http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=...-after-the-40s

I tried to read it, honest I did but I felt emotional turmoil stirring when it talked about Happienss is a U shaped thing in our lives, meaning at the beginning and end it's at it's highest. I am not sure I agree with that since I am still pretty happy and have been for a few years, I was happy for some years in my twenties and happy in my late teen years.

I was out with mother today and we were talking about how it's harder getting older and I saw her feeling out of breath trying to stay caught up with us so I have to remind myself not to ask too much of her on these day trips out for lunch and light shopping. Today I had to get shoes for Jack and myself and it was kinda tiring for us all that we looked all over walmart and then Kmart.

It took forever to find what we were looking for but we found them at Kmart. So anyway, I forgot to buy coffee and toilet paper and I even had a list! I just forgot to look at it and was worried about Mother so I wanted to get done faster, anyway needless to say it's humbling seeing your Mom growing old. She's all I have left, I lost Daddy when I was 12 and he was 57 at that point so I never knew him when he wasn't tired and older.

Now I am going to be 40 this year and I think about it a lot, kinda feel sad to see things getting harder, though since I became stable on meds a few years ago things got a lot easier. But I know that can change, and what once worked can stop working. I don't know exactly what it is that makes me sad, is it getting older, I don't know. Is it the fact that I am halfway through life if I am lucky? I don't know. But I do know it's weighing more and more on my mind as this year progresses.

I had Jackie late in life, I was like 27 and gave birth at 28. I think that has a little to do with this, because he's growing up so fast, I mean WOW just yesterday it seems like he was in kindergarten and here he is ready to hit sixth grade! I still feel pretty even though I don't wear makeup too often, and I still have most of my teeth, and I sat here thinking about getting partials, I think that will work out better then implants would. And I am getting used to the idea of it.

So is it all that miserable to be in your 40's and 50's? I don't know. But the 20's and 30's were good to me. What's bothering you bizi? Let's talk about it here.

When I was going to be 40, I used to say that to me, as long as my body is as good and strong as it has always been, this is just an arbitrary number that everyone attaches too much meaning to, and I meant it. But I did notice how people around me kept on cracking jokes about it or even telling me I was in denial. I got pretty annoyed, feeling like some of them were just making the jokes you are "supposed" to make, others really resented the fact that I was not about to become gloomy about it just to please them.

I have noticed in many instances that from the day one is born, there are numbers, age-wise, everyone really makes a big deal out of. So I feel that many people would not be as affected by "middle age" if within their culture it was not so ostensibly expected of them to have a "crisis". QED, if you read the article, in one culture people are congratulating each other when they reach middle age and feel proud and happy about it.

The only real thing is reassessing where you are headed, revising your inner picture of yourself and your transition from parent to ex-parent. But why can this not be viewed as a gradual process? Maybe because the years of raising children are so full of hectic and responsibility, that there seems to be no time to reflect on or prepare for the moment the last child leaves home. It can come as something of a shock at a time where the hormone-levels are changing and one is therefore more susceptible to depression. But these two things do not HAVE to coincide exactly, in fact they usually do not, especially since mothers these days generally have their first child a lot later than say twenty years ago. Also most women these days get medical support if their hormonal levels sway to much. And we stay in good health longer than we used to in general, and in any case this is very different in each individual. For every 70-year old that needs dentures and walking aids, there is another one that is still in full glorious health.

So it could be that our expectations about middle age and midlife crisis are based on coinciding factors that no longer coincide or even happen. All the more reason to not be daunted by the number "40".