“Before I started to have discomfort, our sex life was good. I had only remarried in 2004 so, although we were middle-aged, we were still like newlyweds,” recalls Bianchini, now 57, a human resources manager at a hospital in Staten Island, N.Y. “It had been going on for at least a year, but I just did not bring it to my doctor since I thought it is just the way it is.”But sex became so infrequent that, desperately, Bianchini finally mentioned the problem to her gynecologist, David Herzog, MD. Herzog explained that after menopause, decreased estrogen levels in the body can lead to loss of elasticity, or atrophy, around the vaginal muscles—essentially shrinking the opening and making it more difficult to have intercourse.
It’s not an uncommon problem: Dryness and pain during intercourse are two of the main causes of female sexual dysfunction, which affects more than 40% of women and is most common between ages 45 and 64, according to the 1999 U.S. National Health and Social Life Survey. (Other causes include lack of interest and inability to experience orgasm.) A 2007study found that among women ages 57 to 64, 34% avoid sex altogether, citing pain (18%), decreased lubrication (36%), and low desire (44%) as their reasons.
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