What does it feel like to be old?

Originally posted by mainidh
When you're young, you look to the future and are filled with hope.

When you're old, you look to the past and are filled with regret.

Enjoy!!

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When you're young you look to the future and are filled with hope

When you're old you look to the past and reminisce


je ne regrette rien!!!!!!

I have a few books of classic poetry. Here is one. Look to the classics for they contain great wisdom and great heart.

Growing Old
Matthew Arnold

What is it to grow old?
Is it to lose the glory of the form,
The lustre of the eye?
Is it for beauty to forego her wreath?
Yes, but not for this alone.

Is it to feel our strength
Not our bloom only, but our strength decay?
Is it to feel each limb
Grow stiffer, every function less exact,
Each nerve more weakly strung?

Yes, this, and more! but not,
Ah, 'tis not what in youth we dreamed 'twould be!
'Tis not to have our life
Mellowed and softened as with sunset-glow,
A golden day's decline!

'Tis not to see the world
As from a height, with rapt prophetic eyes,
And heart profoundly stirred;
And weep, and feel the fulness of the past,
The years that are no more!

It is to spend long days
And not once feel that we were ever young.
It is to add, immured
In the hot prison of the present, month
To month with weary pain.

It is to suffer this,
And feel but half, and feebly, what we feel:
Deep in our hidden heart
Festers the dull remembrance of a change,
But no emotion none.

It is last stage of all
When we are frozen up within, and quite
The phantom of ourselves,
To hear the world applaud the hollow ghost
Which blamed the living man.

Growing Old
Matthew Arnold

I won't mention my age, I hate to think about it. But I'm not even really 'up there' I'm more in the middle of things. But I don't feel it like you would think, but I know I'm starting show it. If I could I'd go back to 20 and try to change some things, I would. Nothing really bad but just some things.
What is when you're this old, you're not chosen for a job, only if you're well qualified, but usually it goes to someone younger. They say they don't discriminate but they do, they just do it in a way that you can't prove it
unless they're stupid and do it when it's so obvious.
I feel disgruntled when (I'm not old enough yet for that) but when AARP comes out with a commercial about the great things about being 65,) there's nothing great about getting older. I applaud those who think so, but from my point of view no way.
I will of course continue to age, have no choice. But it's not something I particularly look forward to.
My advice enjoy being young, don't do anything really stupid, pay it forward with acts of kindness instead it doesn't have to be monetary,study for something that's going to make you comfortable in your declining years, try to find someone to spend the rest of your life with and good luck!

South Park's "Grandpa", and what it's like to be old...

Getting old or older is pretty cool. I can still do most everything I did when I was 18 or 20, but it just hurts more the next day... seriously.

The good thing is that you have enough experience and knowledge to use your mind more and your back less, unless you want to... I do a very demanding job, both physically and mentally... and it still makes me proud that I can outwork a lot of the young men that work for me... loading and unloading pallets, trucks...

As for women and sex... I am married, but I still like looking at women. I love women. No latent homesexual urges here. But what does change is the kind of woman I like. Young perky long legged girls used to tear me up. As I have gotten older, I actually like a woman with a few wrinkles, crows feet...gray hair...I find them sexy as hell and that really suprised me when I was in my early forties. They actually can carry on a conversation about politics, philosophy, the arts...

As for the sex, it is better than ever... actually lasts longer... and you find it is as much mental as physical. On the down side... it is not as often, and frankly you don't really care. More than a few times, I would catch my wife coming out of the shower, we will fool around, and before it gets to hot... she says she is just too tired, but will if I want to. I love her... so I say "No Baby, it's cool...get some rest." then I go and pop some popcorn, put in an Eastwood Western, pour some Pepsi... kickback and actually enjoy myself.

The best part is you don't give a damn about all the things that used to stress you out. Appearances, styles, upgrades...you don't care and you don't care that you don't care. no one will spank you if you leave the dishes till tommorow morning... no one cares if you eat a whole row of chocolate chip cookies out of the bag, no body will punish you if you wear your weathered jeans, a sweatshirt, muddy muck boots, and a cowboy hat to the grocery store. It's great. unless you have led an unusually sheltered life or been in the military... none can do anything to you that you haven't weathered before... So when you tell someone to "Go to Hell." you really mean it.

On the other hand, my heart gets more and more tender every passing year and i really love children and especially animals. I would never be suspected of being a cat lover, but I have a buddy named Festus and since he is about a year old, he will probably be there when I retire... go out crabbing and oystering on the Pamlico Sound drinking Bloody Marys at 9am in our big ol' Jon boat.

reply to post by AlreadyGone
I can help you a little with the first sentence about getting sore. There are a few reasons for this. Eating a little turmeric can sometimes help. another words put mustard on you're sandwich. It helps with both muscle cramping and bacterial overload. Eat more things in you're diet that contain high levels of Molybdenum. It's presence is in most foods but the soils are getting burnt out. I read that eating vegetables of the lime helps with health somewhere on a historic article on potatoes. Lime makes the Molybdenum in the soils available to plants but potatoes can't be limes because they get scabs. The known enzymes that use molybdenum help us with the lactose, Acetylaldahyde, Xanthium oxydase, and one more that skips my mind. Lacic acid is formed by use of muscles. It builds up and makes them sore. Sometimes drinking milk can stimulate the body to make more of this enzyme but sometimes if a person digests it too well it adds to the problem and causes others. Scetylaldehyde buildup makes muscles sore all over so the same cure takes care of both and some headaches also. A molybdenum supplement helps, it is in some multivitamins also. Too much of this can cause other problems so don't go wild. Our bodies change when we get older and my studies of that informations isn't easily found. It seems that people have come to think we are going to die at a certain age so disreguard evidence that says we can live much longer. Our bodies also make a chemical to cancel out the inflamation and pain on a local basis at the point of injury. I'm studying the necessary chemicals and minerals that have to be injested at the same time. If our bodies have stores of these they need to be available for use. Sometimes they get locked out and this needs more research on my part. I have ideas but ideas have side effects that need consideration before telling anyone. Maybe this will help. Nothing can restore us to eighteen again but being older and wiser is better anyway. If we were 18 again we would probably get in more trouble. We know how to avoid detection for things with experience so would just do riskier things if we turned the clock back. Hope I helped. There are many other things also but I only stated the most common.

It sucks to be honest. Sorry for the one liners mods, but it does suck getting old. Especially when todays youth are a dumb as a box of rocks. And useing op's guide lines, all you under forty, fall into that box.

I am 49 and I love it when folks say well next birthday you'll be "middle age" .Excuse me but how many 100 year olds do you see walking around right now. 40 is more like middle age. And beleive me 50 aint the new 40 it's 50 no doubt about it.

I'm only 35 so I don't technicly quailify but lets face it. It doesn't matter how old we get we still feel the same inside. I feel the same at 35 as I did at 25 as I did at 15...

Hey! I learned 2 happy things last night about being old.
I do not care any more about running in the house. Had a great game of chase and hide and go seek with the bulldog.
I outlasted the one year old bulldog!!!!!!
He had to have a nap!

There is a reason the younger generation is (in large part) rather ignorant about things...

They've always grown up with the ability to find the answer to any question with a Google search. They don't NEED to retain anything, so they don't. I'm not even sure they realize it.

When those of my generation (or older) went to school though, we had to KNOW the information. We had to build up a mental knowledge base, so we had things to pull from, and compare against, etc.

Kids today aren't even growing up with that mindset, so they won't really develop this skill as much as we did until they hit the workforce, and learn the ins and outs of their trade.

Whyyy, back in myyyyy day, this was -my- day. And ya liked it!

reply to post by ofhumandescent


Read and enjoyed your lovelly post on 14th and i shed a tear.

reply to post by sharkz


Thank you.

My favorite answer was by CranialSponge 9th reply down 1st page. She was truthful and funny.

Really made my day!

Hope everyone gives her a star.

A lot of good replies.



interesting thread.

reply to post by muse7

I am 59 ... I am going snow-skiing for the first time tomorrow ...

I will let you know how old I feel then

Just turned 49 a few days ago so this is a interesting topic for me. Well
where to begin... I feel no different in some ways like I don't feel older ...BUT physically...
When I turned 40 I realized I just might need reading glasses... today I can't read anything without them!
My hair needs frequent colorings and abit more conditioner these days! My hair has always been thick thick thick now it's thinning a bit.
I haven't had my monthly period in 4 months before that it was 5 months on maybe skip one or two then back to normal again.
I am hot I am cold in a matter of min's sweater on sweater off! I am crying happy and pissed all at the same time.
I can't get comfortable in bed and wake a few times a night theres never a good night sleep to be had.
My lower back aches my legs ache... my bones snap krackle and pop like a bowl of rice krispies. I sit on the edge of the bed for a bit before I get up in the morn for fear of falling on my face. I can't grap a pillow and sit on the floor like I used to and it's tough to get up ( like someones put a hitch in my giddy up).
I feel like I lost my get up and go and honestly I recall the aches and pains starting around 47ish.
So all in all I am just glad to be alive you take what you are given and run with it but in this case I think I will just stroll.

reply to post by DrMattMaddix


It feels great to be old. The secret is to eat right, get regular exercise, keep your inner child the only one in there, stay busy, maintain an open mind and love humanity. Also, stay well groomed and feel good about yourself. If you follow all these suggestions, you won't feel old. I don't know how old feels because when I look in the mirror I don't see an old person. And dance even if you're by yourself! The spirit says we are ageless. Go to: messages2012.blogspot.com

reply to post by muse7


I didn't read the rest of this thread, but I thought this was such an interesting question I wanted to answer without the influence of other posts.

I can only speak for myself. I don't think any one person can say "what it's like to be old". They can say what it's like for THEM to be old.

I remember when I thought people over 40 were old, too. I'm 56 now and 40 is young. That's one thing that's different.

With me, I am happier than I've ever been. I'm more open-minded, more mellow... what other people do doesn't bother me. Life's too short to be concerned with other people's behavior. I think life gets better as you go along. You learn more and gather memories and special events that you'll think back on all your life. My husband and I still laugh about things we did 20 years ago.

I do wish I had taken better care of myself, physically. I smoked for many years and ate a lot of the wrong stuff... And I think my health suffered from it. But I'm doing much better on that now.

One thing about being "old" is that I'm done trying to please other people. I spent way too much time trying to be what other people wanted me to be. At last, I can freely be who I am and it feels wonderful!

So, what's it like? It's pretty cool.