Herbal Health

Late adolescence starts around the age of seventeen or eighteen in girls and about eighteen to twenty, or later, in boys. It is basically a time of changing relationships, even with the self. It represents the last days of childhood.

Independence from parents increases, although some late adolescents cling to their families or their families to them. As at all stages boys are given more freedom than are girls and usually still feel comfortable at home. Girls can be very conscious of their need to escape: into work away from home, into higher education, and even into marriage. When they do escape they often pass through a phase in which they want to reduce contact with home to a minimum whilst maintaining a friendly relationship.

Parental criticism or disappointment still hurts the late adolescent but most consult their parents about important decisions and sooner or later do accept their advice. Some parents are excellent at giving approval and support to late adolescents without interfering but others try to exert total control. The latter court the risk of open or covert rebellion or, if the child submits, of changing his (more frequently than her) future growth. Open rebellion can take the form of delinquency or, in girls, unsuitable relationships, a premarital pregnancy and so on. Covert rebellion is sometimes expressed in failure of one form or another. Late adolescents are not fully realistic about their parents, but the old idolisation of the parents that was present in childhood is usually overthrown in mid-adolescence. The emotional feelings withdrawn from the parents (and especially the opposite-sex parent) into the self by mid-adolescence are available in late adolescence for investing in significant relationships outside the family.

From mid-adolescence the child increasingly creates his or her own social life independent of his parents, but in late adolescence the emphasis is on opposite-sex relationships. Progressively throughout adolescence the individual becomes increasingly cynical about friendships and by late adolescence, in contrast with early adolescence, feels that the chances of finding a new, good friend are increasingly remote. At this stage many girls say they dislike other girls but boys still mainly function in same-sex groups of one kind or another. Boys often see a girlfriend only as someone with whom they share sexual, but few other, intimacies.

Emotional development along adult lines proceeds rapidly but in girls, on average, it occurs two or more years earlier than in boys of the same age. Girls are more ready to commit themselves to a relationship, perhaps partly motivated by guilt over their sexual activities and sometimes regard their boyfriend as being more committed to them than he really is. By the late teens some boys still look upon girls either as medals or as game to be tracked down. This is not so much the result of their insensitivity but rather reflects the more rapid progress of girls and poor education on sex and emotions for boys. Misunderstandings are rife and more girls think of themselves as being engaged, to a greater or lesser degree, than do boys. Suicidal gestures can be the result of the rejection which ensues. Although adults can be very impatient with such gestures it is important to remember that the girl is really saying that if she cannot be loved she does not even want to live.

Girls, much sooner than boys, can become preoccupied with thoughts of loving and being loved, and they may cry themselves to sleep thinking about it. Late adolescence can be a harrowing time for a girl and bouts of depression are common. At this stage some girls become more or less passive, being chosen rather than choosing. Older and even married men can seem very attractive, not only because of their resources and experience but because ultimately the girl knows there is little hope of an enduring relationship, so thoughts of ending the liaison distresses her less. Paradoxically, with older men she feels she is doing more of the choosing and is more in charge. As she becomes more self-confident her sights usually become set on men more of her own age.

Boys reach the same stage of emotional development later (at around twenty-three to twenty-five) than girls, but because women tend to marry men a few years older than themselves, most men do not have to experience rejection distress. This is not to say that boys have less anxiety than girls: it simply takes a different form and is more concerned with approaching girls and, eventually, with sexual performance fears. Some late-adolescent boys conceal their anxiety behind callow behaviour towards girls.

The average girl today first has intercourse around or before her sixteenth birthday, and probably more than 95 per cent of girls first have intercourse between the ages of fifteen and twenty, whereas the range amongst boys is much wider. Male virgins of twenty-three to twenty-five are not uncommon. As a result, many young women today have had several fairly intense relationships before they finally marry. If this helps them to deal better with sex and any guilty feelings and so frees them to choose a partner based on personality factors rather than being swayed by an obsession with genitality, then this is beneficial.

Although most earlier sex education has been too little and too late, there is an intense practical interest amongst late adolescents and young adults about the establishment and maintenance of relationships. Many really do want to know how to understand and please the opposite sex, and not just physically. They want to know if anything is wrong with them and if so how to correct it. Minor defects can be sources of agonising worry. In spite of being nearly adult they can easily be disorganised by anxiety and often need parental support.

Various strands of their previous development now begin to be knitted together, for good or ill, but change, even dramatic change, is still possible. Although what happens in childhood has immense consequences, it is not necessarily permanent. New attitudes, perspectives and insights are possible and late adolescence is the last chance before the relatively fixed attitudes of adulthood overtake the individual. A lot of preventive work can be undertaken with late adolescents, but the majority have no readily available service to help them, unless they are in extreme distress. As a result, maladaptive attitudes towards the self and others are carried forward into adulthood where they ultimately cause trouble either for the individual or those around him or her.

Like most people, late adolescents need success but, because they are at the starting-line of adult life, their needs are particularly great. Although some may seem self-assured and even arrogant, typically under-confidence and self-doubt are never far away. They are in a difficult situation because they are becoming increasingly aware of their need for a relationship with a member of the opposite sex. This is more than a genital need, although men reach their lifetime peak of sex drive during this period. This is before many of them have had intercourse.

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Early adolescence starts with puberty in both sexes. Why puberty starts when it does is uncertain but hormonal changes begin to occur a year or two beforehand and there is evidence that these affect behaviour.

Puberty is often thought of as starting at the same age in both sexes but there is little doubt that the changes occur earlier in girls. A boy’s adolescent spurt in height occurs, on average, two years after that of a girl, so for a time girls are, on average, taller than boys and may be stronger. This may partly contribute to the avoidance of girls by boys which characterises this stage. The unusually early onset of puberty is much commoner in girls than in boys and, when it occurs in boys, unlike girls, the cause is usually a disease or disorder. The late onset of puberty, in contrast, is of less medical concern in boys because perfectly normal boys may be late just as perfectly normal girls may be early.

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Provided all goes reasonably well with the oral stage, the child progresses to the next phase at around the middle of the second year. This is the anal (excretory) phase, in which the baby’s excretory functions become the primary source of interest and pleasure. As bowel and urinary control become possible, usually in the second or third year, the child experiences pleasure in expelling and retaining bowel motions and urine. The child’s mother is involved because of starting some form of toilet training. Boys are taught to hold their penis and to direct the stream whereas girls are expected to remove clothing and to crouch or sit down.

In ancient Egypt, where the sexes were treated equally, the reverse was the case and the women often urinated standing and men crouching. Some experts in this field believe that female feelings of inferiority start at this point of child development because of the urination postures taught to girls. Certainly, for many adult women who are otherwise totally open about their sexual behaviour, urination can be a source of considerable embarrassment. Urination, too, seems to have an erotic significance for at least some women, some of whom can masturbate to orgasm by simulating their urethral opening or with the muscular efforts required to hold back their urine. Emotional upsets in later life can be psychosomatically expressed as disorders of urination by women, in whom urinary problems are vastly more common than in men.

It has been observed that little girls of about a year often laugh as they urinate and this has been attributed to the tickling sensation that urine causes in the vulva. If this is true, urination will serve further to draw a girl’s attention to the pleasurable sensations she can get from her vulva, whereas a boy is impressed more with his urinary stream and the actual performance of the act.

Either because they develop sooner than boys or because they are intrinsically more affection-dependent and want to please, or both, girls learn to control their bladders earlier than do boys and are also less prone to bed-wetting. The ability to feel shame develops around the age of one and a half years and many mothers use this to help their children gain control over their bowels, and bladder. Moral development starts with toilet training as it is the first time a baby’s parents control his or her bodily desires and pleasures to bring them into line with society’s accepted norms.

Once children have learned to control their bowel movements they have some power over their mothers, depending on whether they choose to perform or not, and many children use this power very effectively. The child’s bowel motions thus become the first gift he or she has to give or withhold. His or her motions, including their smell and appearance, can fascinate and excite the child.

Although a mother expresses delight as her child performs on the potty she nevertheless controls his or her interest in the result by saying it is ‘dirty’ or has ‘germs’ and flushes it away. Later, when the child is in full control of his or her bowels, he or she may play with or collect the motions and hide them away. Old people whose interest in sex has waned often return unwittingly to this anal stage and become preoccupied with their bowel functions, just like a developing child.

If the anal stage progresses well it is an impetus towards creativity and productivity but frustrations can, it is thought, lead to the character traits of obstinacy, stinginess, compulsiveness and over-orderliness. These are seen as a defence against a desire to return to the pleasures of the anal stage. Obsessionalism may be a more extreme defence. On the other hand frustrations may be expressed later as untidiness, disorderliness and even destructiveness. Anal pleasures may continue to be over-represented, relative to other pleasures, later in life, and some individuals require additional anal stimulation during masturbation or intercourse to get their best orgasms. Many prostitutes tell of how they are asked to insert a finger into the anus of a client experiencing ejaculatory difficulties. Some women claim to have orgasms only from anal intercourse and a persistence of anal eroticism is obviously a possible basis for some cases of receptive homosexuality.

Interest in the anus and anal area spills over to the buttocks at this stage. Adult fantasies about beating or being beaten on the buttocks may start here and may be reinforced by parents actually or playfully smacking or threatening to smack their child’s bottom. Prostitutes say many men like to be beaten before intercourse or even that being beaten is enough in itself to produce an orgasm and ejaculation. Some women too, say they enjoy being smacked on the bottom prior to intercourse. Perhaps they have been brought up to think that sex is so naughty that they can only get pleasure from it if they are punished first.

The anal stage, then, has many implications and probably the best advice to parents is to take potty training very gently, consistently and slowly, and to stop the potty training for a while if the child doesn’t seem ready.

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In American culture, we have a myth that sexuality is only related to procreation. According to this myth, once our reproductive years are over, we are no longer sexual people. Many people mistakenly believe that it is unacceptable for older people to have sexual needs or to express themselves sexually. The truth is that we all remain sexual throughout our lives, even in old age.

There are two basic requirements for maintaining healthy sexual capacity in old age. The first is maintaining good physical and mental health. The second is to keep having regular sexual activity. “Use it or lose it” still applies to women and men in the later years of life. The more sexually active that people remain in their later years, the healthier and more enjoyable their sexual activities become.

In the later years of life, well-established relationships may evolve and blossom into more intimate relationships. For older adults, love relationships may slowly transform from passionate love into deep and intimate companionate love. On the other hand, old friendships may become romantic and sexual. Opportunities for sexual expression may decrease or increase. But the quality of sexual activity may become more important than the quantity.

As with our entire sexual journey, there are physical changes that affect the sex lives of older women and men. Understanding these changes can reduce performance anxiety and the feeling that one has become useless and unattractive.

Women go through specific physical changes that affect their sexuality. After menopause, the vaginal walls become thinner, a process that continues into the senior years. The thinner walls can’t absorb the pressure from a thrusting penis as well as they could in youth. This pressure on the vaginal walls is also pressure on the urethra and bladder. These tissues can become irritated. As a result, older women may feel the need to urinate immediately after sexual intercourse.

The vagina also shrinks in width and length. The labia majora also shrink. Because of the smaller size, insertion of the penis may be difficult or painful. Women also continue to experience hormonal imbalances in their later years. These imbalances may cause the natural uterine contractions that occur during orgasm to become painful. It is important to remember, however, that a woman in her 80s has the same capacity for orgasm that she did at 30.

Physical changes affect men as well. Good circulation is essential to getting an erection, but with old age, there is usually a hardening of the arteries. This change in circulation may make it take longer to become erect. In addition, older men experience fewer morning erections. There is also a longer refractory period after orgasm for men.

When we reach midlife, our lives are about half over. We have come a long way from our childhood years. Many people mistakenly think that after they get married or live with someone for many years, life will get boring. This does not have to be true. Our sexuality does not stop growing, changing, or being expressed just because we are older than 29! Our middle adult years are a new and exciting leg of our sexual journey through life. Midlife, or middle age, is generally considered to range from 40 years to 55 years old. The two biggest myths surrounding our midlife sexuality are (1) older people are no longer interested in sex and don’t have sex anymore, and (2) older people are unable to enjoy sex.

We will explore the physical changes that accompany middle age. We will also look at some of the concerns of our midlife years. Our sexual desires are no longer as exclusively focused on the attributes of youth and attractiveness as they were when we were younger. We become more concerned with our potential partners’ sense of themselves. Self-worth begins to matter more than physical appearance.

At this time of life, we reach a stage in which our bodies change in ways that may be unexpected and dramatic. This stage of change is called the climacteric. The climacteric marks the physiological changes that occur in our transition into midlife. Both women and men go through a climacteric. It is a more definitive stage for women because they pass through a transition from being fertile to infertile. Men do not experience this transition. Men are fertile until death. Women experience greater physical changes in their middle life. The changes for men are less noticeable and cause fewer side effects.

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Women and men who have gender identities and sexual orientations that differ from social norms have long-term and committed relationships despite the social constraints against them. The accomplishments, problems, and decisions that these people make within relationships are similar to the ones made by straight women and men who fit the social norms.

Gay and straight couples experience the same frequency of sex, talk about who initiates sex, and decide whether or not to have children. They are equally satisfied with their relationships.

Many gay people live their sexual orientation in a hidden way. The common expression is “in the closet.” They keep their sexual orientation a secret out of fear of losing loved ones, housing, or a job. Increasing numbers of gay people and those perceived to be are more overt about their sexual orientation. They live their lives out in the open and are “out” to others. Some people feel safe being out to only some of the people in their lives—to coworkers, but not family, for example. Others feel safe being out to all the people in their lives.

Questions about Myself

1. Have I thought enough about myself and my sexuality to know that I am ready to have sex?

2. Am I prepared to protect myself or my partner against unintended pregnancy?

3. Am I prepared to deal with an unintended pregnancy if it happens?

4. Am I prepared to protect myself and my partner against sexually transmitted infections?

Questions about My Relationship

1. Do we feel comfortable talking with one another about sex?

2. Do we both agree that we are ready and want to have sex?

3. Are we committed to protecting one another physically and emotionally?

4. Are we using sex to hold our relationship together?

Questions about My Parents

1. Do I ever talk about sex with my parents?

2. Do I understand my parents’ values about sex, and do I share them?

3. Will I be able to talk with my parents about my decision? If I

can’t, how would it feel if I lied to them?

4. Am I planning to have sex to hurt, anger, or spite my parents?

Questions about My Friends

1. Are my friends pressuring me to have sex?

2. Would I be considered “not cool” if my decision about sex isn’t the same as theirs?

3. Do I become tempted to have sex when I get drunk or high with my friends?

4. How much does it matter what my friends think?

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Most children are not aware of their sexual orientation until they become teenagers. Most assume that they are straight. They strive to be what they think is considered feminine or masculine in their culture. They expect to have partners of the other gender when they grow up. They base their expectations on what they observe in their families, their communities, and the images that are presented in the media.

Some children, however, find that they feel somehow different from other children. They may not be able to express how or why they feel different. Later in life, when they are older, they may come to understand what made them feel different. They may have sensed that they didn’t quite fit the gender roles and sexual identities they felt were assigned to them. This insight often happens when young people discover that they are lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender.

Parents cannot predict if a child will conform to cultural and sexual norms regarding gender identity. They have no way of knowing which, if any, of their children will grow up to be lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender. Neither do their children. That’s why it is especially important for parents to allow their children to begin their sexual journey through life without feeling pressured to be feminine or masculine or gay or straight.

Children who experience their sexuality differently from cultural norms may have the impression that their families will not accept their true sexual identities and can have a very hard time growing up. They are much more susceptible than other children to depression. They make more suicide attempts and are at higher risk for using alcohol and other drugs. They are also more likely to leave their homes at early ages and to engage in high risk sex practices in order to survive on the streets.

To sum up, you become a male for several interacting reasons. First, your genes carry a Y chromosome, and this is expressed in every cell of your body. This is your genetic (or chromosomal) sex. Second, because of your genetic sex, your sex glands, or gonads, are invaded by male-directed sex cells. This is your gonadal sex. Third, the male-directed sex cells induce the gonads to secrete the male sex hormone, testosterone, which encourages the development of the male sex ducts, and another substance which causes the withering of the female sex ducts. At the same time testosterone, in its altered form of dihydrotestosterone, induces the tissues at the lower end of the unborn child to differentiate into a penis and a scrotum. These changes make your genital sex. During your life in your mother’s uterus, the circulating testosterone may have left a male ‘imprint’ on your brain cells. This means that after birth, during the vital early years, you are better able to respond positively to and copy male models. First, you copy your father, or another close male figure, and later, other male children of your own age. In humans, in contrast with other mammals, the hormonal conditioning of your brain is only of small significance, adding a flavour of maleness to your more important identification with the male model of your father (or some other male) and the recognition of your mother (or some other female) as a person of the other, complementary sex. These behavioural influences induce you to indicate, by your behaviour to others, that you are a male. This shows your male gender-role. Finally, with the continuing impact of environmental influences, with your interaction with other humans, and with your growing awareness of your male gender-role, you become self-aware of your maleness. This might be called your sexual sex. You have acquired a male gender-identity. You are indeed a man, my son!

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Does early as opposed to late maturity have any lasting effects on the boy’s personality?

A boy who is physically mature at 15 is likely to be regarded with greater respect by his parents, by his peers, and by girls than a boy who is still small and has little or no facial hair. The physically mature boy is able to compete better in athletic contests, which in our society gives him status. Because girls mature about one or two years earlier than boys, the physically mature boy is more confident with girls of his own age in heterosexual encounters.

These observations were confirmed by the scientists in California, who found that late maturers were less well poised, less physically attractive to others, less popular with their peers, more likely to seek attention, and more tense than early maturers. The late maturers needed more sympathy and encouragement to combat their anxiety and distress.

Many of these problems would be avoided if the wide variation in age of physical maturity in adolescence were known by parents, and if they stressed to their anxious son that by 16 or 17 he will be as physically mature as a boy who matures early. Parents and children should know that the physical changes of adolescence can occur at widely different ages in normal young people. The height spurt may occur as early as 11 or as late as 16. The size of the boy’s chest may increase at 12 or not until he is 17. He may put on weight, increasing his muscle mass and his strength, any time between 12 and 16. There is no basis for the folk myth that a boy can outgrow his strength.

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