Conversations on Healthy Aging

In society younger people will discriminate against older adults in anyway. Jobs will hire younger people because older people will be close to retirement or they will be two slow at the job. People get mad at older people while driving when they pass someone going slow and it’s an older person they’ll say, “what a surprise some old guy driving.” People will avoid older people simply because they are older. To me I think that it is because people in general usually lack the ability to understand and know that sometimes when something happens there is an actual reason why and not some excuse. It happens all the time with anything. Me personally experience people who lack a level of understanding when I’m driving. When I pull off a red light, I can only get up to like 10-15 MPH before I must let off the gas and shift. When I do that my car is coasting for that 1 to 2 seconds but the guy behind me is still on the gas. So, my point of that is I almost get rear ended sometimes or someone will switch lanes really quick and cut me off or give a what the heck hand gesture. It is simply because people don’t understand that there are still manual cars out there and we need a little more time to get going that someone in an automatic. That falls into the same category as when someone older is at work. If their boss tells them they are going to slow and hurry up and keep hustling them they need to understand that the employee is older and is a little slower moving than everyone else. This doesn’t mean that they are a bad employee at all. When I was at McDonald’s some of the day ladies were hands down better than me and they were triple my age. So in the end I think it comes down to a lack of understanding what is going on and why something is going on.

Age and generational discrimination are common in our society. In our society it is common for people to want to resist the fact that they are getting older. It is common for people to be in denial about their age, so they want to dress younger, lie about their age, and even get surgery. It is so common for people in our society to want to be young forever, there are multi-billion-dollar companies built on just the idea. For this it goes way beyond only lying to ourselves, healthcare companies have banked on this idea as well. Healthcare is more expensive for older adults, rather than younger adults. Healthcare utilization and cost increased with older adults in comparison to younger adults and continue to increase as you age across the lifespan. This fact has also led people to believe that older adults are looked at as a “burden” within the healthcare system. This could be due to the fact that older adults often need more medical procedures, rehabilitation, and expensive treatments meaning that this could also be a way to collect more money from people as they age. Another factor that contributes to age and generational discrimination is the fact that young children and their idea of growing old. Children as young as fourth graders have common negative views about growing old and old age in general. People perceive individuals who are older as more disabled then themselves. I am completely guilty of this as well, when I was a child, I thought of getting older as a curse, it was a version of myself that I never wanted to imagine myself being in. I never wanted to envision a life where I couldn’t do anything I wanted, had a hard time moving, and even struggling to get out of bed. I never wanted to see myself in that position even though I knew it was a normal part of life. It is hard for people to accept the fact that they are getting older, and one day may die. It is hard for some to face; therefore, they do anything they can to delay the process, but there is nothing we can do to stop it. One day we will be old and gray and will blessed that we even made it to that point.   

Although age and generational discrimination is common with older adults it is also common with younger adults and adolescents as well. It is common for older adults to view adolescents as naïve, immature, and incapable of making the right decision. Older adults often think that teenagers don’t know anything and will never have to face real hardships. The age and generational discrimination woks both ways, all ages view other ages a certain way, and even though it is not right it is apart of life.

Sierra Gray

Lifespan Development

April 23th, 2020

With age and generalization it has become so ingrained in our society. Form under handed comments about someone’s age wether they are older or young, or to making a comment about what time they were born such as “everything is the Millennial’s fault.” Too comments such as “Okay Boomer.” For age and Generation description, it doesn’t matter who you are at some point you will experience this. We all start out young and people look down on us for being inexperienced for not knowing what we should be doing, or for having different ideas and ideals then the last generation. The older generations also face this kind of discrimination. Such as people thinking that they are slower, that they don’t understand things as they get older. Older adults start to be seen as unable to do as they get older and people. Both of these group are able to fall in this category.

Wether it is an older person being seen as incompetent or a younger person because they are incapable of understanding, because they haven’t “lived long enough” both of these parties are so different but are also are treated the same when it comes to discrimination they are seen as something less then they are and they are ignored. There thoughts and feelings are not taken into account. This discrimination can happen to almost anyone all of us are young and experience it and all of us get old and experience this as well. Agism and generalization can effect any race and any class it can happen to all. These experiences are all part of our society because the way that our society sees the young and the old. We all have to work to be more understanding and more accommodating to people. I believe that we can do this and we can help one another.

Ageism is a big problem in today’s society. It is seen mostly with older adults but younger adults can also experience this as well. Both of these age groups are stereotyped and frowned upon by others. It happens in society within a wide range for each age. Ageism in older adults can vary from giving someone a gloomy birthday card joking about their old age for their birthday. To seeing someone drive slow and assuming its an old person. To discriminating against older adults in the workforce. Most older adults who are still capable to work and are still wanting to work are often discriminated against by employers often having negative attitudes towards older workers. It’s not only hard for older adults to get hired because of ageism but a lot of older adults are getting fired or laid off because of the false perceptions of their age. This is also causing our society to lose many valuable experienced experts in their workplace.

Younger adults can also experience ageism in a wide range as well. From trying to buy your first car and being looked down upon by salesmen. To being stereotyped and similarly being discriminated upon by the workplace. Younger adults in the workplace are seemed by employers to be inexperienced especially when looking for a job right out of college. One example that shows this is in a even younger age is how the minimum wage is set lower than the national wage because of their age. This can also lead to why younger adults don’t get paid for their internships even though they still need to support themselves as well. These are just a few examples of how ageism is common in our society and there is many more examples in our society. A few acts and laws have been put in place to stop ageism such as The Age Discrimination in Employment Act that prohibits employers from discrimination. But there are still many steps that need to be taken to potentially stop and make ageism not as common in our society as it is today.

I think that generational discrimination has been prevalent for a long time and is seen commonly still today unfortunately. I also think that there is a stigma associated with both younger and older generations. The grouping and naming of generations and classifying people solely on that categorization is a big issue when it comes to age discrimination. For example “Okay Boomer” is an insult used by younger generations to make fun of the ideas of the baby boomer generation. Likewise, Millennial’s are being categorized as lazy, complacent, and wanting participation trophies and Gen Z are known for eating Tide Pods.

In a workplace where there is a large age range of employees where age discrimination can become very obvious to see. I have seen patients question the skill set of a Physical Therapist because she “looked young” despite the fact that she has a doctorate and a license to practice physical therapy. On the other hand, older people who did not grow up in the age of technology get called out on being slower learning or struggling with media and technology and “being stuck in the old ways” of doing things. Another age discrimination that society plays a part in is the idea of when to retire. The normal age that we hear is often 65. However, if a person is still mentally, physically and willing to continue to work then they should be able to without fear of forced retirement. Other age related discrimination in the workplace can include: seeing a pattern of only younger employees being hired, experiencing layoffs, getting denied a promotion or being isolated from anther age group. The Age Discrimination Act of 1967 helps to protect those individuals above 40 from those things previously mentioned.

Overall, I think people can sometimes see others just through the lens of their own generational patterns rather than recognizing that the ways in which each generation was raised was different and under vastly different circumstances. I think to lessen the prevalence of age and generational discrimination we as a society need to think twice and consider a person for more than just their age and what generation they grew up in and realize that we all bring something to the table that is different and appreciate that.

Generational discrimination is very common in society, which can be seen through the names they are given. For example, the Baby Boomer generation was born between 1946 and 1964. This generation is said to be the most successful and productive in their communities as they have gotten the most income, food, apparel, and retirement programs. While generational discrimination is amongst certain generations that share the same characteristics, age discrimination is based upon people above the age of 40 that are treated poorly in the work force. This can be seen amongst multiple ages as the younger and elderly employees are said to not see eye to eye, however, the stigma is primarily based upon negative thoughts towards the older workers. In the United States, we have The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA), which forbids age discrimination against people who are age 40 or over. My perspective on what contributes to these forms of discrimination are based on the stigmas that society has created. With every type of discrimination, it is caused because people are pointing out the status quo and commonalities amongst a group. Yes, there are people that break the status quo, but for the most part, we see trends. When we grow older, we are going to be competing for a job. There are going to be other qualifiers for your position. This tends to make people want to outshine others, which can cause controversy in a workplace. My cousin is a nurse and had started in a different division in the hospital and didn’t stick with it long. Supposedly the older and more experienced nurses looked down upon the young ones or newcomers to the group. Discrimination is very evident in the workplace and I don’t know what will change that, because obviously, we are not just discriminatory amongst the older aged workers. I think to reduce the prevalence there could be a different act that states discrimination amongst all ages is forbid.

Many people would describe health aging as a physical characteristic. Society has an image that if you have wrinkles and your old, or if your hair is shedding and your old, then your considered being unhappy and a decline in aging. Society tends to look at the physical characteristics instead of the mental and emotional characteristics. Many people fear getting old because of this social norm that if you don’t look young and healthy, then your life is “pointless” and unhappy. To me this is not true, I believe healthy aging is defined as being happy with your life (from young to now). Also being connected and engaged with your community is also a big connection when it comes to healthy age.  Happiness is key. I believe that if you are happy with how your life turned out or even in that moment, it gives you the high self-esteem about yourself because you feel as you accomplished a lot. This also connects to the point that having a purpose in life contributes to being happy. Having a purpose also makes you happy because you are surrounding yourself with things that contribute to your success or purpose. I believe that this idea is true because having a purpose in life gives you the energy to wake up each day and make each day significant. I also believe that healthy aging is connected to being engaged with society because it brings you happiness. Think of you being alone in a room. You would feel lonely in that room. Now think of being in a room full of people, you would rather be in a room full of people, because your engaged and around other people. It has been proven that loneliness leads to depression, which is why older adults tend to want to be around their family because it prevents them from feeling lonely and left out. My grandmother has influenced my perspective on healthy aging. She’s 70 years old and still finds ways to be active in the community. She always tells me it’s what keep her life going because she’s still being active and involved at her age. 

Healthy aging can look different to different people. To me healthy aging is staying active and still doing the things that you like that are of course within your realm. I play Ice Hockey and I have been for 7 years. I can safely bet that I won’t be able to go out and tear it up with my friends at 80 years old. I can say that I would be able to ice skate still when I’m older just simply at an open skate session, as I have seen it before. I think eating healthy is a big part as it’s a fact that your metabolism slows, and you can’t be eating pork rines and bags of chips all day while drinking mountain dew and sitting on the couch. Staying engaged is a big part as my owner who is 90 years old is still very active at my work, of course when there is no virus going around. Healthy aging simply is if you stay active and exercise and keep doing things you like and if you can’t do the things that you like as in Ice Hockey you can find other things. If you let yourself down and stop believing you can do things and that all your friends are gone then you won’t do well in old age. If you have nothing to do you can go to the church festivals or something to keep you occupied.

To me it pretty much comes down to staying active and keeping yourself healthy in eating. It comes down to improvising and adapting. If you can’t play ice hockey anymore at 80 years old, then you should find something else that would suit you like a hobby of some sort. That is why there are some people that are in old age and they are out volunteering and doing stuff because they are finding something else that suits them and keeps them happy and involved so that leads to them not feeling left out and not having a purpose.

I believe healthy aging looks different to every person. I believe that healthy aging involves a mix of physical ability along with cognitive ability. But on the other hand, it is also your opinion. To me healthy aging is doing whatever makes you happiest throughout your life. Based on what I have seen throughout my life and witnessed from the people around me happiness is one of the key aspects to a healthy life. If you are able to be able to be happy throughout the aging process, then that will help maintain both the physical and mental aspect of development.

Based on what I have seen throughout my life, being surrounded by friends and family is one thing that is very important to healthy aging. It allows for you to constantly be surrounded by a support system so if you do ever run into any of the negative aspects of aging, like disease for instance, then you have people to help you maintain your physical health and happiness. Also, spending time with your kids or your grandkids can be a great form of physical activity if you want to play with them outside or even just watching them play is still a good social interaction that can be very helpful when it comes to your mental state.

I have seen this in my own family because for my grandparents spending time with the grandchildren allows for them to get out of the house and you can see it on their face that it makes them happier and makes them forget about the stressors in their life.

Overall healthy aging is living a lifestyle that allows you to feel free and happy while surrounded by people that you care the most about. I think that as you age you should not have to stop living the life that you are but that you should strive to continue to live the life you love and experience new things.

Aging can be terrifying. Some people wonder if they will lose their job because the company wants the new next person. Some wonder if they can still do the things they love because your body slowly degrades. Over the years that I have lived I have found there is really one solution to all of this. How are you going to look at the situation? Going at something with a positive attitude really makes a difference.

There was a student’s grandparents that donated a pickle ball set-up game. They took the time to teach our gym class how to play it. One thing they told my class, that I will never forget, was that if they didn’t start playing it earlier in their life then they probably couldn’t be playing it at the age they are now. They were still doing what they loved and did not worry about change. This drive to still live life like they wanted helped tone their body so they could move like they were twenty years younger. Going into old age confidently can help you prepare for the changes. Working out more can help you counteract the degrading of your body for many more years. Keeping up with friends and family is also very important. I am so sad that some older adults distance themselves either because of their will or the family’s. They have lived so long and conquered many things in their life and should be respected and accepted for it. I love the story of the man who make a pool for the neighborhood to swim in. Even if he had family that lived far away he still brought others to him. Imagine how many people he sees each day.

I often worry about change and new things. For instance, the change the coronavirus has caused has put me through the wringer. But it all comes down to how I look at the situation. Going at life with confidence and determination is the recipe to a long life. I wish all of you the best long life and hope you constantly run towards what you love and stay with it.