In my last post, I referred to a book by Harvard researcher Ellen Langer called Counterclockwise. In that book, she shares findings from a number of studies, including her infamous counterclockwise study on men in their 80s in which remarkable changes took place that seemed to turn back the hands of time. She took two groups of men on a week-long …
There is mounting evidence that our thoughts have an effect on how well or poorly we age. A study conducted in 1996 had two groups of people solving anagrams. In one group, the words were age-stereotype terms like “forgetful” and in the other group, the words were neutral and not age related. After the two groups solved the word puzzles, they …
I don’t know about you, but it really riles me when I hear someone on TV say that we need to keep our waist size below a particular number of inches in order to avoid heart problems. While it’s true that abdominal fat, which seems to creep on us as we age, is more dangerous than other kinds of fat, setting a …
I find it odd that we celebrate the milestones of a child’s life, but after X-number of years no one acknowledges the growth that continues to happen as long as we are alive. We “ooh” and “aah” when a baby says its first word or takes its first step. We marvel over how our pre-teen niece or nephew has grown since …
After completing a research study about women in their 60s and then completing a master’s program through the oldest and largest school of gerontology at the University of Southern California, I am devoting myself to getting out the word on how to age well. There is plenty of scary and confusing information out there. This blog will appear regularly to provide …
I never liked cats much. Always thought dogs made better pets. But when I lived in an old farmhouse in Kentucky and the temperature dipped below zero, I couldn’t bear to leave the two kittens that lived in the barn outside all night. That was 18 years ago and things were never the same again. My first book had just been …
On my 61st birthday, I faced a choice: spend the rest of my life in pain with declining mobility, take pain meds and/or have surgery, or exercise regularly. Two summers ago, I fell in my yard and broke my ankle. That was followed by weeks of pain as I gradually moved from crutches to a walker to a cane. I was …
When I returned to school nearly 25 years after completing my last degree, I was in for a shock. All my life I have loved reading, but reading the textbook in that first class was a real challenge. I would get to the bottom of the page and realize I couldn’t remember anything about what I had just read. Was this …
We learn in science class that skin is the largest organ in the human body. We learn through experience that skin is the first thing to announce our age to the world. The skin on our face, neck, arms, and hands reveals that we are not as young as we used to be, and that can be aggravating. Whether it’s the …
As a kid, I loved fairy tales and Disney movies. The beautiful princesses dancing about in their long, flowing gowns put me in a state of fantasy for hours. The images and messages of those old stories stayed with me and influenced the way I viewed the world around me. The story of Snow White, with her wicked stepmother and those …
