I started formally studying psychology a while back. By the end of this year, I’ll be opening a counselling practice. Most recently, I’ve been studying developmental psychology—the term that defines human behaviour and thought through chronological age and maturity.
It will surprise no one to learn that there’s a wealth of knowledge, studies and theories around the early years of life. There’s also a dizzying number of studies on young white men. But psychological milestones and ‘norms’ become more opaque as we age. And if you’re over 65, forget it. According to mainstream psychological thought, old age is defined simply as ‘65+’.
That definition denotes a plateauing of development that’s false. No one would suggest someone is the same at 20 as they are at 50. Or 30 and 60. Would we expect the same of 65 and 95?
And then, in the way the universe sometimes provides, many things started popping up in my field of consciousness. The compelling New York Times Magazine piece about deathbed visions. The second season of Julia Louis Dreyfus’ remarkable podcast Wiser Than Me, where she interviews women over sixty-five about life and aging. And the new charming Steve Martin documentary on Apple TV+ (titled Steve!), in which he reflects on his life and career (he’s 75). In his old age, Martin has shrugged off many anxieties that debilitated him as a young (although incredibly successful) man.
‘When I was forty, I was obsessed with doom, but it was fake doom,’ he says. ‘Now I’m grappling with real doom, which is much easier to handle. It’s just there.’
Add to this, of course, in my immediate family, there is currently a quartet of people all in their final years of life, each in need of psychological help and (mostly) stubbornly refusing to accept it.
I don’t want to diminish the work of geriatric psychology, which is absolutely a specialised field and very much alive. As you may expect, it’s relatively new, only gaining proper momentum in the 1980’s.
The constellation of nuanced grief experienced by the elderly is monumental and feels under-serviced at the ground level of suburban Australia. I’ve witnessed the older people in my life tackle the loss of independence, the grieving of lifelong friends and family members, the upending of their finances, menopause and massive changes in hormone health, the acceptance of profound physical disability for the first time in their lives and, of course, their oncoming demise.
When I was a teenager, I volunteered at an aged care home. There was one lady I became close with. She mentioned her death once, in an off-handed way. We were talking about technology and speculating on the near future and she said, ‘well, I probably won’t be around then.’
I was fifteen and had no idea how to reply. I’m embarrassed to say I denied it. I waved her away. ‘Oh, come on. You never know!’ She looked at me like I was an idiot, which I was. When I recounted the story to my mother later that evening, she offered an alternate reply.
‘You could’ve said, “and how do you feel about that?”’
That’s a clear memory—all the more clear, perhaps, because we don’t talk about death in my family beyond the clear-eyed business of wills and logistics of care and ‘remember I’ve put the bank details in that notebook’ chatter. It’s not for lack of trying. But the stern, working-class culture of my older family members has kept them safe for most of their lives. Why would we expect them to willingly dissolve into vulnerable emotions now?
There are common threads to their grief and navigation that I’ve talked over with friends. Those who care for the dying are eager to compare notes. Anecdotal similarities are plentiful. The patriarchs are stubborn to admit any weakness, often putting themselves in terrifying physical danger to exert their strength and power. The matriarchs, always soft, gentle and polite, began to relax into a surprising cruelty. They’re at the end of their lives, and they’re pissed. They’ve behaved well, done the ‘right thing’ and are now at the end. There is no societal gold star at the end. It's just a nursing home and an annoying husband. Bah humbug.
A strand of Buddhism instructs daily mediation of one’s death at dawn. It’s a startling, grounding practice. Don’t forget: one day, you’ll die. George Harrison once explained meditation as an essential practice for death. Out of everything you’ll ever do, you’ll be dead the longest. So get some practice in.
It feels vulnerable to type this, but it’s the truthiest truth: I think about death a lot. Not suicide, and not anything too methodological. Just existence and the passing of time. I string together my mixed theology of lapsed Catholicism, Buddhist, Hindu and agnostic. I am breathless at the sight of my children growing, growing, growing.
We are all, each of us, hurtling towards that time. If we are lucky, we keep going into that opaque final act.
I am not committing to a future career in geriatric psychology (although who knows?), but I do hope that we have a hand to hold at that time. Perhaps some stranger even has enough strength to accept the reality of passing with us. To wonder together at its a strange mystery. To watch as we exhale. To open the windows so we may finally leave. Up, up and away.
In companionship to this piece, you may like this piece on grief or this one on happiness.