Saturday, August 25, 2018

Turning 50


My 50th birthday is this week. 49 sounds a lot better then 50. It's strange, I never prepared to grow this old, and in some ways that threw me off. I struggled so long to stay alive, I figured whatever time I have would be short. Remember I was disabled in my late 20s. People who weigh over 400lbs are told the Grim Reaper is about to take them out at any second. Yeah Lipedema changes that equation. However I almost did die far younger.  Every birthday is better then the alternative.

Being old is weird to me. I feel like I am 25 years old inside and need at least 25 years rolled back. Time got away from me somewhere around the year 2000, it's like it accelerated, and that worsened around 10 years ago. Even the years sound funny to me, 2020? What the hell, in my head it's 1987. In some ways, for me being 50 is far more troubling. I got behind and never caught up, though surely there's lots of people in my boat. I did get to be happily married even though there were no kids. However many of us all think we will have "made it" by 50 and that didn't happen.

Aging is hard to deal with. You ponder appearance issues, wrinkles, grey hair, and now the health problems that come automatically like needing glasses which I got last year. The passage of time seems so ignored by people. Inside of me there's a little voice, that yells, "Hurry up, Hurry up, there's only so much time before it's all over!". One ponders how much time is left with strange algebraic equations in my case about how long someone with COPD could live and could I be the world's fattest woman to live the longest ever?

It's strange when I was in my 30s, I wanted to hang around older people, and I did. This is one reason I lost so many friends, that's one draw back of befriending people older then you. People don't live forever. I have some older friends still and this is an inner worry.  Now I want to hang around people who are younger then me too. That's been a transition. I won't be ageist but inside I still feel young.

 I don't want to cut my hair short in tight curls, and don't want to wear white sneakers, and old people "uniforms". I still want to dress goth, listen to rock, and read comics.  Will the nursing homes in the 2040s and 2050s, have Gen X listening to Depeche Mode and U2? It's always funny to me how nursing homes, seem to hold on to the swing music and big band junk when the people who are old in there probably would rather be listening to Jimi Hendrix and The Doors.  In the 1990s, the red hat society ladies who were growing old were all in vogue, many have probably died off now. They tried to make growing older fun.

Some older women talk about a certain invisibility that takes over them with age. I'm not sure if I have felt that. Marriage has spared me from having to look "sexy" to attract a man though he likes a lot of my outfits and dresses.  Being Aspie already sets you aside. I feel for women who probably enjoyed life, being active and healthy, I wonder if aging is different for someone like that then me, who was in such bad shape early on. 

Some people never marry and stay single for life. That is probably very rough. There's the Elder Orphans out there who have no one. Only my spouse keeps me from fulfilling that criteria. Elder Orphan, what a sad name, it gives me pictures of little old people on canes or walkers left out in a street somewhere, with begging bowls at their feet.
 
Some of us never have kids. Society pictures every older woman sitting at her long dining room table with their giant families gathered around them. There's people I went to high school with that have a dozen grandchildren already. I just don't relate to them. What of those who don't have families? I could barely take care of myself. Probably if you have kids, its easier to age, you feel like you are leaving something behind in the world and it's people.  The only way I could have had kids in my case is if I had gotten pregnant as a teen, and in my case the family support would not have been there.

That's a rough part for us people who never had children. I sometimes post on child free boards, telling them to know what they are getting into especially when they get to my age. For me, being childfree was less of a "choice", but this is something to be concerned about. Some of us wonder who will take care of us when we are old. I and my husband sometimes have gotten sick at the same time, and that's one of the times when I've had those thoughts.

Some people when they age worry about getting ill, or incapacitated. I already crossed that Rubicon. Still others worry about ending up alone, and or ending up as bag ladies. This can be a society that is rough on the old.

At UU fellowship one lady read a poem about aging. That lady is probably 25-30 years older then me. She said they had a "croning" ceremony for those who hit their 50th birthday at her far larger UU church years ago. I found that interesting. They did it for mothers as well as non-mothers. In native cultures, there is more respect for the elders, and for their wisdom. This is something we have lost in society, isn't it. I had many older ladies lead me when I was a young woman, who were "mentors". We definitely need that. Allow women who have lifetimes of experience to share those experiences.


As one's life progresses, old age can be a time of regrets. That's a rough thing being an older person who has regrets. Maybe all people do.  I was sitting in the living room with my husband talking about this week and turning 50 and saying,"Where did the time go?". I said at least I found love in this life, that was a great thing not everyone managed but told him I felt sad about the struggles and that we had such a hard life. It is strange, I said, "But we tried our best didn't we, and we had some good times along the way!"  Right now, it will be time to make use of the time we got left, the best we can.


Aging is inevitable, so I will try not to cry over this birthday like I did when I turned 40. Turning 50 feels strange though like I had arrived at a point I never expected.

8 comments:

  1. Happy 50th Peep ! You made it this far. That is an awesome accomplishment. As ACONs we are surprised when we make it this far. We are tougher and smarter than our narc parents ever imagined. They underestimated us our whole lives. So a big middle finger to them! I hope you have a good year. As the band Fishbone song "black flowers" sings:
    No I won't give in to hatred,
    And I'll never stop dreaming,
    And Ill love, I will love
    Till the very last breath
    Is taken away. "
    MG

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  2. Thanks MG, I appreciate it :) Yeah I made it this far. Oh sure ACONs would be surprised to make it down the road this far. I agree we are tougher and smarter then the narc parents could imagine. LOL for big middle fingers hoisted high to the narcopaths. Thanks for the song lyrics, I need to check that one out!

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  3. Happy 5-0 Birthday, Peep! You will not feel old because 50 is the new 25 and medical technology made it possible for people to live longer, or at least stay young longer. Have fun this evening and for the rest of this week. Happy Labor Day weekend. Hope the weather will cooperate.

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    1. Thanks anon, I appreciate it. :)I sure hope medical technology still helps me. :P Have a good week and Labor Day weekend yourself too.

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  4. "I don't want to cut my hair short in tight curls, and don't want to wear white sneakers, and old people "uniforms". I still want to dress goth, listen to rock, and read comics."

    Spoken like the Peep we know and love! Or, I know and love. I feel the same way -- not long ago, I thought, "Is there ever gonna be a time when I don't stay up late, and go to shows?" I thought, "Nah, that'll never change. I like both too much."

    Age is a sensitive topic for me, as well, particularly because my dad constantly dogged me with it -- he used it like a club to beat my head with it, which only made me dig in harder. He seemed to think "I would grow out of it," quote-unquote, as if the things I loved could flicked on and off with a switch.

    So happy birthday, Peep, and I hope you have good memories of it, now that's it comea nd gone -- and yeah, 50 might as well be the new 25, if only because that's when we're finally coming into our own. And getting better at what we love to do most. --Mr. Peep

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    1. Thanks Mr. Peep. I know I am not aging like most people. I don't want to wear the uniform and ugly hair dos. I am glad you are not becoming an old man who screams at the kids to "get off his lawn" :p There's things I don't want to give up too. One thing why are they still making old people play bingo like you see on Better Call Saul, will they force that crap on an aged Gen X one day. I know I will still hate bingo even if I make it to 90.

      Yeah I remember your dad dogging you with age. I heard the "grow out of it" too. They all wanted me to have this picture perfect life circa 1950, that doesn't even exist anymore.

      Thanks for the birthday wishes Mr. Peep. Hey I had a good day even with the other dramas nipping at my heels. Agree about coming into our own. Love Peep

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  5. I actually went to a bingo hall once, and it was one of the saddest experiences I've ever had -- seeing all these lonely old people hoping they might win something to supplement whatever meager allotments they were subsisting on. I haven't been to once since.

    Yeah, I hated all that age dogging BS -- I always wondered who got to make those rules? Because they sure as hell didn't call my house and ask for my opinion, as I used to say. :-)

    But that makes the current state of rock all the more ironic -- who would have imagined that many '70s and '80s heroes would still be going strong, because the other reality (getting a job and/or settling down) was probably too scary to contemplate, as well as living without the added attention.

    I remember how much mileage the press got when Paul McCartney turned 64 -- having written, "When I'm 64," right? Ironically, though, it marked one of his first songwriting efforts as a 16-year-old dreaming the big dream ("One day I'm gonna ..."), as opposed to the world-weary voice of the lyric. The mind boggles. --Mr. Peep

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    1. I hate bingo halls too. Did you know there was a big one in our old town, that lady I was friends with, with the autistic son, her parents were the owners and they were millionaires and had this huge house up on a hill. Always thought about that, and that was one depressing smoke-filled place. It is mostly poor disabled and on Social Security folks who go there to try and supplement their income. It's all by luck too, no skill, I always found the game boring and annoying, having to get up to shout Bingo.

      I am glad the older rockers have kept going, why not? They still have an audience, get what music you can done to the very end. They didn't retreat to rocking chairs and boredom. I hate this idea that I am supposed to act like a certain person and be boring and dead inside because I am getting old.

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