What sex is like at 73

I'm tired of being polite and shutting up about forbidden topics

I’m tired of keeping quiet about things that loom large in my mind but that people normally don’t talk about. On today’s list: my sex life. Younger folks regarding a couple like myself and my husband, in our early 70s, might be wondering, “Do they still… ??” The answer is yes, and also no. But if you’ve read the much-discussed New York Times article on old-age sex, The Joys (and Challenges) of Sex After 70, you might think that old people are having the best sex of their lives. I read the article with great interest, examining its lurid, purple-toned photos, looking for data points with which to compare Sam and me. For example, the following excerpt from the article is generally accurate:

“It’s not surprising that sex can diminish with age: Estrogen typically drops in women, which may lead to vaginal dryness and, in turn, pain. Testosterone declines for women and men, and erection problems become more commonplace.” - Maggie Jones¹

But there’s more—a lot more—about old-age sex in the NYT article that caught my attention. If, like many people in my generation, you define heterosexual sex as good old fashioned PIV,² then yes, it’s true that there is less sex after 70, for the reasons listed above. But you would be wrong to think that this spells the end of our sex lives completely.