You might think that kinky sex is as spontaneous as it is unconventional. But a sexologist told Insider that her kinky clients do a lot more planning than those who are more vanilla when it comes to sex, and that groundwork pays off in a way that we could all benefit from. Account icon An icon in the shape of a person's head and shoulders. It often indicates a user profile. Re your editorial, a few crumbs thrown at gay people is not enough, and never will be. I have been a Christian all my life and have made a generous contribution to church life. But two years ago I decided to stop going as I felt angry when attending church. Why? Because I realised, after 58 years, that I was always going to be a second-class Christian. Jesus said nothing on this subject. So it’s plain prejudice and homophobia. I will only return when I am equal. So they probably have 25 years or thereabouts. After that, maybe I will see them in heaven. As women have gained greater economic power, however, the appeal of a much-older spouse has fallen, making age-gap relationships less common – and often more taboo. In recent years, that vocabulary has been expanded to include relationships in which women are the significantly older partner; words like ‘cougars’ and ‘toyboys’ reflect the rise in this kind of relationship. Statistics show that in 1963 just 15% of UK brides were older than their grooms. By 1998, this had risen to 26%, and findings from one 2011 study suggested that the number of women married or cohabiting with a man five years or younger had almost tripled since the 1970s.

It’s not just about parenting, however. Pairing up with someone of a similar age makes your relationship more likely to go the distance, research shows. Experts believe that this is because these couples tend to go through life challenges and stages at a similar time, and can therefore continue to find common ground. For both men and women, fertility tends to decline after the age of about 35, and though women lose their ability to conceive much more rapidly, it makes sense that we’ve evolved to be attracted to people who are similarly aged. Although there is relatively little data on age in LGBTQ+ relationships, we know that age-gaps among same-sex couples are much more common, perhaps reflecting how much the ability to biologically conceive together influences how we approach finding a partner.Women who choose to date younger men seem to face a disproportionate amount of judgement. “Us humans are judgemental, and if what our neighbour is doing is misaligned with what we expect, we put a spotlight on it,” says Lordan. “Women who match with younger men go most against the grain when it comes to our narrative of marriage, and so suffer the most judgement.” Here are three things that Howard thinks the kink community does that could improve sex for non-kinky couples. Scheduling time for sex Those who find DiCaprio’s dating habits distasteful aren’t without good reason. Aversions to age-gap relationships are very common and, like most taboos, they stem from thousands of years of evolution as well as more recent social and cultural cues.

Touroni says as more kinds of relationships are normalised, she hopes that people will respect the choices of those in age-gap relationships. “We are living in an era of more freedom and flexibility, so I would like to think that over time we will become significantly less judgemental about other people’s relationship choices, whether that’s age-gaps or anything else.” The reasons for this are both biological and economic. If a 50-year-old man wants to have children, it is not in his interest to couple up with a similarly-aged woman who is much less likely to still be fertile. In a patriarchal society in which men have the economic power, the choice to pair up with a much younger woman would be more likely to be available to him.

Practicing aftercare

Responses to the chart were mixed; some commended DiCaprio for his ability to attract younger women, while others berated the veteran actor, begging him to find someone closer to his own age. Even at three years old, the chart continues to resurface, as commentators keep a keen eye on DiCaprio’s current relationship with 24-year-old Camila Morrone. I believe the church can have useful things to say about the ethics of what one does with the contents of one’s pants, but I don’t believe that anyone is defined by that shape – by me or by God.

The media attention that surrounded French President Emmanuel Macron’s marriage to a woman 24 years his senior, or the fevered coverage of 41-year-old Kim Kardashian’s relationship with 28-year-old Pete Davidson only underlines this. Yet Touroni believes that older men/younger women relationships are now perceived with even more judgement than older women/younger men couples. Yet there’s little evidence that society’s fascination with age-gaps is lessening. So-called May-to-December celebrity love affairs still regularly make headlines, and young people seem even more judgemental of age-gap relationships than their older counterparts, particularly when a man is older than a female partner. Given that young people are generally at the forefront of social changes, their disapproval could mean that the age-gap taboo might become even more deeply entrenched. Shamyra Howard, a licensed clinical social worker and AASECT-certified sex therapist, realized that it was her kinkier clients who tended to discuss and plan their sexual encounters, even though scheduling sex is commonly seen as a marker of a stale sex life, and that this made having sex easier and better.

'Using your mouth' to communicate more about sex

In the initial 10 years of marriage, people report higher levels of marital satisfaction when their partner is younger than them,” says Grace Lordan, an associate professor of behavioural science at the London School of Economics, who is currently researching age-gap relationships and happiness. “However, over time, the marital satisfaction of different-aged couples declines more than similar-aged partners. The probability of similar-aged couples divorcing is also lower.” Your editorial ignores the harm that the Church of England’s leadership wreaked during the equal marriage debate a decade ago. After 20 years working as a church musician, I left the C of E in 2013 in protest at the priority that it placed on a false concept of church unity, at the expense of LGBTQ+ people’s lives. My husband and I did marry, but not in church – despite decades of service. I, and countless others, will not return to church life.