How can you be sexy in menopause?

Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russel--Cougar and cub

Carol Forsloff - "Feeling sexy and being sexually active is good for one's health and
sense of well-being.  It is good exercise and slows down aging."  That's the message of the American Association of Retired Persons and sex experts for menopause.

One of the most important ways a woman has of measuring her femininity is how sexy she feels, and there are some good reasons to be optimistic by following some scientific suggestions.

What social scientists and doctors say is that menopause should not signal the end of the love affair.  Great sex can occur after menopause,after the reproductive years and the frets and worries during that
period of time.

Some women expect to lose their sex drives after menopause,  but it isn't true it disappears.  Sexual intimacy is an ongoing thing and has many dimensions.  One's desire for sex doesn't decrease with age nor is it a symptom of menopause.

Indeed some women feeling sexier during and after menopause.  It's then, when there is a decline in men's function, and the need for a little more effort to be made in the experience, sex can still be satisfying for both partners.

Couples experiencing difficulty may want to seek out a sex therapist's advice.

Lack of desire at that certain age often accompanies certain physical and emotional factors, such as stress or depression.  This is why it is important for the woman to be open with her partner and her gynecologist.  Very often women don't want to talk about intimate issues with doctors, but doing so can help facilitate the solution for sexual dysfunction.  Experts tell us that the sex drive does not necessarily go away, and that the decline in desire is gradual.  And folks can perk it up with practice and playful interactions.

There are also ways to overcome vaginal dryness that affects some women's interest in sex.There are other aids to help the physical interaction during sex so that it is less painful.

Safe sex is also important to prevent transmitted diseases.

Experts remind us that healthy sex is healthy for the mind and body, especially during aging.  In fact they say because children are not around to interrupt and a couple have time to play together, sex can actually be better.  Besides there are new tools and a social permission slip from changes in the culture that unleash a variety of ideas for sex play and performance.

The conclusion from those who study safe sex with older adults and the function and satisfaction of sex life-long  is if you are saying to yourself  or your partner at menopause, you're too old for sex, you're wrong.  Think of some other excuse.

Butter, perfume and music: Sex doesn't always sell

Taylor Swift

Carol Forsloff — It’s a common belief that sex sells, but the experts don’t think so, at least if one wants consistent and positive response over time from anything from music to butter.

According to behavior experts, overt sex revealed too frequently can be a turnoff. People begin to wonder about motivation and see it as driven by less talent concerns than the desire for attention. The problem is the attention is short-lived.

An Iowa study found that people are likely more able to remember the advertising in advertisements when they are not surrounded by sex or violence. Many experts observe that the notion sex sells is a false one. In fact less is more is the dictum for “selling”. In other words, more modest, sexually-oriented material has more lasting appeal, and actually sells more products or services, than the overt, more blatant types.

Psychologists say this: “Sexually graphic, intensely violent television programs are selling only one thing: the message of excessive violence and sex.

It is a coarsening and degrading message. It is a message of hostility and misogyny. And it doesn't even work!”

Journal of Consumer Research, presented research by Janne van Doorn and Diederik A. Stapel of Tilburg University in the Netherlands that also concluded that too much sex has the reverse effect on sales, with folks less likely to have long term interest or memory of the product being sold.

Scientific research has also demonstrated that women do not respond favorably to flashy magazine advertisements with sexy women.  A University of Florida research study of 100 women of college age found that after being shown a number of advertisements with flashy, seductive photos, the young women expressed boredom and disinterest. Researchers concluded that male marketers miss the mark when putting out very seductive photos for advertising, with respect to how women feel.  Women tend to gravitate to an attractive woman, like Katie Homes, or in music someone like Taylor Swift, both of whom have that down-home, prettiness as opposed to the overtly sexy model from a Victoria Secret Ad.

So the next time you want to sell perfume, butter or music, it’s best to know what the facts are with respect to sex and advertising and getting the effect you want. The best approach is that less is more, substantiated not just by science, but the old adage we once learned as well, especially women, not to show it all and expect respect — or sales.

Greek-like dramas in modern plays of sex, sin, powerful men

[caption id="attachment_5524" align="alignleft" width="223" caption="John Edwards"]
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Carol Forsloff - Whether it happens in France or the United States or somewhere else in the world, the saga of sex, sin and powerful men remains mesmerizing in the same way Greeks enjoyed the antics of the gods, seeing they could fall like others from great heights.  It is the same old story, written for the modern world.

A young man and woman stood on a Portland, Oregon train, eyes for no one else around as the time became a way to weave a tale of love for an audience that sat transfixed, as if in theater seats.  The scene spoke of young love eternal, but within the view of all who watched there were some imperfections that marred the drama that took place that day.  The young man wore an earring, and the woman a piercing of her lip was held by glitter threads.  These aberrations in the scene of love were likely part of what those watchers thought about, as they wondered about the public display of private intention by imperfect lovers in an open place.  But these weren’t gods that acted in the play, as happens on the world stage with sex and sin of men in places like the gods.

John Edwards had become a god in the United States,  a former Senator who reached the heights of fame in his pursuit of the Presidency of the United States. His wife, Elizabeth, stood beside him upright as a woman mate, the kind the gods might seek, of stature and grace that lent an aura of eternal love her husband's subjects viewed with awe.  But Edwards sought a liaison with a servant woman of a type,  an aide in Edwards' entourage,  a woman not of power nor prestige, nor from the ranks of  bejeweled beauties that become the gold of gods.  So Edwards fell like other mortal men, descending into the throes of political hell where the souls of men like him now dwell, their pride and power gone, as he has been indicted for wrongdoing just this week.  The men,  who fell  just like him, had been stripped of godlike powers they once held,  cast then cast aside as part of human myth.

Governor Arnold Schwarzeneggar of California performed his character of father, family man beyond the time most gods have done before, which brought a new excitement to his stage.  He put aside his queenly wife Maria, replacing her with a servant in his house, who bore a son as happens in those myths we all remember and enjoy.    And Arnold's pain, his fall, his glittering crown now soiled, becomes another tale that will be told again, next time in lives of other men like him who achieve the greatness of the gods only to lose it in the arms of sin.

But more intriguing, captivating stories come from France, a place identified with sin and sultry ways.    Dominique Strauss-Kahn,  a wealthy man of power and prestige, with full abandon that the gods can choose, strode mightily among the servants in his realm and forcibly took one as from those heavens one might snatch a life below.   Yet when the gods steal women from the arms of humankind, they lose the luster from their crowns when those women are plain and simple folk and not a lusty queen.

The tale is ended.  Edwards waits to see what courts might do, while all alone he faces others’ fates.  And we his audience, don’t watch as we do lovers on a train, but with the cynic’s eye that knows that gods fail every day, and now another one has fallen once again.

Sex, drugs and Bon Jovi: agent's memoir fosters controversy

 NEW YORK,--GHN News Editor - Bon Jovi protests
his former tour manager's memoir said to reveal the elements of the
international star's rise to fame as part of a drug and sex fueled
odyssey.

 Richard Bozzett, former Bon Jovi tour manager, examines Jovi's life on the road that he says the star wanted to keep hidden.

"Jon Bon Jovi
has publicly condemned the book and has criticized me in the media
because I know a lot about Jon and the band that he would prefer to
leave in his past."

Bozzett
relays the story of Bon Jovi's colorful activities and racy life style
through a series of what are said to be never-before photographs and
details of drug activities and other details of Bon Jovi and his band's
excesses during their tours.

"Bon
Jovi fans deserve an inside look into the band's early years," Bozzett
explains. "Working and living with the band on the road from 1983
through 1989, I was there for every moment, and want to share it with
the fans."

"Our
inner circle was like a family," he adds.  The author of the
controversial book provides details of some of Bon Jovi's close
relationships with other entertainment figures and the type of pressures
tour managers had on them in managing the stars.  For example, Bozzett
describes how his former childhood friend and former Motley Crue tour
manager, Richie Fisher, tried to commit suicide by jumping to his death
from the Waldorf Astoria Hotel.

"That was the moment when I realized tour managers and road crews give
their all to the job without basic benefits like health insurance, job
security, or provisions for the future," says Bozzett about his friend's
attempted suicide and his own hard work in managing Bon Jovi.    "After
being unceremoniously let go without anything to show for my years of
hard work for Bon Jovi, I was lucky enough to persevere and find my
way," said Bozzett. "Richie was not that lucky.  I wrote this book to
create the Unsung Heroes Foundation which will provide basic resources
like health insurance and a 24 hour support hotline for anyone working
on the road and dealing with the 24/7 demands of touring, or at home
trying to get back to work."