You've probably heard it said that a male's sexual peak occurs in their late teens while a female's isn't until her mid 30s. Well guess what, it's not true.
The myth comes from Alfred Kinsey's data. Kinsey found that 18 year old men and 35 year old women were having the most frequent orgasms when asked to give anecdotal feedback. Published in the 50's, it's likely that young men were masturbating a fair bit in their late teens and that women in their mid 30s were in safe and trusting marriages, hence the findings.
Another viable reason could be that people are mixing up sexual peak with reproductive peak.
"People have reproductive peaks -- that's the time they are best suited to having babies," Jacqueline Hellyer, Sex Therapist and Educator told The Huffington Post Australia.
"That is not the same as a sexual peak. For humans, reproduction and sex are very different things. Unlike most other species, we don't only have sex to reproduce, for humans sex is primarily about bonding, and that is something that is required all life long."
The good news is that everyone's sexual desire ebbs and flows throughout life and it has little to do with age alone.
"People's sexuality varies widely, both in terms of desire and activity. It depends on their stage of life, how busy they are, how healthy they are, whether they have a partner, how they are getting on with their partner. It also depends a lot on their beliefs around sex, particularly sex and gender, sex and ageing, sex and parenting," Hellyer said.
"Given the above, people's sexual interest will generally vary throughout their lifetimes. Unfortunately because of our limited knowledge about sex people tend to fall into the trap of thinking that sex is only good when you're young and in a new relationship and that it will inevitably drop off. In my experience though, that is due to limited beliefs."
"Like all good things in life, if you want sex to stay good, you need to focus on it. You need to learn, and discuss and explore and be creative, and do this together. A good sex life over the years together is a co-creation of two people. It's not something that just happens 'naturally' any more than say health or wealth, which everyone knows require attention if you want to be healthy and wealthy," Hellyer said.
If you need more proof all you need to do is take a look at the statistics which show that STDs among older generations are on the rise.
"You can feel desire at any stage of life. Old age homes are hotbeds of amorous activity, I kid you not! I personally know of one woman who didn't start desiring sex until her 80s when her husband died and she got a new lover!," Hellyer said.