There seems to be some underlying concern for you about when the female friend he has history with became part of this narrative, but try not to jump to conclusions. He may simply be nursing an infatuation as a way of turbocharging his interest in sex. Whether an infatuation is reciprocated or not, it is a dopamine rush, a euphoric state fuelled by lust and novelty. The possessed can think of nothing else and so they strive to introduce the person they are fixated on into any conversation, at any opportunity. Telling you about his fantasies may be a way for your partner to increase his sexual energy, but it is quite likely that the woman in question is oblivious to your partner's sexual interest in her.
Frenzied sexual vigour rarely comes from nowhere, especially in older men, so it's worth thinking about when this all started and what might have triggered it. Has he started watching a lot of porn? Did he start taking Viagra recently? Has he had other health issues? You don't mention any recent diagnoses, so this information may be irrelevant, but it is worth asking the questions in case they provide answers. Older men occasionally experience intense sexual fantasies, urges or behaviours as an unintended side-effect of drugs that are prescribed for medical conditions such as Parkinson's disease or restless leg syndrome.
It's also well known that people with dementia can become overly interested in sex - but less well known that sexual behaviour can change before any sign of cognitive decline. Psychiatrists at Uskudar University in Istanbul published a case study of a 55-year-old man who had been brought to their clinic by his wife. She was upset because he had started to stay up all night talking to women online. He was also demanding more sex from her. Neither the patient nor his wife reported any cognitive decline but MRI scans of the husband's brain subsequently revealed that he had frontotemporal dementia.
There is a lot to think about here. Your partner has been willing to share his fantasies with you and consistently puts you at the centre of them. These are good signs, but you might need to be more open about how his behaviour makes you feel so that he can allay any doubts you have about what is really driving it. If he can reassure you that there is no one else involved and that this is an attempt to inject some excitement into your relationship, there is every chance you can harness his newfound enthusiasm for sex in a very positive way.
Send your questions to suzigodson@mac.com
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