Latest / The Dr. Psych Mom Show with clinical psychologist Dr. Samantha Rodman Whiten / What Issues Arise In Older Woman-Younger Man Couples?

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What Issues Arise In Older Woman-Younger Man Couples? · The Dr. Psych Mom Show with clinical psychologist Dr. Samantha Rodman Whiten

• 0:05
  Hi everybody and welcome to the Doctor Psych Mom Show.
• 0:10
  Today we're going to talk about what issues arise in couples and
• 0:14
  who gets into situations where it is an older woman and a
• 0:17
  younger man. Because we just recently spoke
• 0:20
  about older man and younger woman and it's kind of a
• 0:23
  different but somewhat similar set of issues that arise in the
• 0:29
  in the converse dynamic and before that please do subscribe.
• 0:33
  My most recent subscriber episode was on why your wife
• 0:36
  won't go down on you and the various reasons and types of
• 0:39
  dynamics in which this arises what to do how to think about
• 0:43
  this you know and and more it's a common common complaint but I
• 0:49
  do not see a lot of understanding about it so.
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  So that's why I did this one, to really go into why, you know,
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  because this is what a lot of guys don't understand.
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  OK. So anyway, I do not see older
• 1:02
  woman, younger man as much. It's just not as common as as
• 1:07
  older man and younger woman for a variety of reasons, including
• 1:10
  obviously, as I always discuss evolutionarily.
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  So, you know, younger women are more fertile and if a guy wants
• 1:15
  to get married to A to an older woman and he wants kids, then
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  that becomes more of an issue. You know, of course not for
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  everybody. Some 20 year old guys with 30
• 1:24
  year old women, it's not an issue at all.
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  But you know, if it's a 30 year old guy, a 45 year old woman,
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  it's gonna have, you know, there would be problems with that.
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  But of course not everybody wants kids, etc etc.
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  So let's lead with who does this.
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  So it's it's a common social convention for the man to be
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  older. So a woman that bucks this trend
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  will, you know, necessarily be more open minded in various
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  ways, more intellectually open minded.
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  She's just more, you know, like a little unconventional.
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  Usually from the women that I see, they, they don't care what
• 1:58
  people think, you know. So they're with a guy who's 10
• 2:00
  years younger or something. And even five years is enough
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  for people to be like, wow, he's younger, Which wouldn't even
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  like, raise eyebrows at all if it was an older man with a
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  younger woman with a five year age difference.
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  It's barely even thought about as an age difference, but
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  because it's unusual for the woman to be older, that's why
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  people react differently. So anyway, so she has to be OK
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  with that, which means in many senses that she's more
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  confident, you know, And she usually likes sex, I'll tell
• 2:31
  you, you know, because that is a very good part about a younger
• 2:36
  man is, of course, he's quite sexual and more sexual than her.
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  Her prior husband, you know, probably was was her own age.
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  So I do see a lot of this is more in second marriages.
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  And so, you know, he's just, I mean, obviously he's going to be
• 2:53
  able to get harder and having a lower refractory period and
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  different kind of body and he's way more physically attractive,
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  just like all younger people are more physically attractive than
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  older people. And I mean that's just kind of a
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  thing. But I mean, you know, there's
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  taste. Some people like older people,
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  some people like younger people, but generally bodies or that the
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  younger are more attractive. It's tough nowadays, you know,
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  you gotta be kind of PC. I mean, I I don't even know like
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  how to how anybody would argue that.
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  But like, I mean I'm sure somebody would but whatever.
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  I don't actually get a lot of people writing in with PC
• 3:30
  bullshit on my podcast. I don't really.
• 3:33
  That's Facebook. Facebook.
• 3:34
  I could say the sky is blue and I get like people that tell me
• 3:38
  that I've been brainwashed, but my podcast, you know, people are
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  usually I guess the people who listen already kind of agree
• 3:44
  with me on a variety of things so they don't get as easily
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  triggered. Otherwise, I guess they just
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  don't listen. But anyway, so so yes, I'm real
• 3:54
  out there with my idea that young bodies are more
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  attractive. So you know, generally women
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  that like sex go for the younger guy and and also they could,
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  they're unconventional and also they like being adored because
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  nobody's going to adore you more than a man with less experience
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  that's younger. He's enthusiastic.
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  He's he's still idealistic, he's romantic, all of these things.
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  Great. Cool.
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  What about the guy, though? Like, why would a guy go for an
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  older woman? Does he have mommy issues?
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  Many people ask me sure, people can have mommy issues.
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  They could have any sort of issues.
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  There is something certainly very appealing to some people of
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  any gender. But specifically here we're
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  talking about younger men. There's something very appealing
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  in the idea that this older person with life experience
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  accepts you and approves of you and loves you.
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  And that's even more appealing if you've never experienced that
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  in your family of origins, wouldn't necessarily need to
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  have mommy issues, but he might have daddy issues, he might have
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  some kind of issues where he wasn't really, he didn't really
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  have confidence that he was truly accepted and loved in his
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  family of origin. So now this older, wiser person,
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  it's very attractive to him that she is so into him and gives him
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  basically a seal of approval after having had more life
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  experience. You know, also guys who are very
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  sexual, ironically, you'll hear why it's ironic later.
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  Maybe you've already jumped ahead and realized that this
• 5:21
  ain't going to last forever. Spoiler alert.
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  But men who are very sexual, they like the idea that the
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  woman has had more experience. You know, she's willing to try
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  new things. She's not going to, you know,
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  say you gross a penis. You know, like a woman that's
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  dating a younger man, She's doing that for a reason.
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  And the reason is that she would like to have sex, you know, the
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  younger man. So she's not going to be grossed
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  out, is gonna be more open minded, free spirited, etc.
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  However, then what happens, as I've taught you, then the
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  chickens come home to roost. Because when I do see these
• 5:54
  couples and counseling, guess what?
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  She's hit menopause or perimenopause.
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  And then the shit really hits the fan because they had a
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  better than average sex life before and now they don't, you
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  know, And her hormones have. So her hormones have decreased
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  precipitously starting in perimenopause in her 40s.
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  And usually the average age of menopause as I've discussed is
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  52. And so at that point things seem
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  a lot different to this couple. Usually, you know she has lower
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  estrogen and estrogen is the yes honey hormone that makes her
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  agreeable and amiable and think he's so cute even though he
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  doesn't know as much as her because he doesn't because he
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  doesn't have as much life experience.
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  So he's kind of set up to fail in that situation because he's
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  never gonna quote know as much as her you know, or whoever
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  she's comparing him to in her peer group in the sense that
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  he's not been alive for as long. So while the men, this same age
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  gap situation older men sometimes get get when it's an
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  older man and a younger women, women, sometimes the men get
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  very annoyed that the woman is being like silly or you know
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  inexperienced or the things that she says just don't make sense
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  to him, they seem stupid to him. So I see that less though, you
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  know, with men and women then I do.
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  I really see it with some older women, younger men pairings,
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  because again, possibly they've reverted to the social
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  convention that the man is supposed to know more than then,
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  you know, the woman. Like this is like a thing where
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  like you want to look up to the guy that you're with.
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  So many women, so many women on PC to say it, but so many women
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  bragged to me that their husband is smarter than them is still in
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  2023, you know, and say, Oh yes, he's so smart.
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  Oh, he has all these other problems, but he's so smart.
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  He knows things. I don't know.
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  This is a big one, says. A big one for women you know.
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  And evolutionarily, that's so that he can be the, you know,
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  smart guy who knows how to hunt and provide and and protect you.
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  But anyway, so when the older woman's hormones fall off a
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  little bit, she looks at him more objectively.
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  And if she doesn't care that he could get hard three times, you
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  know, in an hour anymore, you know, then.
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  Then she starts to look at him with a bit more critical of an
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  eye, which is exacerbated by the general irritability of this
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  life stage due to hormones. And so frequently, she loses
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  patience with him. She thinks that he's being naive
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  in various ways. She thinks he's being stupid in
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  various ways and is the sex no longer compensates because she
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  doesn't care as much. So in this situation you know
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  it's and and certainly it doesn't go like this for
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  everybody. So people are very happy.
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  And if you remember in the Older Man, Younger Woman podcast when
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  I said if you were friends 1st and you have this basic level of
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  respect, it always tends to go better when there's later
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  stressors and later more objective looks at one another.
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  So if she knew him for a few years before they ever started
• 9:00
  dating, then this got a lot better chance to weather the
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  storm of her having less hormones, which means that she's
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  looking at him more clearly. And that's not always a good
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  thing for relationships. Relationships, you know, do
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  better with a little rose colored glasses.
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  And what happens when women's hormones changes their rose
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  colored glasses go away. It would be like if a woman and
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  you know, looked at her baby and she was like, well, that just
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  looks like a baby man. Not even terribly attractive
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  baby shit, you know, little cross eyed.
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  I mean, I don't know, not, not not a cute baby.
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  Like, you cannot really think that of your baby because the
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  hormones stop you, you everybody thinks they have the cutest
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  baby. And in fact that's a symptom of
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  postpartum depression is you see your baby too clearly.
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  You have, like depressive realism about your baby, and you
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  do feel like this is just a baby.
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  You know, I don't even like this baby.
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  Baby cries too much, you know. And so without the kind of
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  protective neurotransmitters, serotonin and dopamine and all
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  the protective hormones you know of the postpartum phase, you do
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  think overly, critically and clearly about your baby.
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  You're not supposed to be that realistic about your baby.
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  And it's the same thing with love as I obviously as not only
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  I, but the entire field of attachment discusses, there's a
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  lot of overlap between you feel about your attachment figure
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  romantically and how you feel about your parent or your child.
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  And so when you no longer have that protective rose colored
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  lens that hormones give you, then women, they're looking at
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  that guy a lot more clearly. And at that point, any
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  age-related deficits become glaringly apparent and such as,
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  you know, like he doesn't work hard enough or, you know, he's
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  been coasting or, you know, usually it has to do with that
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  they, they feel like the guy's kind of lazy.
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  And that is, you know, not always true, obviously, but
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  sometimes it is, you know, because sometimes her career was
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  the big career, her career came first.
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  So you know, it's not, it's not dissimilar from or when the
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  man's career comes first. But remember, men don't go
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  through menopause, so their hormones are still there.
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  So when they're the older guy with the younger woman, they
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  still feel like she's like cute and sweet and they're still
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  looking at her with rose colored glasses more than when women go
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  through menopause. And then they look at the guy
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  and they're like, oh shit, like he doesn't know as much as I do
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  in this regard. That regard, he shouldn't tell
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  me what to do about my kids, you know?
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  Maybe he should stay in his own lane.
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  Maybe he should just do his hobbies and leave me alone.
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  So I do see some of that and I see that honestly, even when and
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  this is even worse. So if a guy marries a woman
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  who's 15 years older, he's not a moron.
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  He knows that at some point they are not going to have similar
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  interests anymore or similar sex drive.
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  It's fairly obvious. But the interesting thing is
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  when I see guys with like the five year age difference and the
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  woman goes through menopause and they're still in their mid 40s
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  and they're still high on life and they they they it's almost
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  like very quickly it starts to be as though it's a 10 year age
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  difference. Like that's how they both feel.
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  Like she feels like he's kind of just like young and stupid and
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  like just like with his like silly interests and hobbies and
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  he why isn't he more like, I don't know, like mature, I guess
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  you know, is the word. And he's like who is this old
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  lady? She's acting like she goes to
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  sleep early. She doesn't care about having
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  fun. She doesn't care about sex.
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  I didn't think this was going to happen for years.
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  So you know that does that. That is a possible, a possible
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  way that this could go. Again, if you are in this sort
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  of situation, the more you are deeply compatible as friends,
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  mutually respect respecting friends, then the more protected
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  you are against this change. When the woman is, you know
• 13:02
  reaches a different age and stage hormonally and the guy is
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  still feeling young and virulent on top of the world, you know so
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  so you are always in every situation, certainly not just
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  these protected more. If you start your relationship
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  on a foundation of mutual respect, friendship and you know
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  really really kind of it's it's more more, more like equals.
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  So you can't be equals because of age.
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  One person always has more experience.
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  But for example, if somebody's like, if these people are both
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  professors, right, or they're both working and consulting or
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  like whatever, they're both in the same industry and they knew
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  each other through that, then it kind of, you know, you always
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  have this this basis of like respecting the person for who
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  they are and thinking that, you know, they're pretty good
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  person. If you met this young guy on
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  Tinder when you, you know, were in the middle of your divorce
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  and you had like, you know, like six months of, like, awesome
• 14:05
  drunk sex and decided to get married, and then three years
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  later you start hitting perimenopause, you're like,
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  what? Who is he?
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  You know, Like, what does he even do?
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  Like like how does he contribute to my life now that I don't care
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  so much about just the sex. So, so that that is a thing to
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  think about if anybody is in this situation.
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  And either way, this is usually age gaps or a topic that I've
• 14:31
  been frequently requested to talk about because it is not a
• 14:34
  super huge one that I see, I see enough of it.
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  But it's in no way our large age gaps a a a specialty.
• 14:41
  I think I've, you know, maybe seen dozens versus the hundreds
• 14:45
  of of couples that don't really have an age gap.
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  But anyway, these are themes and of course, people do write in
• 14:51
  with their individual situations as well.
• 14:53
  And I take from that too. All right, Thanks so much for
• 14:57
  listening. Everybody.
• 14:58
  Please do subscribe. You know, you want to hear about
• 15:00
  why your wife won't go down on you because, you know, such an
• 15:03
  exciting and uplifting topic. All right, talk to everybody
• 15:07
  soon. Bye guys.