X-Message-Number: 22333
Date: Tue, 12 Aug 2003 16:07:04 -0700
From: James Swayze <>
Subject: Can Good Sex Keep You Young? WebMD article

\\WARNING: IF FRANK CLINICAL TALK ABOUT SEX DISTURBS YOU SCROLL DOWN 
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I felt this was important enough to post in entirety. All rights 
reserved for WebMD and the author Jeffrey Blum. No changes have been 
made and the original is article available here:

http://webcenter.health.webmd.netscape.com/content/Article/14/1738_50976.htm

[Begin quoted material]

Can Good Sex Keep You Young? Does frequent sex contribute to good health?

By Jeffrey Blum 

<http://webcenter.health.webmd.netscape.com/content/Biography/4/1756_52763.htm>

http://webcenter.health.webmd.netscape.com/content/Biography/4/1756_52763.htm

WebMD Feature Archive

Nov. 13, 2000 -- When I asked my 77-year-old friend Peter Kranz of 
Darien, Conn., about his sex life, he was immediately forthcoming. "We 
make love twice a day," he said.

"You do this every day?" I asked.

"The schedule is not written in stone," Peter explained. "But we do make 
love every day."

Michael Roizen, MD, would say that sex is keeping Kranz young. In his 
best-selling book, RealAge -- Are You as Young as You Can Be?, Roizen 
makes the case for the antiaging effects of sex after surveying the 
available literature. "Having sex at least twice a week can make your 
RealAge 1.6 years younger than if you had sex only once a week," Roizen 
says. He defines 'real age' as "an estimation of your age in biologic 
terms, not chronologic years."

Although Roizen's statistics are sketchy, he derives his figures 
primarily from a study done in Caerphilly, Wales, and published in the 
December 1997 British Medical Journal under the title, "Sex and Death: 
Are They Related?" One of the few efforts to examine the relationship 
between sex and mortality, the study found that men who reported at 
least two orgasms a week at the time of the study had less than half the 
risk of dying from various causes over 10 years of follow-up than those 
with a lower frequency of orgasm. Drawing on the researchers' remark 
that the evidence suggested a dose-response relationship -- meaning in 
this case that the more orgasms a man had, the longer he lived -- Roizen 
concluded that someone like my friend Peter, who has sex every day, 
could have a Real Age as much as 8 years younger.

At first blush (and Peter's candor did make me blush), my friend is a 
convincing example of Roizen's argument. He is youthful-looking, 
energetic, and actively involved in many interests. Peter still works as 
a developer of computer systems. He has had a steady, positive 
relationship with his wife who, at 77 also, still commutes to Manhattan 
for her own job at a major nonprofit institution.

But although Peter enjoys his sexual interludes immensely, he also does 
many other things to remain youthful. He watches his weight and caloric 
intake very closely and makes sure he stays slim. Over the last decades, 
he has been involved in strenuous earth and rock-moving activities in 
his own backyard; and he also splits wood when it is needed. He has 
exercised steadily and intensely over the years.

So does sex itself really extend our lives or prevent heart attacks? 
This claim is difficult to prove. Yes, sex and good health are usually 
linked -- in most of the studies and our observations -- but which one 
is the chicken and which the egg? Does sex contribute to good health or 
does good health make regular sex possible?

How Sex May Keep You Young

One of the first longitudinal studies of aging begun at Duke University 
in the '50s and reported in the December 1982 journal Gerontologist 
found that the frequency of sexual intercourse (for men) and the 
enjoyment of sex (for women) predicted longevity. Other studies have 
found that sexual dissatisfaction was a predictor of the onset of 
cardiovascular disease. A study published in the November-December 1976 
journal Psychosomatic Medicine compared 100 women with heart disease 
(acute myocardial infarction) with a control group and found sexual 
frigidity and dissatisfaction among 65% of the coronary patients but 
only 24% of the controls. In these studies, though correlations were 
found between the frequency and/or enjoyment of sex and longevity or 
other outcomes, they do not answer the "chicken and egg" question.

In a long-term study published in book form as Secrets of the 
Superyoung, David Weeks, MD, head of old age psychology at the Royal 
Edinburgh Hospital in Scotland, found that "the key ingredients for 
looking younger are staying active ... and maintaining a good sex life." 
In a study of 3,500 people, ages 30 to 101, Weeks found that "sex helps 
you look between four and seven years younger," according to impartial 
ratings of the subjects' photos. Theorizing on his findings, Weeks, a 
clinical neuropsychologist, attributed this to significant reductions in 
stress, greater contentment, [and] better sleep.

Michael Roizen's reading of the research and his clinical work have led 
him to believe that sex keeps us younger because it "decreases stress, 
relaxes us, enhances intimacy, and helps ... personal relationships." 
Although no study has yet proven a cause-and-effect relationship between 
good sex and longevity, there seems to be a beneficial system at work 
here -- a sort of virtuous cycle of sex and health reinforcing one another.

Sex and Seniors

Although it may gross out 20-year-olds to hear it (especially about 
their parents), older people do continue to have sex, according to the 
MacArthur Foundation report "Successful Aging" by John W. Rowe, MD, and 
Robert L. Kahn, PhD. They cite a Duke University study published in the 
November 1974 Journal of the American Geriatrics Society that found that 
"at age 68, about 70% of men were sexually active on a regular basis" 
but that this number dropped to 25% by age 78.

A more recent study, published in the January 1990 issue of the Archives 
of Internal Medicine, reported that nearly 74% of married men over 60 
remain sexually active, as do 56% of married women. And an April 1988 
study on "Sexual Interest and Behavior in Healthy 80 to 102-year-olds" 
published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found that 63% of men and 
30% of women were still having sexual intercourse. "Given that by the 
age of 80 or older there are 39 men for every 100 women, lack of 
oppportunity may well account for a large portion of such gender 
differences," says Cindy M. Meston, PhD, in her paper on "Aging and 
Sexuality," published in the October 1997 issue of the Western Journal 
of Medicine.

While men may experience a gradual decline in sexual libido as their 
testosterone levels slowly diminish, women experience a wider range of 
effects as a result of the more complex hormonal changes that occur with 
menopause. Some, like Eileen Smith, 70, a nurse in Laguna Beach, Calif., 
experience no decrease in sexual desire through the years, although she 
attributes that to the fact that she began hormone replacement therapy 
at the first sign of hot flashes. "In my own case, intensity of desire 
was not tied to menopause," she says, "but rather to the quality of the 
relationships I was having at different times in my life." The mother of 
two and grandmother of four, she said that years after her divorce, when 
she was "crazy in love" at age 60, she experienced sexuality "as hot as 
ever."

Other women may respond to the lower testosterone levels that sometimes 
occur after menopause with a decrease in desire. Judith Gerberg, MA, a 
career counselor and president of the Career Counselors' Consortium in 
New York, found that a hysterectomy 10 years ago left her totally 
depressed and disinterested in sex or anything else. Despite treatment 
with estrogen, her apathy continued. She did not give up on finding a 
solution and kept consulting physicians until she found one who was an 
early proponent of the use of small doses of testosterone to restore 
sexuality in middle-aged women.

When she began taking Estratest, a combination of estrogen and 
testosterone, all aspects of her sexual functioning returned. "I was 
sexy as ever," she says. "Joy returned. I was energized. I stopped 
worrying all the time." In her work as a career counselor, she now 
advocates that women suffering similar problems explore hormone therapy 
with their gynecologists.

Use It or Lose It

For both men and women, the best way to maintain sexuality in later 
years is never to stop making love. "The vagina is one organ where use 
makes a difference," says Susan Love, MD, in Dr. Susan Love's Hormone 
Book. "Sexual exercise -- either masturbating or having sex with a 
partner -- will increase your natural lubrication." Men, too, may find 
that arousal comes more easily when sexual activity is maintained 
regularly, although the normal sexual diminution that comes in their 70s 
and beyond may require some adjustment and variation.

My friend Peter Kranz explains his method. "We make love twice every 
day, but I don't finish twice a day, just once. We go to bed around 11 
p.m. After a few hours sleep, I wake my wife up, and we have intercourse 
for 20 or 30 minutes. Then we go back to sleep till the alarm goes off 
in the morning. We make love again upon awakening, and then I generally 
do finish off."

And one of Roizen's enthusiastic correspondents, 87-year-old Joe, who 
had sex regularly until his wife died at age 83, gives his sexual 
recipe. "This year I met a 56-year-old lady full of energy who had never 
married," he says. "Since I lost my erection in my 70s, I am able to 
excite her with my hand and by oral sex." Joe adds that until her 
relationship with him, she had been in a physical "cocoon," due to lack 
of sex. But after two months, "She came out of the cocoon ... and her 
juices started flowing."

Jeffrey Blum, PhD, is a psychotherapist in private practice in New 
Canaan, Conn., who treats individuals, couples, and families. He is the 
author of Nothing Left to Lose: Studies of Street People and Living with 
Spirit in a Material World as well as numerous magazine articles.

 

Related WebMD Information

What Men Can Do to Prevent Impotence 
<http://webcenter.health.webmd.netscape.com/content/article/1687.50748>
http://webcenter.health.webmd.netscape.com/content/article/1687.50748

Sex After 60 -- Why Not? 
<http://webcenter.health.webmd.netscape.com/content/article/1687.50188>
http://webcenter.health.webmd.netscape.com/content/article/1687.50188

Great Sex After 70 
<http://webcenter.health.webmd.netscape.com/content/article/1685.50042>
http://webcenter.health.webmd.netscape.com/content/article/1685.50042

Older Adults and Sex 
<http://webcenter.health.webmd.netscape.com/content/article/3172.10280>
http://webcenter.health.webmd.netscape.com/content/article/3172.10280

[End quoted material]

URL references

"RealAge: Are You as Young as You Can Be?" by Michael F. Roizen
All his books: 


http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/index=books&field-author=Roizen%2C%20Michael%20F./104-8745135-4107138
RealAge book:


http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060930756/qid=1060725333/sr=2-2/ref=sr_2_2/104-8745135-4107138

"Secrets of the Superyoung", by David Weeks, MD


http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0425172589/qid%3D1060727473/sr%3D11-1/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F1/104-8745135-4107138

"Dr. Susan Love's Hormone Book" by Susan Love, MD
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-form/104-8745135-4107138

"Anatomy of Love: A Natural History of Mating, Marriage, and Why We 
Stray" by Helen Fischer


http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0449908976/qid=1060726760/sr=2-1/ref=sr_2_1/104-8745135-4107138
---

This supports my long held opinion that what comes natural is good for 
us and ought not be taken for granted, like good exercise for instance. 
One can think of sex as a special kind of exercise just as vital as 
regular strenuous physical activity but not replaced by it. As reported 
elswhere and mentioned several times in various venues by renowned 
Anthropologist Helen Fischer, the author of "Anatomy of Love: A Natural 
History of Mating, Marriage, and Why We Stray", the act of kissing and 
embracing recharges us and boosts our immune system. So now we can 
honestly say to our partners with a special twinkle in our eyes, "Honey 
I'm concerned for our health, I want to do everything I can to keep us 
healthy and young".

Cheers,

James

-- 
Cryonics Institute of Michigan Member!
The Immortalist Society Member!
The Society for Venturism Member!

MY WEBSITE: http://www.geocities.com/~davidpascal/swayze/

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