Movies

How I wound up with the sex drive of a teen at 27

The R-rated comedy “The Late Bloomer” — released Friday and starring Jane Lynch, Maria Bello and J.K. Simmons — is loosely based on the best-selling autobiography “Man Made” by senior E! News and E! Online correspondent Ken Baker. Because of a brain tumor, Baker’s body was flooded with a female hormone that reduced his testosterone levels to nearly nothing. When he was finally cured, he essentially went through puberty — at the age of 27. Now recovered, the 46-year-old journalist, who resides in Los Angeles with his wife, Brooke, and kids, Jackson, 13, and Chloe, 12, tells Jane Ridley his story.

At Monday’s afterparty for the Hollywood premiere of “The Late Bloomer,” a fan made a slightly inappropriate remark before asking whether she’d embarrassed me in front of my mother.

“Are you kidding me?” I replied, genuinely shocked. “How could I be embarrassed when I just sat in a theater with my mom and 100 other people watching a movie about my penis?”

This particular part of my anatomy is the focus of the film inspired by my 2001 memoir. The book chronicles my struggles with sex after I developed a rare medical condition that rendered me impotent.

Though it might seem strange material for a farce, as the old cliche goes, laughter is the best form of medicine.

If only I could have had that attitude when I was going through 10 years of hell in the late 1980s and 1990s. I blamed my inability to perform in the bedroom on neuroses in my head — a psychological problem, not a physical one. In truth, there was something going on in my head — a benign brain tumor pressing on my pituitary gland. It was causing my body to produce excessive amounts of the female hormone prolactin, more than 10 times as much as a breast-feeding mother.

“Man Made: A Memoir Of My Body” by Ken Baker (Tarcher)

As my doctor observed, it had gotten so bad, it was a miracle I could muster a trace of an erection, given my suppressed levels of testosterone.

I knew something was amiss in high school, leading up to the time I lost my virginity in a Canadian hotel room in 1987 at age 17. Unlike other boys who’d gone through puberty, I wasn’t obsessed with sex. I could take it or leave it.

In the movie, my character, Pete Newmans, woefully recalls how his then-girlfriend described the deflowering as “making love to a boneless thumb.”

It wasn’t far from the truth. After a “failure to launch” experience, I managed to get a half-erection for my disappointed but understanding girlfriend, Jenny. “I keep my eyes closed and grip her swaying hips, waiting for it all to end,” I wrote in my book.

Over the following decade, I became the type of guy you meet at a party and go on a few dates with. We make out a few times, but as soon as sex is on the agenda, I disappear.

So was I gay? No. I was a closeted heterosexual in a sexual netherland. I was mentally driven to be with women, just not physically driven.

I was a closeted heterosexual in a sexual netherland. I was mentally driven to be with women, just not physically driven.

Afraid to expose myself and hating the pressure to perform, I built barriers and shied away from sex as often as I could, rarely masturbating because I didn’t feel aroused. I would have the odd brief, long-distance romance — occasionally sustained by a rare bout of sex that usually didn’t involve penetration. Such relationships ended quickly and with heartache.

My body shape was a mess. I earned the hated nickname “Pear” at college due to my narrow shoulders and round, womanly middle. Despite exercising like a champ, it was practically impossible to build muscle. When I ran, my nipples would become irritated and painful. Then, to my horror, they started secreting a white fluid.

Other problems during my 20s included depression, debilitating tiredness and agonizing headaches. They forced me to go home in the afternoon to rest from my hectic reporting job at People magazine.

I was in denial, and kept my secret to myself, refusing to see a doctor.

Baker in high school. After seeing a doctor, he learned his prolactin level was 1,578 nanograms per milliliter: about 10 times a breastfeeding woman’s level and about 150 times men’s levels.Courtesy of Ken Baker

That all changed after a kiss that saved my life. It was 1997 when, through a People article, I met an amazing girl, Robin. We made out on our first date in the dugout after an Oakland A’s game. She had kind, beautiful blue eyes that made me trust her. I’d never felt so connected to a woman.

The kiss and our subsequent year-long relationship saved me because it opened me up, emotionally and physically. For the first time, I started talking about my issues.

“I’m really scared,” I told Robin. “I’m afraid you’re going to dump me like the other girls.” Before long, Robin was fully versed in my sexual history, hangups and my physical symptoms. Her words to me were simple: “Promise me you will go see a doctor.”

I kept my word. In October 1997, I saw Dr. Joshua Trabulus, a Los Angeles physician. It took guts, but I told him about my erectile dysfunction and the lactation.

The following day, he showed me the results of my physical exam.

“The normal level of prolactin for men is between 5 and 10 nanograms per milliliter, but your level is 1,578,” he said. “A woman who is breastfeeding will have a level of around 150 ng/ml.”

Next, he sent me for an MRI. His suspicions that I had a brain tumor were confirmed. Mercifully, it was benign. The chestnut-sized growth, called a prolactinoma, was causing my pituitary gland to oversecrete the female hormone. The specialists said it was one of the rarest cases they had ever seen.

It sounds crazy, but I was the happiest man alive to discover I had a brain tumor. At last, I’d found the answer to the problem that had been ruining my life that past decade.

Baker in 1997, before his transformation. Within weeks of taking drugs to reverse his hormonal damage, he began to put on muscle and his penis grew.Courtesy of Ken Baker

Dr. Trabulus immediately put me on drugs to shrink the tumor, though I wound up having surgery to remove it in June 1998. Meanwhile, medications reversed the hormonal damage and built up my testosterone levels. Within weeks of taking the drugs, I started to put on muscle. I was able to maintain strong erections. I felt like Peter Parker in “Spider-Man” when he discovers his powers. The only downside was the acne over my back and neck.

Baker, after his transformation, with his future wife, Brooke, in 1999.Courtesy of Ken Baker

All of a sudden, especially after the operation, I turned into a horny teenager who saw sex everywhere. I lived in Santa Monica and Rollerbladed along the beach. “How did I not notice that so many women are wearing bikinis?” I thought.

I remember going to a tobacco newsstand down the street from my apartment to buy a pack of gum, and there were all these porno mags on the rack. I’d never had the urge or interest to buy them before. Now I was reaching into my pocket to pay for Playboy and Penthouse.

Sadly, I couldn’t hang on to Robin. I couldn’t keep dating her when I also wanted to be with the girl down the hall, the girl at the smoothie place and that reporter from the premiere. I felt like a total jerk.

We went for counseling, and after a particularly harrowing session in the fall of 1998, we had the inevitable discussion while driving over the Bay Bridge in San Francisco.

“I don’t want to break up with you, but I need to almost go back in time and really explore this new self,” I told Robin. She said she couldn’t continue, either. “Just when you’ve become a healthy man, I can’t enjoy you,” she said, sobbing.

That’s when I started to learn that, though I may have become male almost overnight, I had a lot to learn about being a man. Maleness is simple — just like any other animal, you have hormones and urges. But being a man is about the soul.

After splitting with Robin, I hooked up with about six women over the course of several months, around twice the number of women I’d tried to bed over the last decade. In the space of one day, I had some form of sex with three girls.

Part of me was exhilarated, but I stayed up that whole night psychoanalyzing myself. I was a fairly decent human being, and it didn’t take me long to realize I could never be a player. I was craving a meaningful relationship.

Baker with “The Late Bloomer” director Kevin Pollack and actor Johnny Simmons at the premiere’s afterparty Oct. 3.Getty Images

Just months later, in January 1999, I started dating Brooke, whom I married in June 2001. She worked in the People building, and we’d been friends for a while.

When I told her about the hormone imbalance, called hyperprolactinemia, and the surgery, she was shocked but understanding. I explained that the symptoms could be kept in check with regular medication, which I now take twice a week. Meanwhile, we’ve been blessed with two beautiful children, Jackson and Chloe.

I often joke I’m a senior correspondent for E! News, but, in real life, I’m editor-in-chief of Overshare.com.

I don’t keep anything bottled up anymore. Brooke, our entire family and I thrive on communication. We’ve created an environment where the kids feel free to talk about not just their feelings, but their bodies. If I’ve learned anything, it’s important to speak your truth. That’s why I’m delighted with the movie and am willing to tell my vulnerable story again.

And this is for my son and all the other guys out there: Don’t put it off. Go see your doctor.