Dr Ruth prepares visit to N.Z.

Press, 8 March 1989, Page 14

Dr Ruth prepares visit to N.Z.

NZPA-AAP New York Sports widows should abandon their beer-swill-ing couch potato mates and do something they like doing, according to one of America’s best known sex therapists. Dr Ruth Westheimer’s antidote for television football addicts is tennis with friends, or a ladies day out on the town. Next time hubby sits down with a can of beer for an afternoon’s sports viewing, “go out and do something you love to do,” she advises. “I say to these women, don’t just sit there and cater to him by giving him another beer during the commercial. Don’t just sit there and stew. “Because to the football widow, that’s not funny. She’s not going to be a good sex partner that night after the game when she has been ignored for the entire day and has been cleaning up and taking care of the children.” Watch out New Zealand! She is on her way here to promote three, perhaps four of her books — if her biography “All In A Lifetime” comes out in time. Dr Westheimer’s books include her first blockbuster, “Dr Ruth’s Guide To Good Sex”; “First Love For High Schoolers”; and

“Dr Ruth’s Guide For Marital Lovers.” Although no champion of unrestricted sex, she does believe that society has a responsibility to hand out free condoms, especially to teenagers. When she started counselling teenagers on American radio, Dr Ruth was criticised by conservatives opposed to frank discussion of sex. These days, with the A.I.D.S. epidemic and high teen-age pregnancy rates, her advocacy of condom use to prevent both has become more acceptable. Although she firmly believes in marriage, romantic love, and monogamous relationships, she does not frown on teenagers experimenting with sex. But she does get angry with young people who do not take precautions against unwanted pregnancies and who hurt others in the process of searching for a long-term partner. “If you are sexually active and you don’t want to be a parent, use contraceptives. I say that until I am blue in the face.” In what may bring yet more wrath and controversy on her head, Dr Ruth says the American trait of wanting to confess

all sexual problems is not necessarily productive. “Sometimes if there was an infidelity and there is no danger of it being found out, I say very often keep your mouth shut,” she said. Her visit to New Zealand and Australia will draw her unbridled fascination to subjects such as why some men may have difficulty having erections or maintaining them, and whether they have premature ejaculations. On the other side she will be curious to discover whether women “Down Under” are orgasmic, and if they talk openly about sex. “I am very interested in finding out do Australians go to sex clinics for advice,” she explained in her distinctly rasping, heavily-accented voice. “Are they very British or Victorian, and puritan about it? Do women speak up when they have difficulties being orgasmic? “All of these things I hope to talk about to journalists, professionals and just anybody from morning to night. I promise not to sleep in Australia and New Zealand — just to talk, and to listen. I really want to learn about you and what’s happening there.”