Posts by Joan Price
How has your idea changed of what sex is?
I was interviewed by Audacia Ray for her Naked City column for the Village Voice online. Audacia asked me, “How has your idea of what ‘sex’ is changed over your lifetime?”
In my teens and early twenties, I was trying to shed the restrictions I had been taught by family and society about sex being bad until a wedding band somehow transformed it, so sex was rebellion. Although I willingly shed my virginity at 17, I didn’t have an orgasm until two years later. Being a child of the 1950’s, I didn’t even know what/where my clitoris was or what made it work, until a more experienced college boy showed me. I haven’t stopped enjoying it since!
From my mid-twenties to early-thirties, sex was both an expression of love and an exploration of what turned me on. I was in two committed relationships (serially) during that time, and I loved the high and the bonding of sex.
In my mid-thirties and through my forties, sex was the Big O: orgasm, as frequently as possible. I was in a love relationship for part of that time which was sometimes exclusive and sometimes open, and after that broke up, I went a bit crazy with the excitement of multiple partners. This was my real coming of age, sexually. I discovered the glory of powerful orgasms, whether alone or with a partner (or series of partners), filling my drawers with vibrators and my datebook with eager men.
During all this time, my hormonal, biological urge was propelling my sex drive. After menopause, all this shifted.
I was a post-menopausal single woman, needing lubricant, taking longer to get aroused and reach orgasm, and as eager as I was to keep my sex life going, often I felt invisible to potential partners. I still felt youthful and vibrant in my mind (still do, at 64!), but my face started showing my age, and boom, men were no longer interested. It was amazing to me, really.
Then at age 57, I fell in love with Robert, who was then 64. Our love affair was the reason I wrote my book, Better Than I Ever Expected: Straight Talk about Sex After Sixty. My sex drive was no longer hormonally driven. Rather, it was driving by love, the yearning to bond deeply, and a deep commitment to my lover’s pleasure as much as (sometimes more than) my own. We married when I was 62, he 69. Ours has been the great love of both our lives. It has also been the best sex, because joining together is a culmination of everything we’ve experienced in our lives as well as our deep love for each other. It’s spiritual as well as physical.
How would YOU answer the question, “How has your idea of what ‘sex’ is changed over your lifetime?”
For the rest of the interview, please click here.
Man, 20, loves “slow burning flame” of late-40’s lover
I received a powerful email from Elliot, age 20, who is in a passionate relationship with a woman in her late forties. He writes:
My lover and I are very affectionate, very loving and ultimately very content with each other. Personally, I enjoy the pace, as I am not given a time limit on anything, much less anything sexual. I am given a reign of freedom that most men would divorce for, and my lover herself is so passionate yet so trusting and warm, and dare I say it, cuddly, that she presents the very thing that I have yearned for, yet never found in women my age!
This slow-burning flame I have the fortune to enjoy day after day is something I find much more cosy, more inviting, but finally something that can truly blaze with raw passion, rather than the all-consuming forest fires I seem to find so common in anyone my age. After all, I want to be warm, secure and loved, not burnt over and over again.
So what, in the above paragraph, involves some sort of magic age limit? Where does the question of age come into this? As I write this, I found myself needing to ask my lover what her age actually was, as we see it as something so inconsequential, something so trivial and ultimately so near enough to pointless that I don’t even try to remember it. If my wants and desires are met, does it matter if that person is anything between 18 and 65? Of course not. If I find the perfect lover, her age is practically meaningless..
I want a woman who I can cradle lovingly in my arms and read quietly to, so that she will dream a wonderous dream while she sleeps. I want a woman who can be so very vixen in her nature, but so very kitten in her love when she chooses either. I want a woman who is as intelligent as she is loving, with a quiet intensity, but most of all, with a love for being orally pleasured until she passes out after god only knows how long. Where, I ask you, can I find these qualities in a better way than choosing an older woman?
I honestly believe that I must have undergone some major task, some amazing feat in a previous life, to be rewarded with an almost perfect bliss day after day. No, I choose to keep my bliss close to my heart, rather than trying a younger girl, and honestly? When I masturbate when she is not with me, visions of younger girls don’t do it for me anymore. She’s the one flame I have eyes for.
Sex after Menopause: Good Vibrations magazine
For both of those challenges, it’s crucial to use a good, slippery lubricant. Even if you think you’re wet enough, your natural lubrication has changed – it’s thinner and less protective for your more delicate tissues. So experiment with a slick lube that feels good and doesn’t dry out or get tacky quickly. Personally, I love both Liquid Silk, which feels most like natural lubrication and stays moist through prolonged sex, and Eros, which is very slippery and comfortable.
Older Women, Younger Men: Let’s hear from the women, too
My most popular posts are the older women/younger men topics — most viewed, most comments and emails, and most frequently searched with phrases like “older woman young man sex” and “granny sex” (which I understand is not a pejorative term in other English-speaking countries, so I’ll get used to it!). Yet the comments and emails I receive are almost all from the younger men, not the older women who are involved with them. I’d love to hear from the women, too, about your experiences, your feelings at the time, and your perspective now. You can either comment here or email me with permission to post your comment.
Let me assure the women and men who write me that any identifying information will remain confidential, and of course you can comment directly anonymously or with a pseudonym.
Yes, I get requests from younger men begging me to hook them up with older women, but I don’t/won’t get into that. There are websites that specialize in older women/younger men, and I’d love to know which ones, if any, you’ve viewed and found dignified and not in any way predatory.
I’ll be including this topic in my new book. I’m still accepting interviews, so please contact me if you’re interested in receiving my questionnaire.
Personally, I used to date younger men almost exclusively right up until the time I met Robert when I was 57 and he was 64. (At 64 and 71, we just celebrated our second wedding anniversary!) Until Robert, I found younger men more open-minded and energetic, less set in their ways, and more appreciative of what an older woman had to offer. But this all got blown away when I fell in love with Robert and discovered the man I’d been looking for my whole life. An older man can offer all those qualities I used to seek in younger men, yet with the wisdom of experience and relationship skills.
This makes me think that a long life being single before settling down might be just right to let us experience the qualities of youth, the qualities of age, and any mixture that might entice us!
I’d love to hear from you!