Fappy Gilmore
My husband and I are both 70, and we have a good, satisfying sex life. I found out recently that he masturbates now and then. I was puzzled and hurt, but he said he just doesn't want to bother me all the time. Should I be worried that he's masturbating?
--In The Dark
You really want your husband to hit you up for some sex whenever the urge strikes him? Imagine the call: "Hi, honey...I'm in the golf course bathroom. How quickly can you get down here?"
As long as your husband isn't ditching sex with you for his knuckle-love sessions, his masturbating isn't something you should take personally. People masturbate because they're bored, they're tense, they can't sleep, or their phone needs to recharge before they can continue their Facebook flame war over whether "Saved by the Bell" was a vehicle for the Illuminati.
Also, there are times when a person just wants to get off solo -- maybe because they're short on time and maybe because they're low on emotional energy (and their hand doesn't get miffy if they don't cuddle it afterward and tell it it's beautiful).
Still, maybe you're thinking, "Well, why can't he just wait till I'm around?" And it's understandable that you'd think that -- maybe because you're just fine with waiting. And if you are, that may be because you're a woman. It turns out that there are sex differences in sexual desire.
Social psychologist Roy Baumeister and his colleagues, surveying piles of studies, explain that men tend to have a far stronger sex drive, with "more frequent and more intense sexual desires than women." That's surely why it's primarily men (and probably single men) who show up in emergency rooms with embarrassing sex-for-one-related injuries -- like wiener-in-the-vacuum-cleaner lacerations. (Since penis-in-vagina sex is fun, why not penis-in-the-Shop-Vac?!)
So, back to your question: Should you be worried that he's masturbating? No, you should be celebrating! Bake his penis a cake! (That's what we do for people who are still alive at 70. Why not for their sex parts?)
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I mean, men are on only a few times a day at the best of times
I nearly froze to death in high school, Ive told this story a few times so I will skip the details.
End result is I damaged my hypothalamus, ever since my body temp is a flat 96 degrees, I dont suffer from jet lag as I no longer have a circadian rhythm, and I am perpetually as horny as I was at 15 years of age when I nearly froze to death.
As a result of that I am by no means typical, but I usually hit six most days, Im 38 - the largest number of times I masturbated in a single day was just shy of thirty, and that was after having part of my lung cut out (another fun story) so between the surgery, meds, and being on an army base for 16 months made for on odd confluence of events
Posted by: lujlp at August 16, 2018 7:10 AM
Dear LW:
I am delighted that you and your guy get busy still. It's an inspiration to me, at least, several years your junior. Let me offer you a suggestion or two.
Many men fear the calendar for two reasons: they are getting old - and then, the other people they know are getting old.
It's not a tragedy for me so much that decades have gone by - but I can't quite grasp that my high-school sweetheart, whom I have not seen for decades, is not 17 any more. That's not horrifying, because I know Father Time is a mean SOB, but it does put a more conspicuous label on his work.
I hope that your fellow is thinking about you even as you are not there to, er, encourage him.
But I suspect he is fantasizing about being younger, himself, and enjoying something fleeting in fantasy so as to not truly betray your avatar (the picture of you he carries in his mind).
Posted by: Radwaste at August 17, 2018 4:23 PM
