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Confessions of a Cougar

MENOPAUSE, SEX
Dori Hartley | VenusBlogs Managing Editor

I‘m not what you’d call an incredibly sexual person. Not anymore, anyway. I’m still interested, mind you. I just have very specific preferences when it comes to sex. I’m in my fifties now (and hopefully wiser for the wear), so I no longer have the frisky energy of a younger woman. When I was young and hungry for sex, the world was my playground. I was out to conquer and be conquered. Age puts perspective on things.

In fact, it’s that very lack of desperation that’s freed me, sexually speaking. Having come to terms with the mature woman that I’ve become, I’m finally in touch with what I want. And what I want is younger men.

Fortunately, younger men seem to gravitate toward me, and I often find myself on the receiving end of some very flattering sexual attention. When I first noticed this phenomenon, I thought, Nah, what could these young dudes be seeing in me? I must be reading into it. Recently, a lovely man of about 23 approached me. He could hardly catch his breath while telling me how beautiful he thought I was. I laughed in his face. In my mind I looked more like an exhumed corpse than an object of lust on that bright (very bright) afternoon.

As he reached out to touch my bare arm in what became a seductively overt caress, I realized this guy was serious. And I must admit, it was an incredible turn on. He asked for my number and I gave it to him, still laughing. Did I really want to pursue this, or was this just a perfect moment unto itself? Either way, his attention thrilled me.

To read the rest: Confessions Of A Cougar: Why I’ll Only Date Men Half My Age as seen on YourTango.com.

No Fan of Menopause

MENOPAUSE
Gabrielle Vaughn | VenusBlogs Editor at Large

There is no beating menopause. When she wants her way, she gets it. You might try to tame her into submission with black cohosh and other herbal supplements, but she will only allow you moments of reprieve. The truth is, no matter what you do in your attempts to conquer her, La Menopause will best you each time.

I am new to this game. I am fresh on this menopausal battle field, but let me tell you, I have not come unequipped. I have my weapons with me at all times, and even though this hormonal upheaval tests me daily, I am not without my own defensive strategies.

Not one to fancy hormone replacement, I’ve decided to tackle this scoundrel in my own natural way. Noticing that she is relentless in her abundant delivery of hot flashes and night sweats, I no longer wait until it’s too late and I’m drenched in perspiration. Now, thanks to clever planning, I meet those devils with what I like to call…

Many Little Electric Fans.

Yes, all over my house, I have mini-fans plugged in. Even as I write, there is an electric fan poised above my head, ready to be clicked on, ready to push cool breezes my way should the overwhelming waves of scorching inner temperature suddenly rise — as these waves are known to do.

Ah…here comes a wave now. Down, down, you little monster! I shall not sweat for you this morning! Sweet, silent airflow, how effective you are. Somewhere in this wind tunnel is a sweaty, middle aged woman who laughs at your efforts — you shall not take me alive! The flashes — I hardly notice them.

It’s the same at night. Fans, precariously placed, ready to blow. I find myself snuggled deeply under thick, warm blankets — and then, at any moments notice, I am suddenly unflung of my coverlet and ready to rip my own flesh off just to catch a moment of cool. Alas, I no longer need to be so dramatic because my friends are there. My fans. My fans love me.

And I love my fans. And my freezing glasses of iced tea or grapefruit juice.

Now, if only I could leave the house. If I can just make it to the store without melting into a puddle of menopausal moisture…if I can just get my clammy hands on one of those handheld battery operated fans — If I can be both menopausal AND chilly — and I know I can — then you will hear me cry, in my best Stuey Griffin: Victory is mine!

Menopause Monday: Joint Pain, HRT

HEALTH & WELL-BEING, MENOPAUSE
Gabrielle Vaughn | VenusBlogs Editor at Large

Ow! My knees hurt! Is this joint pain menopause related and is there something I can do about it? Please help!

The North American Menopause Society sheds some light on the subject.

Estrogen therapy can help keep joint pain at bay after menopause for women who have had a hysterectomy. Joint pain was modestly, but significantly, lower in women who took estrogen alone than in women who took placebo in the Women’s Health Initiative (WHI) trial. The findings were published online today in Menopause, the journal of The North American Menopause Society.

Studies looking at how estrogen affects joint pain in women after menopause have had mixed results. But this analysis of data on some 1,000 women who had hysterectomies—representative of the more than 10,000 women in this randomized trial—makes it clear that estrogen alone is indeed helpful for joint pain. At the beginning of the study, 77% of these women had joint pain. But after three years, 80% of the women who took a placebo had joint pain, but only 74% of the women in the estrogen group did.
Read more

Musings of a Menopausal Bitch

MENOPAUSE, SEX
Jaguar Jones | VenusBlogs Contributor

I hate sex.

Oh yes, oh yes, oh yes, you read that right. I hate sex. I don’t want to have it, I don’t want to think about it and I don’t ever want to be told that it’s my birth rite to keep having it until the day I die. I don’t want it! I’m tired of it. I’m all fucked out. I’ve had sexual intercourse 20,000 times in my life (give or take a few) and I think experience has bought me the right to say, “Leave me alone! I’ve done it! I’m finished with sex.”

After all, I’m the one living my life, correct? And so, while the whole world obsesses over how tight, wet and fabulicious they should be, or how sex with another million-year-old person is just the bee’s frikkin knees, I’ll be over here totally happy to not be getting slippery, slidy and smelly.

Calm down, it’s okay. It’s OK to not want sex. Why? Because I said so and what makes me an authority is that I am a menopausal woman who is thrilled out of her ever lovin’ gourd that she can finally blame her lack of sexual desire on something everybody believes to be the be-all-and-end-all of sexual destruction: menopause. Yay! I can finally get away with not wanting sex! Read more

Menopause Mondays: Aging Gracefully

HEALTH & WELL-BEING, MENOPAUSE
Gabrielle Vaughn | VenusBlogs Editor at Large

Recently, I heard Health and Wellness Advocate Ellen Dolgen speak on Menopause. When the subject of getting older came up, she explained:

Forget youth. I want to get old.

It’s a gift that I added to my life’s wish list at the age of 13, after my father had his first heart attack. He was in his mid-forties.

Watching my father’s declining health—interspersed with medication and surgeries—caused me to be unusually concerned with illness and early death. My father passed away at the young age of 58 from heart disease.

But with the right perspective, I believe good can come from the hardships of life. For me, the good was learning to value the precious time I have here on Earth with the people I love—and doing everything in my power to ensure myself as many days filled with fun, love, and laughter as possible. As Ralph Waldo Emerson believed, “The first wealth is health.” And in striving for health, I have gained the wealth of vitality, happiness, and peace. To me, that is aging gracefully and wisely.

Interesting way of thinking, wouldn’t you agree? Life — as a gift? While I was profoundly moved by her willingness to embrace her age as well as her future, I was also humbled by the idea that so many of us walk into our latter years with such dread and self-hate, as if these lives of ours — these gifts — could only be worth something as long as we’re young. Read more

You’re a Rock-n-Roll Menopause

HEALTH & WELL-BEING, MENOPAUSE
Dori Hartley | VenusBlogs Managing Editor

So, if you’re presently going through menopause, there’s a good chance you’re of the generation that went crazy with music and bands. As little kids we probably watched Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie together, in different cute bedrooms. We knew George Takei as Sulu, the real deal. We’d listen to Seals and Crofts and Badfinger and by the time it was summer, we were ready for all kinds of trouble.

Back in those days, a little later, say — late teens/early twenties, you might have been into either disco or punk. Glitter was a major part of our lives, we believed in it. For me, the glitter was always black.

For those of us worldwide who veered to the dark side, we had Stevie Nicks to front the team for the Forever Dark Club of Women and Faerie-like Beings. We still exist, though we’ve toned the make up down considerably.

We really are a sisterhood if you think about it. I mean, we’ve seen Alex Trebek’s entire career play out before our eyes. And he still looks fantastic.

We knew life without computers. And some of us before color TV. Yes, it is so! Read more

Menopause Mondays: Boozing it Up

HEALTH & WELL BEING, MENOPAUSE
Gabrielle Vaughn | VenusBlogs Editor at Large

Menopause is an experience that can really drive one to drinking! That’s the interesting thing about it’s timing; We’re older and because of that, we feel like we deserve to treat ourselves to those little adult pleasures — to take the edge off. Between the hot flashes and those ghastly over-emotional moments where we feel like we’re getting too old for our own good, sometimes a woman just wants to uncork a bottle of stress-relief and call it a sweat-free night.

And menopause is certainly not restricted to our stereotypical notion of what a mature woman must be experiencing; outside of the physical symptoms, we might also be dealing with empty nest syndrome, divorce, remarriage, teenage children, midlife crisis — oh boy, there certainly isn’t a standard ‘type’ of lifestyle that assures any one of us an easy breezy beautiful menopausal experience.

With all that going on, sometimes the — holy crap, I’ve had enough! — menopausal woman says (or rather, screams like a wild banshee): Get me a drink! And, because we’re really going through everything we say and know we’re going through — we feel we deserve it. Read more

Menopause Monday: Vaginal Atrophy

HEALTH, MENOPAUSE
Gabrielle Vaughn | VenusBlogs Editor at Large

Each and every Monday, VenusBlogs will be sharing valuable information for those of you who are interested in the topic of menopause. While our mothers prepared us for the physical and mental challenges of menstruation and childbearing, the only thing we’ve ever really heard about when it comes to menopause is the concept of night sweats and hot flashes.

Truly, there is so much more. Now, the discussion is open and the knowledge is available. While some women call it the third act, others call it their second puberty. Whatever menopause means to each individual woman, it is an inevitability for all of us and understanding it is the key to happier and healthier vaginal health.

Today, we shed light on something called vaginal atrophy. Sounds a lot scarier than it is, but nothing to fear — we live in a day and age where relief now comes in the form of something VenusBlogs likes to call “intimate skincare”.

Read more

Part Time Works Better

MEDIA, MENOPAUSE, HEALTH & WELL-BEING
Gabrielle Vaughn | Venus Blogs Editor at Large


One of the unspoken truths about the world of online editors and writers is that the top positions in the field are held by women. I always thought that if this was indeed the “man’s world” we all complain about so often, one place where we could all take solace would be in knowing that the majority of people in charge of what we read in the media are women. Smart, ass-kicking women. Some very young and edgy, some mature and finessed — sassy!

Just look to Jill Abramson and Arianna Huffington for a taste of how that awesomeness gets set in motion.

Many of the folks who run the news blogs of the world today are seasoned, hard working women who have also gone through marriage, childbirth, child raising — she may have lived through divorce, family issues — the one thing she doesn’t lack is life experience.

The career woman of today is not the cold stereotype of the past; she is now a mother, a grandmother, a wife, a homemaker — she’s also a fiercely ambitious bread winner, a survivor, a brilliant mind and quite possibly a woman whose long career took her straight into menopause.

You have to hand it to women; we really do it all. But sometimes, we just want to do a teensy bit less. Not because we’re slackers, but because it’s hard to do it all, all the time. Read more

Sex Drive on E

MENOPAUSE, SEX
Gabrielle Vaughn | Venus Blogs Editor at Large


The information in this article may seem obvious to us by now — because we’ve been around long enough to think we know it all — but it’s always nice to refresh our memories, just in case a brain cell or two died a fair death along the way.

In Love and Sex with Dr. Laura Berman, she talks about low sex drive in women, the causes, the symptoms and the treatment. READ: Low Sex Drive in Women

Finding Treatment for Low Sex Drive
If you suspect that your low libido could be due to unhealthy lifestyle choices, then making small tweaks can help you address these issues. However, if you try it and still have low desire, it’s important that you seek medical advice. Your doctor can do a full hormone panel to make sure that your hormones aren’t out of whack and also help troubleshoot other possible culprits with you. For example, maybe your hormonal birth control is sapping your desire (ironically, the pill has been linked to low desire in many women), or maybe other medications are causing sexual side effects. The reality is that low libido can be caused by so many factors — from antidepressants to menopause — and until you know the real culprit, you can’t treat the issue.

You may also want to check out : 10 Keys to Great Sex During Menopause