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CHARLENE BALDRIDGE
Special to The Jewish News

7

he boomers turn 50 and
suddenly we are assailed by
the term "male
menopause." It's on the talk
shows, the nightly news and on the
counter at the corner vitamin store.
The phrase "male menopause" was
coined in the late 1940s. The phe-
nomenon happened much more
recently. Why? 'What is it? Does it
really exist? Do you have it, and if you
do, what do you do about it? What
caveats might there be? Personally, my
feminist hackles rose like Nessie from
the Loch when I first saw the term.
Male menopause? Puh-leez. Can't
they let us have just one life cycle
unique unto ourselves? Not
to mention-the semantic
problem of mating the word
"male" with "menopause,"
derived from "menses,"
which, as we all know, refers
to a female biological func-
tion.
But, to be fair, when one
considers that in utero dif-
ferentiation does not occur
until a fertilized egg is about
10 weeks old, it's not too
farfetched to assume that
whatever hormonal forces
affect female menopause (in
Western countries menstrua-
tion ceases around age 50.8)
— and there are many —
might have some parallels in
the male.
By definition, the real and
original female menopause is
the final cessation of men-
struation. The term 'climacteric is used
to describe the 10-15 years during
which a woman's ovaries gradually
stop producing eggs and large
amounts of hormones.
In his new book titled Male
Menopause (Sourcebooks), author Jed
Diamond explains that he used the
term to emphasize what he believes are
the important similarities in hormon-
al, physiological and chemical changes
that both men and women experience
during the midlife transition. The
major difference, he writes, "is that for
women menopause means the biologi-
cal end of their ability to bring new
life into the world. Men at midlife still
have a biological choice.
"The fact that men don't have a
clear biological marker that ends their
reproductive years is both a blessing
and a curse ... (and) allows them to

stay, at least in fantasy, 'forever
young."' It's when they begin having
trouble with "potential" that they run
into difficulties, because, as Diamond
admits, many men over 50 are still
boys emotionally.
"As the first wave of baby boomer
men crash onto the age 50 shoreline,"
he writes, "they come demanding
solutions for the problems they are
having with their flagging libidos."
The Census Bureau projects the
number of males between 40 and 70
in 2010 will be 54 million. "This
means America's male menopause
population will increase by almost 60
percent in the next 20 years," Dia-
mond says. The decline in men's
testosterone levels takes place over a
long period and varies widely.

According to a USA Today article,
the decline in production is not as
great as formerly thought: "Two-thirds
of men. over 65 produce as much or
more testosterone than healthy 20-
year-olds," the newspaper reported.
An old joke tells us that major indi-
cations of male menopause (formerly
midlife crisis) are a fast red sports car
and an even faster, younger woman.
What are the symptoms of male
menopause? Although she describes
men's experience as "menopause lite,"
renowned sexuality expert Dr. Theresa
Crenshaw says, "Their bodies sag and
change shape. Characteristic medical
conditions like enlarged prostate
develop. Sexual functioning is often
compromised by hormonal imbalance,
disease, medications, mind or mood."
She also notes that some men expe-
rience severe depression leading to sui-