Dr. Ruth Westheimer died Friday at her home in New York.
Dr. Ruth Westheimer, the renowned sex therapist who was a straight shooter as a radio talk show host and TV personality, has died, ET has confirmed. She was 96.
In a statement to ET, her rep, Pierre Lehu, shared, "The children of Dr. Ruth K. Westheimer are sad to announce the passing of their mother, the internationally-celebrated sex therpaist, author, talk show host, professor and orphan of the Holocaust."
The statement continued, "She died peacefully at her home in New York City on July 12th surrounded by her loving family, just over a month after celebrating her 96th birthday. In addition to her children, Joe and Miriam, she is survived by her four grandchildren, Ari, Leora, Michal and Ben, son-in-law Joe, daughter-in-law Barbara and her granddaughter's husband, Elan. She was proceeded in death by her husband of 36 years, Manfred Westheimer."
The rep said the family will have a private funeral. The family's also requesting that donations be made in her memory to the Museum of Jewish Heritage and Riverdale YM&YWHA.
The New York Times was first to report her death.
The beloved psychologist, who many times said "there's nothing more interesting than sex," entered the pop culture lexicon in 1980 with her WYNY radio show in New York City. While the show started as merely a 15-minute segment, Westheimer answered a myriad of questions on sex and relationships that captivated audiences in the Big Apple. She soon became a national sensation, and she's largely credited with breaking the stigma that sex talk is taboo.
Westheimer, who earned a degree from the Sorbonne and a doctorate from Columbia University, would ultimately land TV and film roles as well as her own TV show (Lifetime's Good Sex! With Dr. Ruth Westheimer), which saw celebrities talk about their intimate lives. After she was a research assistant at Columbia's School of Public Health, Westheimer went on to do her postdoctoral work in human sexuality at New York-Presbyterian Hospital, where she trained with the renowned sex therapist, Helen Singer Kaplan. Westheimer would later teach at Lehman College in the Bronx and at Brooklyn College.
She rose to fame in the 1980s with her popular syndicated live call-in show on radio and TV. She also wrote a column for Playgirl magazine and became a household name with her how-to books on sexuality and intimacy. Westheimer, who famously said that even at 4-foot-7 one had to have "the courage to stand up," would go on to use her platform to advocate for sexual literacy and AIDS research
"I believe everybody has an obligation to do something for others especially when you are so fortunate like myself," she once told ET in 1995.
She also told ET in 1992, "I love to dance and to laugh and to talk about sex, but at the same time I'm a very serious person."
Westheimer was born Karola Ruth Siegel in Germany on June 4, 1928. A decade later, Nazis captured her father and she was sent away to an orphanage in Switzerland, where she was essentially a housekeeper. At just 10 years old, Westheimer would never see her family again, all of whom were presumed to be murdered at Auschwitz.
"I always had a lustful life, and if you want to talk in psychoanalytical terms -- how come I can have that in spite of the fact I had a tragic childhood -- I think part of it has to do with I did have a good foundation in my early years," she once explained in 1985. "So, having that good foundation I could then build on it."
The beloved grandmother, who famously rejoiced numerous times saying "Hitler lost and I won," found fame after the community affairs manager at WYNY saw her give a lecture on sexual literacy to a group of broadcasters. From there, her show, Sexually Speaking, was born, earning her $25 per week, according to The New York Times.
But while her blunt approach on sex, intimacy and relationships earned her a legion of fans, there were also detractors, including mental health professionals who accused her of turning a serious subject into entertainment.
Undeterred, Westheimer continued to give lectures and make numerous appearances at high-profile events. She was undoubtedly a celebrity who had a magnetic effect on just about everyone, including famous celebrities, and was never shy about giving advice on sex during interviews or offering her two cents on a myriad of topics. She once opined that the 2011 erotic romance novel, Fifty Shades of Gray, was "not great literature but interesting to read."
She was married twice before finding her true love in 1961, when she met telecommunications engineer Fred Westheimer while skiing in the Catskills. He, too, was a Jewish refugee. And a foot taller than her. They were married for nearly four decades before his death in 1997.
She once famously told Esquire in 2010, "Skiers make the best lovers because they don't sit in front of a television like couch potatoes. They take a risk and they wiggle their behinds. They also meet new people on the ski lift."
She would later joke to ET in 2019 that, instead of a cane, she takes "good looking guys" to hold on to when she goes on her walks.
Westheimer is survived by her son, Joel Westheimer, her daughter, Miriam Westheimer, and her four grandchildren.
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