You're Too Old to Accept Being Invisible: Let's Grow Up and Show Up

Too Old for This Sh*t: How to Take Your Life Back from an Ageist Society

Photo by Alexander Grey on Unsplash

My mentor warned me that I would become increasingly invisible the older I got. I didn’t, nor should you

We don’t have to disappear as we age. Let’s push back, shall we?

But not at each other.

There’s this thing now, that of course has been Named. I capitalized that word because we Name things like Elder Orphan, so that the US marketing machine can scare the shit out of us enough so that we buy whatever is being sold.

This Named Thing is the Invisible Woman Syndrome. Here’s an excellent article to give you an idea of how it sneaks in, and how one writer chose to deal with it.

I got the idea to write about it for two reasons. Friends have mentioned this to me recently, and my long-time mentor spoke about it before she turned 80.

This was one hell of a powerful woman who sat on the boards of America’s biggest banks. She said that I might feel increasingly invisible as I aged and greyed.

So natch, I figured: that’s an article. As her body shrank, in all other ways she grew in stature and authority, not only to me but to all those who loved her.

Visible. Like the goddess she was.

I love taking on sacred cows which are fake but elevated to gospel by those who would profit from the fear they create. This one, like “elder orphans,” is right up my alley.

The age at which our “invisibility” happens varies from forty to sixty. Or earlier.

That’s quite a range, right?

That’s the same kind of baseless reasoning that the medical community uses to determine that “elderly” begins (variously at sixty or sixty-five) all the way up to 100 plus.

That’s wily marketing. Locate where we carry the most fear and shove a hot poker into that spot, then offer all manner of pricey cures.

This invisibility isn’t true just for women, kindly. However, men seem to squeak by a bit longer under the label “distinguished,” at least for a while. Then society slowly starts to erase them, too.

For women, some research states that we start to lose our market value at eighteen. For men, it’s fifty. Here’s a study about that taken from the world of online dating (in other words not the real world, just the swipe-left world of ridiculous expectations).

People can run a study to prove just about anything.

With all respect to the gentlemen, though, this article is primarily directed at women, for whom age-hate in our society starts sooner.

You and I are Way Too Old to let society rub us out when we’re just revving up for our Last Third.

The American Marketing Machine is a Great White shark, a constantly-moving predator forever in search of its next meal. Said meal is whatever portion of American society it can frighten and shame about age, sickness, wrinkles, fat, race, religion, politics, you name it.

Given ubiquitous social media, and how gullible we are to fears about aging (also a product of the Great White shark marketing machine), we eagerly lap up all the terrible-awful news about becoming useless to society. Invisible. Effectively the moment we women enter menopause.

We humans are motivated by fear, drawn to the negative, and because of those characteristics, easily convinced of the worst.

Said “worst” of course will be fixed by this product, that training course, this surgery, that pill, this supplement…..and a great deal of our money.

Most of this is often, if not always, fixable by attitude. Choosing to see things differently. Educating ourselves on facts.

Marketing messages would not have us be educated. Here’s one big reason: as we age our thinking and intelligence improve in ways we couldn’t have imagined before fifty. But if we’re distracted by fears of aging, that joy, that agency is ripped from us. Instead we focus that potential on distractions like being terrified of aging, being invisible.

Let’s educate ourselves.

As we head into our middle years, second halves, or for my part to my Final Third, let’s challenge the narrative. So much of marketing is nothing but smoke, mirrors and pure unadulterated nonsense.

Such as, our value as women drops starting at eighteen.

You and I, especially women since our society so values youthful, nubile and fertile (right down to twelve, in some religious sects so perfectly made for pedophiles), can spend most our lives apologizing for our existence simply for getting older if we believe this.

No wonder we fear the years. We associate age with annihilation.

That fear and loathing sells trillions in products, lotions, potions, procedures and all kinds of snake oil. None of it reverses the clock. We might get temporary respite but ultimately, we have to die.

Isn’t it worth it to spend all that energy being vividly alive, grateful and as healthy as we can be?

Photo by Majestic Lukas on Unsplash

Women have always and forever been invisible in many regards. To that I will recommend the following read. That book speaks to the larger issues affecting women in general across all spheres. It’s a universal phenomenon. This isn’t that article.

I’m addressing the notion that you and I slide into a blurred, foggy existence once past a certain age, because of age.

The advice I saw in articles from The New York Times to Vogue to deal with feeling invisible all say much the same things.

• You and I choose what to believe

• It’s only true if you and I choose to make it true

Here’s my addendum:

• Beware that we aren’t engaging in attacks on our own aging and aged sisters (and brothers, please), attacks which have their basis in fear for our own lack of visibility and viability.

• Don’t let the lies turn us into bullies against each other.

  Because of this eternal truth:

  When we erase others, we erase ourselves.

This article by Gina Frangello Ph.D., M.A. for Psychology Today underscores how we perpetuate these crimes against aging women ourselves.

From her piece:

There is far too much complexity to the real divisions between women to reduce them all to any simple equation. But, what is clear is that the more women disagree about matters such as whether or not to use a filter in a selfie or whether it is empowering or desperate to be an openly sexual being past forty-five, the more we do the work of keeping each other shamed and small while the patriarchy cracks open a cold one and put its feet up. Gendered oppression breeds in its most fertile grounds when women ourselves are eager to cast the first stone.

With reproductive freedom at stake, and some three-quarters of those who have lost jobs in the pandemic being women, and with real issues on the table such as abled, affluent, white cis feminists still often being oblivious to the issues faced by their Black, brown, trans, disabled, and poor sisters—it seems perhaps the least we can do to not further demonize each other for whether or not we wish to be visible. (author bolded)

In order to not be invisible, then, perhaps that starts with not rubbing each other out. That’s zero-sum competition, which is based on fear, which is rooted in scarcity thinking, thank you patriarchy.

Patriarchy hurts men just as much. You need only heed abuse directed at “old man” this or “old man” that to know that the barbs aren’t limited to women, and age-hate isn’t gender specific. We just carry it far longer.

Photo by Julien de Salaberry on Unsplash

I see you.

That’s where it begins. The gift is always and forever first to the giver. The gift of acknowledgment, recognition, being seen and valued graces two people simultaneously.

There are few things more powerful.

The more we take the time to notice aging people, spend time with them (and ourselves, thank you), the more visible we feel. Giving imbues us with power. Seeing others causes us to feel seen, be seen.

You and I are Way Too Old to behave like high school bullies, attacking each other about our looks, greying hair, wrinkles, or infirmities.

We all have them. Or will, soon enough.

That’s what I mean by “grow up.”

I saw an article on Medium a while back about a svelte, super-healthy woman in her seventies brutally taking down other older women at her gym for wearing sweat pants and not being slim and expensively-attired as she was.

What on earth is that, pray tell?

We need each other far more as we age. We need community, safety, laughter. Above all we have the right to age the way Nature intended, without shame or blame.

That’s what I mean by “show up.”

It’s time to break the patriarchy, I’d say.

In a world where too many women and old folks in general are marginalized already, made sick and sad by such isolation, the real superpower we can wield is to see, elevate and validate each other.

We don’t lose value as we age. Quite the opposite: when we support each other, it increases exponentially.

We are only just beginning to evolve. Goddess years ahead.

Let’s play.

Photo by Patrick Fore on Unsplash

Thank you so much for spending a few minutes with me while I explore ideas around how to age well. It’s not just fitness, food and friends; all aging well begins in our minds. That’s where I seek the magic, supported by all the other work we get to do to take care of ourselves. I hope it was worthwhile. If so, please consider:

If someone you know is struggling with aging, please also consider

However you go forward, do it with joy. You are the youngest you will ever be right now.