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When did you realize you were getting old?

When I successfully completed a task that my Gungdo teacher in Heilongjiang, China, assigned me to do: To be able to pull a 40lb draw hunting bow to full draw and hold it there as steady and motionless as a stone while tuning out everything around me, drifting leaves, lightly falling sleet and rain bouncing off my face and running into my eyes, 40 degree early winter wind, the increasing strain and burn of the muscles on my arm that is holding the drawn arrow, and only focusing on the swinging target 20 yards in front of me for 5 minutes straight, then loosing the arrow and nailing the moving cube straight through it's center. I was 11 years old. When that arrow slammed through the cube, the man did not congratulate me or say any words of praise, but only said: "Don't feel excited or happy. That was what you were supposed to do. You just learned the basic fundamentals of a martial art that has 20 tiers built up over 3000 years of development." Had already been shooting for years prior but Gungdo taught me the importance of being focused only on an important task at hand and being able to put aside all distractions and anything occupying my mind that is useless, until the task has been completed. These lessons translate to everything in life off the archery and gun range and translates equally: Weakness is doing or saying anything that produces no results. Only be satisfied with results.
 
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Not really sure when reality struck me... it wasn't a lightning bolt but has been a more gradual process of awareness and making good choices prior to negative consequences. Perhaps most recently it was the ruptured achilles tendon at 62, and the destroyed shoulder the following year from a fall.. I don't bounce like I used to or catch myself, and I certainly don't heal like I used to.

I still have the mind of a 20 yr old college kid at times.... :LOL: , but mostly keep my smartass mouth shut as I'm too old to get my ass kicked.
 
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DIBBS said:
Not really sure when reality struck me... it wasn't a lightning bolt but has been a more gradual process of awareness and making good choices prior to negative consequences. Perhaps most recently it was the ruptured achilles tendon at 62, and the destroyed shoulder the following year from a fall.. I don't bounce like I used to or catch myself, and I certainly don't heal like I used to.

I still have the mind of a 20 yr old college kid at times.... :LOL: , but mostly keep my smartass mouth shut as I'm too old to get my ass kicked.
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Almost 90% of how our lives will be as we get older, maybe more than 90% is determined by what we consume. Make sure at least 2-3 green/red apples are ALWAYS part of your daily routine. Antioxidant fruits, fresh air, and a constant exercise and movement routine tailored to your specific capabilities. There are 30 year old neckbeards wasting away in basement dens suffering from 5+ chronic and potentially fatal conditions, and there are 90+ year old ranchers and veterans dropping feral hogs with lever action rifles in Texas high country every day. A nation's health and wellbeing is determined by the health and wellbeing of those who are protecting it.
 
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When I wrote something down and then looked at it and wondered why my writing was so sloppy as I've always been a pretty decent hand writer.

My buddy calmly handed me a pair of reading glasses......and I said "no, my vision is fine" but he insisted I try them.
Damn if my next few written characters didn't have their old neat fashion.
I think my next words were something along the lines of "Oh fuck no".
 
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tundrawookiee said:
I remember my moment.

I was heading into our local retail store to purchase some supplies.
In front of me was this cute 30 ish young lady.
She paused for a moment then held the door open for ME :(

Ouch.
Click to expand...

F-n rookie....she was checking out that ass. She was probably thinking "I wanna toss that salad.". You missed your chance.
 
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n2ishun said:
When I wrote something down and then looked at it and wondered why my writing was so sloppy as I've always been a pretty decent hand writer.

My buddy calmly handed me a pair of reading glasses......and I said "no, my vision is fine" but he insisted I try them.
Damn if my next few written characters didn't have their old neat fashion.
I think my next words were something along the lines of "Oh fuck no".
Click to expand...

Yep. My body feels OK as long as I get decent rest, but my near vision is getting awful. Buying "cheater" lenses for my welding helmets and those dorky manufacturing visors for the machine shop and lab benches confirmed the obvious - I'm getting old.
 
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Screenshot_20230313-153849~2.png

Screenshot_20230330-122546~2.png

For me it was about 3 1/2 years ago when muscles and tendons started tearing for no good reason.
 
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Blue Sky Country said:
Almost 90% of how our lives will be as we get older, maybe more than 90% is determined by what we consume. Make sure at least 2-3 green/red apples are ALWAYS part of your daily routine. Antioxidant fruits, fresh air, and a constant exercise and movement routine tailored to your specific capabilities. There are 30 year old neckbeards wasting away in basement dens suffering from 5+ chronic and potentially fatal conditions, and there are 90+ year old ranchers and veterans dropping feral hogs with lever action rifles in Texas high country every day. A nation's health and wellbeing is determined by the health and wellbeing of those who are protecting it.
Click to expand...

I think being active has a great deal to do with it, more so then what we eat. The way I look at it is if eating "right" is going to tack another 3-4 years onto the end of my life, when I am sitting in an old folks home at 90 shitting myself I think I will pass. I am going to keep doing and eating what I want. And I eat like I am still in college, not over the sink but in front of the TV. The only time I am in front of the TV is when I eat, and that is not very often.

When did I feel old, when I started watching this shit...I will watch it again as I change out my hearing aid batteries.

 
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I had my first spinal surgery at 25. It was humbling how long the recovery process took. Unfortunately, that was the point where I never recovered to be completely healthy and capable of being a normal 25+ year old.

I still have my moments of greatness every now and again, but they are frequently followed by getting out of a chair and going down to the ground.

At 40 my hair started to migrate from the top of my head to the middle of my back. That's when I started to look the part.
 
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I will probably think of more later. But yeah, I feel old when I see the car from birthyear. The Ford Mustang came out as a half-year model.

I feel old, sometimes, when someone younger than me, dies.

I use to feel old at decade birthdays. Like turning 30, 40, 50....

Now, I don't care. I am a bit shorter of breath. I have high BP, high cholesterol, and Meniere's (the inner ear problem that sometimes causes vertigo.)
I have completely fake teeth, now. My back hurts if I sleep to long. My toes tingle and get numb (not diabetes.) Zero degrees of arc in my lower back.

But I have been incredibly lucky.

I had a colonoscopy a year ago. 4 polyps, all benign.

I smoked cigarettes from May 25, 1982 to January 29, 2018. Earlier this year, for a lung cancer study my doctor was doing, I had a screening.

Nothing. No nodes, lumps, no cancer.

So, living on borrowed time.
 
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I kayaked 15 miles of class 3 and had a few beers then passed out on the couch. No big deal. But I woke up several hours later and my arms and back were burning, aching like crazy. I had to take 3 ibuprofen for the first time for a non hangover incident. On that day I felt old.
 
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Blue Sky Country said:
When I successfully completed a task that my Gungdo teacher in Heilongjiang, China, assigned me to do: To be able to pull a 40lb draw hunting bow to full draw and hold it there as steady and motionless as a stone while tuning out everything around me, drifting leaves, lightly falling sleet and rain bouncing off my face and running into my eyes, 40 degree early winter wind, the increasing strain and burn of the muscles on my arm that is holding the drawn arrow, and only focusing on the swinging target 20 yards in front of me for 5 minutes straight, then loosing the arrow and nailing the moving cube straight through it's center. I was 11 years old. When that arrow slammed through the cube, the man did not congratulate me or say any words of praise, but only said: "Don't feel excited or happy. That was what you were supposed to do. You just learned the basic fundamentals of a martial art that has 20 tiers built up over 3000 years of development." Had already been shooting for years prior but Gungdo taught me the importance of being focused only on an important task at hand and being able to put aside all distractions and anything occupying my mind that is useless, until the task has been completed. These lessons translate to everything in life off the archery and gun range and translates equally: Weakness is doing or saying anything that produces no results. Only be satisfied with results.
Click to expand...
When was it your time to leave, Grasshopper?
 
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When I was double hoofed by a ranked bull, bull riding. My son watched that and was terrified. He did steer riding and never wanted to ride a bull.
I felt really old after that incident. The hospital staff didn't help either, "aren't you a bit too old to be riding bulls?".
 
At 35yo they gave me hearing aid, glasses, and pulled my wisdom teeth. At 72yo - kidney stones, torn rotator cuff on both shoulders, awaiting decision when to do knee replacement, recently had cataract and pteridium surgery, and awaiting biopsy results for skin cancer. Can't wait for what the next 30 years will 'gift' me. Luckily my mind is still good.

If someone asks, who are you people and what's that smell?
 
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vinniedelpino said:
When I looked in the mirror and saw my dad staring back at me.

It took me almost 40 years to realize all the advice he gave was absolutely priceless. Now I'm passing that advice on to my sons and they're doing things the hard way just like I did.

It's bittersweet.
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So agree with this^^^^^

It's a WTF just happened moment.

Well I look in the mirror - what the hell happened to me?
Whatever I had has gone away
I'm not the young kid that I used to be
So I push the hair back out of my face
That's O.K., I knew this would happen
But I was hopin' not today

John Mellencamp
 
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thejeep said:
I kayaked 15 miles of class 3 and had a few beers then passed out on the couch. No big deal. But I woke up several hours later and my arms and back were burning, aching like crazy. I had to take 3 ibuprofen for the first time for a non hangover incident. On that day I felt old.
Click to expand...


Worked 10+ hours on a very large and time intensive ductwork deepclean and reinstall project for a restaurant oven system. Felt nothing afterward UNTIL after waking up from an 8 hour sleep. Every limb aching and droning away but an ibuprofen clears things up quickly. The aching is from the inflammation that the body undergoes to repair the wear placed on your muscles during the extensive workout routine and sleep is when that full inflammation process is started, that is why you feel nothing UNTIL after you slept.
 
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When I have some accomplishment, and want to share it with my folks......I cant, they are both passed
When I was hiking the bwca recently, thinking of the last trip my lab did with me, seeing a big downed tree I had to help him over.....
When I went to the Dr recently, and he said its probably past time we put a camera up your arse......
When I see classmates in the obits.........
 
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Conducting an annual physical health screening on soldiers and I saw this young female E2 with a very unusual last name. Same last name as a fellow 2LT that was KIA in Iraq back in 2004. I said I knew a soldier with the same last name and mentioned his full name. She piped up "that was my uncle!". Made me feel instantly old. I was doing screening exams on soldiers that were basically the sons and daughters of soldiers I deployed and fought with. Hell, I'm seeing troops now that were born in 2006.
 
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About 20 years ago, I was in a liquor store. Got a bottle of Stoli's for my wife and #7 for me. Set them on the counter, cashier was reading a magazine. As she looked up from it, she said, "Can I see your... never mind." :poop:
 
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E. Bryant said:
Yep. My body feels OK as long as I get decent rest, but my near vision is getting awful. Buying "cheater" lenses for my welding helmets and those dorky manufacturing visors for the machine shop and lab benches confirmed the obvious - I'm getting old.
Click to expand...
I feel that! That day when you think "Why is this DRO or these dial graduations soooo blurry!" Or "How the hell do I turn the brightness up on the CNC monitor?!?" And I don't even think about trying to read a .0005" Interapid test indicator with out +2.5 readers. Seeing an edge finder is a stretch these days.
 
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"You have arthritis in your knees"
"No I don't"
"YES you do"
----
"When were you born? (to coworker)"
2000
---
When my shoulders started sounding like bubble wrap everytime I move.
 
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How do I know I'm getting old?
My nieces and nephews are listening to music like Linkin Park and say that they like these oldies
I'm happy to be carded buying alcohol
I have to explain to my nieces and nephews what the world was like before google and social media
I have trouble understanding what the kids are saying
 
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In stages
At about 26 I gained 10 pounds and the hair started receding. :oops:
At 35 all of a sudden 10 more pounds and less hair.
At 45 I had 3 misses during a USPSA match, this was after taking a break for a few years, but I hadn't ever missed the whole darn target before. Eyes going bad and hadn't realized it. Been 20/20 beforehand and had to have prescription shooting glasses made.
Somewhere in this time frame I hurt my back lifting a spray ring into the truck. Never was a problem previously and learned the hard way I had to be careful from then on.
A few years later I went over the handle bars at 140 mph at a track day. Expensive and was blessed not to have had serious damage. Time to sell the sport bike plus a felony ticket was coming down the tracks eventually.
At 55 I couldn't see exactly where my misses went anymore in tactical matches and was losing physicality and steadiness. Eyes even worse.
Approaching mid 60's and more pitiful every year that goes by.

Yet a few weeks ago I got 2nd place in a long range air rifle match. Lost by one point to the arguably the best shooter in the country who is in his prime. Old dog can still hunt = sometimes.
 
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I have another cute story about realizing I’m getting old.

I used to work 3rd shift, 12a-8:30a, with weekends off. Periodically we’d keep my stepdaughter home on Friday to leave for a weekend something-or-other or just to do a thing Friday afternoon. On these days I’d try to only take a short nap when I got home while my wife got stuff ready to go. I usually ended up sleeping too long and making us late to whatever the thing was. Well, I can solve that problem. I purposefully laid across a large lounge chair in our living room, thinking that laying in an uncomfortable position would wake me up after 30-ish minutes. Instead I still slept for a few hours and when I woke up I was crippled. It took at least 45 minutes for me to be able to move correctly.
 
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I remember it distinctly. I was sitting there doing the math, and realized I would be 26 when I graduated from college. :ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO:
 
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