The Latte Lounge partnered with Sylk Natural Lubricant in February 2021 to create a series of live events on our Instagram account and in our Facebook group (The Latte Lounge). Join our Facebook group and follow us on Instagram to take part in future events!
Whether you’re single or in a relationship, our goal was to support, inform and empower you with tips and insights from our experts.
Read on for an overview of each event and watch on demand
WATCH THIS INTERVIEW NOW: Take a watch of this interview which took place on 4 February 2021 with Dr Nighat Arif.
As women start to enter the perimenopause and menopause years our hormone levels (in particular oestrogen) start to decrease quite rapidly and can bring with it a whole host of unwanted symptoms including vaginal dryness/atrophy. This can make sex and smear tests particularly painful.
So many women find it hard to talk about and in many communities it can be a real taboo. While about 70% of women suffer from this painful symptom only 7% of us actually go and seek help with it.
To talk about why that is and what we can do about it we spoke to Dr Nighat Arif, a GP specialising in women’s health, as our first guest in our ‘Let’s Get Intimate’ series.
You might recognise Dr Nighat from her weekly appearances as the resident GP on BBC Breakfast and from ITV’s This Morning. She’s passionate about women’s health, especially the taboo subjects and wants to particularly open up these conversations in ethnic minority communities (she translated a Vaginal Dryness leaflet authored by Jane Lewis into Urdu for example). Oh, and she’s also a superstar on TikTok too (follow her @drnighatarif), bringing much-needed evidence-based awareness to all things women’s health.
Fluctuating hormones can have a massive impact on your sex life in midlife. There’s uncomfortable and perhaps painful symptoms, creeping anxiety, lowered body/self confidence and often a drop in libido too.
Louise Proddow, founder of Rejuvage, knows this only too well and has been on her own empowering journey. With her own hormones raging and a new sense of freedom over 50, there is no way she was ready to be invisible, discarded and labelled as ‘past it’. With her entrepreneurial spirit she set out to reshape the midlife mindset in others too, breaking down taboos and stigmas to help midlifers navigate healthier and happier lives.
I chatted to Louise all about midlife sex, and Louise shared her own journey and her advice for others about how to take control - whether you’re in a relationship or single. Follow Louise on Instagram and Facebook and Twitter.
I also chatted to Sex Educator Renée Denyer all about female sexuality and pleasure. Renée is an award-winning Store Manager at Sh! Womens erotic emporium, has her fingers in many pies and spends her days talking about G-spots, P-spots and any other spots you may have found in your nether regions. She writes a regular column for Erotic Trade Only Magazine and dreams of penning a bestselling sex guide one day. You can find Sh! On Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
These women lay bare their midlife mantra of discovering passion, losing your inhibitions and feeling liberated even after menopause. We spoke about enjoyment and creating our own pleasurable moments whether you’re in a relationship or single - while also recognising that for many of us we will have to address certain barriers to a healthy sex life such as illness, surgery and menopausal symptoms.
Ever wish that you could just be heard? While the global pandemic means we’re spending more time than ever before with our partners, it hasn’t necessarily meant we’ve got better at communicating with each other.
In this Facebook Live we heard from couples’ therapists and real life couple Caron and Glenn Barruw.
Glenn is a behavioural psychologist and Caron a psychotherapist. They talked from both a male and female perspective on keeping, finding or losing a relationship.
Caron and Glenn revealed the secrets to good communication within relationships where each partner feels heard. We heard their professional tips and insights on navigating those midlife pressures and areas of conflict.
Caron and Glenn draw on their extensive experience as psychotherapists, where they take couples through intensive intervention programs to understand the jigsaw puzzle of peoples’ lives.
Over many years they have learnt what triggers people and why, how to change repetitive patterns and behaviours to build loving, effective relationships.
In this talk they shared some of the tools they use with couples to cope with obstacles and practical advice that you can implement in your own relationship or in future relationships.
Find out more about Caron her website and follow Caron on Instagram and Twitter. Find out more about Glenn on his website
Comedian and physio Elaine Miller explains why pelvic health is so important, how our pelvic floor muscles work, common issues we may face in menopause and midlife (such as prolapse) and tips for maintaining good pelvic health. While this topic is usually no laughing matter, Elaine's comedic style ensures this is an entertaining but educational watch!
Find a menopause specialist, download our symptom checker, tips on preparing for your GP visit and so much more.
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The original home of The Latte Lounge - our private group of more than 25,000 women discussing all things midlife.
