Sharon Gordon Sharon Gordon
Image: File picture
The older I get, the more I realise society has very firm ideas about what women over 50 should and should not be doing. Apparently, once menopause arrives, we are expected to quietly exchange our lingerie for orthopaedic sandals, develop an encyclopaedic knowledge of scatter cushions and spend our evenings discussing fibre intake.
Desire, according to society, is for the young. Older women are meant to become “nice.” Safe. beige.
And sex? Well, we’re apparently supposed to stop that immediately. Preferably with a ceremonial burning of the bra. Not that I’m opposed to burning my incredibly uncomfortable bras.
Now, before I climb too high onto my feminist soapbox, I should confess something deeply politically incorrect: I used to think old people being intimate looked slightly… horrifying.
There. I said it.
As a younger woman, watching older couples kiss in movies made me want to look away politely, like someone had forgotten to close a bathroom door. If a sex scene involved wrinkles, reading glasses or an orthopaedic pillow nearby, I became instantly uncomfortable.
Society had trained me well. Sexy belonged to smooth skin, flat stomachs and people who could get up from the floor without making a noise.
Then something deeply inconvenient happened.
I got older.
Suddenly, I wasn’t observing “old people” anymore. I was becoming one of them. Which raises an alarming question: at what exact age are women expected to surrender pleasure? Fifty? Fifty-five? The moment we buy our first air fryer?
Because here’s the truth nobody tells you: menopause may change your body, but it doesn’t magically switch off your humanity. Women still want intimacy. Affection. Connection. Desire. Some women even, brace yourselves, discover themselves sexually for the very first time after 50.
There’s a strange freedom that comes with age. By then many women are less interested in performing youth and more interested in actual pleasure. The exhausting pressure to be decorative starts fading. You stop caring whether your thighs jiggle and start caring whether the person next to you knows where the clitoris is.
Frankly, it’s liberating.
And while menopause certainly comes with its glamorous moments, hot flushes, mystery aches, and sweating suddenly like a criminal during a police interview, it can also become a period of reinvention.
Women today are talking openly about vaginal dryness, libido, hormone therapy, sex toys and relationships in ways previous generations never could. Thank goodness. Because silence helped nobody.
Millions of women spent decades believing they were broken simply because their bodies changed.
Meanwhile men of a certain age have never exactly been encouraged to become celibate monks. Society happily accepts older men dating younger women, remarrying, flirting outrageously on cruise ships and purchasing sports cars during what can only be described as a testosterone-based identity crisis.
But let a woman over 60 wear a fitted dress or admit she still enjoys sex and suddenly people behave as though Nana has started an OnlyFans account.
The truth is, intimacy in later life often becomes less about performance and more about connection. Less frantic Olympic gymnastics and more comfort, laughter, confidence and knowing yourself. Also, significantly better communication. Older people are less likely to fake orgasms and more likely to ask for an extra pillow.
And perhaps that’s what really unsettles society. Older women who still desire things are difficult to control. A woman who understands pleasure, takes up space and refuses invisibility is inconvenient.
So no, menopause should not come with a nun’s outfit, unless it’s part of the cosplay.
If anything, it should come with better lighting, supportive friends, decent lubricant and the confidence to stop apologising for having a pulse.
And perhaps I owe older couples an apology too. Because now when I see elderly people holding hands, flirting or kissing in public, I no longer think, “How embarrassing.”
I think, “Good for them.”
Although if either of them removes a compression stocking in a seductive manner, I reserve the right to leave the room.