For my 70th birthday, I did something radical: I hired a sex worker. Not out of desperation, but defiance. The fear wasn’t of death—I accept that inevitability—but of fading into the invisibility society assigns to older women. I needed a jolt, a rebellion against the expectation that desire and pleasure expire with menopause.
The choice wasn’t reckless abandon; it was a calculated risk. Parachuting seemed equally viable, but less practical given my osteopenia. The $1900 investment could have funded a trip abroad, yet I chose to spend it on a three-hour encounter with a man young enough to be my grandson. It wasn’t about sex; it was about asserting ownership of my body and desires in a world that would rather ignore them.
The reality was underwhelming. My escort, Mitch, promised arousal but delivered boredom. The experience was unsatisfying, leaving me questioning the point of risking financial and emotional discomfort for such a lackluster result. I requested a refund, which he promptly provided.
But the failure was instructive. It exposed the societal expectation that older women should accept diminished sexual agency, or worse, pretend it doesn’t exist. This realization fueled my resolve. Why should age dictate my right to pleasure?
I tried again, this time with Chris, recommended by a woman who had read my essay in the Sydney Morning Herald. The second encounter was different. Not because the sex was superior, but because I approached it with unapologetic self-possession. I asked for what I wanted, and for once, the transaction didn’t feel like a negotiation of shame.
The real awakening came from speaking about it. Sharing my story through essays, podcasts, and interviews ignited a conversation. The backlash was inevitable—men sneering at my audacity, women whispering their judgments. But the criticism only strengthened my conviction.
This wasn’t about escorts; it was about dismantling the narrative that older women are invisible, undesirable, irrelevant. It was about reclaiming my sexuality, my voice, and my right to pleasure without apology.
The world doesn’t reward aging women for wanting or needing physical intimacy, but that doesn’t make the desire any less real. The truth is that as we age, we continue to have needs, and those needs should be validated not shamed. The act of speaking openly about this has been more transformative than any encounter.
I am not advocating for everyone to hire an escort, but for all women to reject the silence and shame that silence creates. The world doesn’t owe us youth or desirability, but it doesn’t have the right to deny us pleasure either. The liberation lies not in the act itself, but in the courage to defy expectations and claim the joy we deserve.
