Life After Menopause

A New Frontier

For most of human history, women didn’t live long past menopause. Average life expectancy meant that the post-reproductive years were brief—a decade at most. Today, a woman entering menopause at 50 can reasonably expect to live another 30 to 40 years.

This is unprecedented. We are the first generations of women to have this much life after fertility ends. And we’re still figuring out what it means.

What’s clear is that the old narratives don’t serve us. Post-menopause isn’t decline. It isn’t the beginning of the end. It’s its own territory, with its own pleasures, challenges, and forms of flourishing.

The Science of Aging Well

Recent research from Dr. Michael Snyder at Stanford has identified critical inflection points in molecular aging that occur around ages 44, 60, and 78. These aren’t arbitrary numbers—they represent moments when our biology shifts in measurable ways.

The good news: these shifts aren’t destiny. Lifestyle factors—how we move, eat, sleep, connect, and find meaning—significantly influence how we age. The gap between lifespan (how long we live) and healthspan (how long we live well) can be narrowed substantially.

Dr. Peter Attia and other longevity researchers emphasize that the choices we make in our 50s and 60s profoundly shape our experience in our 80s and beyond. Movement is particularly important—leg strength at 60 is one of the strongest predictors of cognitive function at 80.

What Happens to the Body

Post-menopausal bodies continue to change, and understanding these changes allows us to support ourselves well.

Bone density decreases without the protective effects of estrogen, making weight-bearing exercise and adequate calcium and vitamin D more important than ever.

Muscle mass naturally declines with age, but this isn’t inevitable—strength training can maintain and even build muscle well into the 80s and beyond.

The vaginal and vulvar tissues, with fewer estrogen receptors being activated, may become drier or thinner. This is common but very treatable with local estrogen, moisturizers, and consistent intimate touch.

What remains constant: the clitoris. Unlike many tissues that change with age, the clitoris retains its nerve endings throughout life. Orgasm remains available to women at every age—a fact that deserves more celebration than it typically receives.

The Emotional Landscape

Research on happiness across the lifespan reveals something counterintuitive: wellbeing tends to increase with age, not decrease. The “U-curve” of happiness shows that after a dip in midlife, life satisfaction tends to rise through the 60s, 70s, and beyond.

Why? Older adults tend to regulate emotions more effectively, focus more on positive experiences, and care less about what others think. The psychological research calls this the “positivity effect.”

This doesn’t mean post-menopausal life is without loss. Grief is a real companion in these years—grief for parents who age and die, for children who leave, for friends who face illness, for versions of ourselves that are changing. But many women find that they’re better equipped to hold grief alongside joy than they were in younger years.

Sexuality and Desire

One of the most persistent myths about post-menopausal women is that sexual desire and pleasure inevitably fade. Research tells a more nuanced story.

A significant percentage of sexually active women between 65 and 74 report having sex at least monthly. Desire may shift—it often becomes more responsive than spontaneous—but it doesn’t disappear.

What changes is the context. Many women in their 60s and 70s describe their sexuality as more intentional, less rushed, more connected to overall sensuality rather than narrowly focused on intercourse. The physical changes that come with menopause—slower arousal, need for more lubrication—can actually invite a more exploratory, whole-body approach to intimacy.

And for women without partners: self-touch remains a viable and important form of sexual expression. Masturbation supports pelvic floor health, mood, and the ongoing capacity for pleasure. It’s not a substitute for partnered sex—it’s its own practice, with its own value.

New Models of Aging

We’re in desperate need of new models for what post-menopausal life can look like. The invisibility that often accompanies aging for women—the sense of mattering less, being seen less—is a cultural failure, not a biological inevitability.

Chip Conley’s Modern Elder Academy explores the concept of blending wisdom with beginner’s mind—being both experienced enough to have perspective and curious enough to keep learning. This is the posture that makes aging generative rather than merely endured.

The grandmother hypothesis in evolutionary biology suggests that post-reproductive women evolved to play crucial roles in human survival—not as relics, but as essential contributors to the flourishing of their communities.

The Work of This Stage

Post-menopausal years invite particular kinds of inner work:

Releasing control over adult children and allowing relationships to reorganize

Making peace with parents (living or dead) and often becoming the family’s primary carrier of memory and meaning

Examining the “prison of preferences”—the accumulated habits and rigidities that can narrow life

Finding ways to contribute that draw on accumulated wisdom rather than competing with younger energy

Physical Practice

Movement becomes more important, not less, as we age. Dr. Kevin Stone, orthopedic surgeon and researcher, emphasizes warm-up, recovery, and appropriate intensity—not pushing through pain, but staying in motion.

What’s remarkable is how capable the older body can be. Women in their 60s and 70s are completing ultramarathons, taking up new sports, and discovering physical capacities they never explored in younger years. The body’s potential for adaptation doesn’t disappear with menopause.

Olga Kotelko started track and field at 77 and competed for the next 20 years. She’s not an anomaly; she’s an example of what’s possible when we don’t accept the cultural story that aging means decline.

Go Deeper

These are the original writings this entry draws from:

The 9 Lives of Woman: Stage 7 (Free Period)

The 9 Lives of Woman: Stage 8 (Glide)

The Longevity Imperative: What Science Tells Us About Aging Well

What Supports This

Physical expressions of this philosophy

Honor Everyday Balm

Daily moisture for vulvar tissue and perineal care →

Arouse Stimulating Serum

For enhanced sensation and circulation →

View all at rosewoman.com →