Are You Really Satisfying Your Wife?
There's a very good chance she isn't as happy with her sex life as you think.
-By Mac Montandon
-Photograph by Christian Webber
Are you past your prime or just getting warmed up? Talk about it in the comment section.
Photograph by Christian Webber
Among the universe's cruel ironies—pretty much anything having to do with puberty, say, or the career arc of Michael Bay—this has to be near the top of the heap: Women typically hit their sexual stride in their mid-thirties, just as many guys the same age are pulling up lame with the equivalent of a sex-drive charley horse.
Okay, the sprinting metaphor is a bit much, but you get the idea. Guys experience a huge surge of testosterone during adolescence, but by their late twenties, that jolt is already on the wane. A few years later, women are finally ready to join the party.
Does it get any crueler?
And this situation may be more acute than ever.
"There are a lot of very attractive women in their thirties not getting the sex they want," says Pepper Schwartz, a professor of sociology at the University of Washington in Seattle and author of Prime: Adventures and Advice on Sex, Love,
and the Sensual Years. "And it happens as the relationship matures."
Schwartz notes that it can be an off-putting experience for some men—conditioned for years to initiate sex—when their partners are suddenly making the first move. And the second. And the twelfth.
"Men are used to cajoling and seducing, they are used to doing things on their own erotic schedules," says Schwartz. "This often teaches him about his own sexuality—that he's not as omnivorous as he thought." Then something truly bizarre occurs. "Men can get hurt, too, and find women pushy."
Such is the case with "Tina" and "Owen" (some names in this story have been changed), a mid-thirties couple in Brooklyn, New York, who both work in marketing. When they started dating, seven years ago, Owen, who lived in Manhattan at the time, was always up for a late-night outer-borough schlep if it meant he'd score.
"I'd be, 'It's eleven o'clock at night,' and he'd say, 'I'll be there,'" Tina says wistfully.
Now married for three years, Owen and Tina are approaching a different anniversary—one year of couples therapy. Let's just say that it isn't Tina's sex drive that needs the tune-up.
"He calls me a 17-year-old boy," she says with a sigh. "It's kind of like a sad joke."
Owen wasn't laughing the day the enormous cherry-red vibrator that Tina ordered arrived in the mail. "I showed it to him—'Look, honey!'—I was all excited," Tina says.
His reaction: "That's really aggressive." The vibrator was no fun; it became an issue in therapy.
Tina and Owen are far from alone. There is ample science related to men and sudden dips in testosterone levels—and none of it is good news. Beginning at age 30, most men see the hormone's production fall off to the tune of 10 percent every decade.
And a study last year by the New England Research Institutes found that today's men are manufacturing about 20 percent less testosterone than they were only 15 years ago as they age. Speculation on the cause includes an increase in obesity and a decrease in smokers (smoking, it seems, bumps up testosterone production), but nothing has been identified as the main culprit yet. What we do know are the nasty side effects of these hormonal hard times: more fat, less muscle, depression, exhaustion, and, that's right, a lower sex drive.
It's a different story for women. Tina has found that her female friends all agree that their orgasms have grown better, stronger, and more fulfilling as they've gotten older—but they've also become far less frequent as sex is less frequent. Several of Tina's girlfriends have considered having affairs to compensate for the lack of attention they get at home. In one extreme case, a friend who acted on her desire had to have invasive surgery after contracting a sexually transmitted disease. Her husband still has no idea.
She's gotta have it, indeed.
"These are third-wave feminists," notes clinical sexologist Ian Kerner, author of She Comes First: The Thinking Man's Guide to Pleasuring a Woman. "Female sexuality is part and parcel of the air they breathe."
Though she doesn't partake in extramarital activities herself, Tina understands the temptation: "For the first 15 years of my sexual life, from about 15 to 30, I was just trying to keep everything under control. Now I wonder why I wasn't just a total slut."
So why aren't more thirtysomethings having more sex? It often comes down to that eternal killjoy: communication.
"The main thing I hear from women is: 'My guy thinks of me as his sweet little girlfriend, while he's in the other room jerking off to porn,'" Kerner says. "'But if he heard the dirty thoughts I have, it would blow his mind.'"
It's unlikely that "Ben" thinks of "Cynthia" as his sweet little anything—the New York couple, married for four years after dating for two, have always talked openly about sex. "I'm a lusty person," says Cynthia, a 39-year-old software developer.
On the couple's second date, Ben, 42, who works as a gaffer, went to her place to cook dinner, and matters quickly progressed to the bedroom. Over the next several months, Ben almost always made the first move and it was always met with enthusiasm; they got it on a few times a week.
Then romantic inertia set in. Before they realized it, they were spending far less time in the sack. Soon enough, they were lucky to have sex twice a month.
Cynthia's raging libido, it seems, was not enough to ensure frequent happy endings. As Ben slacked off as the sexual instigator, their success rate dropped precipitously. "If he initiated it, fine, we'd have sex," Cynthia says. But if Ben didn't make the first move? Most nights that meant no action.
Eventually, practically bursting with horniness, Cynthia had little choice but to take matters—that is to say, Ben—into her own very capable hands.
Ben acknowledges that Cynthia's high sex drive has been a boon—essential, even—for their coupling. "That's an attraction for me," he says. "When she decides to jump on me—well, hot dog!"
Things aren't quite so harmonious for "David" and "Frances," who met in a Baltimore bar three years ago. Early on, the sex was fantastic. But then David, 36, took a job in North Carolina, and Frances, now 33, moved back home to Wisconsin, and grew unhappy about her lack of sexual satisfaction. When she visited him in Carolina, they slept together only once over several weeks. David had become preoccupied with other concerns.
"I guess I'm not spending enough time with her clitoris," he says now. "We have sex, I get off and leave her frustrated—but it's not intentional."
The relationship is hanging on by a thread; the prospects don't look good. When David called Frances in Wisconsin recently, she told him she was on her way to help a friend "feed the chickens."
"But I found out later she was really going over to fuck this other guy," David says.
Which, it seems, is an elevated risk these days if your partner is not getting what she needs in bed—and on the kitchen counter and the bathroom linoleum.
"We're now in the post-Samantha age of the MILF," Kerner notes, alluding to the Sex and the City cougar.
For some guys, that will mean more sex than they ever imagined. For others, it might be time to find a younger girlfriend.
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great blog!
liteliteuser1
Sep 13, 2007 11:27:28 AM
I'm a divorced mom in my late 30's but I look like I'm 25 to 28 years old. I just go out or hook up with guys in their 20s - they usually approach me first because I look young. They don't have any problems with my age. I don't have any complaints about the sex, lol.
hotrunnermom
Sep 15, 2007 9:07:09 AM
Sure I am...er...I think.
alec4444
Sep 17, 2007 2:11:47 PM
Hey, great article. Hey Hotrunnermom, send me an email, it would be nice to meet you.
GlobeTrotta
Sep 18, 2007 6:57:52 AM
strange isnt it?
fistandantelis
Sep 18, 2007 5:40:33 PM
My ex-husband is in his early 40s. I got married when I was 22. We practiced a lot of abstinence since I wasn't very interested in sex throughout most of my marriage. I've done a complete 180 and my lust and desire for these guys is over the top. A lot of it is because they are younger and hot-looking. I definitely am very flattered that a 23 and a 25 year old would be interested in me :-)
hotrunnermom
Sep 18, 2007 11:36:59 PM
There is also the inconvenient truth that men are simply not as attracted to women in their thirties and forties.
As we lose interest in having sex with our middle-aged wives, notice how it dovetails with an incrase in lust for our daughter's friends in their late teens and early twenties.
I know it's not fair, and it's not the whole story of course, but it's definitely a part of it--we're wired to be sexually attracted to youth and fertility.
When you reach menopause it's not a coincidence that we don't want to have sex with you as much any more.
bellingman
Sep 20, 2007 1:44:06 PM
The irony is, of course, that older woman are such better lovers.
Oh, if we could only combine the lusty uninhibitedness of the forty-year-old woman--threesomes? anal? toys? swinging? Sure!--with the nubile body of an 18-year old...
Or even younger, at least as far as our animal brains are concerned. Peak attraction is probably reached a couple of years after puberty, declining steadily and with increasing rapidity thereafter.
bellingman
Sep 20, 2007 1:54:58 PM
100 years from now, if we haven't scorched the place, people will have stopped obsessing over monogomy. It's a bullshit premise instigated by a Roman Emperor (I think it was Augustus.) who was desperate to keep his armies populated while he banged every male and female slave he could get his hands on. So, fuck who you like, till you don't like them anymore and then fuck someone new. End of story.
bradylord
Sep 21, 2007 2:15:02 AM
I disagree that men are hardwired to lust only after very young women. It's a cultural thing, for there are other cultures around the world where yes, young women are appreciated for their dewy youth but older women are also lusted after for their ripe mature bodies, adventurousness, and sexual experience. American media has made a fetish of youth, constantly ingraining the idea in men that only very young women are desirable, and are over the hill by 25....whereupon we're off to ogle the next little starlet. While creaky old men like Michael Douglas and Woody Allen continue to be offered up to women as desirable sexual partners. This is culturally induced, not hardwired. I, for one, don't subscribe to the morays of this crap consumer culture where sex and love are sold to us like just one more product, easily disposible. My honey is 10 years older than me, ripe and curvy and hot as a pistol. But I'm from a Latin culture where older women are appreciated properly, at least in the bedroom. (Politically, that's another matter, but we're working on it.)
latinlover
Sep 21, 2007 4:02:59 AM
p.s.: One of the proverbs in the country my family comes from is roughly translated as "It takes a real man to appreciate an older woman."
latinlover
Sep 21, 2007 4:08:31 AM
p.s.: Maybe a better translation is "It takes a real man to satisfy an older woman." You get the idea.
latinlover
Sep 21, 2007 4:09:59 AM
At last.
A man's magazine as stupid as women's magazines are.
JDBishop5
Sep 21, 2007 5:10:23 AM
This article helps to explain the reason for the majority of divorces. After x amount of years with one man a women starts to desire sex with new men.Not to marry them or run away with them...just good new hard sex.I became aware of my growing desires about 5yrs ago so I told my husband that I thought I would like to try to seduce our neighbors husband.I felt like a school girl again the excitement and expectations were mind blowing.We started our experiment by having him come over to the house to visit/watch tv/dinner.I would wear as little clothing as possible/no bra with sheer tops that you could see through/mini dresses/I would sit close to him and let my dress ride up to the top of my thights.He would get hard almost immediately and it looked so good through his pants.I wanted to unzip him and stroke his dick.My new desires were growing stronger and I knew that yes I wanted a different man to fuck I wanted to feel his dick inside of me and fuck his brains out.We finally were at the point of making our plans come true/it took about a month.
Now 5 yrs later we have an open marriage and I have had over 25 men.All are my boyfriends and they know its about the sex/All are friends.The sex with my husband has never been better and we are very secure in our relationship.My husband was understanding that I wanted more sex with different men and it had nothing to do with me loving him less....it is and was about the sex.I did learn that I love big dicks,the larger the better.I will not have sex with a man that is less then 6".I prefer 8+/I have learned alot about my sexuality
karenlynne
Sep 21, 2007 8:34:41 AM
latinlover: you are my hero!
We have been brainwashed and like most victims, we have no idea that we have been. This country's youth fetish has now become out and out perversion! (A US Attorney was caught after arranging to have sex with a 5 year old.) All of these media images objectifying the young female body and now the objectification of little girls is what is hard-wiring men into sexual inclinations that now border on perverse. All the while manipulative media execs idealize the 'mature' man as sexually attractive. And now with the internet and the availability of a constantly fresh glut of Photoshopped pornographic images, it's only going to get worse as it feeds the libido of the visually-oriented male psyche. Of course, women are playing their part, too, as they provide males with the glut of fresh images since exhibitionism + female vanity = sexual arousal in the female psyches. (Read the above post of the woman who seduced her neighbor if you don't believe me.) The sad part is that no one is getting any kind of sexual satisfaction even as they act on their fantasies, it is not enough and never will be. That's because people are rejecting the spiritual component and the appreciation for the simple basic lust of their flesh and blood partners in pursuit of the plastic image and personal fantasy in their head that can never be realized. You want good sex, then turn off the tube, the internet and get into the partner who's in your life: the smell of her, the taste of her, the feel of her. And take your time!!
hetheru
Sep 21, 2007 9:17:01 AM
OMG This PERFECTLY describes me. I am in my fourties but people think I am between 24-33.
I have been seeing younger men because men on my age range...well, don't have hot steamy sex anymore. What a tragedy!
Mammacita
Sep 21, 2007 10:36:02 AM
Latinlover:
On the contrary, sexual attraction to menopausal women is what is "cultural". From an evolutionary/biological perspective, mating with an infertile woman is obviously useless.
Consider that until around a thousand years ago the average life expectancy was only around 30 years old. By the age of 40 most women were grandmothers, with typical childbearing years occurring between 15 and 25.
It is a simple fact that men have evolved a desire to mate with young fertile females, just as women seek powerful older males--however painful this may be to hear if you are a post-menopausal female or young low-status male.
(Peters_Jake: I will forgive your knee-jerk reaction; just re-read my original post and pay closer attention this time.)
bellingman
Sep 21, 2007 10:35:50 PM
I agree with hetheru...
about turning off the tv, internet, etc.
My bf has made me realize things about respect in a sexual relationship. We are very active, and never integrate any props or extras. I think that is also why we dont need lube, or the need to get freakier than the last time.
He is 33, I am 28...(everyone says something like this so: but I look 19.) It is because of genetics and because I am flat-chested. Our age gap is perfect for us.
I do not like younger guys, even if they are 27.5. I am not a swinger either. I dont have stds, or any health problems at all. I have a clear conscience.
Because of the first post, I would like to say that my bf is very large and even after having sex 4/7 nights a week for almost a year, I dont think I have the symptoms that you seem to suffer from... (LPS)
Also, maybe I am close-minded but "MILF" just isn't right. Moms should act in a respectable way, as role models.
i am grateful every day that I have a man w/ a more traditional approach to relationships. I dont have to be psycho and self-obsessed and competing so hard and getting surgery. I can really be for real, I dont have to pretend I am cool with stupid fads. I think there is something repulsive about swinging.
There is something pathetic about delusional older women with no real accomplishments who are so vain. Others can see the real ugliness beyond the plastic accessories.
Men who take advantage of desperate women are equally disgusting, no matter how wealthy.
NotReplicant
Sep 22, 2007 10:07:07 AM
This article is totally distorting the merits of the arguement. The author is misleading the reader through the old trick of selective statistics. Never once is mentioned that hormonal prime for men and women is achieved in the late teens. This sexual peak question has much less to do with any sort of physiological changes as with a mental attitude that allows older women to be more open in their sexual encounters thus leading to more enjoyable sex and since we generally tend to like to do things we enjoy they also desire more sex than they did in their younger years. So let's stop using these misleading stereotypes and get some true journalism.
thill
Sep 28, 2007 10:33:40 AM
Hello im 25,he's 57,we have been friends for over 3 years,and now we have become best freind's.He's just a wonderful person,smart,very mature and sensitive.
I met him on the net Agelesscupid.com three years ago. I am now a happy woman who is deeply in love and planning a wedding ceremony before the end of this year by the grace of God.
Kaly
Sep 29, 2007 3:12:08 AM
So, were all of these women having affairs with younger men... or men their age with wives who weren't interested in sex?
I would really love to meet some of these over-35 sex-starved women to see if we could sate each other.
favecrayon
Oct 23, 2007 11:18:26 AM
I'm a late 30's male who wants more and more sex from my wife, but she has No sex drive due to depression. I wish things would change. I miss having sex a couple times a week versus never.
lustydc
Oct 23, 2007 9:03:30 PM
I TOTALLY agrre with you, Bradylord! We are one of very few aminals that practice monogomy...and how do you think our human race would be i our very few ancestors only mated with 1 other...We'd be extinct! I cant speak for all the straight males in here because im not...but I think the big problem is that men lose intrest in sex with thier partner because it goes agains our inate wanting to "spread the seed". We are going against nature. A little variety in the sex partner dept. can honestly save a "relationship"!
popinfresh78
Apr 12, 2008 4:14:04 AM