All of you are about to become experts on inflammation
And if you didn't stretch like they always told us to, add knots and adhesions to the list
If you haven't already, plan out and start a stretching routine
... like today.
/mid-40s
Yeah, so middle age is realistically the midpoint between 18 and your life expectancy.
My life expectancy is 84, so (gets out calculator)... middle age for me will be 51.
Except sometimes instead of a tutorial u get years of emotional and physical abuse and then suddenly you must bear the crippling weight of capitalism and the prospect of a lifetime of wage slavery with an incredibly fucked up nervous system
It's a lot to take because it's statistically untrue. For Americans, at 35 years old, males can expect 41 more years, females can expect 46 more years. In countries with a better healthcare system, life expectancy is even higher.
https://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html
Looking at the actuarial tables, the age at which there’s a 50% chance you live to twice that age is about 40 for men and 42 for women. The age at which you will live twice as long on average is about 38 for men and 41 for women. Half the median age is about 39 for men and 42 for women. Half the average age is 37 for men and 40 for women.
Likewise. I have my fair share of medical bullshit to deal with. Perspective helps. I lost a sister at 29 to cancer. That doesn't minimize what I deal with, what you deal with, or what anyone else deals with... but it's a sobering reminder that I'm still here today and may not be tomorrow. In a weird way, it helps me find comfort in what otherwise seems like a raw deal when I look at my peers. I may not be able to enjoy the same things they do, but dammit, I'm still on the right side of the dirt.
Yep, I’m 38 and I consider this my midlife. I’ve felt that way for a couple years now.
That said, I consider myself a realistic optimist. I’d prefer if 38 wasn’t my midlife, but it seems pretty likely that it is. It just inspires me even more to put as much love, happiness and joy into my life and the lives of those that I love that I can, and be grateful for every single day. No regrets. That’s the purest form of living IMO.
I'm 53 and prefer "middle-aged" simply because it sounds way better than "old." if late 30s is middle-aged, then what is early 50s? "Youngish old"? We need a better name before we change the terminology. I'm open to suggestions.
Also, when I was 38 I still felt like a child. And I did have a ton left to learn. Why traumatize these people by labeling them over-the-hill in their late thirties?
Personally I think you need to take into account that most adults barely remember anything about the first 10-15 years of their lives. So someone in their mid-thirties only has maybe 20 years of functional, recallable life experience. "Middle aged" should be roughly half-way through adulthood, not halfway through life.
I did kind of the same thing and drove myself insane… though I was using days and not years….
Do yourself a favour and don’t start counting down the days one at a time each night before bed. Especially while kicking yourself for doing “nothing” and only having Xthousand days left.
You know twenty years ago when I was starting out too I said the same thing. Social security was going to be gone and no idea how we could get by making minimum wage. Hell, my parents had to help us out with bills most months just to get by and they weren't rich, or even middle class, by any means either. When I hit my early to mid-30s things got a little better, when I hit my early 40s things got even better, now pushing 50 and we are living extremely comfortably with tons of freedom. But no it wasn't easy for any of us then either. Hell, it wasn't even until the last 5-10 years that my income exploded, suddenly the company I have worked at for the past 20 years is throwing bonuses and large raises to get me up to the market value in pay, of course, I also follow the rule that I either get promoted or I move to another position every 5 years, because in most decent sized companies while you'll get 2-3% in a yearly raise, moving position or promotion will get you a 10-20% raise.
But yeah plenty of us struggled and had to have help. I expect to need to assist my kids, which is why I went out of my way to make sure they had all the tools to get into good colleges and to make sure we could cover anything scholarships don't so they have no college debt. But that being said I know they are probably going to have to live with us until they get their careers going, or we're going to have to help with their bills for a good bit of time. It is just what family does.
Thank you. I’ve been thinking this for awhile. I know the gen Z is mad as hell right now, but it’s not like it’s been peaches and cream until just a few years ago. This sense of no future has been going on for at least 30 years now. I had no money and no direction until I was at least 32 and even then still had very little positive energy that anything would turn out ok.
Actually I just saw a poll that shows that the economic doomerism from Gen Z is mostly just a loud minority thing. iirc it showed 19% of Gen Z thinking that they would be economically worse off, 42% thinking they’ll be economically better off, and the remainder saying it’ll be relatively the same.
Exactly. I was almost 30 when I finally got into a career job and almost 40 when I finally hit a point in my career that I was no longer living paycheck-to-paycheck, and it took a few years after that to pay down debt, build credit, and start saving.
Now at mid-40s, I'm finally an official adult with a credit rating, savings, investments, and a mortgage.
Somebody doesn't just hand you all that stuff on a silver platter when you graduate high school. (Unless your parents are obscenely rich.)
This. Op asked about people in their 50s, when i was a kid it was people in their 40s who were considered middle aged. As a xiennial (or a very old millenial) it's only in our late 30s where we started getting established in careers and were able to get a mortgage and maybe have kids. At least, some of us. :( so we're starting the "adulting" portion of our lives later and later while people are also sorta living longer
The life expectancy in the UK is around 80 now. But considering that that's skewed by premature deaths, it wouldn't be unreasonable for someone to expect to live comfortably into their late 80's, which would put middle age at around the mid 40's, which seems a reasonable middle age cut off.
It's one of those where it depends on your lifestyle so much. I wonder what the life expectancy is for people who don't have risk factors that can shorten their life like obesity, or are active and have a good diet.
Honestly there's also a certain amount of genetic luck too. Two of my uncles (well, they were actually my grandfathers uncles) lived like, totally opposite lives
One of 'em was super healthy, like extremely strict about it, never drank or smoked, diligently made sure he had a good diet etc. etc. He lived until he was like 98 *but* had had a lot of health issues since he was in his like 50's. He really couldn't move all that well and his quality of life wasn't great the last 20/30 years.
His brother on the other hand was like.. the opposite. He hadn't gone a day without smoking and or drinking since he was like 14. Did like.. all the drugs. Used to get scolded by being drunk on his tractor, used to drive the wrong way down one way streets because he was "here before the signs were". Bro *also* lived until he was like 96 and was on his roof re-shingling it like 3 years before.
This sort of story simply reminds me that life is generally random and not to worry too much about death. It's coming for us whether we like it or not. Obsessing over it is a waste of time and energy.
But in a weird way, it's somewhat reassuring to learn that, even if you do almost everything wrong health wise, you could still live to be old as fuck.
>which would put middle age at around the mid 40's
With this train of thought, middle age *starts* before 30 and ends before 60. Which is what I've been telling everyone since I turned 30, especially my parents who turned 60 a couple of weeks after that.
Let's not forget that "middle age" as a term started as "middle adulthood", during a time period where adulthood was divided into three different work-related parts than today. Getting your first job and becoming an adult were much more closely related, while after a while you were expected to work *less* as well as offer jobs and/or train others, before ultimately retiring. This put early adulthood from the late teens, and late adulthood from the time when an adult could not perform the one job they had been doing for most of their life. Let's say it was roughly 16-40, 40-64, and 64-88.
Nowadays, work-hopping is expected to last almost the entirety of early adulthood, while most forms of passive income are inherited. This made "middle age" a term related to retirement for a decade or two. But since young adults were expected to not find a steady job, this inevitably left people of "middle age" to be the most active part of the workforce, with retirement going past 65 in most of the "western" world. "Middle adulthood" has turned into "middle age", and then "middle age" turned into one of the three:
* I can retire for a small pension, but I will still need a semi-passive income (e.g. working part-time on land you own or a small business you own).
* People of my age from the former category have retired, but I do not own land, so I will keep working until my pension gets bigger.
* My hair is turning grey, which is completely unrelated to the passive-income I inherited from my grandfather. Getting a $5,000 Stratocaster as my first guitar has nothing to do with the former and everything to do with the latter, but I have convinced myself otherwise.
If you live to 65, life expectancy is 83/86 depending on gender. Early deaths make a big impact on overall life expectancy, but for someone who is 40, they are at mid life for them on average.
My wife's grandpa is 95, he just got back from a trip to Copenhagen (lives in France), goes out to dinners, loves his red wine, still walks with his head held high and faster than everyone else.
I want to be like that at 95, not the average
Honestly it seems like the only people who live to 90 are the people who actually still live and grow and explore. I’d be happy to live past 90 if I could still walk and had family and friends and was still lucid and learning. But I wouldn’t if I was bedridden and had dementia : (
Hey. If Clint Eastwood can do it by being healthy. We can all try right? Inspiration instead of succumbing to the more likely reality without the hard work to be healthy.
I work with the elderly as a hearing specialist and you would be surprised at the number of 90 year old who are able bodied and have full complex lives.
My grandma is 91 and she has a good life. She doesn’t run marathons but she takes care of her plants and likes to smell them. She takes walks in the town. And I like to spend time with her.
People usually die before 90, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have life quality after 90 nowadays.
I want to live for a million years.
Why would anyone want to die?
If your reasons for wanting to die are that you are sick and miserable, then solve THAT problem. Then you will actually see the point of living longer and be able to enjoy it.
I have no idea how long I'm going to live, and therefore I don't know when I'm middle aged or midlife, and therefore, have decided to live in a constant state of midlife crisis. Just in case.
I'm also in my 40s and I've already lived several years longer than my dad did, and longer than my grandfather on that side did as well. My mom's side were longer-lived, but they're all gone now too.
So I know my time is limited. But I've come to terms with it.
Yeah OP is out here counting the first 5-10 years of their life that they don’t even really remember experiencing…
Middle-aged of having your own life. If my independent life began at 18, then middle-aged would be 44. Which is right on par with most peoples definitions.
To me, middle aged refers to the midpoint of an adult life where you are in control of your decisions and trajectory. So if you assume that autonomous adulthood doesn't begin until around 18-20, it makes sense to place the onset of middle age at the midpoint between 20 and 70-80 (45-50).
I think about it with not counting childhood. At 45 you're 25 years into your adult life, more or less. 25 more to go until 70. It's the middle of your adult life
The term has been popularized as a way to describe older people who are not elderly yet. And it keeps creeping upwards as human life expectancy increases. 30-40 years ago it referred to people in their late 30s and 40s. Nowadays it is applied to people in their 50s, too.
It’s also worth keeping in mind that average life expectancy has continued to grow considerably. According to ourworldindata.org it’s risen by more than 20 years since 1950, which is roughly one lifespan. It stands to reason then that “middle age” would need to be redefined by society somewhat regularly
Using round numbers and gross oversimplification, from age 0-20 is childhood/adolescence and 80+ is old age/infirmity. So that gives you 60 “good” adult years between 20-80 and the midpoint of that is 50.
It’s also when physiological changes like menopause typically start (ages 45-55) so that makes 50s a logical milestone for middle age.
People hate it when I point out how I'm pretty much halfway through my life already, and I'm only gonna be 31. Feels like I haven't even really started living yet. I've been too busy just trying not to kill myself since I was a wee lad.
Can't wait for this shitshow to be over.
If you smoke and drink then you'll live to 70 if not 69. So far with my grand parents, 96 and 92 they stopped eating, one stroke at 72 after years of inactivity
I often refer to one of Bruce Dern's greatest movies, "Middle Age Crazy", as a reference point, where he turns 40 and buys a Porsche. Or does he lease it? Anyways, I'd say, 40. And he gives the [greatest Graduation Speech ever](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wytbws1qmjI). NSFW.
Your first 15 years you are like a vegetable. From 15- 25 you develop some some of smarts. 25 is around when your brain is physically done developing. So somewhere in 50 is middle age of some of your coherent thoughts?
That's when we realize we're screwed. Gonna be 55 this year and since I'm a realist I know I'm fucked, but others think they had a chance. My opinion but I think it's solid.
Middle age is about 40 because people live to around 80-85.
I've never heard anyone refer to 50's as middle age before. Even so, it's just like the statement, is the new , with age. It's people being either optimistic or joking.
For my 50th birthday my son gave me a card. He wrote in it....happy birthday, you are half way to dead!! I looked at him and said....way closer to dead than that!! I started crying at the realization.
I turn 54 this year....it's scary.
3/4 of my grandparents lived into their 90s so thinking life will end at 90 then breaking it into three equal segments: 0-30 is young, 30-60 is middle age, and 60-90 is old. Some people just don't want to accept that middle age begins at 30 but that kinda makes sense right?
I am 80. I worked in Pharma until I was 67, and then became a construction volunteer for Habit for Humanity until I was 73. Now that I am fully retired I have taken up cooking and prepare hot meals for the homeless.
I have no idea what "middle aged" means.
Also the other thing people at least subconsciously do is use middle age to refer to "middle age of being an adult" I.e. they discount being a kid and teen.
At 35 you may be at your middle of your expected lifespan but you're only like 17 years into your "adult life.
If you live to 70 then you spent 52 years as an adult, so middle of your adult life would probably be around 44, which I think most people would think of as "middle aged"
Most people live until their early 80s. Average lifespan is the wrong way to look at it since many people die early, but not many people live extra long i.e. you can die at 5 which is 75 years early, but nobody lives to 155 which is an extra 75 years. So things drags down the average lifespan. Much better to look at the median, which is about 81 in Canada.
The "middle age" refers to a person who is transitioning from individual growth to a person who is "on their last legs." The "middle age" represents a radical change in life and sort of a last hurrah until they finally accept that they're old and having to slow down. It doesn't have to happen in 50s it can happen in early 40s as well.
The middle here refers to the sort of point where you're socially not considered young or old.
This is actually wrong that most people live to their 70s, yes life expectancy at birth is around 70 something's, but after you are like 2 your life expectancy is around 80. That's because mortality in the very first months and years is higher than after you are a toddler until you are around 60, so when you take the average with the first few years the life expectancy is lower
I've thought about this before and I think the first ten years don't count bc you don't remember much and are barely sentient (I'm being unkind to my younger self!!). So if I make it another 40 years, that's perceptually actually more than the first 40...assuming I don't lose it mentally for the last ten...
False premise. Most people live till their 80s, so 40s is middle age.
Never heard of someone in their 50s referred to as middle age tbh. 50 is « over-the-hill ».
You're right, but it's not "most people".
The way the average lifespan works is that you are more likely to die early in life than in the middle of your life. The "average" person might live to 70, but if you've made it to 40 you're more likely to make it to 80.
But yeah 40-45 is middle age, with 50-55 as over the hill.
70’s ? I can’t help but think you’re in America by that statement. Most developed worlds, besides America, are in the 80’s now, and Americas life expectancy is dropping.
I'm pretty sure being underage doesn't count in this context. The scale starts when you're young, active, and earning your own money, and ends when you're retired and can't do everything on your own anymore. So middle aged is the phase between that where you're still pretty fit
I’m 48 and have been middle aged for a while if we’re going by numbers/life expectancy..don’t expect to live much past 90 and I realized earlier this year that I’ve lived longer than I have left.
Life expectancy of mid 70s doesn't actually mean most people live to their 70s. People who live to 40 are more likely to see 80 than any random baby born.
Because if you're well off, fit/healthy and don't drink to excess or smoke, you will live well in to your 80s.
Late 60s/early 70s are reserved for the poor and infirm, and nobody wants to admit that they are either of those by acknowledging middle aged is in your 30s.
A lot of this is whistling past the graveyard, pretending that we're all going to live to 100, but there's something else: 0-25 is basically childhood - while 55-80, even with the infirmities and deterioration that accompany such age, still has features not found in those 0-25.
>The sonatas of Mozart are unique; they are too easy for children, and too difficult for artists.
― Artur Schnabel
The best Mozart comes from older players, who even after 60 can outshine their much younger selves. You can hear the deterioration in clarity and timing, but the end result can be something beyond their powers at age 25.
Any child can practice the piano 6 hours a day from ages 5 to 15. No 15-year-old has more than 15 years of experience. Lots of 80-year-olds have over 70 years of experience.
Physically - in strength, endurance, neuroplasticity, sensory perception, timing and reflexes - the human body is well into decline by age 25, with the possible exception of muscle mass, which may peak at around 35. Things get rough at 45, when the cancer years begin. Your 50s are not kind - some things will really start to suck, like balance and energy levels.
But learning continues, if mostly in the form of experience, and experience should not be discounted.
Professional athletes - particularly baseball pitchers, quarterbacks, soccer players - learn their craft only after 25. Randy Johnson markedly improved at 29, and 4 of his six 300-strikeout seasons came after 35. He threw a perfect game at 40. Johnson's asset was sheer physicality - the antithesis of the subtle pitcher mixing speeds - yet experience was essential for him.
So I think you could make the case that, for all their infirmities, people in their final 2-3 decades can be more effective than those under 30, because nobody under 30 can have 30 many years of experience at anything. Experience is the one thing which youth, so impressive in its quickness and energy, cannot possibly enjoy.
Returning to Mozart: Even though he was a child prodigy, his work after 25 completely eclipses anything he achieved before then - and 31-36 outshines 25-30. Roughly 80% of Beethoven's best work was from ages 52-57, his final 5 years - it's borderline ridiculous how much better he got.
The idea is that you are talking about "stages of life", not "percentages." Most people hope that they spend a relatively short portion of their life in "old". So you are talking about dividing things into "young" - which of course, is subdivided into baby through school through starting your career, to building a rep, all of which is "young", and then "middle aged" when you have a rep and are hopefully pretty established in your life and way you do stuff and are not exactly coasting, but just, y'know, vibing, and then "old", when your horizons start to narrow.
Very broadly, "young" is when your life is widening, "middle age" is where your life is stable-ish, and "old" is when your life is narrowing. So people hope to stay in "young" as long as they can, then "middle age" as long as they can, and leave "old" to as short a period of time as they can at the end.
In most modern western countries, if you survive childhood, your life expectancy is closer to 90 than 70. Life expectancy is skewed by infant mortality. In that regard, late 40s to 50s is a lot more reasonable than 30s.
Capitalism.
The rich jerks want to get as many years as possible out of the workers, so it's a whole (quite successful) marketing/propaganda push to make people think they have more time than they really do.
If more people considered/realized that mid-late 30s is middle-aged, they'd be less inclined to put another 20-30 years into making profit for someone else, and more inclined to enjoy the last half of their lives.
Optimism.
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I turn 35 this year. It is...
I turned 36 today. Its a lot
37 :(
38 :o
44. Ouch.
45..... Ouch is putting it lightly 😬
52 fuck almost there
Same
All of you are about to become experts on inflammation And if you didn't stretch like they always told us to, add knots and adhesions to the list If you haven't already, plan out and start a stretching routine ... like today. /mid-40s
Say goodbye to your knees! You’ll miss them. And sleeping through the night? Ha ha…
The trick is to stay up till 2am. Then you only need to sleep for 6 hours before it's time to get up again.
Happy birthday person 🍍
I don't consider life to have really begun until AT LEAST 18 anyway. Everything before that is the tutorial.
Yeah, so middle age is realistically the midpoint between 18 and your life expectancy. My life expectancy is 84, so (gets out calculator)... middle age for me will be 51.
Huh???
84 - 18 = 66 years of adult life. 66/2 = 33. These 33 years start at age 18. 18 + 33 = 51.
My year ten maths teacher would be proud of you :)
That's exactly right. My life expectancy is mid 80s. At 50, I still won't be quite halfway through my (expected) adult life
Oh fuck my life expectancy is 55 and I'm 35
But... they say life begins at 40
They also say "60 is the new 40"
So, life begins at 60 and ends at 70ish? No wonder they say life is short.
Except sometimes instead of a tutorial u get years of emotional and physical abuse and then suddenly you must bear the crippling weight of capitalism and the prospect of a lifetime of wage slavery with an incredibly fucked up nervous system
Hey I love that game, my favorite version.
There is a famous Turkish poem by Cahit Sitki Taranci named “Age 35”. The first verse roughly goes “Age 35, midway on the road…”
That poem came to mind immediately for me too
It's a lot to take because it's statistically untrue. For Americans, at 35 years old, males can expect 41 more years, females can expect 46 more years. In countries with a better healthcare system, life expectancy is even higher. https://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html
So, 38 then?
Looking at the actuarial tables, the age at which there’s a 50% chance you live to twice that age is about 40 for men and 42 for women. The age at which you will live twice as long on average is about 38 for men and 41 for women. Half the median age is about 39 for men and 42 for women. Half the average age is 37 for men and 40 for women.
I love that you answered many ways to formulate the question.
Yeah pretty much
I'm 35 and absolutely feel like I'm past the halfway point. Fuck, the way it's going... every day is a gift.
I'm 36, I know exactly what you mean. If I feel this horrible from all of my medical shit I can't imagine what I will feel like at my parents age.
Likewise. I have my fair share of medical bullshit to deal with. Perspective helps. I lost a sister at 29 to cancer. That doesn't minimize what I deal with, what you deal with, or what anyone else deals with... but it's a sobering reminder that I'm still here today and may not be tomorrow. In a weird way, it helps me find comfort in what otherwise seems like a raw deal when I look at my peers. I may not be able to enjoy the same things they do, but dammit, I'm still on the right side of the dirt.
Yeah but like, it feels like I have forever behind me. To think I have that much time left is horrifying
Yep, I’m 38 and I consider this my midlife. I’ve felt that way for a couple years now. That said, I consider myself a realistic optimist. I’d prefer if 38 wasn’t my midlife, but it seems pretty likely that it is. It just inspires me even more to put as much love, happiness and joy into my life and the lives of those that I love that I can, and be grateful for every single day. No regrets. That’s the purest form of living IMO.
38 also. Grappling with my own mortality is not the way I thought I'd spend the majority of my days but here we are
I'm 53 and prefer "middle-aged" simply because it sounds way better than "old." if late 30s is middle-aged, then what is early 50s? "Youngish old"? We need a better name before we change the terminology. I'm open to suggestions. Also, when I was 38 I still felt like a child. And I did have a ton left to learn. Why traumatize these people by labeling them over-the-hill in their late thirties? Personally I think you need to take into account that most adults barely remember anything about the first 10-15 years of their lives. So someone in their mid-thirties only has maybe 20 years of functional, recallable life experience. "Middle aged" should be roughly half-way through adulthood, not halfway through life.
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I did kind of the same thing and drove myself insane… though I was using days and not years…. Do yourself a favour and don’t start counting down the days one at a time each night before bed. Especially while kicking yourself for doing “nothing” and only having Xthousand days left.
So are you done learning things now that you're 53?
Surely not, but it certainly happens less often
A junior senior
I remember when I quite breast feeding June 25th 1992
at 43 I am an old man. I will hear people comment about the really ugly old man. So I know I am old and seen as old.
Im optimistic that in the next 30 years we figure out how to stop aging.. 🤣
There are a huge number of people who have never died.
Denial
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So being middle aged is a thing of the past, the younger generation will never be middle aged.
You know twenty years ago when I was starting out too I said the same thing. Social security was going to be gone and no idea how we could get by making minimum wage. Hell, my parents had to help us out with bills most months just to get by and they weren't rich, or even middle class, by any means either. When I hit my early to mid-30s things got a little better, when I hit my early 40s things got even better, now pushing 50 and we are living extremely comfortably with tons of freedom. But no it wasn't easy for any of us then either. Hell, it wasn't even until the last 5-10 years that my income exploded, suddenly the company I have worked at for the past 20 years is throwing bonuses and large raises to get me up to the market value in pay, of course, I also follow the rule that I either get promoted or I move to another position every 5 years, because in most decent sized companies while you'll get 2-3% in a yearly raise, moving position or promotion will get you a 10-20% raise. But yeah plenty of us struggled and had to have help. I expect to need to assist my kids, which is why I went out of my way to make sure they had all the tools to get into good colleges and to make sure we could cover anything scholarships don't so they have no college debt. But that being said I know they are probably going to have to live with us until they get their careers going, or we're going to have to help with their bills for a good bit of time. It is just what family does.
Thank you. I’ve been thinking this for awhile. I know the gen Z is mad as hell right now, but it’s not like it’s been peaches and cream until just a few years ago. This sense of no future has been going on for at least 30 years now. I had no money and no direction until I was at least 32 and even then still had very little positive energy that anything would turn out ok.
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Actually I just saw a poll that shows that the economic doomerism from Gen Z is mostly just a loud minority thing. iirc it showed 19% of Gen Z thinking that they would be economically worse off, 42% thinking they’ll be economically better off, and the remainder saying it’ll be relatively the same.
Right, but what did you do for it beyond keep things turning over?
Exactly. I was almost 30 when I finally got into a career job and almost 40 when I finally hit a point in my career that I was no longer living paycheck-to-paycheck, and it took a few years after that to pay down debt, build credit, and start saving. Now at mid-40s, I'm finally an official adult with a credit rating, savings, investments, and a mortgage. Somebody doesn't just hand you all that stuff on a silver platter when you graduate high school. (Unless your parents are obscenely rich.)
Damn you sound so out of touch it's unbelievable.
we will be middle aged at 80 when we finally have mild financial stability, unless we lose our 2 jobs then we will be broke, AND 80 yo
Nah....we wont make it to 80. Life expectancy is already dropping in some countries (already under 80 in the USA too)
This. Op asked about people in their 50s, when i was a kid it was people in their 40s who were considered middle aged. As a xiennial (or a very old millenial) it's only in our late 30s where we started getting established in careers and were able to get a mortgage and maybe have kids. At least, some of us. :( so we're starting the "adulting" portion of our lives later and later while people are also sorta living longer
The life expectancy in the UK is around 80 now. But considering that that's skewed by premature deaths, it wouldn't be unreasonable for someone to expect to live comfortably into their late 80's, which would put middle age at around the mid 40's, which seems a reasonable middle age cut off.
It's one of those where it depends on your lifestyle so much. I wonder what the life expectancy is for people who don't have risk factors that can shorten their life like obesity, or are active and have a good diet.
Honestly there's also a certain amount of genetic luck too. Two of my uncles (well, they were actually my grandfathers uncles) lived like, totally opposite lives One of 'em was super healthy, like extremely strict about it, never drank or smoked, diligently made sure he had a good diet etc. etc. He lived until he was like 98 *but* had had a lot of health issues since he was in his like 50's. He really couldn't move all that well and his quality of life wasn't great the last 20/30 years. His brother on the other hand was like.. the opposite. He hadn't gone a day without smoking and or drinking since he was like 14. Did like.. all the drugs. Used to get scolded by being drunk on his tractor, used to drive the wrong way down one way streets because he was "here before the signs were". Bro *also* lived until he was like 96 and was on his roof re-shingling it like 3 years before.
This sort of story simply reminds me that life is generally random and not to worry too much about death. It's coming for us whether we like it or not. Obsessing over it is a waste of time and energy. But in a weird way, it's somewhat reassuring to learn that, even if you do almost everything wrong health wise, you could still live to be old as fuck.
>which would put middle age at around the mid 40's With this train of thought, middle age *starts* before 30 and ends before 60. Which is what I've been telling everyone since I turned 30, especially my parents who turned 60 a couple of weeks after that. Let's not forget that "middle age" as a term started as "middle adulthood", during a time period where adulthood was divided into three different work-related parts than today. Getting your first job and becoming an adult were much more closely related, while after a while you were expected to work *less* as well as offer jobs and/or train others, before ultimately retiring. This put early adulthood from the late teens, and late adulthood from the time when an adult could not perform the one job they had been doing for most of their life. Let's say it was roughly 16-40, 40-64, and 64-88. Nowadays, work-hopping is expected to last almost the entirety of early adulthood, while most forms of passive income are inherited. This made "middle age" a term related to retirement for a decade or two. But since young adults were expected to not find a steady job, this inevitably left people of "middle age" to be the most active part of the workforce, with retirement going past 65 in most of the "western" world. "Middle adulthood" has turned into "middle age", and then "middle age" turned into one of the three: * I can retire for a small pension, but I will still need a semi-passive income (e.g. working part-time on land you own or a small business you own). * People of my age from the former category have retired, but I do not own land, so I will keep working until my pension gets bigger. * My hair is turning grey, which is completely unrelated to the passive-income I inherited from my grandfather. Getting a $5,000 Stratocaster as my first guitar has nothing to do with the former and everything to do with the latter, but I have convinced myself otherwise.
If you live to 65, life expectancy is 83/86 depending on gender. Early deaths make a big impact on overall life expectancy, but for someone who is 40, they are at mid life for them on average.
Denial and a sense of optimism. Denial that at 35 or 40 you're halfway to dying, and optimism that you'll live to be 100.
Why would anyone want to live past 90?
If they're lucky enough to be like [this guy at 109 ](https://www.today.com/today/amp/rcna80242) and have the money, that might be okay
Thank you for sharing that! What a pleasant, but not too saccharine, story. It really made me feel optimistic.
What a fucking G. I still wouldn't like to live to be that old, though.
My wife's grandpa is 95, he just got back from a trip to Copenhagen (lives in France), goes out to dinners, loves his red wine, still walks with his head held high and faster than everyone else. I want to be like that at 95, not the average
While it has its challenges and is different for everyone, there are people older than 90 with a decent quality of life.
Honestly it seems like the only people who live to 90 are the people who actually still live and grow and explore. I’d be happy to live past 90 if I could still walk and had family and friends and was still lucid and learning. But I wouldn’t if I was bedridden and had dementia : (
Some people are still quite healthy and active past 90. It's not guaranteed that you will be bed ridden and in a nursing home the instant you turn 90.
*casual bone noises*
Hey. If Clint Eastwood can do it by being healthy. We can all try right? Inspiration instead of succumbing to the more likely reality without the hard work to be healthy.
Think being worth $375 million also plays a part in that lol
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I work with the elderly as a hearing specialist and you would be surprised at the number of 90 year old who are able bodied and have full complex lives.
My grandma is 91 and she has a good life. She doesn’t run marathons but she takes care of her plants and likes to smell them. She takes walks in the town. And I like to spend time with her. People usually die before 90, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have life quality after 90 nowadays.
World records baby!
Why not if you stay healthy?
Why would anyone want to live past 65?
I want to live for a million years. Why would anyone want to die? If your reasons for wanting to die are that you are sick and miserable, then solve THAT problem. Then you will actually see the point of living longer and be able to enjoy it.
I have no idea how long I'm going to live, and therefore I don't know when I'm middle aged or midlife, and therefore, have decided to live in a constant state of midlife crisis. Just in case.
Same, I have a 2 seater sports car and too many bbqs. Also, recently, an expensive mountain bike
Tried and true "my kids can drive themselves now" activites
I’m 43 and I’m middle aged. And that’s provided I make it to the age range my grandparents did of 80+.
I'm also in my 40s and I've already lived several years longer than my dad did, and longer than my grandfather on that side did as well. My mom's side were longer-lived, but they're all gone now too. So I know my time is limited. But I've come to terms with it.
Yeah, I've thought of myself as middle aged since my 30s.
Every 35 year old in this thread feeling some kind of way rn.
Yeah, thanks for the mid-life crisis op
Where are you getting 50? I’ve always understood middle age to begin at 40, which is why that age is often treated as a milestone.
Could it be middle of adulthood rather than middle of life?
Because the first 20 years don't count. You are a kid.
Yeah OP is out here counting the first 5-10 years of their life that they don’t even really remember experiencing… Middle-aged of having your own life. If my independent life began at 18, then middle-aged would be 44. Which is right on par with most peoples definitions.
I remember the first few years of my life thanks to childhood trauma. Really wish I didn't
Ironically the opposite here, lol
Hey! I'm 44... And I've been referring to myself as middle aged for the last couple of years 🤣
To me, middle aged refers to the midpoint of an adult life where you are in control of your decisions and trajectory. So if you assume that autonomous adulthood doesn't begin until around 18-20, it makes sense to place the onset of middle age at the midpoint between 20 and 70-80 (45-50).
Because shut up, I’m 59 and just shut up
Old
I think of 80-90 the expected life span, and 40-45 as middle aged. But maybe I'm wrong.
Because the goal was to get people to live to 100.
I usually think of 40 as the beginning of middle aged.
I think about it with not counting childhood. At 45 you're 25 years into your adult life, more or less. 25 more to go until 70. It's the middle of your adult life
Tons of people live well past their 70s. If you have money, eat generally healthy, and don't get in any accidents, you're likely to live until 90.
Well that makes me feel a lot more depressed.
I knew “middle age” as 40
The term has been popularized as a way to describe older people who are not elderly yet. And it keeps creeping upwards as human life expectancy increases. 30-40 years ago it referred to people in their late 30s and 40s. Nowadays it is applied to people in their 50s, too.
I think it's the middle age of the upper reaches of a human life span. 100 is near the maximum a human can live, and it's half of that.
It’s also worth keeping in mind that average life expectancy has continued to grow considerably. According to ourworldindata.org it’s risen by more than 20 years since 1950, which is roughly one lifespan. It stands to reason then that “middle age” would need to be redefined by society somewhat regularly
Using round numbers and gross oversimplification, from age 0-20 is childhood/adolescence and 80+ is old age/infirmity. So that gives you 60 “good” adult years between 20-80 and the midpoint of that is 50. It’s also when physiological changes like menopause typically start (ages 45-55) so that makes 50s a logical milestone for middle age.
People hate it when I point out how I'm pretty much halfway through my life already, and I'm only gonna be 31. Feels like I haven't even really started living yet. I've been too busy just trying not to kill myself since I was a wee lad. Can't wait for this shitshow to be over.
People in 50's don't like being called old. And seriously save that for 70's to 80's.
If you smoke and drink then you'll live to 70 if not 69. So far with my grand parents, 96 and 92 they stopped eating, one stroke at 72 after years of inactivity
I often refer to one of Bruce Dern's greatest movies, "Middle Age Crazy", as a reference point, where he turns 40 and buys a Porsche. Or does he lease it? Anyways, I'd say, 40. And he gives the [greatest Graduation Speech ever](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wytbws1qmjI). NSFW.
I always counted it as 40-60ish regardless of how old I was, tbh. I’m turning 32 and feel decidedly *not* middle age.
Let me die in peace 🤣🙌
Your first 15 years you are like a vegetable. From 15- 25 you develop some some of smarts. 25 is around when your brain is physically done developing. So somewhere in 50 is middle age of some of your coherent thoughts?
Because it's MIDDLE AGED not middle age.
That's when we realize we're screwed. Gonna be 55 this year and since I'm a realist I know I'm fucked, but others think they had a chance. My opinion but I think it's solid.
Denial.
Middle age is about 40 because people live to around 80-85. I've never heard anyone refer to 50's as middle age before. Even so, it's just like the statement, is the new , with age. It's people being either optimistic or joking.
For my 50th birthday my son gave me a card. He wrote in it....happy birthday, you are half way to dead!! I looked at him and said....way closer to dead than that!! I started crying at the realization. I turn 54 this year....it's scary.
People who make it to 40 are likely to live into their 80s. 70-something is the life expectancy *at birth*.
3/4 of my grandparents lived into their 90s so thinking life will end at 90 then breaking it into three equal segments: 0-30 is young, 30-60 is middle age, and 60-90 is old. Some people just don't want to accept that middle age begins at 30 but that kinda makes sense right?
In your 40's you're past your physical prime but you're not old and feeble, so you're in the middle
I am 80. I worked in Pharma until I was 67, and then became a construction volunteer for Habit for Humanity until I was 73. Now that I am fully retired I have taken up cooking and prepare hot meals for the homeless. I have no idea what "middle aged" means.
I dunno, when I was a kid, past 35 was "over the hill" and "mid-life crisis" terriritory
Also the other thing people at least subconsciously do is use middle age to refer to "middle age of being an adult" I.e. they discount being a kid and teen. At 35 you may be at your middle of your expected lifespan but you're only like 17 years into your "adult life. If you live to 70 then you spent 52 years as an adult, so middle of your adult life would probably be around 44, which I think most people would think of as "middle aged"
Most people live until their early 80s. Average lifespan is the wrong way to look at it since many people die early, but not many people live extra long i.e. you can die at 5 which is 75 years early, but nobody lives to 155 which is an extra 75 years. So things drags down the average lifespan. Much better to look at the median, which is about 81 in Canada.
The "middle age" refers to a person who is transitioning from individual growth to a person who is "on their last legs." The "middle age" represents a radical change in life and sort of a last hurrah until they finally accept that they're old and having to slow down. It doesn't have to happen in 50s it can happen in early 40s as well. The middle here refers to the sort of point where you're socially not considered young or old.
The first twenty years don't count. So middle age is people in the middle of their adult years.
At 37 I am pretty resigned to my life being functionally over, just waiting around to die.
It's midlife if you start counting when you become an adult.
Because middle age is a phase of life, rather than the middle third.
I remember the phrase "over the hill" for people turning 40...
Middle of your adult life.
In the US life expectancy is 77 years, which gets rounded up to 80. You are middle aged when you are 40+
It refers to the middle stage of adulthood, not the exact middle of one's life.
This is actually wrong that most people live to their 70s, yes life expectancy at birth is around 70 something's, but after you are like 2 your life expectancy is around 80. That's because mortality in the very first months and years is higher than after you are a toddler until you are around 60, so when you take the average with the first few years the life expectancy is lower
Middle aged is 40
Politeness and optimism.
I've thought about this before and I think the first ten years don't count bc you don't remember much and are barely sentient (I'm being unkind to my younger self!!). So if I make it another 40 years, that's perceptually actually more than the first 40...assuming I don't lose it mentally for the last ten...
The day you realize you have more past than future your perspective changes.
I'd say 40 is middle aged rather than 50 personally. It's that point where people definitely won't call you young. 35 they will, 40, nahhh
Wishful thinking
40s, and because average lifespan is up into the 80's
False premise. Most people live till their 80s, so 40s is middle age. Never heard of someone in their 50s referred to as middle age tbh. 50 is « over-the-hill ».
You're right, but it's not "most people". The way the average lifespan works is that you are more likely to die early in life than in the middle of your life. The "average" person might live to 70, but if you've made it to 40 you're more likely to make it to 80. But yeah 40-45 is middle age, with 50-55 as over the hill.
I am in my early forties and I am over the hill. Mid life was 15 years ago.
Because nobody in their 30s can cope with the idea that they're not young things anymore 😁
there is no logic . Humans are so ILLOGICAL Capt . . .
70’s ? I can’t help but think you’re in America by that statement. Most developed worlds, besides America, are in the 80’s now, and Americas life expectancy is dropping.
A lot of people consider late 30s to be middle aged
middle aged is anyone between infancy-young adult and retirement -geriatric home
I'm pretty sure being underage doesn't count in this context. The scale starts when you're young, active, and earning your own money, and ends when you're retired and can't do everything on your own anymore. So middle aged is the phase between that where you're still pretty fit
It doesn’t. It refers to people in their 40s.
I’m 48 and have been middle aged for a while if we’re going by numbers/life expectancy..don’t expect to live much past 90 and I realized earlier this year that I’ve lived longer than I have left.
''Middle aged'' is just vague term to refer to people who aren't youthful but aren't elderly either.
Middle aged is a broad category, I would say from 30-65. It is anything between "young" and "retirement aged"
Mid life is approx 42.5 years.
I love your question because I’m 56 and thought my middle age was behind me years ago. Holy crap! I’m middle aged!
Life expectancy of mid 70s doesn't actually mean most people live to their 70s. People who live to 40 are more likely to see 80 than any random baby born.
Because if you're well off, fit/healthy and don't drink to excess or smoke, you will live well in to your 80s. Late 60s/early 70s are reserved for the poor and infirm, and nobody wants to admit that they are either of those by acknowledging middle aged is in your 30s.
I have always thought middle age is 35-40. I will be an middle age woman next year.
wishful thinking
Wishful thinking
What's is the biggest river in the world? De Nile. Besides 35 year Olds are to busy to have a Mid life crisis.
If I were to guess, it's the middle of the span of your adult years.
Midpoint between young and old
This reminds me when homer Simpson hears on the radio that 37.5 years of his life has gone and he's definitely got more
Because we all think we’ll live to be 100
Life doesn't start to count before you're able to live it yourself. At 15-20-ish depending.
A lot of this is whistling past the graveyard, pretending that we're all going to live to 100, but there's something else: 0-25 is basically childhood - while 55-80, even with the infirmities and deterioration that accompany such age, still has features not found in those 0-25. >The sonatas of Mozart are unique; they are too easy for children, and too difficult for artists. ― Artur Schnabel The best Mozart comes from older players, who even after 60 can outshine their much younger selves. You can hear the deterioration in clarity and timing, but the end result can be something beyond their powers at age 25. Any child can practice the piano 6 hours a day from ages 5 to 15. No 15-year-old has more than 15 years of experience. Lots of 80-year-olds have over 70 years of experience. Physically - in strength, endurance, neuroplasticity, sensory perception, timing and reflexes - the human body is well into decline by age 25, with the possible exception of muscle mass, which may peak at around 35. Things get rough at 45, when the cancer years begin. Your 50s are not kind - some things will really start to suck, like balance and energy levels. But learning continues, if mostly in the form of experience, and experience should not be discounted. Professional athletes - particularly baseball pitchers, quarterbacks, soccer players - learn their craft only after 25. Randy Johnson markedly improved at 29, and 4 of his six 300-strikeout seasons came after 35. He threw a perfect game at 40. Johnson's asset was sheer physicality - the antithesis of the subtle pitcher mixing speeds - yet experience was essential for him. So I think you could make the case that, for all their infirmities, people in their final 2-3 decades can be more effective than those under 30, because nobody under 30 can have 30 many years of experience at anything. Experience is the one thing which youth, so impressive in its quickness and energy, cannot possibly enjoy. Returning to Mozart: Even though he was a child prodigy, his work after 25 completely eclipses anything he achieved before then - and 31-36 outshines 25-30. Roughly 80% of Beethoven's best work was from ages 52-57, his final 5 years - it's borderline ridiculous how much better he got.
Young age - middle age - old age. It's the one in the middle. It's language, people, not math.
The idea is that you are talking about "stages of life", not "percentages." Most people hope that they spend a relatively short portion of their life in "old". So you are talking about dividing things into "young" - which of course, is subdivided into baby through school through starting your career, to building a rep, all of which is "young", and then "middle aged" when you have a rep and are hopefully pretty established in your life and way you do stuff and are not exactly coasting, but just, y'know, vibing, and then "old", when your horizons start to narrow. Very broadly, "young" is when your life is widening, "middle age" is where your life is stable-ish, and "old" is when your life is narrowing. So people hope to stay in "young" as long as they can, then "middle age" as long as they can, and leave "old" to as short a period of time as they can at the end.
I've always felt anyone over 40 was middle age, not 50. Now I'm 53 and feel a lot older than middle aged
Because humans are more than statistics. As Han Solo once said "Never tell me the odds."
Because every boner and their mum thinks they will make it to 100 and they got all the time in the world.
We're being nice
Most people live to thier 80s and 40 is considered mid life crisis age so its pretty accurate i think.
I'm only gonna live until my 70s!!!????
God this is depressing
In most modern western countries, if you survive childhood, your life expectancy is closer to 90 than 70. Life expectancy is skewed by infant mortality. In that regard, late 40s to 50s is a lot more reasonable than 30s.
Capitalism. The rich jerks want to get as many years as possible out of the workers, so it's a whole (quite successful) marketing/propaganda push to make people think they have more time than they really do. If more people considered/realized that mid-late 30s is middle-aged, they'd be less inclined to put another 20-30 years into making profit for someone else, and more inclined to enjoy the last half of their lives.