To be worried how I will manage to work until I am 67?

[brasty]

I am in my mid fifties. I already get more tired than I used to when younger. I wonder how I am going to manage to work full time until I am 67 years old. And continue to do my share of cooking, cleaning, family stuff and actually having some fun.

by the way your 'keeping an open mind' could be directly evidenced by you actually listening to the factual situation around depression and realising that your dearly held 'positivity is a matter of choice' assumption is actually incorrect.

Why not give it a go?

It would be a bit like I was obese then through massive efforts I lost 20 stones

I am fine with your individualist approach. But I think what you are missing is that we are a society. Health issues like the one you mentioned are about much more than an individual consuming calories.

What happens to people as they age is a question that we will all have to deal with as a society, there is no other way.

What we don't want to see is instability, or an erosion of civility. These things we see in history, and around the world today....Britain is not immune. There is nothing in the air above our nation that keeps people civil.

Have you heard of Eckhart Tolle, he overcome years of being depressed/suicidal. He's certainly worth a listen to.

M.
You are mixing disability with depression and assuming that everybody who's feeling sad or down is severely depressed?
Sweeping statement yours!
Caveat : my statement doesn't apply to people clinically depressed, I admit I am not professionally trained for that.

However I have a friend on a wheelchair who's very happy and part of a basketball team and lives life to the full and another friend who is young and able bodied but suffers from anxiety and mild depression.

What would you suggest to both of them? Euthanasia to relieve them from their pain that you perceive as such?

Really worrying....

Have I suggest suicide to ANYONE? I certainly don't think so. I pointed out that knowing suicide is an option can improve peoples mental health because it reduces the pressure they feel.

I'm contributing to a book on how to treat depression at the moment...and I really wish I'd had this chat with you earlier - coz I wouldn't have bothered with all the technical detail inside and instead would just have printed 'cheer up' on the cover and 'no need to top yourself' on the back.

Job done.

Okay - here is the definitive important information.

Depression is an illness.

Depression can in most (but not all) cases be treated, but that treatment is often complex and fraught with setbacks.

Telling people to cheer up or think positive does not treat depression. It often makes it worse.

You can't tell over the internet if someone who is saying they are sad/depressed/considering suicide/low/unmotivated/isolated is suffering from depression or not.

Given you have the choice to not say something that might make someone suffering feel worse, why would you still go ahead an keep parroting it?

Probably because as I have said many times I am not addressing those people who are clinically depressed.
To those I suggest professional help from the likes of yourself.
I was referring to those who more generally feel down and worry all the time. Which I believe is the majority. However if you have data to confute what I am saying feel free to share it. It would fascinating to see.

Wimps and whingers? Wow. I'd be ashamed to be so unkind.

Argh, yes. The usual. Someone who has taken responsibility for themselves being classed as unkind and smug by those who haven't. There is a lot of jealousy on this thread.

I think cottongusset was joking, with her list of accomplishments, 'wimps and whingers' and 'God's waiting room' comments

Argh, yes. The usual. Someone who has taken responsibility for themselves being classed as unkind and smug by those who haven't. A bit of empathy wouldn't go amiss. We're all connected, to have the attitude, I'm alright, stuff the rest of ya.

Argh, yes. The usual. Someone who has taken responsibility for themselves being classed as unkind and smug by those who haven't. There is a lot of jealousy on this thread.

Why not? It's not a very equal society. When people who work equally hard are equally rewarded, you might have a point - although not a bulletproof one, because not everyone is equally able to work hard.

None of these are difficult concepts. It is pretty unkind and smug to pretend you don't understand them.

I’ve been following the tread, and I think those that are worried need to be heard, their concerns are real and not uncommon. I’m one of the lucky ones, some planning and some good fortune means my circumstances are the polar opposite. I’m posting because not all 60 yr olds are in this predicament.

The plant I talked about - it’s an evergreen, contains a famous anti-cancer compound, has nice bright red berries. Doesn’t leave a mangled body behind.
(Not sure about castor bean - it’s the source of ricin, which IIRC from news of attacks is a pretty unpleasant death .)

User If you want a method that will feed the critters, look up Paul Ludwig of Bruckberg.

YANBU OP. My mum retired at 61. She was in a fairly sedentary job but she was still exhausted and her arthritis was causing her problems.

I'm 43 and very active but already feeling the twinge in my hips, knees and feet. I am overweight and working on that but I can't stop the onset of arthritis. DH has had rheumatoid arthritis since his late teens so I worry for him even more. He has already had one change of career.

Do all those happily working in their 60s and 70s have long term health issues? If so how do you cope?

None of the people I know who work still (over 60) have pain related issues. They might have high blood pressure, or on meds for osteoarthritis but those I know I’d consider them fit.

I do think it is a mix, some people are fit to work others aren't, some have had no chance to save, like the people who have posted who have spent many years as carers, on the other hand I get a bit fed up being told I'm lucky as I have a good pension because I did work and save and the people who say it tend to be women who took years off work to be SAHMs. I couldn't afford to be a SAHM so not a choice I had but I actually think I do deserve the pension I worked for and shouldn't have to feel guilty that someone who took 15 years off work doesn't have the same.

I think everyone should have enough to live but some are bound to have more because of the choices they made and it isn't all luck. Well it didn't feel very lucky when I hadn't got the option to be a SAHM. I am lucky that my pension didn't get lost in some scam or bankruptcy or something, I am lucky that I am fit and well so it is a mixture to me.

Possibly Beachy Head for me. A.K.A. Undignitas.

As a resident of East Sussex, Takemedown, can I implore you not to do this? It puts a dreadful drain on the coroner's budget.

DSS is a type 1 diabetic, so he's going to help me with an insulin overdose. He's promised to wait till I'm ready, though. Both my parents died at 76, having had dementia for a few years. If my life expectancy is the same, I'll only have 10 years of living on a pension. And if I end up with dementia too, I'll be bloody glad it's not any longer.

If only we all knew how long we were going to live, it would be so much easier to plan retirement. And those with long working lives but short life expectancy could get a bigger pension, so they could at least have some fun before they shuffle off.

It's very simple: the smug twats who boast about how superior they are? Rob their arses. If you get caught, you go to prison, where you won't have to work or sign on or worry about not having a roof over your head. Sorted.

😂

Someone who has taken responsibility for themselves being classed as unkind and smug by those who haven't.

Well, you can get bent on that front Kath. I will have a comfortable nest egg in the unlikely event I shall make it to old age, having inherited the same shitty condition that killed my Grandfather at 62 and my Dad at 58.

It's interesting that you assumed that my compassion for those who face an impoverished retirement is achieved only because I am in the same position. I am not so self serving.

I don't think you should involve your DSS.

I think it all comes down to people's different personalities i.e. Cup half full/ cup half empty.
I'm the lady who is 70 next year and still works full time (not digging roads up though as someone asked )
I have not been blessed with good health. I've had Bowel Cancer, now just over 5 years ago(so all clear hopefully) Two hip replacements! And still have twinge in right knee and right foot.
Each illness, I have been back in work as soon as possible. Even with hip replacements within 6 weeks.
I have suffered with anxiety and depression now and then, anxiety more or less constant.
But I fight back and I refuse to let these things beat me.
So, don't think that we've all had it easy that are not joining in your whingeing fest.
And yes, I choose, to try to be happy with life!

Scone - my dad went self-employed in his 50s. Partly I think because he was fed up with being sidelined (he’d been working since 14/15, and in his sector for over 30 years), partly the lack of autonomy, partly because the low-ish pay in his job (although we were actually worse off for a while, and I don’t think he ever even approached the equivalent of higher-rate taxpayer).

By 63, he was getting arthritic. He had deliberately taken out medical insurance some time earlier (it may even have been a condition of his mortgage when going SE) and got the effected side sorted. Before anyone tries to derail with moaning about private medicine or how he must have been privileged to afford it - he would have had nothing coming in if he’d been unable to work stuck on a waiting list for months (my mum wasn’t earning by this point), so made provision for healthcare a priority before pretty much everything except mortgage & utilities. The other side deteriorated in due course and was operated when he was 70. He was mostly fairly FT until 65 (like most men have historically had to be...), and wound down around the bouts of arthritis and after his late 60s. By 75 it was mostly bits here and there, and by his late 70s he was no longer really capable of much. At 81, my dad is now pretty gutted at having to give up (his work and his hobbies were all outdoors-based, that he loved); but he acknowledges that he was fortunate to have been able to do something he enjoyed for as long as he did, and still enjoys contributing what he can intellectually and ceremonially to the field.

Well I'm genetically programmed to self destruct in my late fifties because of a funky little cancer gene that killed off 8 women in one generation in my family, so I don't save, I blow all my money on days out and fun with my kids and do the best I can with my existing health problems. I have no pension, no savings and will get about 200k inheritance which I will give straight to my kids (minus one good holiday) I shall then claim benefits in the unlikely event that I live past 55. Screw the government I've paid my taxes I will get my pension when I need it but it will just be called ESA/JSA when I get it.

'But I fight back and I refuse to let these things beat me. '

Wow, so you lived because you fought back? People who don't survive their cancer didn't fight back hard enough? Thanks a fucking lot, my daughter died from cancer, she was 9-years-old, guess she just let it beat her .