Men - Dont Pause
NATIONAL JOURNAL OF HOMOEOPATHY 1994 Nov / Dec Vol III No 6.
Manu Kothari.
The irrepressible, Dr. Vasant Mehta, a medical genius now numero uno in tax matters summed up the situation so effectively : "Men-o-pause, but Men-dont-pause". Not withstanding the medical sciences penchant for converting the most physiological into ostensibly pathological, a common woman / man doesnt give a damn and continues his / her night-time (or day-time) fusions nevertheless, obeying the time honored principle of "if you dont use it, you lose it."
Menopause indeed is the triumph of the human female over Darwinian obsession that survival is the sole right of the reproductively fittest. Whereas the sexual span of an average female is three decades, her post-sterility survival tends to be as high as five decades and consistently greater than that of the perennially fertile male.
World over, women outlive and outnumber men. India, thro female feticide on an astronomic scale has earned the singular notoriety of reversing t his biological ratio. What use are our scriptures, sadhus, temples and the verbal diarrhoea on morality?
The arrival of menopause is accorded an unwelcome. A typical western lexicon describes it in loaded terms - menopause = "the period of natural cessation of menstruation called also change of life; the whole group of physical and physiological alternations that occur in the menopausal woman" the lexicon synonymizes menopause with climacteric: which it describes with derogatory vigour - "a major turning point or critical stage in a peronss life; a corresponding phenomenon of reduced sexual activity and competence in the male."
But what is the change and what is the turning point? Menopause heralds for the woman freedom from sanitary pads and spermicides, from conception and contraception, loop and lactation. Instead of greeting the God given timed freedom - women, men, books and doctors have converted it into such an undesirable extent that it reduces the market price of the human female as a sexual partner. We do not know how m;any of the hot flushes, depression and debilities are nothing if not the direct outcome of an anthropocentric thinking that overvalues fertility and looks down upon the cessation of it.
It pays a pathy to pathologize cessation of menses. the clientele so generated is large, guilt ridden (especially in the west) and desperate to do anything to keep the mind and the hind going. So, in the bargain there is the market for HRT (Hormone Replacement Therapy), vaginal creams and so on. Menopause maintains the medical market.
Is the sexual decline built into menopause or is it an outcome of herd-think? A French prima donna, on her 69 birthday was asked how active she was. She asked for three young men (each 23 years old) to spend a night with her and you bet, gave them a real good time. Mae West in her eighties could share her Venetian wonder with a wide variety of men. My own uncle, past 70 was seen by a urologist for trichomoniasis. The urologist, Dr. Ajit Phadke asked me to check my uncle if he was used to have an occasional fling with my auntie. So I sheepishly approached him - "To be honest we need it daily". My aunty is just 5 years junior to him.
Women of the world unite and cast off the menopausal slur; for it is an natural, inevitable and as innocent as menstruation. It is a pause, yes, but no full stop. Young hind is as young as, or as old as, your mind. The choice is yours. Masculine menopause is no less mental. If in pre-pause you were good, you will continue to be so past-pause.
Dr. MANU KOTHARI MB, MS, MSC
Sanjeevani, 1st floor,
S.V. Road, Santacruz,
Bombay - 54.
