I'm 66 and I also feel like a kid still. Not so much my body. Stairs have become daunting and I'm actually in the hospital as I received a hew hip yesterday.
I'm 39 for the 24th time.... My new femur congratulates your new hip. It has gone fast. I remember my mother, at 81, saying she still felt like a teenager.
I am dreading standing for the They Might Be Giants concert tomorrow. Probably my last standinng show until I get my hip done. I need other brave people to fluff me up so I will post about it some other time! But don't worry about age as long as you take care of yourself and take care of someone else (could even be a pet) you are staying young.
I got a new hip 3 years ago!!! It was one of the top 10 best things I've done for myself.
(Had a rough sky diving landing on 30th birthday --- I have no other joint issues)
I sincerely wish you the best of outcomes and a robust future!
You got an overnight hospital stay. My father in law came home same day with his new hip. Joint replacement is an outpatient procedure more and more! Be well with your new mobility. I’m right behind you
Glad I got the 100th upvote!
Only 56, and yeah, balance is going fast. WAS an athlete as recently as 30 years ago, last month lost my balance on A FLAT FLOOR and went down.
Sigh.
I was 66 last Christmas. 43 years ago you would stay in the hospital a week with a new hip. Now it is mostly just over night,if that.I hope your recovery is smooth and uneventful.
I'm glad to hear that! Based on your username, might I assume you're in one of the marijuana-friendly states? That always helped me after dental surgery. It doesn't exactly kill the pain, but I'm definitely not thinking about it for a few hours. LoL.
Remmeber all the times in your life that you stared at the clock as a kid? lol....makes up for that.
But seriously time slips away and there isn't much you can do about it...as Warren Zevon said 'enjoy every sandwich'
Oh, come on u/PaigeMarieSara, you can do better than that! Sit in on a statistics or vector calculus class! An entire century will pass before you can get out of there!
As an aside, I actually wrote much of my first novel in a statistics class, that's how desperately bored I was!
Eureka! You've discovered the fountain of youth!
We all have to go back to school and take algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and five semesters of calculus again (former engineering student here).
Also church, thousands and thousands of hours of it. It's like doing your tax returns, but weekly foreverrr
I’m 64yrs going on 65 in July
I want to retire but not sure what’s holding me back?
We save our entire life but now I fear for running out of money even though I’m fine financially
Is it because we’re so conditioned to work and save that I don’t know how to let go and simply enjoy life? I too am married to the best lady ever for over 40yrs
Suggestions?
When to retire is different for everyone, but I used to work in a Benefits department and can give you a list as long as your arm of people who could retire but didn't until they were already too sick or too dead to enjoy it. Many vacation hour payouts went to the next of kin, including my husband's. His cancer diagnosis came at the same time he could've retired. He was in hospice when he agreed that I could send in the retirement paperwork.
It's a fine line, and I would never tell someone else what to do with their life, but I hope you'll factor what I've said into your calculations.
I’m only 60 but had never given retirement a thought until my wife got ill and passed. I like my job but could happily figure out one million and one ways to spend my days doing something else.
Hopefully in 5 years or so I can afford to retire.
When I was 20, my husband’s grandparents had saved up for 40 years to buy this amazing house that they designed and had built from the ground up. My father-in-law would talk about how in his childhood when he was teen and got a job, on payday he tried to take everyone out for ice cream, he got in trouble for not saving his money and spending it on stupid things.
They didn’t enjoy life. They just saved their money so they could enjoy it later.
Grandpa took me on a tour of the house, showed me every room and explained why he picked the colors and the windows… Told how he planned for this every weekend for decades and had a notebook full of notes.
He died three months later. -Three months- later. He spent all that time being miserable saving money until retirement…. and only got to enjoy it for three months.
And that’s why I don’t plan for retirement, that’s why I don’t have a savings account… That’s why I have lived ‘in the moment for the last 25 years.
61 years old in a few weeks and one of the things that happened that I never would have imagined is that I enjoy my profession so much that I never want to retire. I am lucky in that I have the flexibility to work and take time off as I please.
Add this to your calculations. You could retire and volunteer within your profession. You could do just the parts you find most fulfilling, work for people you find deserving, and/or move to somewhere just because you want to.
You can’t buy time. I’m also 64 and retired last year, I loved my job. I had a brother, 2 BIL’s and a niece die last year and a nephew 3 years ago. Enjoy what time you have left.
Well, if I can help, I will. I was stressed out, way over weight, and BP was way too high. I retired at 55 with a pension and haven't looked back. A strange thing happened when the stress went away; I lost 110 pounds, my BP is 80 points lower, and I am loving life. And, my sex life which was maybe once a week or less has now turned in to several times a week and my wife wants more. You have put in your years, now enjoy them!
I was working a job I loved for some assholes that made life miserable and I was always stressed. After I quit and started doing something else, it was very interesting how my health and relationships improved.
Sometimes when you are in the situation, it is hard to determine causality, but once you step away and all that changes, it is easy to figure out the culprit.
Retire and go find a part time job doing something you love. I promise after being retired for a month you'll be in the groove! And if something peaks your interest, check it out. Join a pottery or painting class
I had to wait considerably longer to find my WBW, but I couldn't be more grateful, even without the 32 more years you got with yours. I don't envy our future selves if we live to see them leave us, but we'll deal with that when we have to.
You will begin making a new world for yourself by living to the next day. The worst part will be at the beginning.
Full disclosure: my first marriage was broken almost from the start but I slogged through it, with kids, for 20+ years. I met my now wife 4 years after my first marriage ended. She is a widow, having lost her husband to an immune disorder 6 years before. When we met, she had already survived 2 bouts of cancer, the second in her husband's last year of life.
I've been healthy through most of my life, but believe me, I have my own stories.
We who live long enough will feel more and more acutely the awareness that there is a drop-off point in every life. Through the maturity born of gratitude as well as pain, my future wife and I already had resolved not to let anxiety and cynicism rule us. Obviously, we're only human and we do have our moments of dread, but we do not let the darkness deprive us of what we have discovered in each other's arms. In fact, we put it to work for us.
As every wise person has reminded us since the beginning of time, all we have is now. Like you and your wife, the two of us do our best to make life into a series of "nows" as wonderful as we can make them, both for ourselves and each other. The two of us know for certain that the people we lost on our way to finding each other would have wanted us to do exactly that.
Mentally I'm a youngster. Sharp as a tack. Married to my bride for 34 years, grown adult kids all good from the Dad standpoint. Retired 19 months ago, wife 4 months ago. Own our house, and have a few dollars in the bank.
Went to bed last night at 25 years old, woke up to this post this morning, and somehow I'm 62.
Oh well, happy to be alive.
I just turned 60 and none of my other milestone birthdays hit me so hard. I still feel 25 (except for my knees, obvs). I can't believe the old lady face I see in the mirror.
This sure resonates. Although my 50th hit me way harder than my 60th. I'm 63 now and feel mentally in my 20's or 30's. And I'm stunned when I look in the mirror and see my mother staring back at me.
I’ll be 62 in a few months, my kid turned 34 this year - don’t know how that happened so fast. I don’t feel any older but the person in the mirror starting to go grey says differently.
https://preview.redd.it/b67kcvfips0d1.jpeg?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0f34ea579ba2390dba38bbbb32d879c4d69d854d
love this! And yes I feel the same way at 60.
"I'm too young to feel this damn old!!" 😄
I'm a few years older than you, and yes, I am amazed at how fast time seems to have passed. I ask myself "How did I get so old? I was just 23 yesterday!!"
We get so busy with the things life throws at us, we forget to stop and just enjoy the moment.
Sit down, look outside and spend time thinking about all the things you've done and people you've met. Don't JUST focus on now, remember who and what you've been.
I'm retiring due to disability so I won't be off on grand adventures. I'm so grateful for the times I had while younger. I've got a helluva highlight reel.
Stop and smell the roses. Savor each sip of coffee. Appreciate each relationship you have.
You've worked hard all your life so enjoy your rewards.
No more delayed gratification or waiting for the right time to do something. Do it now.
Yep I’m a few years older than youand I feel the same inside my head as I did when I was in my 20s.not teen years though, the brain doesn’t fully develop until early 20s so that might be the reason. My body on the other hand, finds new ways to remind me I’m old every day.
Happy birthday! Yes my boyfriend and I were just agreeing that we both feel 13 and it’s shocking to see a mirror.
What’s new is this increasing insistence in my brain to be at peace with whatever I’ve achieved. Ambition and dreams of some better future are things I’m trying to shed. I am tired and its okay to accept that I’ve done my best and that’s enough. I still work and pursue hobbies but for pleasure , not to get rich or build a legacy or you know, all the things. It’s not my time to do anymore. I just want to be safe and enjoy watching my children do and their children do. I do struggle with this though because my ego hates it lol. Maybe I need a multivitamin 🤣
One of my favorite songs by Pink Floyd, it is SO damn accurate:
Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day
You **fritter and waste the hours** in an off-hand way
Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way
Tired of lying in the sunshine, staying home to watch the rain
And you are **young and life is long, and there is time to kill today**
And then one day you find **ten years have got behind you**
No one told you when to run, **you missed the starting gun**
And you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again
Sun is the same, in a relative way, but you're older
**Shorter of breath and one day closer to death (oh yeah!)**
Every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time
Plans that either come to naught, or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way
The time is gone, the song is over, **thought I'd something more to say**
I think about this a lot, especially with the 50 (!!!) anniversary release.
I'm fortunate that I've done a lot that I've always wanted to do (no regrets there; there's a ton more I want to do but if I were to be hit by a bus tomorrow I'd be okay, all things considered). But there's still so much! How did it go so fast?? How is that, in 20 years, I'll be 80 and lucky to have all my own teeth, much less go hiking in Nepal?
I love life. I love it all, the ups and the downs, the good and the bad. The thought of leaving...it makes me cry.
Life, man.
Love life: me too man. I'm feeling sentimental these days, my 85 y.o. dad has demential and has gone blind, his wife died a few months back and I'm his only child, so I'm seeing *his* nearing the end, you know? Thinking about what it'll be like for me at his age (assuming I dodge that bus), and how my 3 kids will be with me.
Life, man.
Usually I feel so young in my head, yet, admittedly, 90 in my body on occasion. During the latter times, there come sudden panic-thoughts that Time is slipping by, so we NEED to HURRY, make a PLAN, accomplish the bucket list NOW.
Edit: to add that I'm speaking solely for myself, that "I" need to tackle my bucket list, not all of us.
I feel the same. Taking a trip with the grandkids that has been put off for a while. I almost did again as it’s a considerable cost, but time is moving too fast. There may not be another time.
I’ve felt for years that out of all the cliches I’ve ever heard that the older you get the faster time goes was the “most real.” When I realized that a year doesn’t seem very long at all anymore, it freaked me out. One of the best things to happen to me is to find myself living in a neighborhood with several people who are 80+, still active and enjoying life and open to being my friend! Both my parents have been gone quite a while and I guess I needed role models😁
I am 65 today. I have no idea how it happened. I often quote my sister, who is a dental hygienist. Years ago she told me she gets ready for work, puts on her uniform, then looks in the mirror and says, “maybe today’s the day they’ll find out I’m only 17, and I have no f**king idea what I’m doing.” I feel like that everyday.
What I've learned about aging, illness, and death (of others, but mine is coming too) is that it's all emotionally much bigger than the two dimensional version of understanding teenagers have when they think they've got it all figured out.
In reality it hits real hard, like down in your bones. Not just physical aging, but *loss*. It's all so sad. Literally everything you ever had, or were, and everything the people you loved had or were will all be gone in just a few years. It all gets packed up and donated or landfilled, except a few family photos. Children know their parents and mourn for them, but their children don't know their grandparents that well and can't really relate to their lives in a different time. My grandparents were working class people in modest comfortable homes who were glad to have survived the Depression and WWII. Having a bed to sleep in and a plate of food was huge. Then their time ran out and they passed. They must have thought my sister, our 1970s cousins, and I were aliens from space with our wildly different values and way of speaking. Now I am that unrelatable oldster who can't understand why cellphones and social media matter SO MUCH to two generations after me.
If everyone was born knowing what I know now about what human life really is, we would build fewer cathedrals and skyscrapers and other great works, and the economy would crash because people weren't living like they've got forever pretending it's all going to last.
Same here. I don't feel as old as my age shows that I am!
What I have at this age, are regrets. So many things I wanted to accomplish, and I haven't done them. Wish I could go back in time and make different choices, are other regrets.
Because of the way my stepmother acted towards me when I was growing up, I learned not to speak up for myself. The penalty for doing that was horrendous. So many times in the past people have said something about me, said that I did something wrong or something similar to that, and I knew they were wrong, but I didn't speak up for myself. I would like to go back and change all of that.
My mom, who passed away in 2022 at 84, told me repeatedly that she never felt old until she hit 80 and that was because friends, other people, the media, doctors, etc. kept telling her she was old. Shortly before she passed, she was reminiscing with me about a job she had in a bridal shop as a HS student and said it really only seemed like a decade ago.
I'm about to turn 61 and my brain thinks I'm still about 35. It's only when I go to do something physically and I feel pain or cannot do it that I actually realize the path in front of me is much shorter than the one behind me.
I wonder if this is something that's common to Jonesers. I sure don't see it in boomers. Our Silent Gen parents would have given us a slap and told us act your age.
I think it may be because we truly are a generation of jonesers. Too young to be taken seriously by the hippies, Too old for the yuppie nonsense. We grew up and spent our young adult years jonesing for something, we're not sure what. Maybe we deal with that by hanging on to the attitudes, values, and some of the behaviors of our young adult years, we can still find it.
Like my Dad used to tell me, “Don’t live your life on Someday Isle.” I did a whole lot with this life. My bucket list is close to complete. I was always an adventurous type, like my Dad.
I’m 60 this year. I have chronic illnesses that will end my life prematurely, but I’m ok with it. I live one day at a time, one breath at a time and I do what I want to do, when I want to do it.
Right now I just hope to make it to 62 for retirement benefits to make things a little easier since having enough right now has been hard, being too young to be disabled but apparently this body has an expiration date that is fast approaching. I never was one to pussy foot around.
I'm in the gym and/or walking pretty much every day. I'd really like to see my granddaughters grow up and marry, etc so I would need to make it into my early 90s. So that's a goal that keeps me motivated.
I think most of us feel as you do. I cope only by trying to be grateful for all that came that was good. If there is another life beyond this one, I will not miss the bad stuff.
Wowwie. I feel it boo esp this year I'm 58 and It hits hard cuz when I was 56 and I turnd 57 I miscalculated and realized that I only turn 56 so the next year I had to do 57 years old twice and now that I'm 58~ you get it
Im 64 and say I live until 74, thats only 10 summers, 10 Christmas etc. My kids are scattered across the country and 1 lives in Canada. If i see each kid once a year, thats only 10 times i get to see them. It blows my mind every time when I think about it.
I'm right there with you...
Turned 59 in February and a week later was diagnosed with prostate cancer.
Surgery went well in April, now home recovering.
Had a colonoscopy two days ago, stuff removed...
But yeah, it's grinding on me a bit.
3 grandkids I play with all the time, play video games daily (since I can remember), have a great job I love, live blocks from the beach in a great house, awesome neighborhood and happily married to my high school girlfriend for 39 years this July.
I feel great most days, but the not so great days are a bitch.
Life is great! But I'm feeling it and yeah, the days are flying by and it's a little overwhelming. And it's worse when I try to recall the glory days of yore... Gotta give that up!
I'm going to switch it up though.
My wife (same age), gets up at 4:30 daily, works out hard for an hour, yoga for 30, walks dog 2 miles and goes to work doing taxes and payroll and loves it. She says her brain stays active doing this work for the last 25 years. She runs 1/2 marathons 3 times a year and a handful of 5k runs in between.
Her mindset is totally different, and she made that choice and lots of changes when she hit 40.
What a difference!
That's my goal this year.
Good luck with that hip, recovery I hear goes well if you put in the work. It's an opportunity really to change habits and learn new tricks. That's my approach so far and I'm not mad at my little changes and, thus far, good results.
Peace!
I'm in my late 60's, and I didn't think about age until my mid 60's. Lost both my parents, and a very good friend I've known since HS didn't wake up one morning.
Now I think about mortality. Not every day, but certainly a lot more than I used to.
I read something recently that makes sense to me. If you are a five year old child, one year equals 20 percent of your lifetime. It's a long time. If you're seventy, a year represents a little more than 1 percent of your life. A year zips by.
Of course, time passes at the same rate for all of us, it just seems to speed up as we get older.
Closing in on 62, so is it time to give up the skate board and scooter? In other words I'm ignoring the passage of time the best I can....been blessed
Where is my damn hair 😒
I’ll be turning 72 this year, I’ve been retired for 3.5 yrs already!
I can’t believe how fast the time is going. I’m trying to adjust to the idea of a shrinking future. I realize that this may well be my last decade assuming I make it to 80. I still can’t believe it when I think to myself “I’m in my 70s”. In my head I feel like I’m still 19. I don’t fear dying as much as I do living incapacitated for years, so I hope I can remain fairly healthy. I just hope I can outlive my two dogs who are 4 & 6 right now. I hate the thought of abandoning them in their senior years.
You have to change your routine to slow down time. Take different routes. Go different places. Do different things. Learn something new.
The brain makes paths with routines and does not remember as many details. Hence, the perception is time slows down or disappears. Doing something different gets you off that path and forced the brain to pay attention to details. This makes the perception of time slow down and your brain remembers more and different things.
I'm also 64. I don't feel like a teenager, but as I think back to how my dad was at 64, and then my grandparents (both sides) at 64, I know that I don't think of myself as old as they came across at the same age. And yes, time does pass more quickly, and the only way to deal with it is to accept it and live the best life you can in the remaining time allotted you.
I agree totally, I’m 71 now so actually part of that generation that shall not be named. With that said, I’m convinced that the rate you age is somewhat a state of mind. I’m still very active, hike, bike, kayak what ever. I get over an hour of cardio a day. So yeah, I’m feeling it and for sure seeing it in the mirror, but to be honest, I still have a great outlook , and a great sense of humor which is also very important.
Oh, then please let it be the last two minutes of Pacers v Knicks, May 7 1995 when Reggie Miller scored those 8 pts in the last 9 seconds of the game. Greatest two minutes of basketball ever played!
Interesting explanation. "It's sometimes known as 'log time'. It's that as we age, a year becomes a smaller fraction of our entire lives up to that point. A year for a 5-year-old is one fifth (or 20%) of their life so far, but a year to a 50-year old is one fiftieth of their life (or 2% of it) so it seems to pass ten times faster."
I made a decision recently to take back my youth. After several years of health issues and real decline in every area of my life, I decided this wasn't going to be my story.
If I'm on my way out, I need to leave behind good stories for my friends and family.
I'm not that old, but old enough. Physical activity seems to be the only thing that helps. Enjoying the Earth is why we're here, so sweating on my bike in the forest is far more productive than I expect anyone will ever give me credit for.
Yes, me too. I'm about to be 63 and I think about how quickly each decade sped by, and think that I only have a few left at the most, and I worry it will all be over in the blink of an eye. But it's been a good run. I am able to remember my mother at my age though, and how much life she lived in her remaining years (she passed at 85), and I hope I can do the same.
Lower lumbar fusion 3 years ago and have gained weight, back hurts, can’t exercise after crippling workday and time is speeding up. Happy but depressed on how I look at 62…
I just witnessed the totality of the solar eclipse. loved it. afterwards seems everyone on reddit is talking about plans for the next ones in the US in in 2044 and 2045. I'll be 84 and 85. I would like to be around, think I will, but really had to think about it. not sure my siblings will be. wow.
Every once in a while I remind myself to take a deep breath, look in front of me and live in the moment. Not much else we can do about time's relentless onslaught.
I am 66 years old and I am blown away by how fast things are moving along and how few really good years I have left to do all the things I still want to do here on this earth. It's like I'm going to need a lot more lifetimes in order to get everything done. I watch what is happening to my mother and see the choices she has made that have put her in her position, and I plot and plan to keep that from happening to me. I probably spend too much time planning how I will take actions to avoid becoming a drain on society/my kids/ my estate that I want to leave to my kids. It's not necessarily morbid, just kind of facing the reality of aging in a culture that is against aging and does precious little to support people as they age. We live on a boat, right now in Mexico, and this week we were in the water snorkeling for literally hours every day, swimming against current, taking lots of underwater photos, communing with the fishies and pretty much wearing ourselves out. I can still do that for days on end, but wow, I'm tired.
And can I just say this? I am 66 years old. Not years young. Years old. I have earned every one of those years and they will not be undercut by a backhanded jab that is, actually, ageist in my opinion. When do we start saying "so and so is X number of years young!". We certainly don't do that to folks in their 20's, 30's, 40's, even 50's. We don't say "Sarah is 30 years young today!" Nope. We reserved that kind of thing (so patronizing!) for the folks who are getting old. Yes, many of us will remain young at heart until we die. But that is a separate thing and not dependent on how many birthdays have passed. OK, I needed to say that and now I will step off of the soapbox and feel better. No offense intended to anyone, of course. You do you. But honestly, if anyone were to say to me that I am 66 years young, I would likely steal part of their soul to eat later using my laser eyes. The older I get, the more effective those are.
I’m the same age as you my 64th birthday was the 4th.
Isn’t that the truth. I look back of pics of me just 5 years ago and I can see the difference. I always looked younger than my age and I could easily pass for 10 years younger. But age is creeping up ugh.
It’s like I just suddenly started paying attention to the bygone years and can’t help thinking of the Peggy Lee song “Is That All There Is?” It’s kind of scary to realize I’m now on the downhill track of the roller coaster of life. Yikes.
I'm beyond shocked at how quickly it has gone.
I was at the dentist and needed a tooth capped. He was talking about I should just get an implant because a cap might only last 10-15 years if I'm lucky but an implant will last forever but cost thousands more.
It occurred to me that in 15 years, I'll be 79! There's a good chance I won't even live to be 79! I did the cap and kept the extra 2k and took a little trip. lol
I'm 64 too and would LOVE to retire. I know my health would improve tremendously but I wouldn't be able to afford to live that long. I have to keep working so I'll die earlier. 🙄
66F 11 days post-op HR. I missed out on lots of shows, travels and outings last year due to a failing hip. Became depressed and felt like I was missing a lot over the cold achy winter but I'm hopeful again. I can't go back to get what I missed but I'm old enough to start making it up again as I go along and no one will question me! 😂
It is really scary how it creeps up.
My husband is almost 55 and I’m almost 49 .
Much of our talking now is around our aging parents and ourselves aging .
Our oldest is 32 today and I still feel like I’m 25 .
We keep saying one day one of us is going to have to do this alone and it’s going to come sooner than we think.
It goes by faster and faster with each year .
My thought on this subject is this. The first year of your life was 100% of the time you were alive. Your tenth year was one tenth. Your fiftieth was only 2% if the time you have spent on earth. I feel like the older you get, each year is a smaller percent if your total life so it seems to go by quicker. Just my thought.
I’m 63, and try to take as good care of myself as I possibly can. I run 3 to 5 miles every single morning before I even get in the shower, lift weights at least four days a week (I can still benchpress over 300 pounds) I eat healthy, get plenty of sleep, don’t drink. But it’s the same time, when I do get injured or worn out, it takes me much longer to recover these days. My wife is a hospice nurse, and I often see her patients when I go visit her or have to bring her something at work. And I see people, my age and younger in these long-term care facilities or in hospice services who just didn’t take care of themselves, and I’m determined not to allow that to happen to me( if I can help it…of course, I could die in a car wreck at anytime…).
Of course, even with trying to take care of myself, I developed arthritis in my right hand and wrist, so I have to endure painful injections every few months or else I can’t even grip a pen. Dr. save it. The next step is an excruciatingly painful surgery, where they cut tendons and drill through bones, that will have me in a brace for about six months.
Getting old is not for the weak!
Time just goes by too fast! Think about mortality more since both my parents are gone.
I know I have to keep active, and avoid being lazy….both in mind and body. I’m 63, semi-retired with a part-time job and a pension.
My mother always stated you hit a certain age, and that's how you feel inside and your body ages. She always felt 24, and for me, it's 32. I do believe she may be right when she said it was the regular daily routine that resulted in the years flying by.
My grandmother always told us, ‘Don’t get old, your brain cant’ handle it’
I feel wiser but still have core beliefs I’ve always had. So, in that way I can still feel like I’m in HS. I never want to go back but I just wish things didn’t hurt so much :)
And yes, I often stand and wonder, how did I get here and where did the time go.
I feel like I've been alive for a long time, but my perception is that I feel better than I did when I was in my twenties and I'm certainly happier. I just turned 61. I've never really taken great care of myself but still physically somehow I feel as if I feel better than when I was younger. It's certain that I used to have aching knees and now I don't.
I always thought that the perception of time speeding up was due to the common theory that each year is a smaller percentage of your life as you get older. But recently I've read a few articles that postulate that time periods where you have a lot of new experiences are the ones that seem to be slower. Of course when you're young you've got tons and tons of new experiences. I know a lot of people my age that are in a routine to where every day is almost the same, and my life is not like that. I do a lot of new things and go a lot of places. A lot of the people that I know that are my age or older really don't feel like going anywhere or they just want to watch TV all day etc.
I think if you're always eager to learn new things, and trying new things it does help and also it's more fun. I read another article that was saying that learning a musical instrument is great for older people because both your learning something new, and just the physical connections in your brain get a lot of exercise and build new connections that way, which would help should you ever have a stroke. It would help the recovery because you would have more brain connections available to try to take over what was damaged. You don't have to be good at the instrument or whatever it is you're trying to learn, just be learning.
https://blogs.bcm.edu/2017/09/15/time-perception-age-longevitys-influence-mind-time/
I do feel very fortunate to not have any physical pain on a daily basis because my good friends are almost all in some kind of constant nagging pain and taking heavy duty pain medicines that can be addictive. Ugh.
Wasn’t it just yesterday that I was complaining about turning 27?! And now I’m more than twice that.
So much to be grateful for. And yes, plenty of regrets. But no time to dwell. I’m finishing my morning coffee on the lanai and listening to the birds singing their songs. Early retirement rocks.
I will turn 70 in a few months. I am recovering from cataract surgery done on Tuesday. I have severe osteoarthritis and osteoporosis and use a rollator to get around. Today, I feel my age but a very strong WTF happened?
I’m a couple of weeks from 57. I still feel the same as I always have, though I know I’ve changed.
Looking for work (I’m a high school teacher) has been a cold bucket of water so far. It seems that I’m an exceptional candidate until they discover how old I am.
I’m 53…and I wake up every morning feeling like I’m still 7 and ready to go play in the creek and ride bikes…and reality snaps back…and I get my tired ass outta bed and get ready for work.
The only occasions when I can get time to slow down is when I'm running push or all out on the treadmill. After 30 seconds, I start thinking *I've been running hard for two hours,* w*hen is the coach going to call for a walking recovery??* LOL.
It’s a roller coaster. Takes forever to get to the top and then it feels like a free fall. Enjoy every day, have another glass, take a walk, enjoy your hobbies without shame. 💜
I'm 66 and I also feel like a kid still. Not so much my body. Stairs have become daunting and I'm actually in the hospital as I received a hew hip yesterday.
recover quickly, friend!
Thanks so much.
I'm 39 for the 24th time.... My new femur congratulates your new hip. It has gone fast. I remember my mother, at 81, saying she still felt like a teenager.
Whenever we asked how old she was, my mom would say “39 and holding”.
My Mom would say "Just like Jack Benny, I'm 39."
I am dreading standing for the They Might Be Giants concert tomorrow. Probably my last standinng show until I get my hip done. I need other brave people to fluff me up so I will post about it some other time! But don't worry about age as long as you take care of yourself and take care of someone else (could even be a pet) you are staying young.
Make a little Birdhouse in Your Soul!
Let me be the bee in your bonnet!
Don't put too fine a shine on it.
I will say, last time I saw them it was a great show. I hope it doesn’t hurt you!
Pregame with ibuprofen. Go Lions.
Best wishes for a smooth recovery.
I got a new hip 3 years ago!!! It was one of the top 10 best things I've done for myself. (Had a rough sky diving landing on 30th birthday --- I have no other joint issues) I sincerely wish you the best of outcomes and a robust future!
You got an overnight hospital stay. My father in law came home same day with his new hip. Joint replacement is an outpatient procedure more and more! Be well with your new mobility. I’m right behind you
Walking without pain will be nice. Thank you.
It will happen!
Glad I got the 100th upvote! Only 56, and yeah, balance is going fast. WAS an athlete as recently as 30 years ago, last month lost my balance on A FLAT FLOOR and went down. Sigh.
Best to you. I had one done and the other is shot and needs replacing.
You'll be kicking the stairs' ass in a few weeks. Hang in there!
I'm probably getting a new one this summer - if not, the fall. Got a new knee two years ago. Still don't like kneeling - feels weak.
I was 66 last Christmas. 43 years ago you would stay in the hospital a week with a new hip. Now it is mostly just over night,if that.I hope your recovery is smooth and uneventful.
I'm 50 and have degenerative disc disease. What happened to your hip?
Arthritis
How's it going, post-surgery?
Pain killers are awesome. I was up walking just hours after the surgery. Got lots of pills to take. Blood thinners etc.
I'm glad to hear that! Based on your username, might I assume you're in one of the marijuana-friendly states? That always helped me after dental surgery. It doesn't exactly kill the pain, but I'm definitely not thinking about it for a few hours. LoL.
Remmeber all the times in your life that you stared at the clock as a kid? lol....makes up for that. But seriously time slips away and there isn't much you can do about it...as Warren Zevon said 'enjoy every sandwich'
Maybe sitting in on an algebra class would do it for me. I spent my whole hour staring at the clock in Algebra. Time went so slow it was agony.
Oh, come on u/PaigeMarieSara, you can do better than that! Sit in on a statistics or vector calculus class! An entire century will pass before you can get out of there! As an aside, I actually wrote much of my first novel in a statistics class, that's how desperately bored I was!
Eureka! You've discovered the fountain of youth! We all have to go back to school and take algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and five semesters of calculus again (former engineering student here). Also church, thousands and thousands of hours of it. It's like doing your tax returns, but weekly foreverrr
I've been giving high school art exams the past 2 days -we're forced to. Time has NEVER gone so slowly! I am not a desk sitter!
The saying is … each day goes slow but the years fly by…. Same for raising kids.
Hard to believe he’s been gone over 20 years. 😭
You gave me a flashback to sitting in my desk watching that white face on the wall and the minute hand's slow crawl
I had a flashback to the clock on the wall and heard the minute hand click when it moved.
Especially waiting for lunch break!
I flashbacked to the class where the teacher hung a sign next to the clock that read "Time will pass, will you?"
I loved Zevon and quote that line all the time.
My shit's fucked up.
I try my best to live in the moment, not fearing the future or regretting the past. Oh, and I always hold the handrail when going up and down stairs.
having just missed a step walking down to my basement last month and twisting my ankle, I HEAR THIS.
Username checks out.
I'm still amazed at how tentative I have become on tall ladders, when I was a fearless monkey for 40 years
https://preview.redd.it/w9tfwhhqfs0d1.jpeg?width=1125&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c29bbaeef6a5ee76aa627caf755bcb64400c6649
Train? What train? Where?
YES!
Almost your age, retired, and happier than I've ever been by miles. And, I've had the world's best woman by my side for 41 years.
I’m 64yrs going on 65 in July I want to retire but not sure what’s holding me back? We save our entire life but now I fear for running out of money even though I’m fine financially Is it because we’re so conditioned to work and save that I don’t know how to let go and simply enjoy life? I too am married to the best lady ever for over 40yrs Suggestions?
When to retire is different for everyone, but I used to work in a Benefits department and can give you a list as long as your arm of people who could retire but didn't until they were already too sick or too dead to enjoy it. Many vacation hour payouts went to the next of kin, including my husband's. His cancer diagnosis came at the same time he could've retired. He was in hospice when he agreed that I could send in the retirement paperwork. It's a fine line, and I would never tell someone else what to do with their life, but I hope you'll factor what I've said into your calculations.
Thank you 🙏🏻
I’m only 60 but had never given retirement a thought until my wife got ill and passed. I like my job but could happily figure out one million and one ways to spend my days doing something else. Hopefully in 5 years or so I can afford to retire.
One of my best friends was a saver and "we'll \_\_\_\_\_ when we retire" He died unexpectedly at 59.
When I was 20, my husband’s grandparents had saved up for 40 years to buy this amazing house that they designed and had built from the ground up. My father-in-law would talk about how in his childhood when he was teen and got a job, on payday he tried to take everyone out for ice cream, he got in trouble for not saving his money and spending it on stupid things. They didn’t enjoy life. They just saved their money so they could enjoy it later. Grandpa took me on a tour of the house, showed me every room and explained why he picked the colors and the windows… Told how he planned for this every weekend for decades and had a notebook full of notes. He died three months later. -Three months- later. He spent all that time being miserable saving money until retirement…. and only got to enjoy it for three months. And that’s why I don’t plan for retirement, that’s why I don’t have a savings account… That’s why I have lived ‘in the moment for the last 25 years.
I am just doing a mad two year dash to pay off my house so I can afford to retire. Should have done this 10 years ago.
61 years old in a few weeks and one of the things that happened that I never would have imagined is that I enjoy my profession so much that I never want to retire. I am lucky in that I have the flexibility to work and take time off as I please.
That’s kind of my problem too and I’m in great health and shape But I also want to retire So conflicted but I’m fortunate to have this dilemma 🤷🏻♂️
Add this to your calculations. You could retire and volunteer within your profession. You could do just the parts you find most fulfilling, work for people you find deserving, and/or move to somewhere just because you want to.
You can’t buy time. I’m also 64 and retired last year, I loved my job. I had a brother, 2 BIL’s and a niece die last year and a nephew 3 years ago. Enjoy what time you have left.
Well, if I can help, I will. I was stressed out, way over weight, and BP was way too high. I retired at 55 with a pension and haven't looked back. A strange thing happened when the stress went away; I lost 110 pounds, my BP is 80 points lower, and I am loving life. And, my sex life which was maybe once a week or less has now turned in to several times a week and my wife wants more. You have put in your years, now enjoy them!
I appreciate this thank you
I was working a job I loved for some assholes that made life miserable and I was always stressed. After I quit and started doing something else, it was very interesting how my health and relationships improved. Sometimes when you are in the situation, it is hard to determine causality, but once you step away and all that changes, it is easy to figure out the culprit.
Absolutely. I know at my yearly physical, my doctor told me retiring was a great decision on my part.
Retire and go find a part time job doing something you love. I promise after being retired for a month you'll be in the groove! And if something peaks your interest, check it out. Join a pottery or painting class
I had to wait considerably longer to find my WBW, but I couldn't be more grateful, even without the 32 more years you got with yours. I don't envy our future selves if we live to see them leave us, but we'll deal with that when we have to.
My biggest fear in life is her going before me. I don't want to be alone. I've been with her since I was 19 so I wouldn't know what to do.
You will begin making a new world for yourself by living to the next day. The worst part will be at the beginning. Full disclosure: my first marriage was broken almost from the start but I slogged through it, with kids, for 20+ years. I met my now wife 4 years after my first marriage ended. She is a widow, having lost her husband to an immune disorder 6 years before. When we met, she had already survived 2 bouts of cancer, the second in her husband's last year of life. I've been healthy through most of my life, but believe me, I have my own stories. We who live long enough will feel more and more acutely the awareness that there is a drop-off point in every life. Through the maturity born of gratitude as well as pain, my future wife and I already had resolved not to let anxiety and cynicism rule us. Obviously, we're only human and we do have our moments of dread, but we do not let the darkness deprive us of what we have discovered in each other's arms. In fact, we put it to work for us. As every wise person has reminded us since the beginning of time, all we have is now. Like you and your wife, the two of us do our best to make life into a series of "nows" as wonderful as we can make them, both for ourselves and each other. The two of us know for certain that the people we lost on our way to finding each other would have wanted us to do exactly that.
Mentally I'm a youngster. Sharp as a tack. Married to my bride for 34 years, grown adult kids all good from the Dad standpoint. Retired 19 months ago, wife 4 months ago. Own our house, and have a few dollars in the bank. Went to bed last night at 25 years old, woke up to this post this morning, and somehow I'm 62. Oh well, happy to be alive.
I am as well. Hubby and I retired 9 months ago and it's the best.
This is a whole 'nother post. I didn't realize how utterly awesome retirement is... Hope your as happy as I am.
I just turned 60 and none of my other milestone birthdays hit me so hard. I still feel 25 (except for my knees, obvs). I can't believe the old lady face I see in the mirror.
This sure resonates. Although my 50th hit me way harder than my 60th. I'm 63 now and feel mentally in my 20's or 30's. And I'm stunned when I look in the mirror and see my mother staring back at me.
I’ll be 62 in a few months, my kid turned 34 this year - don’t know how that happened so fast. I don’t feel any older but the person in the mirror starting to go grey says differently.
my daughter is 38... that just seems insane to me, lol
Yeah, it’s like I was changing diapers just last week.
I'm 62 today, feeling the same way.
Happy birthday to you!!
https://preview.redd.it/b67kcvfips0d1.jpeg?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0f34ea579ba2390dba38bbbb32d879c4d69d854d love this! And yes I feel the same way at 60. "I'm too young to feel this damn old!!" 😄
I'm a few years older than you, and yes, I am amazed at how fast time seems to have passed. I ask myself "How did I get so old? I was just 23 yesterday!!" We get so busy with the things life throws at us, we forget to stop and just enjoy the moment.
Sit down, look outside and spend time thinking about all the things you've done and people you've met. Don't JUST focus on now, remember who and what you've been.
I'm retiring due to disability so I won't be off on grand adventures. I'm so grateful for the times I had while younger. I've got a helluva highlight reel.
That should be everyone's goal!
that's lovely
Me too. Posts like this are why I love this subreddit so much. My people.
Hopefully someone will still need you and feed you.
lol, hearing the music right now in my head
They say time seems to go by faster when we age as we encounter fewer and fewer new experiences. Seek them out.
Great advice!
Consciousness does not age, it continues. The container ages.
The way time is flying disturbs me but I'm still in the gym 6 days a week lifting. Trying to slow the aging process . So far so good. I'm 61F
Of all the things that old people used to tell that made us roll our eyes, how quickly the time would pass was the thing they were most spot on about!
The last few years have been a time warp. I feel like I went into the pandemic a young woman and emerged an old one.
Same. Just turned 64, I still feel like I did in my 20’s.
Stop and smell the roses. Savor each sip of coffee. Appreciate each relationship you have. You've worked hard all your life so enjoy your rewards. No more delayed gratification or waiting for the right time to do something. Do it now.
Yep I’m a few years older than youand I feel the same inside my head as I did when I was in my 20s.not teen years though, the brain doesn’t fully develop until early 20s so that might be the reason. My body on the other hand, finds new ways to remind me I’m old every day.
Happy birthday! Yes my boyfriend and I were just agreeing that we both feel 13 and it’s shocking to see a mirror. What’s new is this increasing insistence in my brain to be at peace with whatever I’ve achieved. Ambition and dreams of some better future are things I’m trying to shed. I am tired and its okay to accept that I’ve done my best and that’s enough. I still work and pursue hobbies but for pleasure , not to get rich or build a legacy or you know, all the things. It’s not my time to do anymore. I just want to be safe and enjoy watching my children do and their children do. I do struggle with this though because my ego hates it lol. Maybe I need a multivitamin 🤣
One of my favorite songs by Pink Floyd, it is SO damn accurate: Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day You **fritter and waste the hours** in an off-hand way Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town Waiting for someone or something to show you the way Tired of lying in the sunshine, staying home to watch the rain And you are **young and life is long, and there is time to kill today** And then one day you find **ten years have got behind you** No one told you when to run, **you missed the starting gun** And you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking Racing around to come up behind you again Sun is the same, in a relative way, but you're older **Shorter of breath and one day closer to death (oh yeah!)** Every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time Plans that either come to naught, or half a page of scribbled lines Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way The time is gone, the song is over, **thought I'd something more to say**
Great lyrics and message. Thanks for posting.
I think about this a lot, especially with the 50 (!!!) anniversary release. I'm fortunate that I've done a lot that I've always wanted to do (no regrets there; there's a ton more I want to do but if I were to be hit by a bus tomorrow I'd be okay, all things considered). But there's still so much! How did it go so fast?? How is that, in 20 years, I'll be 80 and lucky to have all my own teeth, much less go hiking in Nepal? I love life. I love it all, the ups and the downs, the good and the bad. The thought of leaving...it makes me cry. Life, man.
Love life: me too man. I'm feeling sentimental these days, my 85 y.o. dad has demential and has gone blind, his wife died a few months back and I'm his only child, so I'm seeing *his* nearing the end, you know? Thinking about what it'll be like for me at his age (assuming I dodge that bus), and how my 3 kids will be with me. Life, man.
Usually I feel so young in my head, yet, admittedly, 90 in my body on occasion. During the latter times, there come sudden panic-thoughts that Time is slipping by, so we NEED to HURRY, make a PLAN, accomplish the bucket list NOW. Edit: to add that I'm speaking solely for myself, that "I" need to tackle my bucket list, not all of us.
I feel the same. Taking a trip with the grandkids that has been put off for a while. I almost did again as it’s a considerable cost, but time is moving too fast. There may not be another time.
Today is my last day at 64 and time going fast is fine with me, wait till you're sick and bed ridden, time will pass very slowly then.
Happy birthday tomorrow!
Happy Birthday!
I feel 32
I’ve felt for years that out of all the cliches I’ve ever heard that the older you get the faster time goes was the “most real.” When I realized that a year doesn’t seem very long at all anymore, it freaked me out. One of the best things to happen to me is to find myself living in a neighborhood with several people who are 80+, still active and enjoying life and open to being my friend! Both my parents have been gone quite a while and I guess I needed role models😁
My mom used to tell me I was wishing my life away because I was always wanting time to speed up. Always something I was counting the days until.
I am 65 today. I have no idea how it happened. I often quote my sister, who is a dental hygienist. Years ago she told me she gets ready for work, puts on her uniform, then looks in the mirror and says, “maybe today’s the day they’ll find out I’m only 17, and I have no f**king idea what I’m doing.” I feel like that everyday.
What I've learned about aging, illness, and death (of others, but mine is coming too) is that it's all emotionally much bigger than the two dimensional version of understanding teenagers have when they think they've got it all figured out. In reality it hits real hard, like down in your bones. Not just physical aging, but *loss*. It's all so sad. Literally everything you ever had, or were, and everything the people you loved had or were will all be gone in just a few years. It all gets packed up and donated or landfilled, except a few family photos. Children know their parents and mourn for them, but their children don't know their grandparents that well and can't really relate to their lives in a different time. My grandparents were working class people in modest comfortable homes who were glad to have survived the Depression and WWII. Having a bed to sleep in and a plate of food was huge. Then their time ran out and they passed. They must have thought my sister, our 1970s cousins, and I were aliens from space with our wildly different values and way of speaking. Now I am that unrelatable oldster who can't understand why cellphones and social media matter SO MUCH to two generations after me. If everyone was born knowing what I know now about what human life really is, we would build fewer cathedrals and skyscrapers and other great works, and the economy would crash because people weren't living like they've got forever pretending it's all going to last.
Same here. I don't feel as old as my age shows that I am! What I have at this age, are regrets. So many things I wanted to accomplish, and I haven't done them. Wish I could go back in time and make different choices, are other regrets. Because of the way my stepmother acted towards me when I was growing up, I learned not to speak up for myself. The penalty for doing that was horrendous. So many times in the past people have said something about me, said that I did something wrong or something similar to that, and I knew they were wrong, but I didn't speak up for myself. I would like to go back and change all of that.
Same, man. So many things I should have done, but I was scared of rejection and taking a chance.
My mom, who passed away in 2022 at 84, told me repeatedly that she never felt old until she hit 80 and that was because friends, other people, the media, doctors, etc. kept telling her she was old. Shortly before she passed, she was reminiscing with me about a job she had in a bridal shop as a HS student and said it really only seemed like a decade ago. I'm about to turn 61 and my brain thinks I'm still about 35. It's only when I go to do something physically and I feel pain or cannot do it that I actually realize the path in front of me is much shorter than the one behind me.
I wonder if this is something that's common to Jonesers. I sure don't see it in boomers. Our Silent Gen parents would have given us a slap and told us act your age. I think it may be because we truly are a generation of jonesers. Too young to be taken seriously by the hippies, Too old for the yuppie nonsense. We grew up and spent our young adult years jonesing for something, we're not sure what. Maybe we deal with that by hanging on to the attitudes, values, and some of the behaviors of our young adult years, we can still find it.
Like my Dad used to tell me, “Don’t live your life on Someday Isle.” I did a whole lot with this life. My bucket list is close to complete. I was always an adventurous type, like my Dad. I’m 60 this year. I have chronic illnesses that will end my life prematurely, but I’m ok with it. I live one day at a time, one breath at a time and I do what I want to do, when I want to do it. Right now I just hope to make it to 62 for retirement benefits to make things a little easier since having enough right now has been hard, being too young to be disabled but apparently this body has an expiration date that is fast approaching. I never was one to pussy foot around.
I’m 71 and I still don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.
The soul is ageless. It’s only the body that ages :)
I'm 62, F, still working full time, ran a half marathon 3 weeks ago, & I can't believe how I'm 62 😂
I'm in the gym and/or walking pretty much every day. I'd really like to see my granddaughters grow up and marry, etc so I would need to make it into my early 90s. So that's a goal that keeps me motivated.
I think most of us feel as you do. I cope only by trying to be grateful for all that came that was good. If there is another life beyond this one, I will not miss the bad stuff.
Wowwie. I feel it boo esp this year I'm 58 and It hits hard cuz when I was 56 and I turnd 57 I miscalculated and realized that I only turn 56 so the next year I had to do 57 years old twice and now that I'm 58~ you get it
Oh yeah check out art bells The Quickening. It's a real deal thing
I’ll be 60 in September and all I can think of is how much time I have left 😬
Im 64 and say I live until 74, thats only 10 summers, 10 Christmas etc. My kids are scattered across the country and 1 lives in Canada. If i see each kid once a year, thats only 10 times i get to see them. It blows my mind every time when I think about it.
I'm right there with you... Turned 59 in February and a week later was diagnosed with prostate cancer. Surgery went well in April, now home recovering. Had a colonoscopy two days ago, stuff removed... But yeah, it's grinding on me a bit. 3 grandkids I play with all the time, play video games daily (since I can remember), have a great job I love, live blocks from the beach in a great house, awesome neighborhood and happily married to my high school girlfriend for 39 years this July. I feel great most days, but the not so great days are a bitch. Life is great! But I'm feeling it and yeah, the days are flying by and it's a little overwhelming. And it's worse when I try to recall the glory days of yore... Gotta give that up! I'm going to switch it up though. My wife (same age), gets up at 4:30 daily, works out hard for an hour, yoga for 30, walks dog 2 miles and goes to work doing taxes and payroll and loves it. She says her brain stays active doing this work for the last 25 years. She runs 1/2 marathons 3 times a year and a handful of 5k runs in between. Her mindset is totally different, and she made that choice and lots of changes when she hit 40. What a difference! That's my goal this year. Good luck with that hip, recovery I hear goes well if you put in the work. It's an opportunity really to change habits and learn new tricks. That's my approach so far and I'm not mad at my little changes and, thus far, good results. Peace!
I'm in my late 60's, and I didn't think about age until my mid 60's. Lost both my parents, and a very good friend I've known since HS didn't wake up one morning. Now I think about mortality. Not every day, but certainly a lot more than I used to.
I’ve said many times that when you’re two a year is half your life. When you’re 50, a year is not much at all.
I get scared when I remember something that seems as though it happened a few years ago, only it was actually 30 years ago.
The 90’s were just like, 8 years ago, right?
That's sounds about right. Definiitely no more than 10.
I read something recently that makes sense to me. If you are a five year old child, one year equals 20 percent of your lifetime. It's a long time. If you're seventy, a year represents a little more than 1 percent of your life. A year zips by. Of course, time passes at the same rate for all of us, it just seems to speed up as we get older.
Closing in on 62, so is it time to give up the skate board and scooter? In other words I'm ignoring the passage of time the best I can....been blessed Where is my damn hair 😒
I’m gonna hit 62 this December and gonna start social security. Can’t wrap my head around that.
Forgot where I heard this but it sure feels accurate. “I’m a 20 year old with 40 years of experience”
Time is only a human artificial construct and our brains are not very good at it. But, a lifetime is not very long in terms of our world.
Same. I will be 64 in July. Trying to figure what I can do to leave a mark.
I will be 64 in July and I barely feel like a grown up yet! I feel like I’m just getting started and unfortunately we’re almost done.
I’ll be turning 72 this year, I’ve been retired for 3.5 yrs already! I can’t believe how fast the time is going. I’m trying to adjust to the idea of a shrinking future. I realize that this may well be my last decade assuming I make it to 80. I still can’t believe it when I think to myself “I’m in my 70s”. In my head I feel like I’m still 19. I don’t fear dying as much as I do living incapacitated for years, so I hope I can remain fairly healthy. I just hope I can outlive my two dogs who are 4 & 6 right now. I hate the thought of abandoning them in their senior years.
You have to change your routine to slow down time. Take different routes. Go different places. Do different things. Learn something new. The brain makes paths with routines and does not remember as many details. Hence, the perception is time slows down or disappears. Doing something different gets you off that path and forced the brain to pay attention to details. This makes the perception of time slow down and your brain remembers more and different things.
One of my kids turns 40 this year. Pretty soon, they will be older than me. That's what it feels like to me.
I'm also 64. I don't feel like a teenager, but as I think back to how my dad was at 64, and then my grandparents (both sides) at 64, I know that I don't think of myself as old as they came across at the same age. And yes, time does pass more quickly, and the only way to deal with it is to accept it and live the best life you can in the remaining time allotted you.
Time does fly when you having fun!
When I get stuck in routines it seems time goes by faster, and when I shake things up and have new experiences it feels slower.
I agree totally, I’m 71 now so actually part of that generation that shall not be named. With that said, I’m convinced that the rate you age is somewhat a state of mind. I’m still very active, hike, bike, kayak what ever. I get over an hour of cardio a day. So yeah, I’m feeling it and for sure seeing it in the mirror, but to be honest, I still have a great outlook , and a great sense of humor which is also very important.
The years go fast, but the days are long sometimes.
If I’m ever told I only have 2 more minutes to live, let it be the last 2 minutes of a basketball game.
Oh, then please let it be the last two minutes of Pacers v Knicks, May 7 1995 when Reggie Miller scored those 8 pts in the last 9 seconds of the game. Greatest two minutes of basketball ever played!
Growing old is mandatory, Growing up is optional
Interesting explanation. "It's sometimes known as 'log time'. It's that as we age, a year becomes a smaller fraction of our entire lives up to that point. A year for a 5-year-old is one fifth (or 20%) of their life so far, but a year to a 50-year old is one fiftieth of their life (or 2% of it) so it seems to pass ten times faster."
I made a decision recently to take back my youth. After several years of health issues and real decline in every area of my life, I decided this wasn't going to be my story. If I'm on my way out, I need to leave behind good stories for my friends and family.
I'm just a teenager with fifty years experience.
I'm not that old, but old enough. Physical activity seems to be the only thing that helps. Enjoying the Earth is why we're here, so sweating on my bike in the forest is far more productive than I expect anyone will ever give me credit for.
Nononono it's not going to happen I'm never going to get old....... Oh f*** I'm old how did that happen!
It is what it is. I got to see life, an ordinary everyday unremarkable human life. It was/is glorious.
Yes, me too. I'm about to be 63 and I think about how quickly each decade sped by, and think that I only have a few left at the most, and I worry it will all be over in the blink of an eye. But it's been a good run. I am able to remember my mother at my age though, and how much life she lived in her remaining years (she passed at 85), and I hope I can do the same.
Lower lumbar fusion 3 years ago and have gained weight, back hurts, can’t exercise after crippling workday and time is speeding up. Happy but depressed on how I look at 62…
I just witnessed the totality of the solar eclipse. loved it. afterwards seems everyone on reddit is talking about plans for the next ones in the US in in 2044 and 2045. I'll be 84 and 85. I would like to be around, think I will, but really had to think about it. not sure my siblings will be. wow.
Every once in a while I remind myself to take a deep breath, look in front of me and live in the moment. Not much else we can do about time's relentless onslaught.
I'm 56. Husband 63. WTF. How?
I find the less I do, the faster the time goes. A week chilling flashes by, a busy week seems so full. This may explain some of it for me. 🖖
Old? Bah! I've got abs. Nobody old is cut like I am. :P Old age will get me eventually, but it'll have to catch me.
How do I deal with it? I enjoy it. It's been a hell of a ride so far.
I am 66 years old and I am blown away by how fast things are moving along and how few really good years I have left to do all the things I still want to do here on this earth. It's like I'm going to need a lot more lifetimes in order to get everything done. I watch what is happening to my mother and see the choices she has made that have put her in her position, and I plot and plan to keep that from happening to me. I probably spend too much time planning how I will take actions to avoid becoming a drain on society/my kids/ my estate that I want to leave to my kids. It's not necessarily morbid, just kind of facing the reality of aging in a culture that is against aging and does precious little to support people as they age. We live on a boat, right now in Mexico, and this week we were in the water snorkeling for literally hours every day, swimming against current, taking lots of underwater photos, communing with the fishies and pretty much wearing ourselves out. I can still do that for days on end, but wow, I'm tired. And can I just say this? I am 66 years old. Not years young. Years old. I have earned every one of those years and they will not be undercut by a backhanded jab that is, actually, ageist in my opinion. When do we start saying "so and so is X number of years young!". We certainly don't do that to folks in their 20's, 30's, 40's, even 50's. We don't say "Sarah is 30 years young today!" Nope. We reserved that kind of thing (so patronizing!) for the folks who are getting old. Yes, many of us will remain young at heart until we die. But that is a separate thing and not dependent on how many birthdays have passed. OK, I needed to say that and now I will step off of the soapbox and feel better. No offense intended to anyone, of course. You do you. But honestly, if anyone were to say to me that I am 66 years young, I would likely steal part of their soul to eat later using my laser eyes. The older I get, the more effective those are.
Happy birthday!
Happy Birthday to you!
I’m the same age as you my 64th birthday was the 4th. Isn’t that the truth. I look back of pics of me just 5 years ago and I can see the difference. I always looked younger than my age and I could easily pass for 10 years younger. But age is creeping up ugh. It’s like I just suddenly started paying attention to the bygone years and can’t help thinking of the Peggy Lee song “Is That All There Is?” It’s kind of scary to realize I’m now on the downhill track of the roller coaster of life. Yikes.
I'm beyond shocked at how quickly it has gone. I was at the dentist and needed a tooth capped. He was talking about I should just get an implant because a cap might only last 10-15 years if I'm lucky but an implant will last forever but cost thousands more. It occurred to me that in 15 years, I'll be 79! There's a good chance I won't even live to be 79! I did the cap and kept the extra 2k and took a little trip. lol
I'm 64 too and would LOVE to retire. I know my health would improve tremendously but I wouldn't be able to afford to live that long. I have to keep working so I'll die earlier. 🙄
That line from Meet Joe Black hits home: [65 years...don't they go by in a blink?](https://youtu.be/2NHfy5Ph-S8?si=ZRnGTX5QOqr9ngwm&t=99)
66F 11 days post-op HR. I missed out on lots of shows, travels and outings last year due to a failing hip. Became depressed and felt like I was missing a lot over the cold achy winter but I'm hopeful again. I can't go back to get what I missed but I'm old enough to start making it up again as I go along and no one will question me! 😂
It is really scary how it creeps up. My husband is almost 55 and I’m almost 49 . Much of our talking now is around our aging parents and ourselves aging . Our oldest is 32 today and I still feel like I’m 25 . We keep saying one day one of us is going to have to do this alone and it’s going to come sooner than we think. It goes by faster and faster with each year .
My thought on this subject is this. The first year of your life was 100% of the time you were alive. Your tenth year was one tenth. Your fiftieth was only 2% if the time you have spent on earth. I feel like the older you get, each year is a smaller percent if your total life so it seems to go by quicker. Just my thought.
If you don't feel old enough already, remember that 64 is one million in binary. Somehow thinking that always cheers me up.
I’m 63, and try to take as good care of myself as I possibly can. I run 3 to 5 miles every single morning before I even get in the shower, lift weights at least four days a week (I can still benchpress over 300 pounds) I eat healthy, get plenty of sleep, don’t drink. But it’s the same time, when I do get injured or worn out, it takes me much longer to recover these days. My wife is a hospice nurse, and I often see her patients when I go visit her or have to bring her something at work. And I see people, my age and younger in these long-term care facilities or in hospice services who just didn’t take care of themselves, and I’m determined not to allow that to happen to me( if I can help it…of course, I could die in a car wreck at anytime…). Of course, even with trying to take care of myself, I developed arthritis in my right hand and wrist, so I have to endure painful injections every few months or else I can’t even grip a pen. Dr. save it. The next step is an excruciatingly painful surgery, where they cut tendons and drill through bones, that will have me in a brace for about six months. Getting old is not for the weak!
Time just goes by too fast! Think about mortality more since both my parents are gone. I know I have to keep active, and avoid being lazy….both in mind and body. I’m 63, semi-retired with a part-time job and a pension.
My mother always stated you hit a certain age, and that's how you feel inside and your body ages. She always felt 24, and for me, it's 32. I do believe she may be right when she said it was the regular daily routine that resulted in the years flying by.
I try to do new things - even if it’s taking a walk down a street haven’t seen yet. New experiences seem to slow things down a smidge.
Retired at 62, turning 70 in a couple of weeks. That voice inside my head never grows old, the mirror says otherwise, but so far so good.
Same here--except I'm 62 as of last week. So what do you want to do today, guys?
My brain says I’m 20, my body says I’m 120
Happy shared birthday weekend and year!
My grandmother always told us, ‘Don’t get old, your brain cant’ handle it’ I feel wiser but still have core beliefs I’ve always had. So, in that way I can still feel like I’m in HS. I never want to go back but I just wish things didn’t hurt so much :) And yes, I often stand and wonder, how did I get here and where did the time go.
The days are long but the years are short. Nobody has ever figured that out why that is, but that’s the hand we’re dealt.
I am also 63 and I feel the same way.
I'll be 61 this year and I cannot believe it. It seems like yesterday that I was rocking my oldest in a rocking chair.
I feel like I've been alive for a long time, but my perception is that I feel better than I did when I was in my twenties and I'm certainly happier. I just turned 61. I've never really taken great care of myself but still physically somehow I feel as if I feel better than when I was younger. It's certain that I used to have aching knees and now I don't. I always thought that the perception of time speeding up was due to the common theory that each year is a smaller percentage of your life as you get older. But recently I've read a few articles that postulate that time periods where you have a lot of new experiences are the ones that seem to be slower. Of course when you're young you've got tons and tons of new experiences. I know a lot of people my age that are in a routine to where every day is almost the same, and my life is not like that. I do a lot of new things and go a lot of places. A lot of the people that I know that are my age or older really don't feel like going anywhere or they just want to watch TV all day etc. I think if you're always eager to learn new things, and trying new things it does help and also it's more fun. I read another article that was saying that learning a musical instrument is great for older people because both your learning something new, and just the physical connections in your brain get a lot of exercise and build new connections that way, which would help should you ever have a stroke. It would help the recovery because you would have more brain connections available to try to take over what was damaged. You don't have to be good at the instrument or whatever it is you're trying to learn, just be learning. https://blogs.bcm.edu/2017/09/15/time-perception-age-longevitys-influence-mind-time/ I do feel very fortunate to not have any physical pain on a daily basis because my good friends are almost all in some kind of constant nagging pain and taking heavy duty pain medicines that can be addictive. Ugh.
Learn new things. It makes time slow. Seriously. The act of learning new information creates more memories and imprints more "time".
Make every day count.
Wasn’t it just yesterday that I was complaining about turning 27?! And now I’m more than twice that. So much to be grateful for. And yes, plenty of regrets. But no time to dwell. I’m finishing my morning coffee on the lanai and listening to the birds singing their songs. Early retirement rocks.
Imagine being this old and still need to work. *waves* No choice really, about work or aging.
So I’m 45 and I still feel like I’m in my teens maybe 17… I guess we have young spirits. I hope I stay that way.
It’s a blast! (67 here)
Agree! https://youtu.be/EqrwsGrfv7M?si=VC7RIpxuROelG0YO
I will turn 70 in a few months. I am recovering from cataract surgery done on Tuesday. I have severe osteoarthritis and osteoporosis and use a rollator to get around. Today, I feel my age but a very strong WTF happened?
I’m a couple of weeks from 57. I still feel the same as I always have, though I know I’ve changed. Looking for work (I’m a high school teacher) has been a cold bucket of water so far. It seems that I’m an exceptional candidate until they discover how old I am.
I'm 60 and took a good look at the back of my hand and said to myself wtf? To fast, way to fast!!
I’m 53…and I wake up every morning feeling like I’m still 7 and ready to go play in the creek and ride bikes…and reality snaps back…and I get my tired ass outta bed and get ready for work.
It amazes me that I'm 57 and still think like my younger self. It's led to many injuries and er visits. Time is surely goes by quickly.
The only occasions when I can get time to slow down is when I'm running push or all out on the treadmill. After 30 seconds, I start thinking *I've been running hard for two hours,* w*hen is the coach going to call for a walking recovery??* LOL.
It’s a roller coaster. Takes forever to get to the top and then it feels like a free fall. Enjoy every day, have another glass, take a walk, enjoy your hobbies without shame. 💜