*Halle Berry is encouraging women to have more honest conversations about menopause, saying the physical changes she experienced once left her questioning whether she would ever enjoy sex again.
Appearing on the July 15 episode of Hoda Kotb’s “Making Space” podcast, the Academy Award winner described how perimenopause affected her body and why she believes many couples struggle during that stage of life.
“Down that path of life, perimenopause, everything gets dry, like I said, and so intimacy and sex can become painful,” Berry said, Complex reports. “And so many divorces happen around this time of life because women become unable and unwilling to have sex because it’s so painful.”
The actress admitted the experience sparked a deeply personal fear.
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“My biggest problem” was worrying she “could not have sex anymore,” Berry said.
Those concerns, however, have faded. Speaking candidly about where she is today, Berry joked, “I am juicy like a peach. My sex life is back batting 100.”
Her perspective on intimacy has evolved in other ways as well. During an earlier appearance on the “Sex With Emily” podcast, Berry revealed she has stopped pretending to reach orgasm to protect a partner’s ego.
“I don’t do that anymore,” she said.
Looking back, Berry acknowledged she once felt pressure to reassure her partners, even when her own needs were not being met.
“We had to say that we did it so that he would feel good about himself. Because what is that doing? That’s putting his needs before our own,” she explained.
Berry now believes both people deserve the same level of satisfaction in a relationship.
“I’m like, ‘No, I come first like you come first to you.’ We both deserve to have this be a mutually enjoyable experience, so we both can roll over and go to sleep because we feel good—not one snoring and the other one looking at the ceiling, going, ‘What the hell?'”
Berry, who turns 60 on Aug. 14, has been with musician Van Hunt for about five years. The couple confirmed their engagement in February, and she has previously described him as “the person I should have married.”
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