Well, the secret is out. The New England Journal of Medicine recently published a report breaking the news: A healthy sex life is not only possible, but quite commonplace, well into the golden years. Retiring from your job doesnt necessarily mean retiring from an active love life. The survey, performed in 2007, revealed that, of those ages fifty seven to seventy five, well over half had had sex at least once within the previous year. Older people tend to enjoy and desire sex just as much as younger people, and its time to put the zany old preconceptions claiming otherwise to rest.

The hindrances towards maintaining a rewarding sex life past a certain age are generally social and medical ones, though even these statistics defy the age old myths and misconceptions about impotence and dysfunction in the elderly. The New England Journal of Medicines report showed that only one in two people over the age of fifty seven admit to suffering from a sex related health problem. The most common of these are erectile dysfunction, dryness and an inability to achieve an orgasm. Recent developments in medicine and therapy have more than made up for these problems, for the most part, so theres no reason that they should be a stumbling block.

The social setbacks to people over sixty having a rewarding sex life generally come, regrettably, from such trusted sources as family, doctors and caretakers, who can often buy into the myth of the asexual old geezer and be unsupportive of the social and personal needs of people past a certain age who have found themselves in the unfortunate condition of having to grow dependent on those around them perhaps more than theyd like to. Many doctors tend to jump to the conclusion that their older patients are electively sexually inactive.