To be surprised that 65+ is deemed ‘elderly’

[Helfs]

Off the back of another thread I wanted to see what the actual definition or classification of ‘elderly’ was and I was very surprised to see it defined as 65+

I always thought 80+ as being elderly so this has really surprised me. Especially looking at those I know around the 65-70 mark, they’re fit, healthy, living their best life and do not scream ‘elderly’ if you looked at them.

Personally I’ve always seen it as;
0-1 baby
1-3 toddler
3-13 child
13-19 - teenager
19-25 young adult
25-40 - adult
40-55 - Middle Aged

55-80 - old
80+ - elderly

So do you think this definition is fair on those who are 65, should the definition not evolve as life expectancies rise?

@BogRollBOGOF i really enjoyed my recent discovery of the "healthy life expectancy index" available by country.
and like many was disappointed to see that 65 is the starting point in canada for "senior" when so many remain in great health.

Anyway, before you make any more baseless assumptions about me, I’m off to bed now 👋

That's nice. I don't think I made any baseless assumptions about you - I deduced you were young and not affected by or informed about the terminology you were confidently proclaiming about.

@CurlsnSunshinetime4tea people think they are in great health but haven’t got a clue what’s going on under the surface.

Respectfully;

Those women are labouring under the misapprehension that their relative youth is one of their most notable and valuable attributes.

I'm not about to start labouring under that very same misapprehension any time soon so I'm not at all arsed about agreeing that I am in fact ageing....

I have an adult child. I am no longer young. I am still valuable, beautiful, kind , industrious and tenacious.

Also however old I am; I'm not dead yet.

@silvergarden Nice ageism there 😉

Goodnight.

55 "old" NO

So you have experience of being 65? Or 55 or 75? No.

Let's be fair. The average woman in the UK lives to 82 so middle aged is probably 38-46.
65 as middle aged is absolutely delusional.

Well, that's good. I wasn't suggesting anyone adopt those attitudes.

Maybe you need a reality check. You’ve been middle aged for some time, the age of your kids is irrelevant.

But 50+ isn’t old, so you aren’t being accurate with your description. I know if you told me to look for an old woman with a grey bob, I’d be looking for someone much older than 50.

As I said, an age descriptor (whether it relates to younger, older or middle-aged) be considered acceptable in my workplace - and thank goodness for that!

My mum had her purse nicked out of her (open) handbag at the supermarket. She was one of those women who knew better than anyone else, so had a postit with her PIN number on the back of her card. Even though she walked directly to the bank, the maximum daily allowance had been withdrawn and given that she was loaded, it was $35,000aud. Because this had been happening on this area with increasing frequency, she was interviewed by the local tv news and smugly made us watch it. Instead of the “poor me” story she had assumed, it was very much an article about how vulnerable elderly people are to this kind of theft and was basically a “How not to” story based on her experience. (We thought it was great, tbh…) Meanwhile, she was LIVID that they had referred to her as elderly, and was telling us that she wanted to sue them for this. (Of course we helped the situation by falling about laughing…) *Tbf, she was nearly 60, but due to her lifestyle of long-term anorexia and several bottles of wine and 100+ cigarettes a day, she looked about a million.

There's bound to be a societal volte face coming soon with regards to ageism.

We're going to be the majority demographic within a decade or two. Gone are the days of a youth heavy society unless there is mass immigration.

Old really will become Gold 😅

In the UK, healthy life expectancy is about 63 years, so falls short of retirement age. In deprived communities it can be significantly lower- Blackpool's is 55.3 years.

It's great when people maintain a "middle aged" and active lifestyle into their 70s or beyond, but it's not a universal truth and many people hit health problems associated with age quite young and have to live with them for many years. Nationally the range is 19.8 years for women and 17.8 years for men between the best and worst performing local authorities.

That's going to affect peoples' perceptions of when "old" happens, depending on what they see around them.

@Peeppuandpopo I’m fine with “late middle age”. But OP’s classification was 55-80 = old. I think that’s too broad a group, because it encompasses too much variation. I don’t think anyone can call 55 “old”.

Nobody has ever struggled to find people based on my descriptions. 50 is definitely old enough to be described as old, especially in the work place where the ages are 18-65ish.

Sorry but 50+ is old.
If you told me to look for an old woman with a grey bob, I'd be looking at anyone aged around 50+. If you said elderly woman I'd be looking for someone very frail (and around 70+).

Thank you! My colleagues clearly all agree as they all come to me when looking for someone they've not met, and they have never once said "oh 2024theplot, there wasn't an old woman in room 123?".
Now I think about it, the first time I met said woman, she sent me an email telling me she was in room 123 and was the old one in the corner and to come see her about XYZ work when I had a moment.

@CatamaranViper, very few people are “very frail” in their 70s.

At 55 I was bombarded by adverts from the likes of Mccarthy & Stone offering the opportunity to experience a great lifestyle in their senior housing. No mention of the facilities they would be offering my dc who was at primary school though.

Absolutely spot on!

Or have grey bobs in their 50s!

How do people know how old their colleagues are anyway? I couldn’t tell you who at work was in their 30s, 40s and 50s - I may just be rubbish at working out ages, but most people could genuinely be anywhere between about 30 and 55.

@blossomtoes Not true. The media age of death for women is 84. There are quite a few frail women in their late seventies.

median not media

Oh dear I'm old.