Although I haven't posted very often on the Healthy Relationships or Healthy Sex forums, I do read them a lot. And my friends have been tracking my journals in which I've discussed my current relationship quite frequently. My lover and I are both seniors. He has lost two significant others to cancer. His wife of 50 years and another woman he was about to marry. Sometimes I worry that I will be the third. I've had abnormal bleeding for several years and do not want a cancer diagnosis or chemo. I'm taking my life day by day. That is my wish and my prerogative. As for him, he will be 82 in August and sometimes seems as if he has "one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel." Therefore, our love affair is sad because one of us will go first, leaving the other bereft. 

Sex is sad because it isn't very satisfying for either of us. That bothers him more than it bothers me. He wants me to go crazy with excitement (yeah, right). I enjoy closeness and fondling, but intercourse is painful or blah. I can't take hormones because of the bleeding. If it's cancer, that would "feed" the cells. Sex is sad for me because we both sense that he does not have much longer. I met him last November and in just eight months he has aged noticeably. He looks older, is less alert, more hard-of-hearing, and cries easily. When we dine out, the waiter or waitress usually addresses me, because I appear more competent. He isn't senile, but at 82 he appears feeble and people looking at an elderly person assume he is senile. 

We love each other. Whether we marry or not, we will probably be together "till death do us part."