Tag: aging

TIME Magazine: 4 Ways To Get Happier As You Age

Time Magazine is publishing multiple articles on aging, which, as you can imagine, interest me greately. Although most of them repeat all the same (and often questionable) things, I liked this one, because it was not about “how to live longer”, but how to live happier when you age. And some examples form this article are really inspiring!

The article and the full text below.

Continue reading “TIME Magazine: 4 Ways To Get Happier As You Age” →

New Field Museum Exhibit, And How I Took My Mom There

Last week, a new exhibit,  “After the Age of Dinosaurs,” opened in the Field Museum. There was a members-only access event on Tuesday evening, and after a long break, I decided to give it a try and take my mom there. I was encouraged by the suggestion of her caregiver that she could travel with her to the museum, and I can come there after work and meet them right there. That way, her caregiver would also have a chance to see the exhibit.

We planned everything seemingly perfectly, but since my mom walks slowly, and they had to switch from the Red line train to the bus, this trip took them a very long time. And my mom felt it even longer.

Then she had to eat something (I planned on that, because I knew that would be the time for her to eat), and it also took a very long time, and she could not choose what to eat, and then she asked how much did it cost, and complained that everything is expensive (even though she didn’t have to pay anything).

When we entered the exhibit, she started to ask how “they” (who put up the exhibit) knew what things looked like 66 million years ago, and then said that they just made things up since there was no way to know. I tried to remind her that she learned about different geological periods of the history of the Earth at school, citing the archeological discoveries and radiocarbon dating, but it didn’t look like she remembered.

The same went for the fossilized plants. The exhibit showcased some prehistoric plants that were distant predecessors of the plants we use widely today, such as chocolate trees or apple trees. She asked skeptically, “How did the scientists know these were the prehistoric apples?” and ultimately concluded that “they made it all up.”

Possibly, this is something trending on the Russian internet these days; I know that the theories of “everything is made up” emerge from time to time.

After that exhibit, we briefly saw the Reptiles exhibit, and I just walked her directly to the actual live reptiles, bypassing all the displays with scientific information.

I got Uber home, and on the way back, she was saying that “she does not understand why there were so many people there, why they were interested, why there were so many children, and why parents explained something to them and they seemed to listen.”

I don’t know what to make of this experience, except that it should be Uber both ways. I am afraid that if I were to stop taking her anywhere, she will mentally decline even more rapidly than now. However, if she is unable to process any new information, I am unsure what good it would do. So still figuring this out.

Mom

The week before last was quite challenging on the “mom’s front.” She forgot again that since the start of the war, we haven’t congratulated her on V-Day. And to be honest, no matter how many times I tell myself that it does not really matter, that she is where she is mentally and can’t reason straight, I still can’t create a version of the “Goodbye Lenin” movie. I can’t make myself think that “it doesn’t matter.” I can’t make myself to say anything celebratory. We talked about this two years ago. A year ago. She kept bringing it up again this year, and I ended up raising my voice and being upset, and the latter one was completely unnecessary.

The WWII Veterans’ organization organized a concert and a celebration at a restaurant, and my mom was invited to both. Later, she told me that at one of the events, another veteran asked her whether she had a social worker. When my mom replied that she didn’t have one, they kept asking who did shopping for her and who cooked and cleaned. She proudly replied that she was doing all of it by herself.

I remember how excited I was when I learned that I could get a social worker for her and offload some of my responsibilities. And I remember how upset she became when I told her that this could be an option. I see at least two different aspects here.

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Your Future Self

I recently read the book Your Future Self by Hal Hershfield. Although, in the end, the book didn’t impress me that much, I liked the main idea of it. The author states that we often base important decisions on our relationships with our “future selves.” When you think about yourself in the future, ten, twenty, or even thirty years from now, can you imagine your future self as a person? Do you think about that person as a stranger or as “you”? Can you imagine what your future self will enjoy doing? Multiple psychological experiments demonstrated that if an individual thinks about their future self as the same person, they usually make important decisions about their life choice considering their future benefits. To put it in more straightforward words, a person who identifies themself with a “future self” would be more inclined to contribute to their 401(k) and exercise regularly. This example is rather primitive, but you get the idea.

Although, as I said, the book overall didn’t impress me (there are many repetitions, and the author does not go into more complex behavioral examples), I was thinking a lot about that concept. It was new to me, and naturally, I wanted to apply it to myself.

Although my life taught me that I should never presume that things will go a certain way, and although I am always ready for surprises, I definitely think about the future me as “me,” and I care about this person, and I do not expect that they would like some tedious tasks more than I like them now, or that they won’t like to do things I am currently doing. And that’s probably why I spend time on planning for the retirement and potential long-term care and I like having a very detailed plan for my retirement years. However, there are some other aspects of the “future self”, which many Goodreads reviews mention: it’s not only about your financial and physical well-being, but also what kind of a person you will be, and whether you will hold to the same values. Right now, when I think about my retirement, I think about how much more volunteering I will be able to do, and how many new things I would try. Nobody can guarantee that this idea will stay with me, but as of that moment, I definitely associated myself with my future self.

Recently, I often think about “what will happen after,” not tragically, but simply thinking about it more realistically: one day it will happen. One day, I won’t wake up (an optimistic scenario). And yes, I think about leaving money for charities, but not because “I will be recognized, ” but because I truly believe in the causes. I thought about it a lot recenlty: I do not need to have a name on a brick, because it won’t matter when I die. I am not sure whether I expressed my phots clear enough, but it really won’t matter. The only thing matters is what we are doing the right thing now, when you are still alive and can do it.