We talk about the importance of role models in learning about sexuality. For people in their sixties and seventies, role models for sexual behavior are a bit thin on the ground. Sex was unlikely to have been openly discussed by their own parents as they became older. Pat is now sixty-five. ‘I remember my mother telling me that any woman who said she enjoyed sex should be ashamed of herself. She made it sound as though anything short of horrific was a bonus. I just couldn’t have imagined her doing it at all when she got older. I certainly never saw Mum and Dad showing each other any signs of affection.’ You rarely see any portrayal of older people in intimate or sexual relationships in movies, novels or magazines either.
As you get older, there are inevitable mental and physical changes. Most of us are somehow vulnerable to the ‘youth culture’ ideal of beauty and find it very hard to accept some of the changes in our body image that come naturally with aging.
*147\17\9*
