Being an Older Parent
Thoughts from This Unusual Vantage Point
I was 54 when my first daughter was born and 57 when my second daughter was born. At age 74, they are still the center of my life. I’m at an age when many of my friends are experiencing the joy and ease of grandchildren. In contrast, I am experiencing the wonder and challenge of my daughters’ teenage and young adult lives. (note: in the sailing photo my daughters are 8 and 11, and I am 65.)
As I write in my book, A Life Yet to Live, my experience of becoming a parent at this late age is the driving force behind my later life health journey. I want to stick around for as long as I can and be as vitally healthy as possible to be part of their lives as a healthy, active father. Becoming a parent at any age is a life-transforming experience. But I find that, being much older, my role comes with different perspectives and priorities.
Mortality Is More Frequently on My Mind
The biggest difference between being an older parent at this stage of life is that I am aware of my own mortality. My older friends know this well. This awareness hits you, usually in your fifties or early sixties, that says, “This is the beginning of the third and final act of my life.” If you take this message to heart as I did at age 57, it may become a paradigm shift for you as it was for me. This realization forced me to examine how I intended to spend the remaining years of my life.
Younger parents, while still radically changed by the experience of having children, usually don’t yet have this extra awareness. They are, as I was at their age, still in the throes of doing, earning, achieving, and juggling it all. Mortality hasn’t yet exerted its considerable power on their awareness.
When I tell my teenage daughters that there is another way of experiencing life than the immediate, practical, and personal, they acknowledge me as unconventional in that regard. Their main concerns at their age, like they were for me, is what their friends are doing and liking and their future plans for their own lives. Those influences along their own individual paths in life will shape them every bit as much as any parental influence.
Yet I also know that somehow they’ve heard me – that they acknowledge there can be another side of life within us that is ultra-special. We only get one go as living beings on this planet. I believe that having this outlook in the background can significantly help them find their way through their own life’s maze.
Showing Children Resilience in Growing Older
This brings me to another aspect of my years. I know that what’s gotten me this far in life is a certain kind of resilience. At key points, I had the courage to separate myself from what many other people around me were doing, and I chose to take a different path. The source of this inspiration is something I’ve come to call an inner gyroscope, a guidance system of unknown origin – a combination of gut feeling, inspiration, careful thought, and who knows what else – that seems to make these decisions for me. I trust this inner power that seems to come from nowhere. I also call it the great guide.
I know others who have this same, well-developed system. The bulk of my friends have it, which is why we have been drawn to each other. They are from many different backgrounds, and each follows this inner guide and not the herd. They somehow seem to manage their lives better than most. Their viewpoints and perspectives are different, substantial, and grounded. They have their own trusted inner confidence.
Above all, as my daughters enter their adult years, I want them to experience this inner power. I help them recognize their inner power by showing them my own resilience in the face of growing older.
If you are reading my blog articles or my book, it will come as no surprise that one way I exhibit resilience in the face of growing older is by staying healthy, fit, and alert. If I am to enjoy all sorts of activities with my daughters for as long as possible, this is not an option.
So far, I have been able to manage this. I’m not sure of the challenges that lie ahead. But staying healthy, fit, and alert is work and effort, and it takes more time than it did when I was younger. I’ve developed a regular daily practice devoted to it.
For me it is well worth the effort. The benefits have been favorable to my life in so many more ways than just health. I am not afraid of getting older and less afraid of dying. I know a great deal more about life than I did before I started on this journey. My entire experience of getting older has changed. I am living an entirely new, different, and active life at an age when many others aren’t able to make this claim.
The Ultimate Gift of Being a Parent at Any Age
The real gift of being a parent at any age is caring for ourselves and our loved ones. What I’ve learned from my daughters is equal to or greater than what they’ve learned from me. Trying to “get it right” and not repeat the mistakes I feel were made in my own childhood has changed my direction in life. And I have been able to recapture some of the essential qualities of youth: energy, genuine spontaneity, and curiosity – essential qualities that I strive to model for my daughters.
