40-year-old virgins really do exist

SAVE yourself but not for too long. Because the longer you hang on to your virginity, the harder it is to get rid of it.

Sex. You could be having it. Yes, you. Picture: Thinkstock.

SAVE yourself but not for too long. Because the longer you hang on to your virginity, the harder it is to get rid of it.

It's like riding a bike. The longer you leave it to learn, the scarier it seems.

That's what we saw on the ABC on Sunday night during 40 Year Old Virgins. The documentary was about how keeping your virginity can overshadow your life. It showed a man and a woman embarking on a desperate course of sex therapy to 'finally' lose 'it'.

IT engineer Clive and 28-year-old Rosie were increasingly worried about their virginal status so allowed a film crew to record their titillating journeys to losing their virginities.

Clive, 45, was a devout Christian who was so terrified of sex that he sobbed before having it and struggled to say words like "penis".

Rosie dreamed about having her own family one day but was scarred from childhood sexual abuse. She hates touching or being touched by men.

Sorry to spoil the show for those who haven't seen it but Rosie remained a virgin, after admitting she wasn't attracted to her "surrogate partner" Gary, a professional sex therapist whose job it is to "transition" people into sexual relationships.

"One thing I've learned from this is I'm not bothered about being a virgin anymore," she said. "I'm fine about it."

Whereas Clive worked with a sex surrogate to go all the way.

Certified sex therapist Matthew Yau told news.com.au that people chose to remains virgins for a range of reasons.

"It depends how you define virgin. A virgin can be a person with no sexual experience or a virgin can be a person who has not had penetrative sex," he said.

"In my experience, the type of person who never has penetrative sex abstains due to some sort of message that sex is dirty or bad, or due to trauma. Alternatively people choose to stay celibate, sometimes for religious or other reasons.

"Sometimes it's due to sexual disorders like Vaginismus, a condition where there is involuntary tightness of the vagina during attempted intercourse.

"Sometimes lesbians do not want penetrative sex. Generally I think if people keep your virginity it's self-determined and voluntary."

They've decided not to have sex so they indulge in the next best thing - ice cream. Picture: Thinkstock

Professor Yau, from James Cook University, says sex gets harder to initiate the longer you abstain.

"The older you get the harder it is to find a compatible person," he said.

"Women are more complex and give more consideration to sex. They are also under the most pressure to get married and have children."

While the true prevalence of older virgins remains a mystery Prof Yau has counselled clients who have been concerned about their lack of sexual experience.

"I've had a couple of clients in their 40s and 50s who are still virgins," he said.

"Another group of people who are still virgins are the severely disabled. I work a lot with people with disabilities who are interested in sex but haven't had the opportunity.

"I had a lady aged about 50, who wasn't disabled but was a virgin because she never met the right person and was socially shy. The reason she saw me was because she wanted to check whether she was normal. I advised her to pleasure herself, to start socialising and going to parties, or to use a male sex worker. She didn't want to see a sex worker but she started to pleasure herself."

Why don't all virgins who want to lose their virginity just use a sex-worker?

"There's a social stigma attached to going to a sex worker," Prof Yau said.

"People think it's immoral. I think there's more pressure on women to live within the traditional moral code."

Sex. You could be having it. Yes, you. Picture: Thinkstock.

In 2002 rugby league international Jason Stevens published a book Worth The Wait about his decision to shun premarital sex and why he thinks virginity should remain sacred before marriage.

The 2005 romantic comedy the 40-Year-Old Virgin made light of the issue.

But according to San Francisco journalist Michael Castleman people who haven't had sex by the time they're 25 often feel ashamed, isolated, stuck, handicapped and not part of the adult world.

A 2009 study published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine Are There Really 40-Year-Old Virgins? found that 5 per cent of men and 2 per cent of women said they'd never had sex.

It found two common themes associated with older virginity: regular attendance at religious services and abstinence from alcohol.

But Castleman, who has written about sexuality and sex research for 36 years, says it has more to do with profound shyness, social awkwardness, general discomfort with the opposite sex and the whole idea of physical intimacy with another person.

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