Tuesday, July 16, 2013

The Implied Contract

    In a previous blog post, I introduced my readers to Dr. Gordon Livingston, a psychiatrist and writer.  I had enjoyed his recent book The Thing You Think You Cannot Do and wanted to pass along some of his observations of the psychotherapeutic process.

    One of the essays in this collection is entitled "Old Age Is the Revenge of the Ugly".  My family (immediate and extended) works hard to support our aging matriarch and so we are all familiar with the issues of the elderly.  Pauline will be 91 in a few months.  She is determined to live alone and that can be worrisome for all of us.  She would be willing to move in with one of her children but, at this time, the obstacles for that are many.  So we do the best we can with the situation as it is.

    In this essay, Dr Livingston brings his focus to the fear that may of us have about the aging process.  He notes that our date of birth is likely the most important aspect of our identities.  As we move past middle age, we are aware of the generation ahead of us and most often do not see a vast number of vibrant and optimistic folks on the road in front of us.  Instead, we see lots of examples of aging people who complain of the physical consequences of growing older.  They are surprised at their declining vitality and disturbed by the difficulties they encounter in daily life.  Livingston proposes that "the old have lost most of what we celebrate in this culture: energy,  sexual adventure, a sense of possibilities, and the capacity to change the future."

   Livingston suggests that perhaps there is an implied contract that governs our lives but maybe it was never properly explained to us. Here's the fine print in that contract:

   "If you are lucky enough to grow old, you will be stereotyped and marginalized by society, even by your own children.  You will become slow of thought and movement and have to cope with unexplained pains.  You will experience unspeakable losses that, finally, will include the loss of yourself.  This is the bargain."

    So, go ahead and have your long life but be prepared for a very different existence than the one you experienced as a younger person.  Be prepared for marginalization and the feeling that you are being left behind.  Be prepared for limited mobility, pain, and heartbreak.  I don't quite know what to make of this at the moment.  In my current days of relative health and well being, I don't want to imagine a life as limited and dark as my mother's appears to be.  But who can say how I might feel at 90 years of age?  And what choice do I have anyway?

     What do you think?  Does the implied contract about sound familiar to you?  Is it one you would take as is?  Is there room for negotiation there?

14 comments:

  1. You know, I think he's right when he says that our date of birth is likely the most important aspect of our identities. It seems that we place a very high emphasis on age in our society.

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    1. Absolutely, Keith. One the one end, youth is king in this culture. But when you are really young, it's all about getting older - can't wait to get to 21 or 25 or even 30 - but after a point, it is not a good thing to be older.

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  2. Even though most of us have been exposed to what growing old looks like, I suppose we won't know how we will feel unless we experience it for ourselves.
    What is disturbing to me is the fact that old people are stereotyped and marginalized by society. And yes, even by one's own children.
    Is that a symptom of way too busy lives? Wasn't there a time when elders were respected? Is it like that in all societies?
    You state that one really doesn't have a choice. I understand what you mean by that. But, I believe that is really what is in the fine print of this implied contract. It is probably a fact that once you reach a state where you can no longer care for yourself, the choice of how you want to live out the rest of your days is no longer a decision you get to make. That's what frightens me.

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    1. Exactly , Lynda. At a certain point, if you live long enough, it seems as if many of your choices are removed.

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  3. The implied contract sounds familiar. My mother, now 69, had been tossing this over and over in her head and talking about it with me. Personally, I tend to be sort of a pain in the ass, so I think I would take it fighting, but likely end up with it all the same. The stereotyping and marginalization is the only part that really seems somehow unfair. The rest is a biological inevitability.

    But we are stereotyped all the way through our lives, aren't we? Not always as marginalized, but definitely stereotyped. At my church, I am among the youngest in any of the discussion groups I've ever met with. The result of this is that every time I share an experience or opinion, older folks feel the need to tell me that I will see things differently once I get to their age. I am often cut off, told I don't understand, and the discussion torch is passed on to others older than me. I find this enormously irritating. It's not that I don't think I will see things differently, and perhaps know more, when I am their age. It's just that I don't feel obliged, because of this fact, to shut-up now. Anyway, I've seen older folks treated just the same in groups of younger people. Or women treated this way in groups of men.

    I could say a lot more about this, but I'll shut-up now, since I'm only 38. :) Lots of interesting fodder...

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    1. Good points, Tara. We ARE stereotyped all our lives. I know that teenagers are often all lumped together as a bunch of incorrigibles and that is so not fair. Talk about a marginalized population!
      Don't ever shut up! You have important stuff to say!

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    2. I love Tara's take on this and it contains something I would've touched on. As someone who works in the recovery field, I see rampant marginalizing and stereotyping directed at the clients we serve. Ultimately, depending on the context, people of any age, gender, etc. can and are treated in this dismissive fashion.

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  4. I've known since I was a teenager that that's not a bargain I want to make. I don't want to live through the loss of my mind. I don't care if my body falls apart as long as my mind is intact. But, without my mind, what's the point?

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    1. I agree that the mind is most important but as I watch my mother, I am seeing the frustrations of a failing body too. It is so limiting to have your mobility erased and to know that there are painful medical issues and procedures at every turn. I know I plan to stay active and blah blah blah but then there are the best laid plans of mice and men......

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  5. Of course there's room for negotiation. How we feel about ourselves is a choice. We can let the aches and pains take over our lives, or we can choose to focus on the good things that are around us. Too many people spend their energy seeing the bad rather than the good.

    We're conditioned to believe that we must lose something as we get older. In some cases, that does happen, but I think in others, it's something that people let happen to themselves. Because they believe it is the way. Because they believe it's what must happen.

    But what do I know, really?

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    1. Hey, you know a lot!
      Certainly attitude is important. And community support is important. I think depression is prevalent among our aging population and that cannot necessarily be only a matter of positive thinking. There is a school of thought that promotes that notion and certainly it might be a factor in some mental health issues. But the elderly? Depression is real. Loss of so much fuels it.

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  6. You mean I have to cancel the Botox appointment? All ads on TV are geared to making us younger or at least that feeling of youth, pills for aches and pains, pills to "get it up" and pills to get it out. Some cultures revere old age and we seem to put up with it, especially if it s out of sight like in a "retirement community". I had a tendency to burn my candles at both ends while I was younger and looking back on it all I do not regret it. Today I can't even find a match! My ambitions get a little smaller each day. What is that saying? "Youth will gather their materials to build a stairway to the stars and older people gather their materials to build an outhouse."... use it or lose it, applies to just about everything!

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  7. I don't know too much about implied contracts. You either get old or you die. If you're having fun, then I guess the aches and pains are worth it; if you're not having fun, then it's probably not. As far as choice goes, you always have choice...

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  8. The marginalization is one thing, the physical consequences a whole other. This contract sort of reminds me of the book The Thing About Life Is One Day You'll Be Dead by David Shields. It's very blunt in places about the toll taken by aging, but it's ultimately comforting somehow.

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