Sex Therapists Reveal The Most Common Issues That Plague Your Sex Life In Your 50s — And Give Tips On How To Fix Them
Living in an ageist culture that equates sex with youth, you may believe things fizzle out in the bedroom after you hit a certain age. But in many cases, that's just not true.
In fact, 43% of Americans over age 50 say their sex life is 'just as or more adventurous' than it was in their younger days, according to one 2019 survey. Another survey from 2021 found that 35% of people in this age group say their sex drive is higher now than when they were younger.
That said, our bodies and lives change as we age, which can result in some shifts in the bedroom, too.
'It is extremely important to note, however, that while changes in sexual feeling and function as we age are normal, problems are not, though we sometimes assume they are,' clinical sexologist and sexuality educator Lawrence Siegel told HuffPost.
As we get older, we need to establish new norms for ourselves, adjusting our expectations as time passes.
'A 55-year-old should not be trying to maintain the same level of interest or stamina as a 25-year-old,' Siegel said. 'While things seem to work automatically when we're younger, we have to provide more effort and awareness to them when we get older.'
To that end, we asked Siegel and other sex therapists which bedroom issues people commonly encounter in this phase of life and how to address them.
1. Negative Beliefs About Sexuality And Aging
Our mindset around sex as we age has a huge impact on our sex lives. And negative beliefs in this area are a 'much bigger problem than most people realize,' said psychotherapist and sex therapist Nan Wise.
'We need to debunk some of the more pernicious myths and misconceptions about our sexuality as we mature. Yes, hormonal changes can negatively impact us as our bodies adjust to the shifting sands of time, but this is greatly exacerbated by our culture's hangups about sex in general and, even more so, about sex as people age,' Wise, author of 'Why Good Sex Matters,' told HuffPost.
People in their 50s have to 'get past the societal stigma that they are less sexual due to their age,' said psychologist and sex therapist Shannon Chavez. In her practice, she found that many people in this age group have better sex than when they were younger.
'They are more clear on what they want and how to express it,' she told HuffPost. 'Sex in your 50s is often more connected and comfortable with less performance anxiety and sexual hangups from the past. Most people in this age group are more confident and have had experience to know what they want and can be much more assertive towards a partner.'
2. Vaginal Dryness
Related: What Happened To This Woman's Head During Menopause Is Something You Have Got To See To Believe
The drop in estrogen levels that occurs with menopause can cause vaginal dryness — which, in turn, can impact sexual functioning. It's estimated that about half of post-menopausal women deal with this condition.
'This can lead to painful or uncomfortable sexual experiences for some, which is why all women over 50 should have a good lube on hand,' Siegel said.
Spending more time on foreplay may also be helpful. Being more aroused can increase vaginal lubrication, making sex feel more pleasurable. If vaginal penetration is too painful, other activities, such as oral sex or using sex toys, might feel more enjoyable.
It's worth noting that many women go through menopause without 'any real issues,' Siegel said, 'other than a sense of liberation from the chance of getting pregnant.'
3. Erection And Ejaculation Challenges
Related: 25 Life-Changing Habits People Added To Their Everyday Routines To Improve Their Lives For The Better
As men age, things change in the erection department — and that's normal.
'They will not have the same kinds of spontaneous or reflexive erections the way they used to,' Siegel said. 'And they will find that they may need more and varied stimulation in order to get or maintain an erection. In addition, they may also find that their erections are not as hard or robust as they used to be.'
Having erection trouble from time to time is not unusual. But if you're unable to develop or sustain an erection most times you try to have sex, you might be dealing with erectile dysfunction. Speak with your doctor, as this can be a sign of an underlying health condition.
Also, the volume of ejaculate and the force with which it's released may be 'significantly less' than what they're accustomed to, Siegel said.
Men are socialized to think their sexual vitality 'hinges on the unfailingly consistent performance of their penises,' said Wise, which can be 'a recipe for problems as men age.'
'It is also one of the most common issues that impact erectile challenges,' she said. 'Even young men experience erectile dysfunction as they become preoccupied with the state of their penises during lovemaking.'
To combat this, Siegel said the most important thing is to relieve performance pressure and change the objective of sex in the first place.
'If we approach sexual encounters with the idea that we are simply wanting to share this pleasurable experience, and if ejaculation occurs, great; if it doesn't, it can still be sharing a great, pleasurable experience,' he said. 'Our intimate and erotic experiences can be greatly increased if we look at orgasm less as a goal and more as a nice side effect of sharing pleasure.'
4. Lower Sexual Desire
Stress, physical health problems, mental health issues, medication side effects and declining hormone levels can all contribute to decreased libido.
Prevalent issues for those in their 50s include 'dealing with changes in their physical body and energy levels which can lead to low desire,' Chavez said, noting that menopause and other hormonal shifts are common during this time. 'The hormonal shifts not only affect physiology and sexual desire but can also impact mental health, including fatigue and changes in mood,' Chavez added.
She suggested getting a hormone panel to see how to balance your hormones and reduce unwanted symptoms.
'Most hormonal changes are very manageable with the right support,' she said.
'For some, hormone-replacement therapy might be appropriate,' he said.'For others, more naturalistic things like yoga, meditation, and supplements can be helpful.'
Siegel said, 'it's perfectly normal' to have less interest in sex as we age.
Finding ways to reduce stress in your life can improve your libido and your overall well-being.
Finding ways to alleviate stress may increase your desire for sex and make you happier and healthier overall. For example, Wise recommends daily breathing exercises to 'access the healing power of the parasympathetic 'restorative' state.'
'Most of us spend most of our time in 'fight-or-flight,' which is when the body pumps out stress hormones that aren't meant to be flooding us so consistently,' she said. 'This perpetual state of hormonal stress erodes our sense of well-being and can put a kibosh on our sex drives, to boot.'
Take five minutes once or twice a day to do this practice. First, find a quiet spot to sit and 'give yourself permission to be exactly as you are and for the moment to be exactly as it is,' Wise said. This is also known as radical acceptance.
'By giving yourself permission to start from where you are, you can loosen and soften a whole lot of the stress we accumulate when we resist what is,' she said.
Then take a long, smooth inhalation through your nose and a long soft exhalation.
'When you make your exhalation longer than the inhalation, your brilliant body shifts your nervous system into the restorative mode, your heart slows down, and your stress hormones decrease,' Wise said.
When stress crops up throughout the day, consider that your cue to slow your breathing.
'You may find that this simple practice becomes a wonderful new habit that enhances overall well-being and helps you tune into your lust for life — both in and out of the bedroom,' Wise said. 'Remember, pleasure isn't a luxury. It's a necessity for a healthy mind and body and a life worth living!' This article originally appeared on HuffPost.
Also in Goodful: Women Are Revealing How Their Lives Have Been Affected By President Trump's Policies, And They're Not Holding Back ANYTHING
Also in Goodful: "I Can't Wait For This To Go Out Of Style": People Are Sharing Popular Modern Trends That Are Actually Pretty Toxic
Also in Goodful: Boyfriends Are Sharing What They Never Knew About Women Until They Started Dating One, And These Discoveries Are Pure Relationship Gold
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
44 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Longevity expert Dr Mark Hyman's daily routine: the key to long living? A simple routine
I wake up and usually journal for a while, taking some meditative time. Then I'll work out in the gym — weight training and cardio — and then have a protein shake. I put a bunch of stuff in there including creatine, which is shown to be really helpful not only with muscle building but also cognitive health. Other nutritional supplements I think are important are omega 3, vitamin D, curcumin and oral nicotinamide mononucleotide. Then I have a sauna and a cold plunge most days. I have a wellness studio in my garage, with a hyperbaric chamber, a Pulsed Electromagnetic Fieldmat, laser robotherapy and a HYPOXI machine, so I play around with those. There are lots of interesting developments in longevity. There has been a lot of research around Klotho, which is emerging as a potential therapeutic gene therapy, stem cells, plasmapheresis and Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy. You can reverse your biological age just through the basics, however. I reversed mine by four years in two years. The last time I checked my biological age was 39, through a methylation test. Right now, most people could probably live to 100 if they applied all the science. Most of the medicines today focus on symptom-based treatment. If you have a disease, they give you a drug and you have surgery. Functional medicine, by contrast, is a framework of scientific wellness. In order to have a healthy lifespan, a number of things are necessary: it's what you eat, it's exercise, it's getting adequate sleep, it's managing stress — and then there's a whole set of other additional therapies that can help activate the body's own healing system. There are built-in longevity switches, I call them, in the body. There are many ways to activate them that most people don't understand. You go to your regular doctor and ask them to help you get healthier and they reply: come back when you have a disease. That's really unfortunate because what we're now learning is that the human body has this immense capacity for healing and repair. We live in a coddled environment. Temperatures are always 16 degrees, we always have an abundance of food, we don't have to move our bodies and we don't have any stresses — historically humans had to deal with all kinds of physiological stresses, hot and cold and hunger. If you fast for a few days you activate a longevity switch. It's called autophagy — it's a bit like a self-cleaning oven. You have these Pac-man like lysosomes that chew up all the old proteins and recycle them. I do not eat a very inflammatory diet. Three things I always pick up at the grocery store are olive oil, small fish like sardines, herring and mackerel, and cruciferous vegetables. I've found a diet of nuts and seeds and vegetables and fruit and protein and olive oil really helps with the microbiome and resets your insulin signalling. Elevated insulin levels drive most ageing; they cause cancer, heart disease, dementia, diabetes, infertility and mental health issues. When you cut out all the crap and ultra-processed food, you increase longevity. I definitely don't drink. I might have a tequila once a month, but there's no safe amount of alcohol. Sleep is critical. It's repair time. I try to get eight hours of sleep and go to bed and wake up at the same time, but it's not easy. I have a lot of relationships, a lot of community. Your close friends — not social media — are a key part of longevity. Dr Mark Hyman leads the RoseBar Longevity Clinic at Six Senses Ibiza. A one-night stay starts at £552 based on two sharing, breakfast included,
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
‘Safe route' or ‘sushi route' − 2 strategies to turn yuck to yum and convince people to eat unusual foods
What will the diets of the future look like? The answer depends in part on what foods Westerners can be persuaded to eat. These consumers are increasingly being told their diets need to change. Current eating habits are unsustainable, and the global demand for meat is growing. Recent years have seen increased interest and investment in what are called alternative proteins – products that can replace typical meats with more sustainable alternatives. One option is cultivated, or cultured, meat and seafood: muscle tissue grown in labs in bioreactors, using animal stem cells. Another approach involves replacing standard meat with such options as insects or plant-based imitation meats. All of these products promise a more sustainable alternative to factory-farmed meat. The question is, will consumers accept them? I'm a philosopher who studies food and disgust, and I'm interested in how people react to new foods such as lab-grown meat, bugs and other so-called alternative proteins. Disgust and food neophobia – a fear of new foods – are often cited as obstacles to adopting new, more sustainable food choices, but I believe that recent history offers a more complicated picture. Past shifts in food habits suggest there are two paths to the adoption of new foods: One relies on familiarity and safety, the other on novelty and excitement. Disgust is a strong feeling of revulsion in response to objects perceived to be contaminating, polluting or unclean. Scientists believe that it evolved to protect human beings from invisible contaminants such as pathogens and parasites. Some causes of disgust are widely shared, such as feces or vomit. Others, including foods, are more culturally variable. So it's not surprising that self-reported willingness to eat insects varies across nationalities. Insects have been an important part of traditional diets of cultures around the world for thousands of years, including the ancient Greeks. Many articles about the possibility of introducing insects to Western or American diners have emphasized the challenges posed by neophobia and 'the yuck factor.' People won't accept these new foods, the thinking goes, because they're too different or even downright disgusting. If that's right, then the best approach to win space on the plate for new foods might be to try to make them seem similar to familiar menu items. During World War II, the United States government wanted to redirect its limited meat supply to troops on the front lines. So it needed to convince home cooks to give up their steaks, chops and roasts in favor of what it called variety meats: kidneys, liver, tongue and so on. To figure out how to shift consumer habits, a team of psychologists and anthropologists was charged with studying how food habits and preferences were formed – and how they could be changed. The Committee on Food Habits recommended stressing these organ meats' similarity to available, familiar, existing foods. This approach – call it the 'safe route' – focuses on individual attitudes and choices. It tries to remove psychological and practical barriers to individual choice and counteracts beliefs or values that might dissuade people from adopting new foods. As the name suggests, the safe route tries to downplay novelty, using familiar forms and tastes. For example, it would incorporate unfamiliar cuts of meats into meatloaf or meatballs or grind crickets into flour for cookies or protein bars. But more recent history suggests something different: Foods such as sushi, offal and even lobster became desirable not despite but because of their novelty and difference. Sushi's arrival in the postwar U.S. coincided with the rise of consumer culture. Dining out was gaining traction as a leisure activity, and people were increasingly open to new experiences as a sign of status and sophistication. Rather than appealing to the housewife preparing comfort foods, sushi gained popularity by appealing to the desire for new and exciting experiences. By 1966, The New York Times reported that New Yorkers were dining on 'raw fish dishes, sushi and sashimi, with a gusto once reserved for corn flakes.' Now, of course, sushi is widely consumed, available even in grocery stores nationwide. In fact, the grocery chain Kroger sells more than 40 million pieces of sushi a year. Whereas the safe route suggests sneaking new foods into our diets, the sushi route suggests embracing their novelty and using that as a selling point. Sushi is just one example of a food adopted via this route. After the turn of the millennium, a new generation of diners rediscovered offal as high-end restaurants and chefs offered 'nose to tail' dining. Rather than positioning foods like tongue and pigs' ears as familiar and comforting, a willingness to embrace the yuck factor became a sign of adventurousness, even masculinity. This framing is the exact opposite of the safe route recommended by the Committee on Food Habits. What lessons can be drawn from these examples? For dietary shifts to last, they should be framed positively. Persuading customers that variety meats were a necessary wartime substitution worked temporarily but ultimately led to the perception that they were subpar choices. If cultivated meat and insects are pitched as necessary sacrifices, any gains they make may be temporary at best. Instead, producers could appeal to consumers' desire for healthier, more sustainable and more exciting foods. Cultivated meat may be 'safe-ly' marketed as nuggets and burgers, but, in principle, the options are endless: Curious consumers could sample lab-grown whale or turtle meat guilt-free, or even find out what woolly mammoth tasted like. Ultimately, the chefs, consumers and entrepreneurs seeking to remake our food systems don't need to choose just one route. While we can grind insects into protein powders, we can also look to chefs cooking traditional cuisines that use insects to broaden our culinary horizons. This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit, independent news organization bringing you facts and trustworthy analysis to help you make sense of our complex world. It was written by: Alexandra Plakias, Hamilton College Read more: Plant-based meat alternatives are trying to exit the culture wars – an impossible task? Gluten-sensitive liberals? Investigating the stereotype suggests food fads unite us all Would you eat 'meat' from a lab? Consumers aren't necessarily sold on 'cultured meat' Alexandra Plakias does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Why Hims & Hers Health Stock Is Crashing Today
Novo Nordisk is ending its relationship with the company, removing its ability to sell the uber-popular drug Wegovy. Novo alleges Hims & Hers was not following standards and was endangering patient safety. 10 stocks we like better than Hims & Hers Health › Shares of Hims & Hers Health (NYSE: HIMS) are imploding on Monday, down 32% as of 3:03 p.m. ET. The drop comes as the S&P 500 rose 0.8% and the Nasdaq Composite rose 0.7%. Novo Nordisk announced it will cut ties with Hims & Hers, saying the telehealth provider can no longer sell compounded versions of its blockbuster GLP-1 weight loss drug Wegovy. Novo Nordisk announced this morning that it is ending a partnership with Hims & Hers that allowed the telehealth provider to sell Novo's blockbuster weight-loss drug, Wegovy. According to Novo Nordisk, Hims & Hers "failed to adhere to the law which prohibits mass sales of compounded drugs under the false guise of 'personalization.'" Hims & Hers offered compounded versions of Wegovy, claiming it offered medically necessary personalization for some patients. The compounded versions, according to Novo, were sourced out of China and the labs producing them failed to meet standards or be approved by U.S. regulators. In a statement on X, Hims & Hers CEO Andrew Dudum said the company is "disappointed to see Novo Nordisk management misleading the public" and that it would "not compromise the integrity of our platform to appease a third party." The loss of its ability to sell Wegovy is a significant hit to Hims & Hers' business. The massive drop today in its stock reflects this, but even after falling more than 30%, the stock is still too expensive for my taste. Before you buy stock in Hims & Hers Health, consider this: The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now… and Hims & Hers Health wasn't one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years. Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $664,089!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $881,731!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 994% — a market-crushing outperformance compared to 172% for the S&P 500. Don't miss out on the latest top 10 list, available when you join . See the 10 stocks » *Stock Advisor returns as of June 23, 2025 Johnny Rice has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Hims & Hers Health. The Motley Fool recommends Novo Nordisk. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. Why Hims & Hers Health Stock Is Crashing Today was originally published by The Motley Fool Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
