Dating feels more pressing than ever to Alex, the 50-year-old divorcée played by Sharon Horgan in the new HBO series “Youth.”
“I think I’ve got, like, 10 years left as a sexual person,” Alex tells her physician in the first episode. “I need someone to fall in love with me now, so there’s a bit of time left with This Me before Old Me is like, I’m here now.”
But meeting someone new also sounds exhausting. She’s juggling a full-time career, a complicated teenager and an ailing mother.
Like Alex, many women over 50 navigate a host of complexities as they date — concerns over their changing bodies, familial obligations and logistical constraints and vastly different dating norms from those they encountered when they were younger.
On the plus side, they often come to dating with a stronger sense of self. In interviews, many women said they knew better what they wanted — and what they were not willing to tolerate.
The other ticking clock
A line by Victor Hugo — “Forty is the old age of youth; 50 is the youth of old age” — was the inspiration for the title of the TV show. The quote captures the urgency many women in midlife feel to find new partners before they’re “too old.”
Much like Alex, I feel this as a single 47-year-old entering perimenopause. Will I want to have sex in five years? Will anyone want to have sex with me?
“The changes in a woman’s sexuality after menopause are huge,” said Liza Cooper, a dating coach in New York City and founder of the online workshop series Find Love After 50 (who is herself 56 and dating). Women who are experiencing the hormonal shift may yearn to be intimate, she said, but then find intercourse painful or struggle to orgasm.
In a study published in 2017 in the journal PLoS One that surveyed 1,406 women, 52.8 percent of participants ages 50 to 59, and 32.6 percent of those ages 60 to 69, reported having had intercourse in the previous month. (By comparison, 77.3 percent of women in their 30s did.) Other research finds that drops in libido and menopause-related symptoms can limit older women’s sexual activity.
Women may also feel self-conscious about their changing bodies. Getting naked with someone new is an “adjustment if you haven’t dated in a long time,” said Maria Ricapito, 63, who lives in Philipstown, N.Y.
In the show, after a man compliments Alex’s “soft bum,” she ramps up her exercise routine. Earlier this year, I squealed in terror when a man I was on a date with reached under my dress and I realized I was still wearing shapewear.
Research has shown that men tie attractiveness to youth and tend to partner with relatively younger women as they age. So older heterosexual women may find that their dating pool is shrinking and that it skews toward men who are older than they are, Ms. Cooper said.
“Women over 50 will get set up with men that look like their grandfather,” she added. That can be jarring for those who previously dated men their own age. In “Youth,” Alex is paired on a blind date with a man 17 years her senior, and when he shows up, she looks horrified.
Making room for romance
Midlife can be a busy and complicated time. Women may want a relationship but be distracted by careers, ex-partners, children and aging parents. Alex’s sexual escapades in the show are frequently interrupted by the urgent needs of her 19-year-old son.
As soon as we finished speaking about her dating life, Ms. Ricapito took her mother to the podiatrist.
“It’s a beautiful time — and a time where you’re navigating more than you ever were,” said Ms. Cooper, who is dating, works a full-time job in health care, runs a dating coach business, has a 16-year-old and cares for her father, who has advanced Parkinson’s disease.
Still, women in midlife often know themselves better than they did when they were younger. They may have stronger convictions and boundaries and be more willing to speak up for themselves, she added.
“There’s a stronger sense of ‘I am who I am,’” said Pepper Schwartz, a sociologist and sexologist at the University of Washington.
Women who date after 50 may also prefer to hold on to their independence. “I’ve got teenagers, so I’m not looking to move anyone into my house, and I’m not looking to move into anyone else’s house,” said Sally Nardoni, 56, who lives in London.
This can limit women’s dating options in some ways, but expand them in others, Ms. Cooper said. They may be comfortable with long-distance dating, as I am, because they don’t mind seeing partners just a few times a month.
Some women told me that, in middle age, they are more open about the kinds of men they date. They’re not necessarily looking for men who will be good fathers, Dr. Schwartz said, and they might be willing to date men who aren’t particularly ambitious or have led unconventional lives.
At the same time, older women can also be less tolerant than they were in the past.
Ms. Nardoni is sensitive to men who “trauma-dump” on first dates, expecting her to absorb and validate their problems. “Before I’ve even had a glass of wine, they’ve told me their life story,” she said.
Learning rules and norms
Another challenging aspect of midlife dating, women told me, is keeping up with the rapidly changing dating landscape and lexicon — I’ve found myself turning to Google for definitions of newer relationship terms like “demisexual” or “ethically nonmonogamous.”
Ms. Ricapito has also struggled to keep up with modern dating expectations like texting etiquette and changing norms around grooming. “I’m just wondering how people are styling their pubic hair these days,” she said.
Women who are lesbian, bisexual or queer can face unique dating challenges, Dr. Schwartz said. It can be especially hard to meet potential partners, as gay bars are typically frequented by younger people, said Dr. Schwartz, who has studied L.G.B.T.Q. dating experiences.
App dating can be frustrating, as well. Research suggests that queer women are routinely harassed on dating apps, and that they have to navigate deceptive profiles, such as couples looking for threesomes but presenting as single women.
No one is immune. I have had to post a pre-emptive message to protect myself from unsolicited photos of male genitalia, for example. It hasn’t always worked.
Ms. Nardoni has also found that her matches on the apps don’t seem to be looking for serious relationships — perhaps, she said, because they’ve recently been through difficult divorces or splits. “They want intimacy without commitment,” Ms. Nardoni said. Men she meets often want to text for weeks before meeting up, she said. And they frequently “ghost” without warning.
When they do want commitment, it may not happen at a suitable time.
In the show, Alex has a fling with an old flame who wants a serious relationship — right after her son drops out of college and her mother has surgery. When her beau senses it’s a bad time, she initially pushes back. “It has to be the right time because another time is going to be too late,” she says.
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