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Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

to think that 35 is not middle-aged

270 replies

vic77en · 24/03/2011 11:07

My colleague yesterday referred to someone as middle-aged. When I said they weren't middle aged, were maybe early-mid thirties, he said that 35 was middle-aged.

I guess technically it's half of the "3 score years and 10" but FFS life expectancy for a woman is 80-something, no?

I am 34 and do not feel ready to be middle-aged for at least another 10 years.

So when do you think "middle-age" starts?

OP posts:
Figgyrolls · 26/03/2011 22:21

oh fuck, thats me than - is it also when you shout at inconsiderate drivers for not saying thank you and wonder why the hell teenagers have their trousers round their arses and young girls don't brush their hair.

I am totally middleaged (36)

spiderslegs · 26/03/2011 22:27

As I've already said

I am a youthful 37

You are middle aged

She is an old bag

iwastooearlytobeayummymummy · 26/03/2011 22:37

what is it with the trousers?
A friend memorably commented when seeing the backside falling out of a 17 year old young builder that it made her want to get the Pampers and wipes out Grin

Ponders · 26/03/2011 22:40

"young girls don't brush their hair"

I bet you it takes a hell of a lot more effort to get it looking like that than to make it look nice, figgyrolls Wink

they have to wash it & then straighten it, then back comb it a bit, & then mess it up

Ponders · 26/03/2011 22:41

(I am totally old btw - pushing 60 Grin)

Figgyrolls · 27/03/2011 13:40

I am so with you there ponders - however my problem with it is when I started actually being concerned about it, surely thats middle age or maybe I have skipped that and gone straight to my mothers age Grin, and so with you on the pampers and wipes Grin.

Oh so fashionable.....................

Lex01 · 09/10/2020 22:42

The average life expectancy in many countries is in your 80s, so that would make your 40s middle age. 35 might have been middle age decades ago, but it isn't anymore. Where I'm from (Australia) life expectancy is 81 for men and 85 for women, so middle age would definitely be in the 40s. Anyone who says its 35 now is living in a bygone era, or their quality of life isn't good.

Leaannb · 09/10/2020 22:56

40-60 is middle age. Im very happily middle aged

User50573 · 09/10/2020 23:02

Suppose 35 maybe is early middle aged I would say

GrandTheftWalrus · 09/10/2020 23:05

The OP of this is middle aged now given it was 9 years ago.

BubblyBarbara · 09/10/2020 23:42

If you divide a 80 year life expectancy into three equal blocks then:

0-26 Young
27-53 Middle
54-80 Old

Anything over 80 is then “Bonus”

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 09/10/2020 23:43

Mathematically, for a female living where you are, it's juuust about 41

If you're basing that on a life expectancy of 82, then how can one single year countg as middle aged? We already have a term to describe somebody who is 41 years old, but 'middle aged' is clearly an age band, is it not?

I know people are taking it as being about your attitude to life, but to me, it's just a simple statement of numerical fact. I'm happy to consider myself MA at 43 and have since about 34/35. To me, it's not a description of how little time I have left, but carries a positive sense of progression through life.

Everybody wants to be young, but I don't see young necessarily as a good thing unless you are young.

Would a woman want to be mistaken for a man? Would a man want to be mistaken for a woman? Most probably not. Does that mean that one of them is better or worse? No - it's just your own personal life circumstances and who you are.

Toddlers are often very amusing and cute, and so loveable, but they're also very needy, frustrating, hard work and thankless. Nobody likes an adult who acts like a toddler.

Teenagers are often volatile, moany, frustrated, irrational and trying to find their way in the world whilst being driven by a sea of hormones. I have teenagers in my family whom I love dearly, but I'm glad that stage is now behind me.

People in their 20s and early 30s are often still living in a time of great uncertainty. They frequently haven't found their life partner, career/life path, settled into their own homes, had any/all of their children, are often still very dependent on their parents. I'm glad I've settled down, have a lot more certainty to my life and a realistic outlook of who I am. I feel I've matured (which I consider a good thing) and learned a lot in the years since then. It's a very exciting time, but also very fraught, and it isn't where I am any more.

From your mid-30s until maybe about 60, it's a time when you've come to know who you are, what your life is like, you've gained experience and confidence, are reasonably established in whatever your life turns out to be and, all being well, no longer live in a state of capricious wildness and uncertainty. Nobody knows how long they will live, but this is your time, for as long as your health, mind and body hold out - which might be another 70 years. In a sense, you've now reached the pinnacle of your life - you've 'arrived' and you're a proper, fully-fledged adult, with your own independence, agency and maturity to enjoy it.

Once you reach 60, you've passed into early old age, but that has no bearing on your attitude whatsoever. Your age is a statement of fact, but it doesn't have to completely define how you live. You could have another forty years left still - mortgage-free, children all fully independent, hopefully financially stable and in no doubt whatsoever of who you are, how you relate to the world, how the world relates to you and how you choose to be you, having had the chance to be brimming with wisdom and experience (although some will have firmly declined this opportunity!). Yes, your healthis probably not as great as it was, but remember that, when your body was at its peak potential, you couldn't walk or talk and had no knowledge or control of when you were going to poo and wee yourself, so it wasn't that amazing. Your life may still be boring and mundane, but you have had the necessary time to have clearly carved out exactly who you are and what your life represents. To put it more simply, which would most people prefer: a Lamborghini with 60,000 miles on the clock or a Micra with delivery miles?

Also, not wanting to end on a negative note, but in world terms, the average age of all the people on the planet is 25 - so on that reckoning, if we split it into 3 bands, you enter middle age at about 17 and old age at 34.... sobering.

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 09/10/2020 23:47

The OP of this is middle aged now given it was 9 years ago.

I never even noticed that Grin

Lex01 · 10/10/2020 05:36

It doesn't make any sense for middle age to start at 35 if general life expectancy is in your 80s.

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 10/10/2020 11:24

it depends how long you consider the stage should last for. If you see it as a brief milestone to mark the anticipated middle, and the LE is 82, then it would be 41; but we don't say that 'being a child' means that you are 6 and no other age or that 'elderly' means you are 75, but not 74 or 76.

It also depensds on whether you consider MA to be around the middle stage of your whole life or the middle stage of your adult life. If the latter, I suppose you could consider that MA doesn't start until, say, 45; it makes no sense to me personally, though, to separate your childhood off from a 'map' of your life. If you do, which part do you hive off: before you can talk; pre-school; before you're a teenager; 16; 18; 21; when you move out of your parents' home?

Florencex · 10/10/2020 11:29

I would definitely not consider 35 middle aged, that is absurd.

I have only recently started it think that perhaps I am middle aged, I was 50 earlier this year. I definitely did not think I was middle aged through my forties.

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 10/10/2020 12:13

I would definitely not consider 35 middle aged, that is absurd.

Are you considering MA as a cultural thing and/or state of mind, rather than a simple pointer of chronology, though? Has the concept of MA come to have a derogatory connotation - like the word pensioner, which neutrally means nothing more than a person who has retired from working, but is widely used as a condescending, ageist term to imply a batty, doddery, helpless little old person who's perceivably outlived their usefulness to society - even though it could equally be a sharp-as-a-tack 60yo with great influence, wisdom and experience, who has worked hard and smart for 40 years and is now joyfully reaping the benefits of that investment - and could do so for another 30-40 years.

zingally · 10/10/2020 12:33

I've just turned 36.

My friends and I jokingly refer to ourselves as middle aged, but in reality don't really feel like it yet.

AmIACowBag · 10/10/2020 12:37

I'm in my 30s I class myself as middle age. 35 is well old (I'm older).

Lex01 · 10/10/2020 20:49

I was always told that middle age was 40s, and it makes sense when you view it was half your life because people are generally living to 80. Plus, the 35-year-olds I see look youthful apart from some who don't take good care of themselves. Many say it's meant to be the prime of your life. And while 40s isn't old, people generally don't look as youthful at that time in their life and aren't as energetic as they used to, so it makes sense that 40s is middle age. Sure, 35 is getting towards it, but it's certainly not there yet.

Lex01 · 10/10/2020 20:52

Also, Harrison Ford was 35 in Star Wars: A New Hope, and I would not describe as middle-aged in that, and he refers back to himself as "so young" at that time.

romany4 · 10/10/2020 20:58

I'm 48.

Middle aged us 50 to me!

Skysblue · 10/10/2020 21:20

I think late thirties is middle age - I mean its not exactly youth is it? Do you feel ‘young’? If not you are probably middle aged. Nothing wrong with that, get over it.

BigChocFrenzy · 10/10/2020 21:25

I am middle-aged and consider myself in my prime, in the first year of retirement Smile

  • I'm 64
BigChocFrenzy · 10/10/2020 21:25

35 is young !

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