Therapist Unplugged
Welcome to Therapist Unplugged – Real Talk from Real Therapists.
Hosted by Laurie Poole of The Montfort Group, this podcast pulls back the curtain on what really happens in and around the therapy room. No jargon, no perfection—just honest conversations about the messy, meaningful, and deeply human parts of life.
We cover everything from burnout and boundaries to sex, shame, relationships, parenting, grief, identity shifts, and mental health in the modern world. Each episode features licensed therapists who get it—because we live it too.
If you're looking for emotional insight without the clinical lecture, you're in the right place.
New episodes drop regularly.
Subscribe, listen in, and stay a little more human with us.
Therapist Unplugged
Sex After 60: Intimacy, Aging & Desire | Laurie Poole with Sex Therapist Edita Ruzgyte
When was the last time you had an honest conversation about sex after 60?
In this episode of Therapist Unplugged, host Laurie Poole is joined by sex therapist Edita Ruzgyte for a candid look at aging, desire, and intimacy in later life. They challenge the idea that good sex requires a perfect body and explore how deeper emotional connection can lead to more fulfilling sexual experiences as we grow older.
You’ll hear:
- How to talk about sex and boundaries—at any age
- What changing bodies mean for intimacy
- Why desire doesn’t expire
- How to reignite connection in long-term relationships
Whether you’re curious about what’s possible or ready to reclaim your sexual vitality, this conversation is your invitation to start.
Therapist Unplugged is brought to you by The Montfort Group. Each episode will feature the unplugged views of guests and fellow therapists as we navigate hot topics, therapy trends and the world around us.
*The Montfort Group provides a serene, calming setting where you can feel challenged, supported, and motivated. Our skilled therapists bridge specialized backgrounds and varied philosophies together to create one unified strategy. Rather than steer you away from your own natural abilities, we help you maximize your unique strengths. We do not view a broken history as the end of a story, we see it as an opportunity for a new beginning.
🎙️ Therapist Unplugged is produced by The Montfort Group, a boutique therapy practice based in Plano, Texas, helping individuals, couples, and families build emotionally intelligent, connected lives.
Subscribe for real conversations with real therapists—because healing doesn’t happen in perfect soundbites.
To learn more about our team or schedule a session, visit: www.themontfortgroup.com
Follow us on Instagram: @themontfortgroup
Good morning everyone. This is Laurie Poole. I am the host of Therapist Unplugged and I am so delighted today to welcome Edita Am I pronouncing that correctly? A couples and marriage therapist, sex therapist and a licensed professional counselor supervisor at Southern Methodist University. After coming to the United States from Lithuania, Edita received her PhD in family therapy and in her dissertation explored cultural and social aspects of relationships and sexuality, which is really important and exciting stuff. She continues to do research examining social influences in relationship dynamics and sexual expression in post-Soviet Union countries. Her survey is translated and available in five languages, and she has thus far traveled to Russia, Azerbaijan and the Ukraine to collect data for her projects. In addition to training and supervising future therapists at Southern Methodist University, Edita trains professionals at various workshops and conferences in the US and other countries such as China, Argentina and Russia. He also returns to Lithuania periodically to train native psychologists and family therapists and currently gives seminars to provide therapy in English, Lithuanian and the Russian languages. Welcome, welcome, welcome.
Laurie Poole:I'm so thrilled to have you.
Edita Ruzgyte:Thank you. Thank you, nice to be here.
Laurie Poole:Well, we have a very interesting topic today about sex over 60.
Laurie Poole:And as someone who's over 60, it's a topic that not only interests me personally but professionally, because I think a lot of therapists, Edita you may have an opinion on this, but it seems to me that there are a lot of therapists that aren't very comfortable talking about sexual intimacy and sex with their clients, and what I've, what I've come to learn is that actually sexual intimacy can improve with age, and I just wanted to share with our listeners something from Peggy Kleinplatz's book called Magnificent Sex as a kind of kickoff for our discussion today. In it she says "the good news is that sexual functioning is not necessary for magnificent sex. That means that aging, chronic illness and disability do not necessarily preclude, and may even be an asset towards, optimal sexual development. The bad news is that sexual functioning is not sufficient for magnificent sex. Having a hard penis or two, or a wet vagina will allow for adequate sexual functioning, but they are no guarantee of magnificent sex. So I'm wondering what comes up for you as I'm reading this.
Edita Ruzgyte:Couple things. A couple things. First of all, it's hope, yes, hope that people can hear. And then, actually, when I hear the words magnificent sex, my question is what is magnificent sex for you? If we take away the word "after 50, if we just talk about sex in general?
Edita Ruzgyte:My question is what is it that you want? Yeah, what is the reason? Yeah, uh, is it- Is it because you had it and you lost it and you want it back? Is it because you heard that it's a great, great thing and you are curious to try it? Is it something that you believe it's like weight or body or good body physique, that, oh, if I reach this body weight, it will be better. Oh, if I have good sex, it will be better? And we live in a society now where we have room to ask what type of career do you want to have? What kind of parenting do you want to have? How will you do finances? And when we come about sexuality, I believe it's not that sexual sex is indecent. We don't have a decent language to talk about it.
Laurie Poole:Exactly, exactly. I'm always amazed when I ask couples so do you talk about what you like? Do you talk about what you're looking for? What is it? What is it you're seeking when you reach for each other physically and for sexual intimacy? And often it's very hard to express more times than not, couples have not actually had that conversation and I don't care if they're in their 20s, their 30s, their 40s or 50s.
Laurie Poole:It's very hard to have that kind of conversation
Edita Ruzgyte:We live in the society where it's programmed that sex is ugly, nasty and dirty. Save it for the one you love, and though they're talking about it, and let's add let's do it in the dark, let's do it. Let's do it. Let's go down there, let's do it. You, you know, like where we have jargons that don't mean anything. You know. When my client says it's like "ell, you know what I mean. When I go down, when it hurts down there, I said I have no idea.
Edita Ruzgyte:I have no idea what you mean, and this is a good place to start. Let's continue to explore.
Laurie Poole:Right.
Edita Ruzgyte:So you know, not only we're in the dark and we are trying to be naked and trying to be comfortable. Then we have a couple more glasses of wine and then we're trying to make sure that the kids are not not not making a lot of noise, or, if it is, we're in the empty nest. You know it's like so. So what does it mean? Oh, we have all the freedom. So hold on. Hold on, we have all the freedom. I'm still uncomfortable taking my clothes off.
Laurie Poole:That's right.
Edita Ruzgyte:And now I have not, I don't have an excuse. You know, let's go to the children. You know let's go take care of the children. So, yeah, you know, before we start conversation about the function, you know I am sex therapist and I tell my students that sex therapist is a therapist who does not get distracted by sex. Because before we talk, you know, as Peggy Kleinblatt said, before we talk about penis and vagina, um, we need to talk about what's in your heart. Yes, tell me what sexuality means to you, what does intimacy mean to you? Because really, when we take it all down, we want sex, whatever kind of version of sex. So sex, penis, vagina, intercourse, it's for procreation. Yes, that's our main place, main function. But after that we're looking for sex to have some combination of pleasure and safety, pleasure and, I'm sorry, pleasure and connection
Laurie Poole:Pleasure and connection.
Edita Ruzgyte:I'm sorry. Pleasure and connection yeah. And in order to balance that pleasure and connection, we need to balance risk and safety. So risk and safety allows our nervous system to know how far to go to be still relaxed and still be relaxed.
Edita Ruzgyte:Pleasure and connection are the two, two main aspects that we seek when we enter the vulnerable space.
Laurie Poole:That's right. That's right and you know it's so interesting because in reading about you know, you know pleasure connection. What is it, what? What is magnificent sex? Because what it is for one person might be different from somebody else. It seems that one of the main features is communication. So the couples who talk about their experience with magnificent sex is also based on their ability to communicate, to negotiate, to express. This is what feels good, this is what I want, and the safety and the risk are such that they can actually kind of abandon themselves and just be totally into how they're feeling and their partner right, being tuned in to each other. But it's so much about communication, whether it's verbal communication, physical communication, you know, body language, facial expressions, sounds all of that in her research seems to be major contributors to what people are identifying as magnificent sex, which is that combination of pleasure and connection.
Edita Ruzgyte:Yes, it is, it is yeah, and you know. When we have people who are not connected to themselves, who, who you know? And when we're talking about people who are in their over 50s, you know we're talking about generation close to baby boomer generation. At that time, it was before birth control pill was invented. Before birth control pill or just as with all the controversies. Sexuality was.. we're not as free in sexuality
Edita Ruzgyte:Uh, because the risk and safety was extremely, extremely difficult. Yes, so now and I kind of I'm aware that I kind of took a detour we were talking about authenticity and being, you know, being being present. But, um, when there is risk, but when we have high risk, when we, when we're afraid of something during sexuality, relaxing and being vulnerable, it's difficult. What about going to Magnificent Sex? You know, I would say that one of the criteria and it's like. So now, before we even go, who's involved?
Edita Ruzgyte:Who's? involved in Magnificent Sex? Is it you and yourself? Is it you and your partner? Is it multiple partners? Is a device s? Is a different area? Symbol like what? What does that mean? And we know, when we talk about sexuality, what you know, we, we're worried about being judged. What you know, we, we we're worried about being judged, very much so, and we're afraid that once I'll say something, once you'll hear something, you cannot unhear it. And if this is not something you know, and if I see the face of judgment, you know, how do we come back to that? You know, you ask sex therapy and I was like this is where sex therapy is good. Sex therapy is helpful. Sex therapy helps you navigate the beginning of these conversations, because these are conversations, once again, these are conversations that we don't have a lot of skill or experience or practice with, and we are talking, you know, about being naked with, you know, doing something in the dark that we never talked about.
Laurie Poole:That's right.
Edita Ruzgyte:So to begin about, you know. So begin deciding who am I having sex with?
Laurie Poole:Yes
Edita Ruzgyte:And a lot of times, if you tell me that you don't like your partner, you don't trust your partner, you don't respect your partner, I can tell you, unless, well, there are two types of sex. There is sex a thing you do, and a place you go. A thing you do, it's your cardio activity, it doesn't matter who is underneath you, on top of you or besides you. Uh, it's more raw, it's more outcome-driven, it's more physical. You know, let me get- There is a specific, there's a specific reason we're entering it. There is a specific goal that is at the end, that is required.
Laurie Poole:Right.
Edita Ruzgyte:There's a lot of time that. That's kind of part of where we tend to have this kind of sex earlier in life.
Laurie Poole:OK
Edita Ruzgyte:It's like we don't know ourselves, we don't know our partner. A lot of times we don't have a lot of luxury of time. We don't have a lot or even attention for time.
Laurie Poole:Yes.
Edita Ruzgyte:I like there is something else that we want to go and then there is sex, which is a place we go. It's sex, it's a place where we meet in that place of vulnerability.
Edita Ruzgyte:And we allow our minds and our bodies to kind of-- our sensations not our minds, I'm sorry. Actually we take our minds aside to let our bodies and sensations and emotions just be. You know, if it feels like I want to touch you and it feels like I want to look at you. And yes, there is communication. Now, a lot of that communication has to happen ahead of time and there has to be trust.
Laurie Poole:You know, yeah, I was just. I was just going to say, boy, I have to like you and I have to trust you because that vulnerability, like you said, once I see something, I can't unsee it or I can't unhear it.
Edita Ruzgyte:And if I judge you, what I, what you see, and that's what happens If I am hearing it, there is a continuum of judgment and curiosity. If I'm hearing on the continuum of curiosity, I'll want to learn more. Then you'll feel my connection. If I'm hearing from the side of judgment, I am now distancing myself. I am putting myself as one up or one down, but I am detaching from you
Laurie Poole:Right, yeah
Edita Ruzgyte:So you know. So, going back to sexuality after 50, um, now, in addition to us not talking about sexuality, in addition of us either having or not having good sex life before intimate life, before our bodies start changing, you know. My dad said, you know, it's like when you're 60 and you wake up and nothing hurts, you have to make sure that you're still alive. You know, it's amazing of how much, how much our bodies experience through the years and how much it shows up. You know, right now, being sexual, we need to like oh, hold on, hold on hold on my hand, arthritis. Oh, we cannot lay, like this, because my back hurts. Ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch. You know, it's like I just I hit something yesterday, it hurts there, oh. And now we add oh, we cannot do this position because my tummy is showing. Oh, we cannot do this because-- by the way, breasts don't sag, they relax. So, partly before we go and explore sexuality with someone else.
Edita Ruzgyte:So, when I'm working with clients, um, my first question is do you have a partner whom you like, with whom you want to explore it? If they're going as a couple and one of them says I want my wife to want me. Great. Do you trust that your wife respects or likes you? You know, if we don't have respect, anything that we do to anything that we push into, will not work and it can be anything. If I don't respect my partner and my partner says we have to go on this trip, you have to go with me and because it's my work trip and I have to, you absolutely have to do. If I don't like and respect my partner, that trip will be hell for me and for him.
Laurie Poole:That's right. I mean, if you don't like and respect your partner, it's going to affect all elements of your relationship, not just your sexual intimacy,
Edita Ruzgyte:Absolutely
Laurie Poole:And why would you want to be intimate, like emotionally intimate with someone that you don't like or respect
Edita Ruzgyte:Because they believe that that will save it. That's the hope. The hope is, you know pornography. It's the hope that, oh, if you'll stop watching pornography, things will get better for us.
Laurie Poole:Yeah
Edita Ruzgyte:You know, it's the hope. And it's hardest to look into ourselves. I truly like. I believe that sex is difficult. Yes, yes, there is societal, all the loud things. Sex, magnificent sex is best when we're the most comfortable and confident with ourselves.
Laurie Poole:Edita, don't you think, or would you agree, that the relationship with ourselves guides almost everything in relationships period, and it's often the thing that gets the least amount of attention, because we're always looking towards our partner or some kind of feedback and not really like what is the degree of comfort you have with yourself and how you express yourself, how you feel about your body? Um, all of those things, it seems to me, all roads lead to.. you know what's happening for you internally, in your relationship with yourself exactly.
Edita Ruzgyte:You know, sex can be a place and entry to the relationship with yourself. You know, relationship with self it's a physical relationship, it's a mental relationship, it's emotional relationship, it's career relationship, it's role relationship, it's family relationship. Sexuality can be one way, creativity can be another way. Yes, discovering yourself is creative. We live in society I keep referring to that that we confuse self-love with selfishness.
Laurie Poole:Yes, can you describe what the difference is like to share with our listeners?
Edita Ruzgyte:So for me, selfishness means when we are focusing on ourselves at cost for someone else. Okay, at the cost for someone else, I'm doing something that I am taking from someone in order to focus on me, so it's a boundary thing. Self-love is me focusing on myself when, independently from other people. Now, here is. Here is the boundary we're coming when we live life where we believe that we're responsible for other people.
Edita Ruzgyte:And here is that control when I'm responsible for the people, I have excuse not to look at myself.
Laurie Poole:hen right, absolutely true.
Edita Ruzgyte:So you know. Another question, so another comment that will go to magnificent sex. Yeah, so it's like one we want to know. You know, in magnificent sex we have to have magnificent parts, and one of the parts is you bringing yourself as a magnificent you, then exploring the boundaries, us then exploring the boundaries, the boundaries of if I am involved, like who needs to know about, about my sexuality, who you know like, do like if I'm in partner relationship and I'm exploring solo sex. Is this something that I want to tell people or not? So, actually, you know we're at the time where we can still do it.
Edita Ruzgyte:Let me i ntroduce you to the framework from Doug Brown Harvey, and it is sex principles of sexual health. So what he? Instead of using the word magnificent sex, he actually so he created it for people, for mainly he worked without men who have out of control sexual behavior. Yet this model of principles of sexual health and division of sexual health really kind of creates a vocabulary language that we don't have. So his idea, the main concept that he has is-- just as magnificent sex, we don't know who are we sexually. What are our boundaries, what are our limits? What do I believe in? So when someone comes and says, you know, I like um, I want my partner to please me. I say great, um, do you have, do you know, the list of reliable ways that your body can be aroused? So not only do you know reliable ways how to arouse your partner's body, do you know arousable, uh, um, reliable ways how to arouse your body, how to get arousal in your body? Now, that's different than desire. For desire, we turn each other, we turn ourselves on. Yeah, but now I'm going into different topic. Laurie, I have so much to say. It's like I'm going and
Laurie Poole:I love it, I love love! it
Edita Ruzgyte:When he talks abou- so he gives, so he says like you know, we don't know what is our vision of sexual health. You know, we talk about the physical health, we talk about mental health. What does it mean? Healthy sexuality? If I wanted to hang from a chandelier with a pickle in my nose, um, and it's only me and my partner and no one gets hurt and no one is involved, and we know the-- my partner is in physics, so he measured how much the chandelier can weigh, can be. So we are safe, safety and right. Yes, is it healthy or not?
Laurie Poole:How do we decide?
Edita Ruzgyte:So Doug Brown Harvey introduced these six principles that helps, that I introduced to my clients as a way, as a framework to make a decision, because, just like mental health, it's not a specific goal, it's a continuous journey.
Laurie Poole:Right.
Edita Ruzgyte:Mental health whenever I'm five, it's different right mental health whenever I'm five, it's different than mental health whenever I'm 40 yes, at very fast I'm learning how to understand what emotions is. That's, you know. For me to name my emotion, that's, that's progress, you know, when I'm 40, if I can, if I'm able to name my emotion and I'm falling on the floor with a pretension. You know we're not talking about developmental ask.
Laurie Poole:Right.
Edita Ruzgyte:So sexual health, the vision for sexual health, is an ongoing process where we can have, when we can then manage judgment and curiosity, risk and safety, yes, in order to create a pleasure and connection right. So the first concept, the first concept out of those six, is a consent.
Laurie Poole:Consent
Edita Ruzgyte:Now consent, it's, we know from movement. There was conversations about it over and over again. Consent is ongoing and active and present, so I'll ask my clients how do you invite each other to be sexual? How do you know that one of you is initiating sex?
Laurie Poole:tI's, because sometimes they don't know. The signals, the signals are
Edita Ruzgyte:Most of the time, most of the times.
Laurie Poole:Okay.
Edita Ruzgyte:And there are times where one part there is a lot of times we'll get to that in another. In second principle, people will say yes when they don't want to. Because if I say yes and you get your pleasure, you'll be calmer for the next three days. It will not be conflict in the house, sometimes sex. So if sex becomes a chore or a task we do when we don't want to do because the price of not doing it is higher, because the price of not doing it is higher, learning to want something that we are pushed to do won't happen
Laurie Poole:Won't happen
Edita Ruzgyte:So here it is. So even bringing that idea up, oh, I do need to ask my partner if they're open to have sex, to be sexual, yes, yes, how do I do do it? I don't know how to talk about it
Laurie Poole:That's right. We don't have the language.
Edita Ruzgyte:And it can be as simple as "oney. I'm in the mood to go play in bed. How about us getting naked and see where our mood takes us? You know I'm really in the mood. I'm not sure if you are not. I'm open for us to play, to see if our bodies respond."
Edita Ruzgyte:What a great way to ask, what a great way to issue an invitation. The way you've just worded it, it sounds like an invitation. It's not a demand. It's "Let's see where this goes. It's very open. Would you be willing. The curiosity
Edita Ruzgyte:We need to put more effort than when we get to it. Yeah, so consent is are you open to play with me? Just like we have consent "Are you open to eat like, Like I ask people when I talk about sex? I'll always ask how do you do this in other areas in your life?
Laurie Poole:Right.
Edita Ruzgyte:When you want to go on a trip, how do you communicate to your partner that you want to go on a trip? When you want to invest your money or you want to take from retirement money, how do you bring it up? How do you talk about it? Yeah, so then we don't need to create new skills. We can use the same skills.
Laurie Poole:Use what we already have.
Edita Ruzgyte:You know, it's much easier. We are making it harder because we don't know. So here is first, yes, consent, like how do you know that your partner agrees? How do you know that you agree if you're consenting with yourself? How do you know if you're having being sexual with yourself or with your partner once a year, once a month, once a day, whatever it is? How do you know this is the time to do it? How do you know? How do you get consent?
Edita Ruzgyte:The second aspect, the second principle, is non-exploitation, and we don't want to talk about it because we believe we're decent people, we are good people and we never exploit. Exploiting is coming home. Like exploiting means withholding something that we know that another person, if they knew it, if they had the data, they would act differently. Okay, when I know, if I'll tell my partner I really want to go, I want to really go to this here this weekend, he'll want to stay, do something. He'll try to convince me differently. I will wait till the last minute or I am strategically so. Where strategy, where exploitation comes in you know it's- it's when we talk about therapy. It's a manipulation, is it? You know when we expect? You know it's like strategic therapy specifically talks about manipulation. Yes, we, we create room for people to think. We hold space for people to think differently than they usually do, right? Yet in therapy we do it knowingly. They don't come in here to get their checks balanced and accidentally they kind of get stripped into doing therapy Correct. Yes, so when we have exploitation is when we do something without an agreement.
Laurie Poole:t's.
Edita Ruzgyte:For example, when I say yes to sex and I really don't mean it, I'm actually allowing my partner to hurt me. I'm participating in my partner violating my boundaries.
Laurie Poole:How many people do you think consider that I'm allowing my partner to hurt me when I say yes to something that I don't want to do.
Laurie Poole:Wow, that's big and I can understand and I hear where resentment builds up when the mouth says yes and the heart says no. I don't want to.
Edita Ruzgyte:And it may be trauma where and it's possible that we don't have the voice to say no.
Laurie Poole:That's right.
Edita Ruzgyte:I'll ask do you have a reliable way how to say no to things that you don't want to do? Do you know the things that you don't want to do? Sometimes we get so used to being told what to do that the best way, the best way of survival as a child, is for us to dislearn or disassociate from what we want and what we like then we might want everything, because it's not safe to express or to show distress so exploitation happens much more often than we're aware of.
Edita Ruzgyte:We just don't want to acknowledge it and and I want to sit with it because it's hard, it's uncomfortable.
Laurie Poole:Yeah, very uncomfortable.
Edita Ruzgyte:And magnificent sex, like magnificent body, like magnificent performance. It requires work.
Laurie Poole:Oh yes.
Edita Ruzgyte:Requires discomfort. So these kind of conversations is the prize towards magnificent sex. Is sitting with it, yes. So so we have consent, then non-exploitation, then we're looking at shared values. If one of you wants to have like and I have couples and we sat in the room and and and and I was careful with them where they love each other, they absolutely love each other, they enjoy all the aspects of their life. One of them is absolutely to the core, monogamous, monogamous.
Edita Ruzgyte:Another person is like really, for me, the idea of being with one woman is just like it's claustrophobic, it's closing and we would look for negotiations, looking, you know, don't ask, don't tell, looking for different ways, and it's not like you can see when one person tries, you know, it's like you can just see that they're. I'm irritated with you, just even sitting with it, yes. Another person is like I'm nervous when you do anything you do with you, just even sitting with it. Another person is like I'm nervous when you do anything you do.
Edita Ruzgyte:So what do we do? And, as Stéphane Perrault says, a lot of situations are not problems to solve. They're dilemmas to navigate, and sometimes we don't like what we want. Right some say that again, sometimes we don't like we don't like what we want, what we're drawn to, what excites us because there's shame.
Edita Ruzgyte:There's not necessarily there are people and now I'll touch a little controversial topic there are people who do get aroused and are excited by from children and they never acted on it. There are people who are attracted to different, to the same gender, and they don't like that attraction I okay, we don't like what we're drawn.
Edita Ruzgyte:We don't always like what we're drawn to right and we know, when it comes to sexual preferences, john money tried. There is different therapists who tried. We don't have a lot of good luck or reliable ways how to steer one person, a person, into different sexual preferences. Shared values can be again another tough conversation and the conversation can be basically with myself how much of those values I'm willing to work through, how much am I willing to push in? You know it's like to work together. It's not about compromise. You know it's like. You know compromise. I want sex 360 times a day a year. You want one time a year. If we compromise for 150 times a year, it will be still 150 times too little for me and 150 times too much for you. You know it's. It's that navigating those dilemmas. It's navigating the dilemmas, for example, with older couple, when one of them decide, when one of them doesn't feel comfortable for another person to drive. How do we have those conversations?
Laurie Poole:Yeah, how do we have those conversations?
Edita Ruzgyte:Yeah.
Laurie Poole:How do we have those?
Edita Ruzgyte:conversations.
Edita Ruzgyte:Yeah, how do you have conversations that? You know my, my penis. I am not able to get my penis erect as reliably as I can, and you know, I know you don't like it, and maybe we can explore it. Like when someone pushes, when you put pressure, when there is some pressure on my anus, I go to the moon and back and my whole body gets alive. What are the things that you're worried about? Oh, you're worried that I'm gay. Okay, what are the things that we can talk about that helps you to ease your attention? Oh, it's not clean. Oh, okay.
Edita Ruzgyte:Well, is this something that you're interested in? You know there is opportunity for. There's option of enema. There are optional finger condoms. There is toys. Are you open any of the ways that you? What are the ways that you're open to play with it? You're not open with that? Okay, well, there are plugs. How about it if we put something in and it is in my body without you having to touch it or deal with it? How would that be? How about us going to the therapist or to urologist and helping understand the anatomy of a human body and watching how prostate actually, how, through anus, we stimulate prostate?
Laurie Poole:Right.
Edita Ruzgyte:So shared values, yes. What is about it that you don't like? You know, if the answer is, I just don't like it, well, okay, and so what do we do when you? Say you don't like something that is very important to your partner. How do we talk about it?
Laurie Poole:It's the dilemmas you navigate. It's how you navigate that yeah.
Edita Ruzgyte:And you know I don't have an answer. I don't and I'm not attached to answer, and I think that's what where therapist is different than your friends, because your friends will know what's best for you and they'll be very excited to tell you that and they'll be very invested in whether or not you take absolutely absolutely, yes, absolutely, yeah, yes.
Edita Ruzgyte:And then so the next so we have consent, non-exploitation, shared values and again, all of these. We have to decide what's my relationship with it within me, and then what role does it play, all those principles, in the relationship with my partner or partners? So the next one is honesty. How honest am I with myself, how honest I am with my partner? How honest am I to say to myself I really don't like being sexual with what we do with my partner? You know, I I never orgasm. Oh, so I had a client who came in it. It's like, you know, we have been together for 30 years. I faked every single orgasm and I am nowhere close to telling my partner that that's her agreement with herself about honesty. It's not up to me to come and say no, honey, you have to do that, you have to say that in order to have magnificent sex. No, it's not my decision.
Laurie Poole:That's right. It's up to her, it's principles.
Edita Ruzgyte:It's not rules, it's not laws. It's principles that you decide what's best for you and they're changing. You may be with another partner you may start that conversation from, I don't know. You may have near-death experience or some kind of butterfly moment. Where it comes, it becomes important to tell you know it's.
Laurie Poole:It's very fluid. What I'm understanding is all of these things are fluid in the sense that what how you were last year with your partner, there may have been things that have happened and unfolded, or whatever. You get to a point, you evolve how you feel about things for yourself. There's all kinds of things, but it's nothing that's static. What you're describing feels very fluid and it kind of moves and it shifts and changes based on where you and your partner are at, or you and another partner. Another partner may awaken a whole other experience well, and that's the whole idea, you know.
Edita Ruzgyte:So that's why, when we talk on about penis and vagina, yeah, we're leaving the whole lot, absolutely so much, we're leaving once again, as they're talking, it's like penis and vagina are just two tools. You have the whole orchestra that you're not paying attention to.
Edita Ruzgyte:Yes, yes, yes so here is our honesty. Yes, honestly, like um, am I open to tell my partner I don't like? When you do this, you know the students, clients, will say it's like, oh, my goodness, how can I tell them? I said, well, you know when you get married and what your partner, you know, loves cooking, and they put a pound and a half of salt. How long will it be before you say you know, honey, I love you to the moon and back. Can we go light your own salt? Yeah, oh, I'll say it immediately, uh-huh.
Edita Ruzgyte:So what's different about honey? I love you to the moon and back? I actually really enjoy when you squeeze my nipples and when you squeeze them when I am not aroused yet, you know, the tension is a little too much and we go lighter. So it may be something that I'll say earlier. You know, like after this. Maybe I will not say in the moment, maybe that's something I'll say later. Maybe that's something I'll say before our next sexual experience or we have conversations. Sex doesn't happen. That period of time, that's right, yeah.
Edita Ruzgyte:The foreplay for the next sexual experience starts when one sexual experience is over. That's so true. That's another way to look at it. We don't have again. Right now we're focusing on sex, so we're talking about sex, but sex will be as important, as successful, as much as we pay attention to it and put effort in it is all about.
Laurie Poole:it is it's like that finessing, it's the adding. If it's too much salt, can we pull back on the salt, maybe we can add a little bit of this. It's like, you know, I love food, so I'm thinking about the food metaphor, but it's, but it is. It's that kind of finessing and feeling confident that if we put, you know, let's put a shot of this in here, what about that? And it might be that way on Wednesday night and it might be different Sunday morning. But we have the flexibility to be honest, like we have the experience around honesty and the freedom of expression to say, hey, let's try this or what about that, and being really congruent, right With Well, and sometimes that you know, know, yes, and I'm very mindful that a lot of times when people talk about sex, they paint.
Edita Ruzgyte:It is as oh, just try it and it will be fantastic. No, you know, if there's something that you haven't done, yes, there is a, there is a possibility for it to happen. There may be other options. You know. It's like let's plan Sunday night date, sunday night date, sunday or Sunday morning sex, sunday morning sex and I.
Edita Ruzgyte:On on Thursday night, I made the wrong step and I twisted my back and I can barely move. So now the question is how do we recover? Yes, now we go back to Godman rapture repair, rapture repair. How do we do it? Do we play honey? You lay down and you don't move and let me do my miracle. You know, at least you'll feel some pleasure. So, as long as you're not moving, what doesn't hurt? So let's do the, let's do the boundaries, okay, does this hurt? Does this hurt? Can I touch this? Can I touch this? Okay, no, okay. So I open to play with this and can we make an agreement anytime, even if it starts, if you start thinking that it hurts, would you like giving me a feedback, because you know when I get your feedback, I will be able to more confidently explore your body. Yes, so, but that takes honesty. That takes honesty to say I'm so disappointed. I am so angry.
Edita Ruzgyte:I'm not angry with you, I'm angry with myself. I'm angry with my body. I'm so frustrated. Yes, honey, I'm not angry with you, I'm angry with myself. I'm angry with my body. I'm so frustrated. Yes, honey, I'm frustrated too. And let's see what we can do from what we have with.
Laurie Poole:Yeah.
Edita Ruzgyte:Yes, so that's honest. The next one is prevention from STIs. Stds, we know good for them and we know that I'm taking back the good for them part. So this we know that the population that has the highest rise in STIs right now is elderly population.
Laurie Poole:Yes.
Edita Ruzgyte:Which makes perfect sense. You know, it's like they don't have to worry about pregnancy Now they didn't have the mentality, as they do, of using a condom. It's not, it's not something that comes up for them. Yes, people with HIV, there is prep, there is new medicine that actually, who are worried about it? Um, that can be really very helpful as a preventative medicine.
Edita Ruzgyte:So I know I'm dropping kind of a lot of information and I'm aware of time as well, if someone is worried, if they'll you know, if I'm worried, if this position will hurt my hips, if I can get an STI and what will happen, or if I'm not comfortable with my body, how do I tell my client? So, for example, how do you talk about if I have herpes? Yes, do I talk about it? Oh, when do I talk about it? Yes, and and, and. How do we then? Then we can talk about honesty. Then, oh, so here is exploitation. Do we tell yes, it's like now you can kind of look for all, for all the principles, and the last principle, my favorite, favorite principle, is pleasure. Does it feel good at any given point? Like right now? Doesn't feel good? Yeah, okay, let's keep going okay, right now doesn't feel good.
Edita Ruzgyte:Okay, let's stop, let's explore. Yeah, do you like it? You know, sometimes I I give. When it is difficult for clients to put wording to it, I'll say does it feel yucky or yummy?
Laurie Poole:I like it for my therapy.
Edita Ruzgyte:Does it uplift you or does it take you down? You know it, it may be not yet, or not this way, or you know, let's explore. Let's explore. Yes, you know, we're kind of going back to the same circle. Laurie, you said you know communication and I think it's. There is a deeper aspect of this communication, but this communication with yourself is framework within which you communicate it's the boundaries between yourself and with other people and and then communicate communication with, with people that we're with. Yes, and we know from like one of the other just aspects to say we know that permission and limited information, permission or room to talk and not having or lack of permission and limited information, permission or room to talk and not having or lack of permission and not having enough knowledge or limited information are kind of the places where the original blogs that people get stuck.
Laurie Poole:Yeah, where people get stuck. There's a lot of stuckness around sexuality, and then it gets to that permission.
Edita Ruzgyte:It's like lot of stuckness around sexuality and then it gets to that permission. It's like how do you start? Like if you haven't talked about sexuality for 10 years, how do you?
Laurie Poole:bring the subject. It's hard, it's really hard, and I you know, something you said at the beginning of our conversation about sex is a place that happens in the dark for a lot of people. It's what goes on down there.
Edita Ruzgyte:Some alcohol is usually involved, you know. So we can take some of our inhibitions down.
Laurie Poole:Yeah, exactly Exactly which which also can affect sexual performance negatively. I mean, as much as it can relax people, it can also, you know, interfere with erections and all kinds of things. So it's it's, it's a. This for me, is a really fascinating subject and I'm curious how do you work with, or initiate conversations with, couples who haven't had sex for years? I have had that in my office, where I will, when I do my intake, I'm always asking about tell me about sex, tell me about sexual intimacy.
Laurie Poole:How do you dance with each other in sex? And I have couples say, oh, we haven't had sex in 10 years. And and I have couples say, oh, we haven't had sex in 10 years. And I'm, and I'm so I'm curious like why, what's going on that you haven't had sex in 10? Well, it's just not that important anymore, or there might have been an experience that sort of never got talked about and is just sitting out there and I'm curious about in your work with couples you know over 50 and sexless marriages, where do you even start that kind of a conversation? I mean, a theme of some of our chat today has been how do you start the conversation about stuff that's uncomfortable and that we feel like we don't have language for, but we actually can pull on skills that we do have. So I'm just curious um for you, um in your experience so for me?
Edita Ruzgyte:Um, first, I would say most of my clients come because of sexuality issues. Really, do we spend time talking just about sexuality? It's usually a lot of other things, but on my informed consent form, I have one question that I have, a question that says define your sexual relationships in one word. So we know that safety risk and safety. So here it is you're meeting a person whom you don't know. You know that they're sex therapists. So I'm being very structural.
Edita Ruzgyte:I'm giving you a very specific question with very specific expectation. Give me one word so I am telling you we'll talk about it and we will have structure. So you feel more comfortable putting one word, that knowing or judging how much I can put and how much not I can put. And then the conversation starts. So I see that you put broken in your answer about sexuality. Tell me about broken. If they come in and they bring the idea that sexuality is the problem, I'll ask if sex was not an issue. If you did not, if you lived in the world where sexuality didn't exist or it was all the way you wanted it to be, would the rest of your relationship be the way that you want it to be?
Edita Ruzgyte:great question so you know, when someone comes and they say we haven't had sex for 10 years, I said is this something that you're interested in? There are people who have not had sex for 10 years and they're perfectly fine with it, they're very happy. That's something I needed to learn. I needed to hold myself back and not project on them. No, no, no, no, no. You need to. You don't know what you're missing. Yeah, what's happening? That you haven't had sex in 10 years? No, no, no. For some people. You know the problem. What happens where you see the most pain is when it is a discrepancy, when one of them wants it and another person and the other one doesn't.
Laurie Poole:That's really hard.
Edita Ruzgyte:Yeah, that's very there is a joke that there is. There are three ways of how to work with, how to help sexual desire clients with sexual desire issues, and no one of them. No one else knows who are those three ways, because just so much things involved. Yes, we have culture, we have physical aspects, we have emotional aspects, we have biological, we have every single aspect in the world that is participating in it. No, so, you know, it's a conversation, it's an ongoing conversation, it's it's yes, there is a lot of as, as we're beginning, we're kind of closing the whole circle. Uh, yes, as with age, with experience, we do have more capacity for more magnificent sex. Absolutely Every single one of us have more capacity for magnificent sex. It's where we put the work in. Like, just as younger, we have much more capacity to run fast, to have quickest to, you know, get aroused just by sneezing or looking at the leg of the chair. You know later on, we have capacity for experience.
Laurie Poole:I love that we have a capacity for experience.
Edita Ruzgyte:And the question is will we put the work in it? You know it's like when you have a surgery you'll walk only as good as the amount of work you'll put in physical therapy. And yes, it's annoying, it's very uh, it's aggravating, it's it's, it's uh sometimes belittling when you know you were in the gym running triathlons and now you have to take three pound weights and and and lift them. But that's the work. Sex is no different.
Laurie Poole:That's so interesting. I love that Because I think that in my experience in talking with couples that it's it's something that they think should just happen without intention, without conversation and communication, and it doesn't just happen. You do have to put in the work well, I'll ask them.
Edita Ruzgyte:You know, if you put the same amount of attention, intention, energy, focus in your work, in your career, as you put in your sex lab, how successful would you be? If you put the same amount of intention, attention, focus, knowledge to parenting, how good of a parent would you be? No, the problem is that a lot of times it is we. We think about sex, so we have sex when we are too tired to do anything else, and once we grow grow up, there is never a natural time for it.
Laurie Poole:Never. No, that's become increasingly clear to me over the years is that the intention, the focus, the priority, the energy and effort are all factors, and I I just love what you said moments ago about. With age, we have a greater capacity for the experience of magnificent sex, and it's not about erections and wet vaginas, it is so much more than that.
Edita Ruzgyte:Part of it, Absolutely.
Laurie Poole:You know it's like it's both and yes, both,
Edita Ruzgyte:and there is much more to the orchestra
Laurie Poole:Absolutely, and these days, of course, as the baby boomers have gone through this and continue to, there are all kinds of resources available for the physiology, but I think also for the emotional and the spiritual and the mental aspect of all of this, which is very exciting and gives us hope for magnificent sex and increased well-being because of sexual experience when we cross over 50s and 60s and beyond.
Laurie Poole:It doesn't mean the end of something at all.
Edita Ruzgyte:We don't. Our license to have sex doesn't expire when we turn 50.
Laurie Poole:There you go.
Laurie Poole:Our license doesn't expire when we turn 50. Edita, thank you so much for this conversation today. It is inspiring to me as a woman in her 60s, but also as a therapist.
Laurie Poole:You've given me so much to think about, and I think there is hope for just this incredible experience that magnificent sex can bring, however one defines it.
Edita Ruzgyte:Absolutely, Absolutely
Laurie Poole:Yes. Well, thank you very, very much for for your time today, um, and I think that you've given hope to our listeners and to other therapists working in this, in this realm, and, I can't thank you enough for your time and your expertise. I really appreciate you.
Edita Ruzgyte:Absolutely, Laurie. Thank you for bringing it up. Thank you for inviting me over. You know we get better at it the more we talk about it.
Laurie Poole:Absolutely, absolutely Super.
Laurie Poole:Thank you very much.
