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Style and beauty

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Original poster

Is it normal to visibly age in 7 years?

54 replies

Onecall · 15/10/2017 10:20

I was looking at photos of myself at a wedding 7 years ago and I look completely different.

Of course I know I will have aged in that time but my skin doesn't have a single line or sag in the pictures but now I am really looking my age, with bags and jowls and wrinkles around my eyes.

Plus I have put on weight and I can't shift that half stone which isn't much but makes me feel uncomfortable and I am squeezing into my clothes at the moment.

It's normal ageing isn't it but shame I didn't appreciate how I looked then!

OP posts:

whatithink · 15/10/2017 12:09

Agree mid 40's tipping point. Had twins at 41 and once I got over the sleepless nights my looks, energy and figure recovered from that nicely. Closer to 50 along with peri menopause symptoms everything gone downhill.

RickOShay · 15/10/2017 12:11

Yep sunglasses are now as important to me as fags were 20
years ago. cloudy, rainy, drizzly don’t care, I don’t leave the house without them. I am 49

rightknockered · 15/10/2017 12:21

I'm going for fillers and botox.

HipToBeSquare · 15/10/2017 13:01

I've just turned 40 and I am noticing I have to actually watch what I eat and drink now.

MissAlabamaWhitman · 15/10/2017 13:06

It's children that do it to you;
My OH is seven years younger than me but looks the same age after three children in four years, he's the SAHP whilst I escaped back to work when they were between three to six months old each time.
He's had sleepless nights for years and I look back at pictures of when we met and wonder where the baby faced twenty one year old went?

I have hardly aged despite coming up to thirty five in December.

Seriously, sleep is the answer.

Ohyesiam · 15/10/2017 13:09

Depends on which 7 years.
20 to 27 no
35 to 42 not much
45 to 52 yes.
You don't just wake up one day and suddenly you are an old lady, is a process.

Roomba · 15/10/2017 13:22

3+ years of appalling sleep loss did it for me. At 35, I still looked in my early 20s, got asked for ID all the time and couldn't discern any difference in photos of me between 25 and 35.

I then had DS2 and aged ten years in three, I swear. It shocked me how much older I looked all of a sudden - wrinkles appeared, grey hairs, skin looked grey and uneven... Tragically, although DS sleeps much better now, I haven't magically reverted to looking 25.

Delatron · 15/10/2017 13:56

Agree, not much difference here 25-35. Asked for ID lots and in my thirties people looked shocked when I told them my age.
41 now, nobody looks shocked!
I think for most people the 'face falling off a cliff' hits mid forties. I can see it start to happen now.

Agree with the above poster that when you hit 60 it slows down! My mum has looked the same for the last 10 years.

I'm looking at lasers now and considering Botox but I don't think I'll get that youthfulness back. I may slow down the decline though...

OCSockOrphanage · 15/10/2017 14:15

I do hope the poster who says it slows after 60 is right! At 61, I'm okay but am never going to be taken for 45. But, staying here like this for 10 years, would be no disaster psychologically (even if it is a forlorn hope).

Floisme · 15/10/2017 14:21

Ha ha no - I can assure you it doesn't.

oldlaundbooth · 15/10/2017 14:22

I'd say so.

Especially if you've had kids.

eurochick · 15/10/2017 14:24

Deflation I'm also 41 and experiencing the same. I'm sure the non-sleeping baby at 39-40 didn't help. My waist is also not what it was. And my eyelids sagging keeps smudging my liner.

PolarBearGoingSomewhere · 15/10/2017 14:37

I have aged quite a bit since we got married 8 years ago. I was 21 and DH was 25 so we are now 29 and 32. DH has aged too, he has got quite a few grey hairs now although he looks "better" as he has lost about 2.5 stone and generally takes better care of himself. I'm the same weight but my body has gone totally soft. I guess when I married people would say I was slim and / or pretty; now, people still say that but I feel like it's always followed by (even if just in their heads!) "...for saying you've got 3 kids."

SpongeBobJudgeyPants · 15/10/2017 18:19

Normal yes. I think I've looked a lot more toned since I started having CACI facials, which has improved things.

simbobs · 15/10/2017 18:36

The real answer lies with your mother. If your mum was jowly, wrinkly etc, chances are you will be, too. If she looked youthful.... Obviously genes are not the whole story but I wish I could give my 30yr old self a talking to about keeping up the exercise and cutting down on the bad stuff. For years you go without putting on weight or looking any older year on year and suddenly it catches up with you menopause. Not sure whether going on hrt would have helped.

BigSandyBalls2015 · 15/10/2017 18:44

I was sitting behind a bloke at a football match recently, and kept thinking he looked vaguely familiar. Wondered if he had been at school with me or my brother ...... then thought nah he's much older than us, Then it struck me, we look like that too!! Could well have been same school year, it was an eye opener.

TheScottishPlay · 15/10/2017 18:57

Definitely. I'm 45 and my eyes are going. Not my sight weirdly as don't need glasses yet but saggy lines appear every day!

Freshprincess · 15/10/2017 19:07

Hard to say, 7 years ago I was 2.5 stone heavier, maybe I'm wrinklier because I've got less fat pushing the wrinkles out. Or I just look older. I look like a teenager on my wedding photos co pared to now.

I did recently have that thing meeting an old school friend and thinking they looked old and realising that so do I.

Birdsgottafly · 15/10/2017 19:17

A HIFU makes a big difference, my Sister and her friends, all in their 60's got them on a Wowcher offer and they look refreshed, eye area has tightened and are less jowly.

I got a bit of filler in my lips and I'm having tear tough filler next week, combined it's costing me £450, but I'm going interviews and it's giving me a boost. My girls have got me the HIFU for Christmas.

I'm seeing the results that Fibroblasting is giving before I think about it, but that looks effective and lasts a few years.

I went through the Menopause early, i'm 50 next year and want what I had at 40, for a while longer.

SallyOMalley · 15/10/2017 19:23

I'm 47 (but still 28 in my head)

It's my neck that's really aged, I think. It's gone all thin and papery. I'm getting quite a complex about it

NeonSun · 16/10/2017 06:22

Yes, it's a common thing in case of aging. Even if you don't have wrinkes and bags under your eyes, anyway you'll look older and it'll be visible in some ways.
Personally I think that it's possible to look beautiful in every age but for this you should care well about your body and avoid too much stress in your life because it usually makes people to look much older than their age :(

RickOShay · 16/10/2017 09:02

I wouldn’t be young again though, I have finally managed to get some self esteem, and that I wouldn’t change for all the glowy complexions in the world. There are definitely advantages in getting older

Jigsisaw · 16/10/2017 10:10

Yes, my self-esteem increased massively between 37 and about 44 but now 3 years later, I'm beginning to feel invisible as a single woman. It is two different senses of self that construct my self-esteem, I now realise. The me that is a person is growing and gaining more insight and wisdom and strength but me that is a woman , for the first time, that sense of self feels diminished, depleted and I have to make a conscious effort not to let it deflate my sense of self as a person.

NotAgainYoda · 17/10/2017 16:37

Rick

I agree

phoenix1973 · 17/10/2017 18:19

Yes. This year ive developed a groove on my right side only between nose and mouth. Plus deepening line between my eyebrows. The horizontal forehead lines have been there a while.
My eyebrows are getting more white ones and wont lie flat.
Hate it.

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