BellaOnline Forums Family Midlife When does Midlife Begin?

Jilly, I think you hit it just right. When my mom entered her late 40's early 50's she became really old. She did not look old, but her aches and pains seemed to become paramount to her. She started too started to look and move like an elderly person. I think midlife is said to begin at about 40, I am long past that. When my friends tease that I am getting old, I laugh; the thing is I don't mind being an older woman or just old. But it is my hope to never be elderly.

Ah, it's just labels! I actually don't think of myself as middle-aged still! And, I just turned 49 in November, both my kids are grown & on their own and I have a granddaughter. If there's a checklist for middle-aged, I'm sure I'd pass with flying colors, but to me, I'm just me.

Every time I have to check off a different "age box" on some sort of form, I find it hard to believe. And, I hear the AARP membership offers start coming at 50, so that'll probably pi$$ me off. LOL

So far, my forties were great and Oprah says at 50 that you are who you're meant to be. Finally! :-)

And, throughout history, especially recent history, middle-aged has certainly changed--it's a moving target. It wasn't too long ago that most of us would be quite "old" in our late forties since life expectancy was so low.

Deb, you are right middle-aged has changed through the years. I have to laugh about your AARP observation, I was annoyed when I my junk mail started to include AARP offers.

I'm 41 and my son is about to graduate from college so I imagine technically that is midlife. It just doesn't feel like that to me.

But I suppose if you think of the first part of your life as the "child / leaning on others" stage, and the middle part as the "full adult / doing" stage, that I'm definitely in that stage

When the kids are off on their own, that's the Good Life, whatever you want to call it!

When people are in this stage, do they have a name for it? What would they call this stage they're in?

I think of myself as just being "an adult" - but not a "senior" I suppose. It's not good to define yourself as "not a X"

An intriguing question!

The only definition i have seen is calling us the 'sandwich' generation. In the sense that our kids aren't really out the door financially/emotionally, but our parents are starting to enter the 'needing help' from us phase.

Technically midlife really starts in the late 30's if you take into consideration that the average life expectancy here in the US is 77.9 years.

life expectancy

I plan to be a centurion, so i still have some time yet.

The "Sandwich" generation defines us by having kids, which not everyone does. So hopefully there's a term that refers to us based on ourselves, not based on us having children. Is there a term like that?