Women find that life begins at 50

Now, most women in their 50s say their love lives have improved after the onset of the menopause.

The Jubilee Report, a study into the attitudes and lifestyles of women born when the Queen came to power, shows that life begins at 50 for many British women.

They have more fun, more freedom, more energy and better sex than previous generations who were more likely to dread the onset of middle age, according to the Social Issues Research Centre.

The research found 65 per cent of women felt they were happier now than before the menopause.

Some 66 per cent said they were more independent, while 64 per cent of women said their sex lives had got better or not changed since the menopause.

And 59 per cent of women said their relationships with partners and families had improved.

Celebrity role models, including the actress, Joan Collins, and the novelist, Joanna Trollope, have already shown women that reaching the menopause does not necessarily mean the end of an active sex life.

Collins recently married for the fifth time, at the age of 69, to a husband over three decades younger.

And at 58, Trollope, a mother, stepmother and grandmother, proclaimed she discovered a new, liberated approach to sex following the menopause.

The queen of the "Aga sagas" admitted she had become more "masculine" in her attitude and saw sex as something pleasurable with less significance than it had when she was younger.

Kate Fox, a social scientist and co-director of the Social Issues Research Centre, which undertook the study, said the use of HRT (hormone replacement therapy) has changed the lives of modern women.

She said: "The research surprisingly reveals that all aspects of women’s lives - health, work, sex, career, relationships, travel, energy, happiness - improve after the onset of the menopause.

"I was really taken aback with the findings. I’d heard people say that life begins at 50, but, as a scientist, I needed evidence to believe it. Now I have some."

According to the survey, women on HRT get more benefits after the onset of the menopause.

Half of those surveyed reported improvements in their sex lives since the onset of the menopause compared with 18 per cent of those who were not taking the drugs.

Some 66 per cent of women on HRT said their ability to pursue a career had improved since the menopause, compared with 45 per cent of those not taking HRT.

For 74 per cent of women on HRT, relationships with partners and family had improved, compared with 56 per cent of those who were not. And 71 per cent of women on HRT reported improvements in overall health and well-being since the menopause, compared with just under half of those not on HRT.

Dr Annie Evans, a women’s health specialist at the Bristol Royal Infirmary, said: "One hundred years ago, the average age of the menopause was 47, but, in those days, the life expectancy of British women was only 49.

"Now, women become menopausal at just over 50 years old but life expectancy is nearer 80, so we can expect to spend 25 or 30 years in the post-menopause.

"They need to be able to make the kind of informed choices that will help them to maximise their enjoyment of all those extra years."

She added: "Women today have high expectations of their elongated lives.

"There are choices that perhaps our mother’s generation and certainly our grandmother’s generation did not have."

However, the report also revealed that today’s post-menopausal women are concerned about increasing social pressure to maintain a youthful appearance.

They also worry about balancing home and work, and describe a "culture of fear" and decline of trust in modern society as well as the problem of losing their independence in old age.

The study of 200 women, aged 50 to 64, was made on behalf of the Choices Campaign, which aims to support women going through the menopause and inform them about treatment available to them.