Dear Christine,
I AM 22 YEARS OLD and he is 36. He is great in bed now, but if I marry him the time will come when our age difference may begin to show up in the love-making. I love him very much but this thought haunts me. I need your advice.
– B.A.
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Dear B.A.,
None of us knows what life will bring. There have been several instances where couples write about one partner having lost interest or capacity for sex while the other still wanted it very much.
Sometimes it is the older husband of the younger wife who loses interest or capacity, but it has also often been the wife, who was the same age as the husband, who was dodging sex. And many other combinations of husband and wife have come to me with different levels of sexual appetite.
If you were just asking with mild interest, I would say that it is almost universal that men are less frequently and less reliably aroused, or able to have erections, as they age. This does not mean that they are no longer good lovers, or that their wives are sexually frustrated.
You say that this fear of his ageing sexually before you lose your strong desire actually haunts your mind, even though he is so convincing in bed right now. Even though you love him very much, I am detecting there is something else troubling you. You may be less in love than you profess, or his love making may overwhelm you less than you say, or he may not be your 22-year-old dream man or family man, or his family may be what you don’t like to think about.
I say don’t rush into this marriage. Put it off a year at least, and in the meantime read a good deal about sex and marriage and get an understanding of this aspect of your future.
You have a realistic suspicion, and you need to know what people do when one partner fades sexually before the other. You must be firm in your mind that you do love this man enough that you will still want to stay close to him and adapt to his changing capacity.
– CHRISTINEÂ
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