If youre in your 50s and 60s what would you tell your 40 year old self?

[Baconontomato]

Just that really. I'm lacking direction and oomph and wondered will the wisdom of years help! What should I know about my 40s? I'm a SAHM with young children and a v stale marriage.
Does life get better?

I'm not saying don't plan for old age - that's a thing this generation of 60 year olds have no excuse for not doing - just don't be miserable and doom-laden about it.

Yes, some people do start to get into habits in their 50s and 60s - where else do all those 'fixed' elderly people come from!

I think it's a mixture of habit and lack of confidence. Not every 50 year old is rushing off to yoga before her class in Business Japanese which will help with her new start Up. I like this thread but let's hold onto reality.

Some people - some women - become too wrapped in their children and in their role as mother.
They do a kind of head down thing where they are so focussed on their children that they pay little attention to anyone or anything else. If you haven't met one I'm surprised. Their conversation and focus is entirely about their children. This is understandable when a child is three or five or eleven but the women who only discuss their adult children, who are involved in their children's relationships to the exclusion of their own do exist and they, ime get really set in their ways and lose confidence about everything else. Their 'empty nest' distress is worse than everyone else's. Their children are fantastic because that is the justification for endlessly talking about them. You can see how shockingly easy it is to slip into once you have seen it happen

If you remain open to new experiences and see parenting as transient then moving on and seeing your 50s and 60s as a new phase is much easier. Accepting that the world is fast moving and embracing that helps too.

Yes Norah, exactly. Default setting as 'whine' is one habit.

Agree about positivity. Also curiosity. The world changes so fast that I can see how dismissing anything new can easily become an instinctive reaction but it's one I'm going to try and fight.

I am 65. I kept fit throughout my forties and fifties, ate well and had a positive attitude BUT I still had ten years of the menopause from hell. So I wish that I had found the Menopause Matters forum, bullied my doctor for more help and found the hormone treatment that cures vaginal atrophy years earlier. Some people sail through it and that is great for them, but if you don't, it is not your fault and there is help out there.
I am glad that I had my career, glad that I always gave a lot of thought to my pension arrangements and glad that DH and I are still happy together after 46 years of marriage. Lots of luck as well as work in all of that.

I agree about the need to keep up with changes (people who say they are too old to learn new technologies drive me bonkers) and to keep learning. I am devoted to my garden and whilst I love spending time with my children and grandchildren, I would never want to crowd them or build my life around them.

I agree about not building your life around being a parent, but look at all the threads on here complaining that parents are off doing their own thing instead of being on call to look after grandchildren...

At 60, glad I always had a career, and one that looked after my pension. Had children late, but not too late to go music festivals and concerts with them now. I'm quite introverted, so eternally glad I have DH to keep booking hip concerts/gigs where we look like the band's parents. :o

Oh god yes, those that say that can't learn new technology are ridiculous. My bf's Mum is in her mid 70's and has just got an iPad and is sailing through it.

I'm old and I'm more techy than a lot of techy people because the help is out there, if you don't know how to do something, you can just google it and try. I've just gone from windows 7 to 8.1 and 2 days on and off of faffing around on it and I've made a new laptop my own. I'm just determined not to be one of those people who have to get their kids to do something geeky because they can't manage it.

I think if you've got kids you owe it to them to keep up with technology, I chat to one of mine on skype or fb or we message each other on wotsapp, viber whatever we fancy. Without knowing how all this works, you lose a huge medium for contact with older kids.

Suzannecanthecan

"but look at all the threads on here complaining that parents are off doing their own thing instead of being on call to look after grandchildren..."

Yes, but are those threads from women who think the whole world should revolve around their child?
I think it's the same women who want their MILs/mothers to join them in being completely focussed on the children and who then become massively over invested as MILs/ grandmothers.

If rather be complained about for being too little around than the endless, near incessant complaints about 'interfering MIL'

I'm at that stage where I know I've built my life around the kids and I need to find something for myself, but I can't for the life of me see what to do about it..

I sort of feel, maybe wrongly, that women like me who have built their lives around their kids are sort of getting a ribbing here. I didn't feel there was any choice. I never had family help, no one to take the kids for the weekend or night whilst we had date nights and kept the flame alive (jesus..)..no one to pick up from school and have for tea whilst I got home from work, no one to take to beavers or scouts or Saturday footy whilst we did our own thing and kept our own lives ticking over nicely...and certainly no spare money to pay someone to do it either.

So now my kids are teenagers and I acknowledge the need to get a hobby/ better job/ interest in something but I really dont know what. I know I sound demoralised and I am, but how do you approach 50 when money is beyond tight and things just feel very monotonous?

I wasn't trying to justify being over involved with adult children, just making the point that sometimes the pressure for it seems to come from the adult children.

I agree that being a parent can be all consuming at the time but for me it was also unfulfilling and that is why I always maintained other interests and feel very relieved now that they are independent and I can live for myself again ?.
I find it very easy to look after number one and resist cultural expectations that women should self sacrifice

Suzanne . I know

I wasn't arguing with you.

ssd - I understand what you're saying because I had absolutely no one to ever have my DCs when they were younger unless I could ask a friend, family certainly didn't help (for various reasons). I paid for all chidcare. The buck stopped here and I had no idea what it was like to feel supported being a Mum. My DH worked away, it was hard.

So now my DCs are independent adults, It is my time. That may sound selfish but it's not - in that I am always there for them (always will be) but my life doesn't revolve round them any more. It's been a long slog and my career and interests were put on hold or compromised to bring them up and I now want to do what I want to do and I am!

No GC's yet but when they come (if they do!), that won't change. I'm not going to be one of those GPs who has their GCs days every week. I will be there and help in holidays, I will have them to stay, I will support in every way possible but I won't have them on a fixed regular basis. My DCs know this and respect this so I don't think there'll be a thread about me in a few years

ssd - it is hard to start thinking about you after all these years of just being Mum, there is lots out there, it's just kickstarting it and finding what suits you.

yes, I do need a kick start

I dread being a mum who tries to live her life through her older kids, when they have their own lives and interests and don't want to feel they have to phone mummy every day/week as she has nothing going on in her life apart from them.

I want an interesting job, where I can learn and keep up with new technology, I'm already asking the kids how to do something online and I have no interest in iphones or skype but recognise that attitude is a slippery slope......

basically, how do I start the rest of my life?

Ssd

I'm not ribbing anyone tbh. I'm just observing the rut that is so easy to fall into.
I do do from experience. I was totally consumed by DS2 and it took me a long time to realise that I literally never had a conversation without mentioning him. It was bad for me, bad for him.

It was incredibly hard to remember what I used to do before him. Doesn't that sound crap.
The tales on here of people studying etc would have intimidated me a few years ago because of my feeling of being left behind. I do know exactly what you are describing and it's no one fault - there is no criticism from me about bring where you are because I was there too.

I did change it by just starting with little things. I go out alone. I started knitting, I changed what I read, I tried to make sure I left the house every day. Little things just started me in the right direction.
I hope that's does not sound patronising, it's just true. I did little things and they led fairly quickly to much bigger things. It's confidence I think. And remembering who you were before the dc.

Hahaha - did you see I went for knitting there.

what sorts of things did you all do when your kids were getting older? my youngest is 14 so still needs me, obviously, but I'm getting to see light at the end of the tunnel and I want to grab it!!

I went to a party recently for two friends who turned fifty and the room was full of women d'un certain age.

What was immediately obvious was that this (largish) group of women took care of themselves physically. Grooming and weight control etc had no way slacked off just because they were no longer 'young'.

Second, this gang knew how to party; a lot of champagne was consumed and we danced until the wee hours.

However, what was also clear, was that for many of these women absolutely nothing had changed since turning forty. Their lives were on a constant cycle directed by the needs of their husbands and children. I had some of the same bloody conversations with the same people that I've been having for over ten years!!!!

I'm not saying they;'re unhappy. I don't think they are. But they must be fucking bored!

Thanks pag, no you dont sound patronising at all, I'm genuinely wondering what to do with myself and have been feeling discontented for a while with things as they are.

The confidence thing is a huge issue with me too.

All the talk of starting a new career etc etc makes me want to cry hide in the corner, hoping someone will come along and sort my life out for me...but I know that's a bit unlikely .

what sorts of things did you all do when your kids were getting older?

I've enjoyed picking up all the hobbies I enjoyed when I was younger. Best thing I've done is join a hill-walking club.

What are/were your interests?

ah, comprende Pagwatch!

"Fucking bored" sums up my existence.

Yes, and I was in danger of living my life through my older kids and still sometimes find I do but I have developed hobbies and interests and things to stop this. Besides which DD1 just tells it like it is every now and then, when I slip. "Stop being so needy Mum!" she says and we laugh about it. She stops my slippery slope.

I was so defined by my kids it got embarrassing and it had to change. The last one left home in a flurry when they got an unexpected job away from home and that was it. I wasn't Mum on a regular basis any more and things had to change.

Small steps ssd. There are loads of courses out there, there are evening classes, there are interest groups, book clubs etc. I don't want to sound like I have it totally right, I don't. I upped my fitness and do something with that regularly, I did some voluntary work which led onto paid work, I read anything and everything, I try and keep learning. Like Pag says I don't want this to sound patronising.

It doesn't sound patronising at all, thanks for answering me!

Wordfactory, with the greatest respect, these women are probably fucking bored and wishing things had turned out a bit different but maybe they didn't have much choice in the matter? I have friends who are nearly 50, or 50 plus, who drink till the small hours, go out socialising all the time, train for triathlons, have millions of friends, and from where I'm sitting (usually on the couch), it all looks a bit desperate.

I just want to be a bit fitter, a bit slimmer and have a job I enjoy. I'm quite introverted and was never a manic party goer, even in my youth.

Reading this thread has made me realise I have a good life, there's just some small tweaks needing made here and there, but the overall frame, including dh and the kids, is great.

When I was a kid I read voraciously then I stopped.
I now have a loaded kindle and I love it. I read at least a book a week and I try to read stuff I normally wouldn't - current affairs, historical stuff.
I try to read the paper often.
I go to the cinema alone.
I'm about to do a wine tasting course.
I do 'days of joy' - I go into London on my own and go to the Tate or The V&A and get lunch somewhere I have never been before. I used to get embarrassed but I'm totally over that.

It's all little stuff.
There was a really good tip in a mindfulness book I read. It said have days where you just do little things differently. Change the radio channel, sit in a different place when you have a cup of coffee. Cook something totally new. Don't put the telly on all day. Go out for a walk.
Just basic stuff . It will tell you how much you are just sleepwalking through your days. It was a massive shock to me - I had even started sitting in the same seat in the coffee shop I use. I stopped that shit quickly