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My dad is 90 and is writing a book. I can see him getting a little frayed around the edges mentally but amazes me with his grasp of things he studied in earlier years. Still drives but it needs to be places/routes he is familiar with.
I'm afraid I will take after my mother who started declining mentally around age 80.
I have a friend who is 97 and still pretty sharp. We will get into political discussions about current events. But her body is not in good shape.
I’ve known plenty of 90+ people who maintained the vast majority of their intellect. Most helpful words of advice to live long? “Don’t do stupid things”.
That reminds me of a quote by the great actor Spencer Tracey. When someone asked him what advice would be give to an aspiring young actor he responded,
"Remember your lines and don't trip over the furniture."
We just received a Christmas card from a 95 year old my husband worked with early in his career. She's still sharp, writing her own cards out and keeping herself busy. She still takes the train into the city from the suburbs to attend cultural events. We met her for lunch a few years ago as we no longer live in the same area. Husband and I left lunch hoping we were as sharp as she is as we get older.
She keeps up with developments in her former field. She was a nutritionist. Her husband died years ago.
My FIL will be 90 in Jan and is one of the sharpest people I've ever known.
He just quit working a couple years ago but still takes care of his 7 acres and house. He has a gal friend that he takes care of and has always made the rounds of visits to those who are housebound.
Being active is key IMO
I believe a sense of belonging and purpose are a common thread with many of our most seasoned citizens.
My dad is 90 and is writing a book. I can see him getting a little frayed around the edges mentally but amazes me with his grasp of things he studied in earlier years. Still drives but it needs to be places/routes he is familiar with.
I'm afraid I will take after my mother who started declining mentally around age 80.
I have a friend who is 97 and still pretty sharp. We will get into political discussions about current events. But her body is not in good shape.
Go Dad.
There was a woman in the writers group to which I used to belong who at 80 co-wrote and published a young adult novel with her granddaughter. Last I saw her, she was working on a mystery novel on her own.
I don't know him personally, but one 91 year old man is a well-known long time authority on minerals and collecting and travels the world doing lectures. He is is senior editor and excellent writer for a popular American hobby magazine. I don't know if I should mention his name.
I have no idea how he does it.
Not sure there are any tips to gain, except "choose your parents well" (lol). My MIL and FIL are pretty good examples, trying every supplement, vitamin, food strategies, exercise, etc etc (some of which were in contrast to other strategies, like replacing all butter with margarine and then dropping margarine and going back to butter, dropping all the fat they could from their diet and then bringing fat back, etc).
My FIL was 94 when he died, my MIL was 91. My FIL had been mentally slipping for more than a decade before he died and the last 24 months or so was pretty much just not mentally there at all. My MIL was very sharp right up until about a month before she died BUT her body had started failing her long before that. By the time she died, the neuropathy in her feet was so bad that she could not really walk, her RA had twisted and curled her fingers so badly she couldn't write or hold books and had multiple medical issues. She said, several times, that her brain had outlasted her body.
I definitely would rather die quite a bit younger, myself. Of course, my parents died at 58 and 71 and their parents before that, so I don't have those long-lived potentials. My older cousins are starting to hit their 70s and are starting to die off as well, so I don't think it was just some lifestyle or environmental factor.
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Many wonderful stories about sharp 90+-year olds certainly sounds encouraging. This leads me to wonder how widespread this phenomenon really is. A 2010 Census report revealed some interesting facts: https://www.census.gov/newsroom/rele.../cb11-194.html
- About 1.9 million out of 310-million population in 2010, reached age 90 (triple that of 1980). 90-year old's comprise about 5-percent of the population of those over 65.
- The 90-and-older population is overwhelmingly (88.1 percent) white. Additionally, blacks represented 7.6 percent, Asians 2.2 percent and Hispanics (who may be of any race) about 4 percent.
-The annual median personal income for people 90 and older during 2006-2008 was $14,760 (in 2008 inflation-adjusted dollars). Almost half (47.9 percent) of this amount came from Social Security and another 18.3 percent came from retirement pension income. All in all, 92.3 percent of those 90 and older received income from the Social Security Administration (86.2 percent received Social Security income only with the remainder receiving either Supplemental Security Income only or both).
- In 2006-2008, 14.5 percent of people 90 and older lived in poverty, a higher rate than for those 65-89 (9.6 percent).
Among the 90-and-older population, women outnumber men by a ratio of nearly 3 to 1. There were 38 men for every 100 women ages 90 to 94, with the ratio dropping to 26 for ages 95 to 99 and 24 for those 100 and older.
-More than 80 percent of women 90 and older were widowed, while more than 40 percent of men this age were married.
In 2006-2008, half of men 90 and older lived in a household with family members and/or unrelated individuals, less than one-third lived alone, and about 15 percent were in an institutionalized living arrangement such as a nursing home. In contrast, less than one-third of women in this age group lived in a household with family members and/or unrelated individuals, four in 10 lived alone, and another quarter were in institutionalized living arrangements. (See Figure 2.)
- Those 90 and older were almost universally (99.5 percent) covered by health insurance.
I only WISH my FIL (90) was still sharp. Hes losing his faculties and forgetting in a 1/2 what he called for when we are out and he leaves a message fir us to call him back.
He cant remember much beyond 5 minutes.
Even his memory of days long ago is failing him.
Part is hes bored, and dids nothing but veg in front of tv court room drama for entertainment.
Ah, well, mayve he wont be around too much longer
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