Sex doctor, Las Vegas Sun, July 15, 1998

Finding Sex-cess Lisa Ferguson Wednesday, July 15, 1998 | 10:19 a.m. There's not much you can say to shock Dr. Carole Altman. The retired Las Vegas sex therapist has heard it all -- from bizarre sexual fetishes and routines to peculiar psychological hang-ups. "I always say if you're not hurting yourself or your partner, it's fine," Altman says in the living room of her northwest valley home. Viewers of KVBC Channel 3's midday newscasts will recognize her as the "Love Doctor." She hosts the show's weekly sex-related news segment on Fridays. Her topics have ranged from the romantic lure of the late Frank Sinatra to the wonders of the impotence drug Viagra. "I talk a lot about how sexuality is a very healthy, fabulous, wonderful level of energy," she says, "and ... not to have that sexual zest for life gives you a lack of energy, a lack of color." Response to the sexy segment has been favorable according to the show's producer, Joyce Kotnik. Altman has received a handful of letters from viewers, which she's answered on the air and through private correspondence. "We're (slotted) against the soap operas, so it kind of helps" boost ratings to broach such romance-laden subjects, Kotnik says. "Especially being against soap operas like 'The Bold and the Beautiful,' you have to get a little bit risque. "I think some people are afraid to talk about sex in a sense, so when (Altman) comes out and just tells the truth about it, we seem to get a good reaction." Late last year, Altman, a New York native, purged the files of about 300 of her former patients in search of titillating tales to include in her recently published book, aptly titled "From the Files of a Sex Therapist" (Lifetime Books, Inc., $14.95). While the book offers a "voyeuristic look" into her patients' bedrooms, "my feeling, positively, is that it helps you to become much less judgmental" about people's sexual eccentricities, she says. "You realize people love in very different ways and it's O.K. for them and you don't have to judge them." Still a few of the anecdotes will likely leave you shaking your head in disbelief -- or perplexed curiosity. Altman counseled one couple whose lovemaking included the use of a chicken egg, culminating with the man crowing like a rooster. The couple, admitting that even they found the act a bit ridiculous, sought Altman's advice. "I looked at her very intently and said, 'Is it O.K. with you?' and she said, 'Yeah ... I don't mind,' and I said, 'Then it's fine.' She said she just wanted to know if she was crazy or not." But at least the pair was concerned enough to question their sexual relationship rather that wait until it went awry. "If the sex is not good, it's a very, very big deal," Altman says. With most couples, "it's interesting because the undertone is there: The woman or the man doesn't say, 'I'm sexually frustrated and that's why this is all going on,' but they are. "There's a lack of flow in your life ... when you're with somebody and you're not being catered to sexually," she says. "If you were lying in bed next to somebody and they're not interested in you, that's hurtful ... so you have this pain that's not conscious, it's not expressed ... it's just an emptiness, it's something that's not being fulfilled and it's sadness." In another chapter, Altman writes of a client who suffered an obsessive-compulsive disorder -- he was severely preoccupied with cleanliness -- which prevented him from having intimate relationships with women. "I rolled him in the mud; I did all kinds of stuff. I took him out on his boat and I wouldn't let him take a shower. It just didn't work," she says. While Altman considers the case one of her failures, "he's kind of happy with his life; this is how he has to be." "From the Files of a Sex Therapist" is Altman's second book. Her first, 1977's "You Can Be Your Own Sex Therapist" (Casper Publishing, revised in 1997), is "a step-by-step program to cure sexual dysfunction." It was recognized by the American Medical Writer's Association as the best medical book penned by a non-medical writer. The grandmother of four began writing about sex three decades ago and has published articles in Cosmopolitan, Harpers Bazarr, Nevada Women and Penthouse Forum magazines. She has also appeared on "Good Morning America" and "Sally Jesse Raphael." Though she's no longer in private practice, she continues to write and hosts lectures and workshops for groups throughout the country. Quick to debunk myths about sex, one of Altman's favorites to quash is that sex must be spontaneous in order to be exciting and enjoyable. "When you're married and you have children, there is nothing spontaneous about it," she contends. "Maybe once in a while in the shower, but even that is planned: You go into the shower with your husband and something could happen, but if you don't go in, nothing's going to happen. "I say this a lot: 'People spend more time planning the menu for dinner than the menu for love, and I don't only mean sex -- I mean love." She urges couples to leave kids with the grandparents, light a couple of candles and get down to business on a regular basis. "Plan it and you'd be surprised -- that moment can keep you going for another week or two, and then you do it again." But the key to a sex-cessful relationship, Altman assures, rests in a formula she devised, called "The Three R's: respect, recognition and reward. "Do you really respect your partner in every way? Do you treat your partner better than you would treat any stranger?" she asks. "Do you tell them 'Thank you for this' and 'Thank you for that'? Do you tell them how good they look ... and do you reward them?" Altman discourages peck-type kisses between partners. "I tell people, 'Kiss for 30 seconds, really involve yourself with the other person.' "People don't make eye contact," she says. "You have to look at each other, you have to share everything that you feel about each other. If you don't share the dark side (of the relationship), then the light side can never really be light. "I try to stress those Three R's, and if you have them in your life, you're going to have the best sex," she contends, "because if you're rewarded, recognized and respected, you're going to ... want to share yourself and that's what sex is all about." Take Altman's relationship with her new husband, Rick Cobb, for example. The pair met while playing poker at the Mirage hotel-casino and married 2-and- a-half years ago. "I don't think I've ever given that man a cup of coffee that he didn't say thank you for," she says. "We're very happy with each other, which, when you're happy, sex is happy; life is happy." archive