on Feb 12th, 2006Older Men, Younger Women (Contact Reproductive Sports)
Sex and the Seasoned Woman : Pursuing the Passionate Life
by Gail Sheehy
Take a guess: Do men in their 50’s or older want to date women their own age, or would they prefer a younger, still fertile woman, even if they have absolutely no desire to father children? The answer, my friends, at least according to journalist Daphne Merkin is that men desire fertile women over post-menopausal women, despite the liberation that comes from no longer having to deal with the whole pregnancy thing.
Is this surprising to a woman? Fertility implies virility. I suspect it also has to do with a notion of time. Dating a younger woman allows an older man to project himself into the mindspace of the younger woman. He gets to re-imagine a future that has passed for him, but is still very much alive for her. By a trick of the mind, the past is gone, and suddenly the older man is young again. And let’s face it, there’s also less emotional baggage to unpack. An older man gets to reinvent himself without a trace of remorse. It’s all good, man. Gimme five, bro!
The sexual diaspora of older women exists because, trends and wishful thinking notwithstanding, we are creatures of our primitive hypothalamus as much as our advanced neo-cortex; before we have higher intimacy needs, we have survival-of-the-species needs. Men move away from older women, I would argue, almost instinctively, because they sense the impending shadow of nongenerativity like a negative pheromone. They don’t need to want to have children, either consciously or subconsciously, for this to happen; they can, in fact, be childless and adamantly against the notion of procreating. Still, they like their eggs ready to rock just in case.
What’s So Hot About 50?
By DAPHNE MERKIN
New York Times, February 12, 2006