Can A Woman Have Sex Like a Man?

Posted by: Francine Kaye Posted Date: 11/01/2011

So there I am walking along the Grand Union Canal on Sunday afternoon with a very nice man, enjoying rare moments of sunshine and discussing the idea that a woman can have sex like a man.

As the discussion deepened, it came as a shock to him that women of a certain age, (well, over 40) are perfectly capable of having sex just because they felt a physical need for it and not because they hoped it would lead to a relationship.

I gave him the example of *Susie. She’s had two long-term relationships, one marriage and one partnership. Her kids are grown and she’s not sure what she really wants right now. At the end of her long term relationship she took some time out to grieve and complete and thought she was ready to date, should a guy she was attracted come along.

In fact she did find a new man with whom she was mentally and physically well matched but that didn’t work out. Since then she has been unable to settle into another relationship and has been ‘experimenting’ with on line dating sites and has dated older men and also much younger men. She has purposely set up ‘one night stands’ because she wanted the freedom to experience sex without ties, but on every occasion has been disappointed with the results.

Now if you are like most people, you may be thinking, well that’s because there was no emotional connection, but you’d be wrong in Susie’s case. It was because the males ‘performance’ had really not been ‘up to much’ (if you’ll excuse the pun).

My friend was quite amazed at this revelation. Some guys really do think that women lay back and think of England or are not as sexually needy as men. They cannot imagine a woman wanting sex as much as they do.

But the truth is that statistics tell us that women between the ages of around 45 up to early 60’s are at their sexual peak. They are much more confident in their bodies, they know what they want and are not afraid to ask for it. For sure this is one of the main reasons that younger guys enjoy dating Cougars (women over 40 at least 10 years older than themselves). In surveys they state that older women are ‘drama free, more fun and less needy' than women their own age. For older men they are pleased and often surprised at the sexual enthusiasm shown by women of a certain age.

But back to the question. Can a woman really sustain unemotional intimacy - that is have sex like a man? Well, whilst Susie was not impressed with the skills of her one night stand men, she did also admit that a few days later she had felt a little flat and wondered if it had been worth it.

Ultimately, I gleaned that without being at least ‘in like’ with a man you have seen several times, having sex with a stranger is not an erotic enough experience for a woman to sustain, because women have to be emotionally as well as physically aroused and that means they have to known the man long enough to like him rather than just fancy him.

In part three of my radio programme “It Must Be Love Radio’ today, we discussed this subject (you can hear it again tomorrow at 1pm at www.glastonburyradio.com) and the conclusion Graham, my producer and I came to was that whilst men really do experience sex as an act; a moment of release that needs no emotional connection, its really challenging for a woman to sustain that type of intimacy in the same way a man does.

And in relationship, the challenge remains for a woman to understand that just because a man has sex with you it does not mean he is emotionally connected and the challenge for a man is to understand that when a woman has sex with him it very probably means she is.

I have no idea why this is a paradox that makes relationships so challenging. It would be so much easier if men and women worked in the same way but no one ever said it should be easy. Fun, frustrating and exciting yes, but easy no.

So I would love to hear your comments, opinions and perhaps even your own experiences. And if you are out of a full time relationship and experimenting with dating and intimacy and would like to understand yourself in relationship, then give me a call.