Speaker 1intimacy doesn't have an age limit and oh my bod is redefining pleasure with beautifully designed tech savvy wellness products rediscover connection and confidence at ohmybod.com that's o-h-m-i-b-o-d dot com hi this is suzanne and you are listening to sex
Speaker 2advice for seniors and perhaps you're watching as well and so you can see i'm wearing my big red england shirt here in honor of the world cup this is probably going to come out way after that though but by which time we may have won who knows anything's possible or impossible when it comes to england but you never know anyway it's kind of it's kind of relevant that i'm wearing this shirt because today we're going to be talking mainly about fitness and about how fitness relates to sex and having a healthy sex life i go on a lot about lifestyle choices the lifestyle choices that people make but it's such a big term and i think that often when we hear the word lifestyle choices we don't even know what that really means so i'm here today with someone who's a performance coach and a fitness trainer and works a lot with all of us older men so he's been around the block and he's seen what these guys are doing to improve their health or sometimes to really screw it up so welcome rock neal leary to sex advice for seniors oh
Speaker 3thank you so much for having me i'm i'm honored
Speaker 2to be here yeah so anyway i want to know really from what you've seen how does physical fitness improve or impact sexual performance and confidence in men over 50
Speaker 3well i think that to start is like as a man the physicality part is is so important like your exercise and so your whole system runs on like the same thing so if your body's working correctly right which it needs to to be healthy and exercise then everything else downstream is going to probably start to work a little bit better and so the thing where that i see is that i see the most with a lot of guys and especially especially older guys is that their fitness is off and so well how does that happen well fitness is kind of like compound interest the earlier you do it and start the better but also it's the consistency of doing the thing that's gonna compound those results and life does get crazy and everybody has different circumstances or situations and things and things happen which you know that's just part of life but the truth is start early and you have to be consistent and you know you find this as you start to get your health back like you know those those things start working
Speaker 2better sure but you know i'm i'm a bit of a fitness person behind this curtain i've got weights and a and a bar and all sorts of stuff that you can't see there and i've been doing it for a long time i've now hurt my arm so i can't do any weights so i know that uh as we get older shit starts to happen to our body right and i know that the way probably that i worked out when i was younger is way different than the way i work out now and what i've been told about how to work out now is much different than what i was told when i was younger you know now i've been told it's all about strength training it's all about preventing osteoporosis it's all about preventing like car you know the cardio is kind of like not irrelevant but not as fundamental to my fitness i know that there's a lot of conflicting reports when it comes to what how older people should or shouldn't work out i've certainly seen with some of my family members that they've gone extreme on things that probably at their age they need to be a little bit more cautious about do you see that as people get older sure of course remaining fit and healthy and exercising is really important but how does it change when we
Speaker 3get older yeah well so the what i see kind of so i think it depends the sort of life cycle let's say for guys the the the trajectory that usually starts is you start you know when you're maybe in high school and what are the things that you want when you're in high school well you want a six-pack and you want your biceps right and you want your chest to be bigger which is which is which is normal right and so so what do you first get into is bodybuilding and bodybuilding is a very specific type of training because it's so isolated to the muscle so you're just doing a lot of hypertrophy and you're growing the muscle and so you get some size and because it's the first thing you're growing the muscle you're growing the thing that you usually get into right you think that that's the best method because it's the first thing and so all right your muscles start to get bigger now you're like okay you know i'm getting i'm getting some size now let me start let me let's try to put some weight up and so what comes next well you might get into some olympic lifts or your power power lift so you're going to get into you know your your squat and your deadlift and your bench and so then as you get into your high school college it's like all these guys like you know what's your bench you know oh i squat it i benched 225 for for eight you know i maxed out what'd you max i maxed out squat 315 or you know whatever and so you start getting you start chasing the numbers and it's again i did the same thing it's fun it's a lot of fun right and so then at that point then you may be getting to like crossfit or you get into just doing doing the things and you're just crushing it right you're you're grinding you're you're you're working and then somewhere somewhere along the way you might get an injury and sometimes those injuries are serious maybe you hurt your back maybe you know it was a knee injury or or whatever and now you know the those guys that were once like these straight gainers going hard they become now they become the functional guy now i'm all about functional movement and i'm going to do i'm doing yoga and i'm stretching and i just want mobility and because now now what happens is you're going to they had an injury that they related to doing x y and z which also pain is registered in the brain so now you associate that injury and now it starts to hurt because of how pain works in the brain and so then you kind of stay away from it right and then you realize like oh what's going on here i'm losing like muscle mass like oh got a gut all the stuff and then you're just kind of scared and you don't know what to do so you kind of they see some guys walk around in the gym and they like all right i'm going to go to uh the light press machine and i'm going to go over i'm going to do a couple curls and everybody sits on the tricep extension and so then they're not really on like any sort of program and they're not really strength training and so they just go back to kind of like some light body building and they're like oh well i'm not gonna i'll just want lower weight higher reps that's everybody lower weight higher reps like okay but strength is it's relative right so like like something that's going to be heavy for me is going to be heavy for you and so it's more about finding the hardest thing that you can do well right and because remember the body needs stress the body needs stimulus to to create out of to change it's gonna and so you don't want to continue to do the same thing and not push yourself right and so then they start just to get there's some sort of fear around it and then because the time has passed so long you become super deconditioned and then as you start to do something it seems like oh my god this is a huge mountain to climb now i gotta start from down here like ah i haven't squat it or you know and then it just kind of comes a lot and it really becomes like a mental game honestly um and but the key is you just got to start and strength training yeah strength training is the rage right now but you never should have really stopped strength training right you just you just you just got to start and you just got to start and you just got to have to be a little bit smarter and the goal is like exercise should give you energy it shouldn't it should not take your energies and now especially right different when if you're an athlete training or you gotta you gotta push the envelope um but even then at the same time it's like we're not trying to be the best lifters as athletes the goal is to perform in your sport so again it should give you energy it should give you life and i guess because of the whole hit and training it's like people think they should be able to do it but they don't and they don't and they don't and they don't be walking away from their workouts like like you know their heart's beating out of their chest they're sweating they're like oh my god they never rest you know they never rest and i don't know that i i just don't subscribe to that and if you think about doing that all the time like how sustainable is that before you get tired or your body breaks down you just do too much over a long period of time and then you and then you break down i i do think that exercise should give you energy in a way that's like i need this because this is going to improve my day
Speaker 2yeah and do you find that when men especially are training in the right way but it does help improve things like rectal dysfunction libido do you see that there's a correlation between learning how to exercise properly and also helping your you know your sexual health and your sex life yeah because
Speaker 3you know a lot of that comes down to to blood flow and testosterone and exercise and being healthy is going to improve those things right when you lift blood goes into the muscle and expands and and so when you have an erection it's it's blood flow and testosterone when you lift it's gonna more testosterone and now of course of course as you age right there's some things that it doesn't matter what you do you just you can't you can't fight it right so that's just that's just part of aging but you can you can work with it you know um and so that's that's where the consistency that's where the consistency comes in and you can't you also can't neglect the fact that the other part that people do sometimes forget is sometimes they think that just exercise and that's going to fix everything it's like it's going to help but you also have to look at like you said in the beginning like your lifestyle your nutrition like those things go that's also stuff going into your body that your body's going to react how it how it performs and then let's not forget that you can't neglect the fact that you can't neglect your body that you can't neglect your body that you can't neglect your body that's not also also get into what's what's going on up here this is also this is also a huge a huge part a lot of this stuff is going to shut down if up here if you don't have any control over what's going on between between the years right if you're nervous or you're like performance anxiety or you know your lack of confidence and like most guys are going to feel more confident one if they're working on their body physically and like all right yeah i got i got some muscle here like all right i'm getting back into it like that's the act of doing it's going to give you more confidence and so then that's also going to play into it too right or do you have the ability to communicate and create connection too all those things kind of go into it it's hard to say like one specific thing but when i when i look at as a coach or a trainer you focus on all those areas hey what's going on outside what's going on like the whole biopsychosocial model yeah
Speaker 2completely and i think often that's neglected when we talk about fitness i had a trainer once and he said look if you're like really stressed out you are not going to want to exercise like your body is going to be your brain is going to be using up all that energy just to deal with whatever shit is going on in your life like it has no it's got no fuel left in the tank for um for exercise so if you're like really freaking out about something do not think that you're kind of like pump it away by going to the gym because you're just going to create more tension in your body and more you know it's just going to become it's just taking up too much energy but say some guy comes to you you know and he's like 50 years old he's overweight he hasn't looked at the gym in a decade you know he was a slim guy but suddenly like you said he's developed this little punch he's like going where the hell did that come from i need to do something about where does he start because i think that for me was when i got back into exercise that was the hardest thing was realizing i had two cesareans they cut through my stomach muscles you know i was like how do i even begin to get back into fitness when i feel so out of touch with my
Speaker 3body yeah yeah yeah yeah well i think i could think of some clients that i've had that similar similar to that um the the first place that i would question now it also depends on like my relationship with them too like if there's somebody that built a good rapport i could challenge a little bit harder but sometimes you know you got to you got to build up that rapport in the beginning but generally you know it's like the training again the training part one foot in front of the other just start find something that's gonna all right push their heart up a little bit they're gonna feel like they're in control like they're like all right i'm doing it i'm doing a good job i'm doing a good job but again it comes back to are you going to be consistent and so and so i i think in that case yes i would get somebody like hire a coach hire me to because the accountability part is huge and i think a lot of trainers do need to understand that like one information is so readily available so somebody could go in chat gpt and say hey this is my situation and i'm going to do this and i'm going to do this and i'm going to do this and i'm five eight uh body fat is like 35 you can you can chat gpt all that stuff and it's going to spit out probably something that's like really close for you and so you have to understand people are going to come to you to keep them accountable so to also remember like hey i'm here to hold you accountable this is why you hired me because you need help and then also understand that what's going on outside in their life are they stressed at home are they stressed at work because that could also be inhibiting them from staying accountable and going to the gym because once like like anything like anything the first week is easy the first session is easy you're fired up to go you're like you know what let's get let's get to it i'm gonna rip five sessions this week great what about in three months and guess what you just you just can you see the you can see them all right how many how many days a week you're going to be able to do that how many days how many how many days a week should i work out it's like well the answer is part-time commitment leads to part-time results or so i would say two to three times a week's a great place to start but the real question is what can you confidently commit to no matter what and that's what and that's just where you start and so don't shoot for the top right away i would i would always start pretty easy to build some momentum i think momentum with that is key so i think answering your question how i would start with them is find something hard that they can do well right because then it feels like they're they're challenged but they're overcoming the challenge and to find something that's going to build momentum and i think momentum is key and it's key in both both ways the the getting back on the the proper nutrition changing the lifestyle building the good habits momentum like build that but it's also true in the other way too you skip one you skip two you skip three you skip four you skip five you skip six you skip seven you you you know have two beers and then two beers turns to three and you know how that road goes right next thing you three three four and then four turns to eight and next thing you know it's all over from there right and now you're set back even more because the hangover as you get older it sits you know and so momentum can go in the other way too and so you have to focus on building momentum positively and slowly start to make those changes and also be okay with like maybe that means you have to change and then you're kind of leaving that person behind too that you want that you once were and that's that's okay that's okay you're supposed to
Speaker 2change yeah and do you find that i certainly know that when i was working with different i've worked with different pts over the years and they did kind of become my therapist so do you find that men all the time all the time like and you know we're talking about sex advice for seniors so i wonder do men confide in you about some of the intimate issues that they're struggling with you know for for example performance anxiety or for example you know ed other things that that that are bothering them do you find that sometimes men use you as someone that they can confide in because being with a pt does becomes
Speaker 3very personal yeah so specifically around that stuff no but i also think sometimes for men talking about that stuff to other men is a little bit uncomfortable now with other areas of their life maybe it's their relationship or work or um any other domain that right those things do come up and there are some pretty intimate conversations that and information that that is shared but that gives me insight which other areas are probably being affected right and so i could probably talk about that in a little bit but i also think there's probably not that i would always make an assumption but there is probably correlation in that now i do run a men's group where it is more geared toward having conversations like that um and so yes those things those things do but different settings for men like in the gym like other people are around right and so sometimes sometimes sometimes as guys you're thinking like nobody can hear you but like you're still you can hear you and so you think the person in that room might be able to hear it's like you know i haven't had i haven't had sex with my wife and and like you know that you think that guys in the other room can hear you or but everybody else has got their headphones so really nobody can hear anyway but i think for guys it's just like a situational kind of kind of thing and not something that's going to come up unless it's specifically geared towards having those types of conversations um but i do talk with guys in in men's group which is it's designed to create that space and it's designed to create that space because most men don't have that space you
Speaker 2know yeah so tell me a bit about about that and how that came about because it seems quite different from the work that you're you're doing like on the fitness and performance coaching
Speaker 3side yeah so that came that came about somebody had asked me to start it and then i kind of just took it and ran with it and then realized that there's so many different domains that you don't really get maybe with some of your friends some of your friends like because those friendship conversations maybe you really do think about them like there's very few of your friends that you're having deep deep conversations with some of them just surface level kind of conversations but i like i do really think for men this it's like about the space like we are here like men need to be like you need to tell them exactly what we're doing otherwise like there can't be any gray area right it's like listen we are here to talk about this so like talk about it and it's cool like no judgment no nothing and so we that's the type of space that that i tried to create is just like let guys be dudes and let's talk and but like this is what we're talking about and there's no judgment and then next thing you know like the conversation starts to flow you start making jokes you're laughing but like at the same time you're you are getting some of those things out where maybe you can't you feel uncomfortable sharing with friends or um you know you can't say to your spouse or at work right it is designed to be able to be in that space to talk about those things so like we had different themes like february like relationships relationships is everybody's favorite favorite topic right those those sessions will go for like three hours people always talk about relationships right and so like yeah some of those some of those things things come up and a lot of it is sometimes with with the guys who are are married it's like there's so much going on with the kids like we have it like i don't have sex i don't have sex in so on because there's just so much other going on that it takes that it takes away from that and like that stress and it's also sometimes i there's this misconception around guys that like they're ready to go at any moment right which that which isn't which isn't true which isn't true right now it's true probably most of the time but not all of the time because there's other stressors that you're like i just i just don't feel like you know so like if you did say it that's kind of like you're kind of embarrassed you're super embarrassed but if if your girl says that then it's almost like kind of it's like okay you got to be in the mood right um but if you don't have the space to talk about it or like get rid of that i feel shameful because of this then now that just keeps stacking up and then you get further and further away from trying to have that conversation which then pushes you further and further away from being connected to your partner when that could actually be an opportunity to create the connection and then yeah yeah and
Speaker 2and is what are the ages in this group is it like a wide age spectrum so most of
Speaker 3the most of the guys are roughly around my age that 28 to 35 ish range we have um some guys that that hang around that are in their 40s um but i i kind of grow the group to be more diverse just because just because i do think like it'd be awesome to have a guy who might be in his 60s right totally different perspective on life and relationship situation and stuff that he's been through then you know one of the youngest guys that has come through is in the is in college right totally different time totally different experiences and i think as guys for sure like to rely on each other for that information and you know to be able to understand like from the older perspective like these are the things that i went through this is how it helped this is maybe not how it just didn't serve me well and that could provide information for like at the end of the day it's like trying to get men to be better men yeah absolutely and do
Speaker 2you is this virtual this group yeah so
Speaker 3i do do i do do it virtually um right we meet yeah we meet wednesdays at seven o'clock and then we meet at eight o'clock p.m um now i'm i'm in right outside of philadelphia um so for you uk uk time that might be that might be a little a little tough but at the same at the same time that doesn't mean that that doesn't mean if there was interest you know i think i think all men could use this work and it's not supposed to be like it's not supposed to be like a therapist where we're going to sit and talk about your childhood for you know nine hours we're gonna this is this has helped to just create better men have men lean into that masculine side of the masculine different than manliness we're not trying to we're not trying to portray manliness in a way it's all about masculinity and you know they're it's virtual so it is it is flexible it could be done at a different time i could add another time for i think
Speaker 2it's fascinating and i think what's really interesting because i i have had a guy on this program um a while back this guy chris and he tried to start a men's group and and he and he stopped actually done it for several years and i think it was slightly older men and he found that the challenge of running this group was that a lot of these men were very angry um and there was a lot of in this group there was a lot of anger specifically towards women to be honest especially around expectations that they thought women had of them and it started to get quite misogynistic this group and so he eventually let it go um i think if you can hold space for men to have to be able to share um their thoughts and feelings without it descending into that and for there to be a range of opinions to hold it all together that potentially it can i suspect be transformational and i know of other men's groups that are that like go off on retreats together and and things like this primarily these things typically are the ones that i know are older men that almost like mentor younger men because of the way that they're able to bring their experience and their and and and all that they've learned throughout life into the relationship that they build with these young men's to help them become more confident and resilient and i think that's great and i think it would be great if you could find some older guys for your group because it sounds like it would be a really interesting dynamic to have what you've already created with those with those guys and then some older guys who perhaps have got something different that they that they'd like to share
Speaker 3yeah i mean there's there's so much there's so much to unpack with that so the the part about being misogynistic and having it being like angry at women you know that's we we definitely don't we definitely don't want that and that's and that you know when it comes to men and women like both both have a different view of what it's like to be a misogynist and a misogynist and a misogynist and have their problems are the things which are going to make you know maybe women aren't doing correctly enough that men aren't doing correctly enough but at the end of the day i think from the man's perspective i would challenge a lot of the guys on this is like the old story of the princess up in the castle it's like everybody knows that story right like it's for some reason it just makes sense to everybody and so every every girl is the princess of the castle that goes through fighting the dragon almost dies almost does this almost does that right to prove that he's going to make the commitment to save her and so did for the guys is like well did you think it was going to be easy no it's not going to be easy it's gonna it's going to suck it's going to be hard yeah like but seriously and i think some guys think it's like i don't know she and and for girls sometimes their expectations are like i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't know it's too much and and that maybe they are looking for somebody who makes a lot of money in this but like you have to understand like okay if you're looking at from like a evolutionary biology standpoint i'm not an evolutionary biologist and i'm not an expert on it but like you know just from some of the stuff that i've read it's like well women are looking for security safety and this because of if they get pregnant then they're kind of like you know they're not out of commission for it and so like okay well what do you look when you look when you look back at it's like okay i can under at least you can understand where it's coming from and that's kind of where it's like okay i can work with that like you need to sort of understand it but like did you ever think it was going to be easy no and then also it's like okay you got to prove yourself like well you've got to
Speaker 2be an open honest person i think i i interviewed somebody called joey dr joey hamilton the other week after i've met her before she talks a lot about jealousy but one of the things she said that that has really stuck with me is that if somebody says they don't want any drama on a dating site she swipes left right because she's like drama is part of human relationships like conflict is part of human relationships like learning how to resolve conflict learning how to deal with uncomfortable emotions learning how to move beyond that and to figure out how to resolve those differences that's part of what makes us human and that's and that's part of what makes relationships relationships if you don't want that don't get involved with anybody like yeah but isn't that also what builds the connection too
Speaker 3though like the friction and the tension and like the and all of it now if it's if it's like that's different than saying like if it's unsafe or unhealthy oh no of course totally different but there's going to there's going to be something about like going through the thing together that is what builds the connection and the the tightness in the relationship and i also think like for men too. It's like, that's how you build the intimacy with your partner. It's just a little bit different than maybe the way that you want it. Right. And so, and so, I mean, that's something that I feel like I've learned, you know, as, as I've been in relationship with my wife and just, and just, just growing, it's like, maybe when you're younger, you don't, you don't think about it that way, but as you're like, you know, it's like, okay, how, how do we, how do we build more connection and intimacy? And like those, those things. Cause I think like men are always seeking novelty in some sort of way. Right. And so it, well, if you've been with somebody for a long time, you got to get a little creative on how to make things, things, things more, things more novel, novel. Right. So like that right there in itself is, is going to be, is going to work.
Speaker 2Yeah. Esther Burrell says distance breeds desire. That's what she said. Absolutely. Yeah. Distance breeds desire. And we have to retain some element of mystery in ourselves to be able to create the attractiveness, you know, the, the, the dynamic with our partner so that they don't think that they know absolutely everything about us. Right. It's, it's more important to see, to think, oh, I, I'm just seeing something new for the first time. That's so exciting. But I think, you know, what's really fascinating is the way that you've been able to combine this interest in physical fitness, nutrition, healthy lifestyle with this kind of more healthy mind side of things through the men's group and through trying to build the connections in that way. I, I, to be honest, I've never seen anyone that's tried to try to cover off both spaces. I suspect that's, that, that can be quite a big challenge because as you said, you're not a therapist. And I suppose, you know, my, my final question, I guess, would be like, um, you know, if, if someone was starting again, you know, what would, what would be their first step towards improving their fitness, both from and, and towards their sex life as well?
Speaker 3Yeah. Well, the first place for your fitness, I would say is if you're having a hard time, the first, well, ask for help. I think, I think in, in both cases, sex life, fitness, like ask for help. Like that's, we need, I'm a coach. So I'm a big believer in coaching, but like, if you're, you know, if you were an athlete, say you're a soccer player and you were having a hard time, what would you do? You would ask one of your coaches, Hey coach, how do I get better at making this pass or something? Well, I think it goes for the same thing. If you're having trouble with your sex life, or maybe you're single and you're not getting any dates, that means maybe you're not having any sex. There's probably plenty of dating coaches out there. That's going to, that's going to help you feel more confident in approaching women or something like that. Um, or there's plenty of coaches that work with you and your partner to create more intimacy and same thing. There's plenty of personal trainers out there to help you, you know, so just ask for help and get coaching. And then again, that's going to build momentum, right? You're going to, you're going to learn more and then, and then go and then go practice it. That's the only way to get better at it. So my advice would be like, go ask, go ask for help. It's, and that's like, okay.
Speaker 2I mean, I think the thing is as well with, with anything going to ask for help, I think is always sometimes the hardest step, but once you've done it, it's great. And, and make sure that the person that you find that is somebody that you feel comfortable with, right. Don't ask your friends.
Speaker 3Don't ask your friends for help. Don't do that. Because no, I actually, I'm a big believer in that. Don't, don't ask your friend. I like, I love my friends and I love my friends, but they're going to give you advice based off of how they already see you. Right. Whereas like a coach, you know, and so there's, so already, because of your friends, there's already some sort of built up conflict of interest or bias in some, in some sort of, sort of way. So I would ask like, I, at least at the times I've gotten coaching always way better, but I perform better in front of a coach who doesn't know who doesn't know me. Cause then I don't, I, in my own mind don't have any I guess, preconceived thoughts of like how this person's viewing me. They don't know me.
Speaker 2Yeah. Yeah. So thank you so much. I'm going to try and get you some older guys for your men's group. Yes. Bring the old guys to the group. We got questions for the old guys, right? As long as they're open to answering them. I've got most of my audiences in the States. So to be honest, there's probably, I wouldn't be surprised if a few people contact you and say, yeah, I'd be quite curious to hear what you're doing. Because for me, I think it's, there's a real gap in the market with really good men's groups. I think it's a real gap in the market with really good men's groups. Where people can be honest and where you've got that intergenerational approach as well, where you can have younger people and older people in meeting on with that sort of frequency. And as you said, and I think it's the, it's the takeaway from this is just be consistent. If you're going to turn up at a men's group, turn up every fucking week. And if you're going to commit to your fitness two to three times a week, don't go crazy. Just be consistent.
Speaker 3Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's, you, you said it, you said it right there. You know, it's about for the, for the men, it's body, mind, spirit. And we try to bring all that in the different themes that we have each month in the group and exercise is a huge, is a huge part of that is a huge part of
Speaker 2that. Totally. Brock, it's been so lovely to talk to you. Thank you so much. Thank you, Suzanne. If you're enjoying this conversation, you'll find more stories, resources, and advice waiting for you. Come and explore our community at my website, sexadviceforseniors.com.
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