How You Know You Are Not Just GETTING Old, You Are Already There!

 

 

I've written about "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of Getting Old"  and I've listed "10 Signs You are Getting Old," and "The Good and Bad News About Aging."

But those posts were about GETTING old. 

How do you know when you have actually gotten there?

When you are really once and for all OLD?

Well, my peeps, I am here to tell you.

You know you are old when...

You still write checks, especially at the grocery store.
And I hate to tell you this.  No one writes checks anymore.  Only old folks.  And NO ONE likes waiting in line for you to write that check.  OLD!

You have a landline.
Practically everyone is using their cell phone for everything. Again, OLD!

You still do your taxes by hand on paper forms and mail them in.
But not before going to the library and giving the librarians a hard time about their now having all of the forms you need (The IRS doesn't even send libraries all of those forms anymore).  OLD!

And speaking of libraries, you think libraries are only about books. 
Or worse yet, you think libraries should only HAVE books, when libraries are providing a wealth of materials, Internet access and classes, not just for children and young people, but for the likes of old folks too! Materials and services that can change your life. If you didn't know or appreciate that, OLD!

Your ears have gotten really big.
I just saw Ringo Starr on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon and his ears were gy-normous!  OLD!

You still subscribe to a print newspaper. 
Remember those?  If you do, OLD!

When you text, you use your index finger to poke out the message. 
Oh?  Text?  Not sure what I am talking about?  OLD!

For you guys out there, when you go to take a pee, you pull down your fly and reach in and can't find your little soldier! 
Because you put your underpants on backwards!  OLD!

You don't know how to use the Internet and are proud of that because you think the Internet would try to steal your identity. 
Or worse yet, you don't use Facebook because you think it would steal your soul.  And you think that Tinder is all about booty calls. 
Well, you are right about Tinder...

You think a selfie is something people do in private behind closed doors. 

And for you ladies, you think it's OK to stop wearing make-up, to wear a stained sweat suit all day and ride the motorized cart at the supermarket even though you can walk perfectly well. 
You've given up on yourself and that's about as OLD as you can get.

But you know what?

I know I'm old.  And I am guilty of some of the above (except for the one about underpants - Hubby has to claim that one- and the one about giving up on myself)!

 

But big ears and putting your underpants on backwards notwithstanding,

what does it really mean to be OLD?

 



You may have lost your hair, have wrinkles, gained weight, feel rickety, but it's all good. 

"Old" is not a bad word.  It means you have made it this far. 

Think of the "crone," from the goddess standpoint, or the wizard for men.

Whether you think "old" is 55 or 85, the longer you live, the more you are becoming an old soul, and what you have gained is wisdom. You know some stuff.

You know what happiness is.
It's not success, it's not money, it's not accolades.
Happiness is a state you can create for yourself through gratitude. It's appreciating that what most people equate with happiness is overrated.
Happiness is that small still voice within that says...I am content.

You know that getting old is not just an age.  It's a state of mind that we have control over.
We may be old but we don't have to be or feel old.
 
It's being self-aware and knowing yourself.  No matter what state you are in, it's being glad you got this far.

And if you live to be OLD, you get to live to be a part of all of this:

 

 

 

 



 

And that's not just getting OLD, that's getting happy.

 

 

 

 

Thanks for Reading!

 

See you Friday

for my review of the new movie 

 

"While We're Young"

(apropos, right?)

 

and

 

The Week in Reviews

 

(What to See or Read and What to Avoid)

and the latest on

"My 1001 Movies I Must See Before

 I Die Project."

 

If you enjoyed this post, feel free to click on the share buttons to share it on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and LinkedIn, email it to your friends and LIKE me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/rosythereviewer


 



 

The Good and Bad News About Aging: How To Advocate For a Happy Old Age (and it's never too early to start)!

I am going to deviate a bit this week from my cheeky pop culture and lifestyle observations and talk about something more serious.

I was recently invited to attend a White House Conference on Aging Forum here in Seattle (sponsored in part by the AARP), where I listened to Federal and local politicians and others talk about what needs to be done to address the needs of the increasing aging population ("The Age Wave"), and then, in small groups, I was given an opportunity to also weigh in.

The Federal priorities regarding aging that were discussed at the White House Conference on Aging Forum are Healthy Aging, Long-term Support and Services, Retirement Security and Elder Justice.

What I came away with was...that when it comes to aging,

there is some good news and some bad news.


The good news is we get old.  

Which is a good thing when you think of the alternative.  We are living longer than those before us.

However, the bad news...

Bette Davis was right.  "Old age ain't no place for sissies."

With a longer life comes chronic illness (you live long enough, you are bound to get something), Alzheimer's, financial issues, we don't die as fast and easy (we can be kept alive longer, sometimes to our and our loved ones' detriment), etc.

But despite that, if we are lucky, we will all get old, even those of you reading this now who might be under 40. 

And it's never too early to start planning for how you want to spend the last years of your life.

I was invited to the White House Conference on Aging Forum, because I am currently a member of our local Council on Aging.  When I retired I wanted to do something meaningful with my time, and issues of aging are of interest to me, not just because I am an old lady, but because of what happened to my mother.

My mother outlived my father by 8 years.  For some strange reason she thought she would die first and because of that, she didn't plan to be on her own.  However, despite the fact that her children were flung far and wide around the country, she had relatives and friends because she lived in the town she grew up in, and she was physically active, engaged and well until she turned 89.  But then she had a stroke that didn't affect her physically, but threw her into a haze of dementia that belied her living on her own any longer.  Because there were no affordable services in place to allow her to stay in her own home, she was forced to become indigent to pay for nursing home care and the last three years of her life were not pretty.

My mother was not alone in this.  Women are in a particularly precarious situation when it comes to aging.  Women who leave the workforce to care for children lose $650,000 in earnings over their lifetime and still only make 78 cents to the dollar that men make when they are working outside the home. That wage gap leads to a Social Security gap.  Add to that the fact that women usually live longer than men, and you can see why one in ten older women live in poverty.

So because of my mother and my not wanting to end up as she did, "Aging in Place" is an issue I am very passionate about.  If there had been services available for her to stay in her own home for those last three years of her life, she would have been able to die with the dignity she deserved.

But there are also other issues of concern:  end of life issues, Social Security, Alzheimer's Disease, lack of savings for long term care, elder abuse and the home care workforce needs.

End of Life Issues

We don't like to think about dying but the best gift we can give our loved ones is letting them know how we want them to handle things if we can't handle them ourselves.

Social Security

There has been an organized campaign to discredit Social Security by its opponents.  So much so that young people actually think it won't be around when they need it.  That is not true, but if people think something is not relevant to them, they are not likely to support it, right?  So our young people need to be educated about it so they will support it. For more information on Social Security and its importance, check out "History and Background of the Social Security Act of 1935" by John Ehrlic.

Alzheimer's Disease

Alzheimer's Disease is the only disease that cannot be cured or slowed.  If we live long enough, that could be in our future.  Continued research is a must.

Long-term Care

People should not have to use up all of their resources in order to be eligible for nursing home care or other services.  They should be able to "age in place" in their own homes. Home health care workers need to be trained, paid well and given benefits.  Being a home health care worker has a bad reputation and it needs to be made a "good job" so home health care will be available to all.

Elder Abuse

Elders, especially those who are disabled or have had setbacks, need to be protected against scams and fraud, often from their own family members.


So whether you are now 65 or 25, those are the issues we will all face and whether you are 65 or 25 it's never too late or too early to get involved to decide how you want to spend the last years of your life.

But things don't happen on their own. 

If you want something to happen, you must advocate.


This year marks...

• the 80th anniversary of The Social Security Act.
• the 50 anniversary of Medicare and Medicaid.
• the 50th anniversary of the Older Americans Act.
• the 5th anniversary of the Affordable Care Act.

These laws are in place to give older Americans a better life as they age.  But they are constantly under attack. If you want a happy old age, you need to protect these important laws and advocate for more long term care and services for our older population, a population that YOU will be a part of one day.

Advocacy is not rocket science.  It's just a matter of picking up the phone, writing an email, introducing yourself to your legislators.  They are there to work for YOU, so be sure they know what you want.

Thanks to a workshop I took last year from Nancy Amidei, a renowned local advocate and author of the book "So You Want to Make a Difference," I learned some tips (and added some of my own) that can take the mystery out of advocacy and that everyone can do: 

Five Easy Steps to Turn You Into an Outstanding Advocate!

 

1.  Sign up with an advocacy group that tracks issues you care about and then do what they ask e.g. write letters or emails in support of an issue, show up at a meeting, etc.

2.  Know who your legislators are and introduce yourself to them when they are at home and not in session (when they are not in session they can focus on you).
 
You can find your U.S. Senators and Representatives here  

For local legislators and to find what legislative district you are in in Washington State go here, and for everyone else, just Google "what legislative district am I in" and add your State.

Also call your County Administrative offices and find out who the County Administrator is and the County Council members.  Do the same for your city - who is the Mayor and who are your city Council members?

Better yet, call the library. 

They can do all of that for you.  You want to find out who your U.S. Representative for your U.S. legislative district is, who your two U.S. Senators are, and your State Senator and Representative for your district as well as your local legislators.  Get their email addresses if you are comfortable with email or their office addresses if you want to write a letter.  Also their phone numbers so you can call them.

When you introduce yourself by phone or in person, say your name, what district you are in and what group you might belong to.  Strength in numbers.

If you want some guidance on writing an advocacy letter, check this out. Be sure to include your legislative district so your legislator knows you are his or her constituent.

Find out what committees your State and U.S. legislators are on. 
Bills go to committees and that is where they either move forward or are quashed.  Does your representatives sit on a committee that affects an issue you care about?  If so, yay!

3.  Advocacy is only a phone call away. 
Call your local Legislative Hotline. You can Google this for your State or again, call your library for the number.

They track issues and will make sure your legislator gets the message. They can also help you understand the legislative process.

4.  Advertise your issue at every opportunity. 

Have a little 30-60 second "elevator speech" in your head and when you meet with your legislator share it. I can tell my mother's story in 30 seconds.  But don't stop there, share it standing in line at the movie theatre, at the grocery store and with your friends while playing cards.

5.  Know who to ask and who has the power to make a difference with your issue.

Don't ask the Mayor to protect Social Security and don't ask your State Senator to help you with the barking dog next door.

So there you have it.  It's that easy to get involved and make a difference. 

However, I don't want to minimize the efforts of advocates.  There is much more you can do, too, but if you just did these things - if you just took five minutes to email, call or write your legislator - you will make a huge difference.  You can certainly spare five minutes to make a difference, can't you?

 

But lest you think it's all bad news about  getting old.  It's not.

With age comes wisdom, deep expertise, a better ability to solve conflicts and a desire and chance to make a difference. 

One last takeaway from the White House Conference on Aging: 

Regarding health, "Sitting is the new smoking."

 

So get up off that couch and use your wisdom, expertise and conflict resolution skills to make a difference for your golden years and for those who come after you!

Thanks for Reading!

 

See you Friday

 

for my review of the new movie

 

"Woman in Gold"

 

and

 

The Week in Reviews

 

(What to See or Read and What to Avoid)

and the latest on

"My 1001 Movies I Must See Before

 

I Die Project."

 

If you enjoyed this post, feel free to click on the share buttons to share it on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and LinkedIn, email it to your friends and LIKE me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/rosythereviewer

My Menopause

C'mon.  You don't need to go "ew." 

Especially you guys.  You have your own version of this.

If I can write about my colonoscopy (which I did), I can certainly write about this.  And, really, it's much less gory.

I was inspired by a book I just finished, "The Madwoman in the Volvo, My Year of Raging Hormones" by Sandra Tsing Loh. 

It's a humorous account of Loh's navigation of "the change."  Hers included an affair, the end of her marriage and managing a nutty 89-year-old father, not to mention the physical issues that come with menopause. 

So being the impressionable little thing that I am, reading her account made me look back on my own journey, which covered much more than a year and, I thought, I too could provide some insight. 

However, my journey was far less extreme and dramatic.

I just got fat, mad and kind of crazy. 

And I wasn't mad about being fat.  I was just really mad...about everything and kind of crazy all of the time.

There was a reason my "handle" on my son's pager (remember those?) was 666.  I thought that one up, because I thought it was funny (you know, Mom calling and we hate that, you know like the devil, you know...), but I think that was my unconscious realization that the devil had somehow gotten into the details of my life, but I didn't know why.

Likewise, with menopause, especially the years leading up to it, it slowly creeps up on you and you don't really realize what is happening until suddenly Aunt Flo doesn't come to visit anymore - ever.  Anyway, that's what happened to me.

It all started in my mid-40's.  I don't remember anything earth shattering like hot flashes, but looking back I see that I was "changing" and had been for some time.

How else can I explain staying up until three in the morning watching old game shows like "I've Got a Secret" and "What's My Line?"  And I had to be at work the next morning. I cried when the Game Show Network stopped showing them.

Or getting up in the middle of the night with heartburn that I was sure was a real heart condition and thinking that having a glass of wine would solve the problem,

Or walking over to Trader Joe's (it was across the street) in my robe ("No one will notice"),

Or my one woman crusade to make sure the people who worked at Trader Joe's did not park on my street.  For some reason, having those cars parked in front of my house made me crazy (Gee, I wonder why), and I not only wrote letters to the management of Trader Joe's, I would yell at people from my front porch,

Or making my kids sleep with me when Hubby traveled because I was sure if a bad guy broke in, he wouldn't kill me with two little kids sleeping in the bed with me,

Or standing in the Safeway line and suddenly feeling like I would die if I didn't leave immediately,

Or on my Friday off (I had every other Friday off), cleaning the house and then shutting all of the curtains and sitting in the dark living room watching movies for the rest of the day (hey, I still do that!),

Or the shouting matches with my teenage son.

It's a wonder I wasn't found wandering the neighborhood in my nightgown mumbling in some language I had made up.

Looking back on all of that, I can only shake my head and wonder what the hell was I thinking?

Well the answer was, I wasn't thinking.  My hormones were ordering me around.

And because I didn't really have any physical symptoms (except for that middle of the night heartburn and those panic attacks), I didn't realize what was happening and didn't know to ask for any treatment from my doctor. I thought it was just ME.

You see, I was always considered a bit "high strung," or that's what my parents would say about me when I would get upset at my brother teasing me at the dinner table and stomp upstairs and lock myself in the bathroom. 

That said, I was now a career woman, a mother.  I could juggle many plates, dammit.  I wasn't prone to prowling around in the middle of the night with my hair standing on end like Medusa and my eyes spinning in my head.  What the hell was going on?

That is why the onset of menopause is so insidious.

I think perimenopause (that period, pardon the pun, leading up to "the big finish") and menopause are kind of like Alzheimer's.  I'm not being disrespectful here. Hear me out. There is the crazed part of it, but, like Alzheimer's, you don't really know you have it until it's all over. The last thing we women want to believe is that we are getting old, because menopause is for old ladies, right?  In the case of Alzheimer's, you could be diagnosed with it, but until you are dead and they analyze your brain, you don't really know for sure.  You could just be demented. 

So at 45, I thought I was too young for Alzheimer's so I just thought I was a demented person.

By the time I finally had my hormone levels checked and started taking hormones, that big study came out that said hormone treatment was linked to heart attacks, so that was enough for me to ditch the pills (things have changed since then).  Besides, I wasn't much into taking pills anyway.  This here girl was pioneer and Swedish stock!  I can beat this thing.

If you find yourself in similar circumstances and exhibiting similar behaviors, take note.  The time has come.  But don't beat yourself up.  You can't help it.  I recommend doing anything and everything you deem appropriate to help you get through it.

But here is the sobering part of all of this.

As Loh points out in her book, when we are very young, we are detached.  It's all about ourselves. But as our hormones kick in, we then become attached as we seek mates and have our children. Once we are no longer able to procreate and our children have left the nest, our bodies and minds go back to being detached, not needing to nurture anyone but ourselves once again. 

However, many of us modern Baby Boomer women didn't live that "normal" biological and chronological clock of a typical woman from an earlier generation:  get married and have children in her twenties, "begin to detach in her forties...Her grown-up (say eighteen year old) children are leaving the nest; her perhaps slightly older (say sixty-ish) husband is transitioning into gardening and fishing; her aged parents have conveniently died." 

So that was an easier menopause because at least many of life's stresses had already passed when it was time to detach.

But Loh goes on to say that doesn't fit the new normal of the late-boomer/Gen X women who put their careers first and didn't get married until their thirties, got pregnant in their late 30's or early 40's, and with medical advancements, their parents are still alive.  So that means just when our bodies are telling us to detach, we still have kids at home and parents to take care of. 

No wonder we go nuts.

That is what happened to me.

The full cycle of perimenopause to menopause to post-menopause can take up to ten years.  So when I think that in the midst of those years when my body was changing from a fertile young thing into a wild-eyed crone, both of my parents went through illness or institutionalization and then died and, my son was 15-25 and my daughter was 10-20, formative years to say the least.  

No wonder I remember big eyes in the back seat when I was on a tirade or that they don't seem to share a lot of happy family memories. No wonder they now say, "You know how you are," when neither has lived with me for over 10 years, and I don't know what they are talking about.  How am I?

I was a madwoman in a Mustang.
(no Volvos for me).

But according to Loh and to me, there is good news for those of you who are suffering or about to. 

It gets better. 

I think that is what I am here to impart, because you know, I am all about providing a public service.

I'm still fat, but I'm not angry anymore, and I like to think I'm no longer crazy, though that could be up for debate.

It does get better. 

Most of those nasty hormonal symptoms do eventually go away.

You do get to detach (as in spending time with yourself). 

And with age comes some perks.

We women of a certain age come to  realize:

It's not as important as it once was to be a skinny bitch. In fact, a little extra junk in the trunk is known to prolong life, save your face and keep you from BEING a bitch.

It's not as important to have a clean house because who do we need to impress anymore?  Hubby would rather have a cheerful companion than an angry cleaning lady in a clean house. 

It's not as important to care what people think. 
It's called "The I-Don't-Give-A-Sh*t-Anymore-Syndrome."  It hits around 60.

It's not as important to be a Super Woman if we ever were.  It's important to be your own hero.

You now have the time to be grateful - for all of it.

What IS important is to make peace with yourself:
body, mind and spirit.

You will come out the other side.

Now I'm the old, but no longer mad,

woman in the Mustang!

Thanks for Reading!

 

See you Friday

for my review of the new movie

"Interstellar." 

If you enjoyed this post, feel free to click on the share buttons to share it on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and LinkedIn, email it to your friends and LIKE me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/rosythereviewer

Letting Myself Go: Questionable Fashion Choices for a Woman of a Certain Age and Size

OK I know what you are thinking, but it looked really cute in "Elle Magazine." 

What I didn't realize at the time was that it was probably on a 7 foot model who weighed about 120 pounds and was probably air brushed to boot.  However, when I see something in a magazine or catalog, I tend to think that's what it will look like on me. It's a weakness I have.

So I bought that coat and wore it on a recent trip to California.  At the place where we park our car at the airport, the attendant said to me, "That's some coat."

Now, let me say that whenever someone starts a comment about you with "That's some...," that is NOT a compliment.  "I like your coat" is a compliment.  "You look nice" is a compliment.  "That's some coat" is not a compliment.

So I should have been ready when we were going through security and the TSA person said to me, "Is that your dog?" 

"What?!" I replied.

She immediately realized she had mistaken the fur on the bottom of my coat for a dog.  We both had a laugh (I was crying inside).

I should have asked her if my "dog" made my butt look fat.

So that little incident made me think about my current fashion choices.

It's no surprise to anyone who knows me or who reads this blog that I consider myself a bit of a fashionista.  OK, basically I am a clothes horse, a hoarder, a shopaholic, whatever you want to call me.  It's been like that practically all of my life, probably since my Dad told me he thought it was perfectly reasonable for me to have a different outfit for every day of the week. That said, it wasn't difficult for me to make the stretch to have enough outfits that I would never need to wear the same thing ever again.

And I have never been afraid to embrace the latest styles, colors and fads.

At 13, I wore this cape to a football game.

I wasn't afraid to sport green shoes (they had pink trim to match the ensemble)

Big earrings were always my thing.

I embraced the famous "Sassoon" haircut when it was first popular.

I even went shorter when I was feeling "punk" and wanted to channel Annie Lennox (Hey, it was the 80's!)

I experimented with vintage dresses, armbands and headbands

Bell bottoms

 

And hats.

When you are young and slim, you can get away with a lot in fashion.

When you are a woman of a certain age and let's say, no longer thin, not so much.

For example, these shoes are hard to explain.

When you have to suck it in this much, probably not a good fit.

And when someone asks you if you are trying out for a part in "Wicked," probably not a good fashion choice.

And here I look like I am about to break into a song from "Snow White."

Does this hat make my head look fat?

 

And please, Lord, tell me I was wearing this to a costume party or a rodeo.

 

(I wasn't).

 

 

So you can see I have been dragged into old age kicking and screaming.  Some habits die hard.

 

One thing many of us women worry about as we age is "letting ourselves go." (You men should worry about it, too, but that's a whole different blog post.)

 

That usually means getting fat, lazy, not wearing make-up, going gray...I think it's even worse for the Baby Boom Generation because we didn't think we would ever get old.  They should have called us "The Peter Pan Generation."

 

But that's not a bad thing.  We may be in our 50's and 60's, but we aren't doing "old age" like our parents.  We may be retired, but our retirement is not our parents' retirement.

 

Ellen Goodman, in her last column upon her retirement after 46 years of writing, wrote about "Letting ourselves go," but she was not talking about getting old and fat.  She wanted to "reclaim" the phrase to mean something quite different.

 

She said, "Now, we find ourselves on the cutting edge of another huge social change. This time, it's the longevity revolution. Ours is the first generation to collectively cross the demarcation line of senior citizenship with actuarial tables on our side...We don't have a label yet to describe the early, active aging. But many of us are pausing to recalculate the purpose of a longer life. We are reinventing ourselves and society's expectations, just as we have throughout our lives."

 

So "letting ourselves go" can be a good thing because we are letting ourselves GO FOR IT.  Just as in our youth we were the generation of great social change, so will we be as we age.

 

I have enjoyed experimenting with fashion all of my life, and I am not stopping now.  Yes, I could lose a few pounds, yes, I will probably make more fashion mistakes, but I don't care. 

 

Because, whether it's fashion or life choices, I am going to continue to let myself go for it. 

 

 

 

Too much?

 

 

Thanks for Reading!

 

See you Friday

 

for my review of the new movie

 

"Birdman"

 

My Week in Reviews

 

and an update 

on my

 "1001 Movies I Must See Before I Die Project."

 

If you enjoyed this post, feel free to click on the share buttons to share it on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and LinkedIn, email it to your friends and LIKE me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/rosythereviewer