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Never Say Die: The Myth and Marketing of the New Old Age
Susan Jacoby, an unsparing chronicler of unreason in American culture, now offers an impassioned, tough-minded critique of the myth that a radically new old age -- unmarred by physical or mental deterioration, financial problems, or intimate loneliness -- awaits the huge baby boom generation. Combining historical, social, and economic analysis with personal experiences of love and loss, Jacoby turns a caustic eye not only on the modern fiction that old age can be "defied" but also on the sentimental image of a past in which Americans supposedly revered their elders.
"Never Say Die" unmasks the fallacies promoted by twenty-first-century hucksters of longevity -- including health gurus claiming that boomers can stay "forever young" if they only live right, self-promoting biomedical businessmen predicting that ninety may soon become the new fifty and that a "cure" for the "disease" of aging is just around the corner, and wishful thinkers asserting that older means wiser.
The author offers powerful evidence that America has always been a "youth culture" and that the plight of the neglected old dates from the early years of the republic. Today, as the oldest boomers turn sixty-five, it is imperative for them to distinguish between marketing hype and realistic hope about what lies ahead for the more than 70 million Americans who will be beyond the traditional retirement age by 2030. This wide-ranging reappraisal examines the explosion of Alzheimer's cases, the uncertain economic future of aging boomers, the predicament of women who make up an overwhelming majority of the oldest -- and poorest -- old, and the illusion that we can control the way we age and die.
Jacoby raises the fundamental question of whether living longer is a good thing unless it means living better. Her book speaks to Americans, whatever their age, who draw courage and hope from facing reality instead of embracing that oldest of delusions, the fountain of youth.
"Never Say Die" unmasks the fallacies promoted by twenty-first-century hucksters of longevity -- including health gurus claiming that boomers can stay "forever young" if they only live right, self-promoting biomedical businessmen predicting that ninety may soon become the new fifty and that a "cure" for the "disease" of aging is just around the corner, and wishful thinkers asserting that older means wiser.
The author offers powerful evidence that America has always been a "youth culture" and that the plight of the neglected old dates from the early years of the republic. Today, as the oldest boomers turn sixty-five, it is imperative for them to distinguish between marketing hype and realistic hope about what lies ahead for the more than 70 million Americans who will be beyond the traditional retirement age by 2030. This wide-ranging reappraisal examines the explosion of Alzheimer's cases, the uncertain economic future of aging boomers, the predicament of women who make up an overwhelming majority of the oldest -- and poorest -- old, and the illusion that we can control the way we age and die.
Jacoby raises the fundamental question of whether living longer is a good thing unless it means living better. Her book speaks to Americans, whatever their age, who draw courage and hope from facing reality instead of embracing that oldest of delusions, the fountain of youth.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2011
About the author
Susan Jacoby
25 books220 followersSusan Jacoby is an independent scholar and best-selling author. The most recent of her seven previous books is The Age of American Unreason. She lives in New York City.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 94 reviews
May 2, 2011
The substantive content of this book could fit nicely in the pages of a magazine article. Jacoby fills the rest of her book with prolonged rants and supports her arguments mostly by telling you vaguely sketched anecdotes about what happened to her friends and relatives.
This is a shame, because the subject is one that is vitally important, so a better written, better documented book on this topic might have done some good.
The topic is one that deserves a lot more notice: the way our society romanticizes the very unpleasant realities of what happens to most people in their 80s and 90s. Jacoby is right about the way that the realities of Alzheimers are something we only discover when a loved one develops it and that it is far more horrible than the sentimental media portrayals would have you think. She is also right that the "wisdom" of age is a fantasy for anyone who wasn't wise in middle age. Most importantly she is very right that the societal safety net we count on is not going to be there as the boomer generation hits its 80s and 90s.
But her tone is so off-putting, and there is so little hard data supporting her arguments, that the book fails. I got to where I was skimming towards the end after I realized I wasn't going to learn anything new by reading every paragraph.
This is a shame, because the subject is one that is vitally important, so a better written, better documented book on this topic might have done some good.
The topic is one that deserves a lot more notice: the way our society romanticizes the very unpleasant realities of what happens to most people in their 80s and 90s. Jacoby is right about the way that the realities of Alzheimers are something we only discover when a loved one develops it and that it is far more horrible than the sentimental media portrayals would have you think. She is also right that the "wisdom" of age is a fantasy for anyone who wasn't wise in middle age. Most importantly she is very right that the societal safety net we count on is not going to be there as the boomer generation hits its 80s and 90s.
But her tone is so off-putting, and there is so little hard data supporting her arguments, that the book fails. I got to where I was skimming towards the end after I realized I wasn't going to learn anything new by reading every paragraph.
April 5, 2011
If you are a baby boomer (born between 1946 and 1964) and you read only one non-fiction book this year, I recommend this one. The idea that our older years are going to be our "golden years" is a myth that Jacoby shatters. If you live beyond the age of 85, you have a 50-50 chance of ending up living in a nursing home AND a near 50% chance of having some form of dementia, like Alzheimer's disease. And, if you are that unlucky, say goodbye to your money, what little you will have if Congress gets their way and cuts Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid. Read this book, get angry, and do something about it! I am contacting my Congressional Rep. right after I type this last word. . .
February 1, 2021
This is probably a book that all people in their 50s and older should read. I’ve certainly begun making more plans to face old age more realistically. The hype of an active happy old age is fed to us by the media non-stop and Jacoby is anything but. With that said, it was hard to buy into her extreme pessimism and her assurance that she was going to end on a positive note wasn’t true. She did not. The book would have been better if it had been condensed; it was repetitive at times and at other times seemed to veer off the subject. It also would have been better if the author had presented a more balanced view.
May 5, 2011
One can hardly say one LOVES this book. I mean, really! I bought it because I heard this woman on the radio talking about how very old people are not allowed to be angry about getting old. I remembered my 8 years with House Calls. Time to come back and look at it again. This woman knows her stuff and her big complaint is the false image so many people have about getting old these days, "90 is the new 50!" etc. Mostly, after 85, all sorts of debilities creep in and most (not all) really don't like the feeling of their precious bodies and souls falling apart! So, she talks about death as something we somehow, as a society, feel we can out-wit, by eating better, exercising more and doing crossword puzzles. In the end, as they say in Six Feet Under, everyone and everything dies. So, why did she write this book? I think to say that falling apart before dying really sucks and it is life and, really, there it is. I remember sitting with my patients who were unable to get up to the bathroom, watching TV all day. People who had been dancers in the 30s, Army officers, mothers of 8. In the end, if it is not swift, there is usually a kind of suffering that is normal. It is about keeping a modicum of dignity and self. It was hard for me to watch my patients. I, at 50, really didn't understand. I kept thinking, gee, isn't enough just to BE who you are? YOU are simply valuable! But it turns out that what they were really struggling with (besides poverty, pain and loneliness) was loss of their sense of their own value. Measured by their own yardstick. That is something that is so deeply personal. As so many pieces of self dissolve in late old age or disease, it's simply a pisser! This author says, let that be OK. Anger is a great organizing power in the self and can keep the fires of dignity going in whatever ways possible. And, as a loving bystander, listen and let whatever love and joy is experienced be honored as well. You all can tell I had no feelings about this book, right?
July 29, 2011
Although I didn't read this book word for word, I read enough to get the gist--the author believes that much of the media coverage, including that of drug companies, would lead us to believe that most of us will live to a ripe old age and enjoy it. Her extensive research and resources indicate otherwise. The reality, she maintains, is that the older we get the poorer we become, and since there are more Americans headed in that direction every day, the future is not as rosy as we are led to believe by the mainstream media.
A sobering look at what baby boomers may face as we edge towards the end of life. Here are a few examples of her thoughts:
"In 2008, several major studies showed that although overall life expectancy was still increasing, the life expectancy gap between the rich and the poor--and between those with the lowest and highest levels of education--had actually widened since the 1980's." (pp 19-20).
"Most days when I wake up to the Today show, some perky woman...is talking...about saving more money....I am wholeheartedly in favor of dispensing with video games in favor of library books...but the consumer maven did not have any ideas about what parents should do to save for retirement if one or both of them are unemployed and toys and makeup have already been eliminated from the household budget in the effort to buy enough groceries.... (p.174)
"One of the few worthwhile pieces of positive advice for people contemplating retirement and relocation is that they move to an apartment in a city with taxis and decent public transportation....One of the big advantages of living in a walkable city is that walking is good for your health. (p. 286)
A sobering look at what baby boomers may face as we edge towards the end of life. Here are a few examples of her thoughts:
"In 2008, several major studies showed that although overall life expectancy was still increasing, the life expectancy gap between the rich and the poor--and between those with the lowest and highest levels of education--had actually widened since the 1980's." (pp 19-20).
"Most days when I wake up to the Today show, some perky woman...is talking...about saving more money....I am wholeheartedly in favor of dispensing with video games in favor of library books...but the consumer maven did not have any ideas about what parents should do to save for retirement if one or both of them are unemployed and toys and makeup have already been eliminated from the household budget in the effort to buy enough groceries.... (p.174)
"One of the few worthwhile pieces of positive advice for people contemplating retirement and relocation is that they move to an apartment in a city with taxis and decent public transportation....One of the big advantages of living in a walkable city is that walking is good for your health. (p. 286)
April 1, 2011
Difficult to plow through because of lengthy discussions on ethical issues related to life extension versus quality of life and the social and political constructs of old age. The author raises depressing facts that are often overlooked by baby boomers who assume their "golden" years will be mentally and physically sound, economically viable, and most importantly, that they will have choices on how and where they spend their final years. In fact most of the "old, old" (those in their 80s and 90s)will have exhausted their resources, suffer from some form of dementia and physical limitation, and be forced from their homes because of the lack of affordable care outside of nursing homes (which in fact is the most expensive form of elder care).
The author compares the U.S. system (low taxes and encouragement of personal savings and individual retirement planning) to the European form (high taxes with unlimited social nets for all, including the aged), and finds our system lacking. She has some suggestions for change but does not offer much hope that American politicians and voters will step up. The book is worth reading for its candid discussion of the realities of old age (political, economic, medical, and social), information that I found vital in thinking about my personal choices for the future.
The author compares the U.S. system (low taxes and encouragement of personal savings and individual retirement planning) to the European form (high taxes with unlimited social nets for all, including the aged), and finds our system lacking. She has some suggestions for change but does not offer much hope that American politicians and voters will step up. The book is worth reading for its candid discussion of the realities of old age (political, economic, medical, and social), information that I found vital in thinking about my personal choices for the future.
October 17, 2014
I really like this, especially when compared to a terrible book I recently read, Long for This World: The Strange Science of Immortality. I get the impression that Susan Jacoby would slap Aubrey de Grey upside the head, and I would honestly pay good money to see that.
Anyway, Jacoby touches on a number of subjects in this book, but I'd say the main theme is that getting old sucks and let's stop pretending that it doesn't, for the sake of old people (and I love that she calls them old people instead of using a ridiculous euphemism) but also for everyone who hopes to one day become an old person. George H.W. Bush may have gone skydiving for his 90th birthday, but if you are lucky enough to live that long, chances you will not be able to do anything like that because you'll be suffering from a number of physical problems and possibly Alzheimer's to boot.
Not that this is a pessimistic book. I really don't think it is. Susan Jacoby just has a realistic perspective on aging, which is something you don't see often because we're all too busy trying to pretend that we're never going to die. But wouldn't we all be a lot better off if we thought about aging and death before we actually got there?
Anyway, Jacoby touches on a number of subjects in this book, but I'd say the main theme is that getting old sucks and let's stop pretending that it doesn't, for the sake of old people (and I love that she calls them old people instead of using a ridiculous euphemism) but also for everyone who hopes to one day become an old person. George H.W. Bush may have gone skydiving for his 90th birthday, but if you are lucky enough to live that long, chances you will not be able to do anything like that because you'll be suffering from a number of physical problems and possibly Alzheimer's to boot.
Not that this is a pessimistic book. I really don't think it is. Susan Jacoby just has a realistic perspective on aging, which is something you don't see often because we're all too busy trying to pretend that we're never going to die. But wouldn't we all be a lot better off if we thought about aging and death before we actually got there?
September 21, 2011
Here's a dose of hard reality. Aging is going to be hard and our collective self-denial of its reality is only setting us up for major despair. Don't buy the myth that you can escape the demise of your body and your brain and the loneliness of old age. There won't be any drugs to keep you from Alzheimers. Jacoby is an articulate atheist and a champion of reason with a capital R so the Christian view of dying holds no appeal to her. Someone needs to write a response.
May 16, 2011
In Never Say Die little miss sunshine Susan Jacoby uses the cheery topic of getting old as a jumping off point for a broad range of topics relating to aging including: products marketed to seniors, Alzheimer’s Disease, entitlement programs, assisted suicide, life extension research and others.
Where I think the book is strongest is in its discussion of financial issues affecting seniors. Since people are living longer than ever (or to put it more accurately, more people than ever are making it to the upper ranges of the human lifespan) savings need to last for many more years than may have been planned for. This is an important point for younger people to understand since planning and saving needs to take place over a lifetime, not as an afterthought at the point of retirement. In the US, where savings rates are pathetic and right wing forces are striving to undermine the social safety net of Roosevelt’s New Deal and Johnson’s Great Society, failure to plan is likely to result in an extended period of destitution (hope that Playstation you bought with you tax cut was worth it).
Where the book is weakest is in its use of anecdote as a substitute for data. While anecdote can put a personal face on a particular problem, it is an unreliable basis from which to draw broader conclusions. A little more research and somewhat less story telling would have gone a long way towards bolstering the author’s points.
Where I think the book is strongest is in its discussion of financial issues affecting seniors. Since people are living longer than ever (or to put it more accurately, more people than ever are making it to the upper ranges of the human lifespan) savings need to last for many more years than may have been planned for. This is an important point for younger people to understand since planning and saving needs to take place over a lifetime, not as an afterthought at the point of retirement. In the US, where savings rates are pathetic and right wing forces are striving to undermine the social safety net of Roosevelt’s New Deal and Johnson’s Great Society, failure to plan is likely to result in an extended period of destitution (hope that Playstation you bought with you tax cut was worth it).
Where the book is weakest is in its use of anecdote as a substitute for data. While anecdote can put a personal face on a particular problem, it is an unreliable basis from which to draw broader conclusions. A little more research and somewhat less story telling would have gone a long way towards bolstering the author’s points.
June 13, 2013
I will turn 65 next month and, in fact, just applied for my Medicare card, so I thought this would be an appropriate time to read this book and perhaps I would learn something about my current 'young old age' and my rapidly approaching 'old old age'. Wrong. I can't imagine how anyone who has lived more than a few decades could possibly not know what the author goes into excessive length to point out; to wit, that aging can be a messy business and that only a very lucky few spend their last days with their dignity intact. I was really put off by her polemics, her diatribes against religion and against conservative politics, even though I agree with many of her political positions. I also found it quite amusing that while she goes to great lengths in her book to mock those who market products to old people in the visual media using young-looking actors, she has chosen a photo of herself for the jacket of this book which is obviously dated at least 10 years prior to the date of publication.
What a pity. In the right hands this could have been a thoughtful, intelligent discussion of aging in America rather than the disorganized screed I just read.
What a pity. In the right hands this could have been a thoughtful, intelligent discussion of aging in America rather than the disorganized screed I just read.
November 15, 2020
What a terrible book. It's as if the publishing company read Jacoby's excellent "Age of American Unreason" and then heard her pitch the idea of a book about American's fear of old age and how that relates to our image/marketing culture and then didn't bother to read her submission or offer any edits.
"Never Say Die" is just a cranky screed with no real evidence or argument. Jacoby seems to believe that people actually buy into the image presented in commercials of old people being vibrant and physically active at 80 and 90. No one actually believes this any more than people believe any of the other nonsense presented by advertising. Advertising certainly says a lot about our fears and insecurities. Americans are so terrified of getting old because we are all so familiar with the reality of dementia and nursing homes. With this straw man Jacoby just rants and rants at the boomer generation and their supposedly unrealistic views of old age.
The book manages to get even stupider when she turns her attention on younger generations. This section takes on a real "get off my lawn" tone. The absolute height of stupidity is when she claims (with no evidence whatsoever) that declining birth rates are the result of people in their late 30s believing they can put off having children until their 40s. As someone in this demographic this was news to me. Crushing student loan debt, looming global environmental catastrophe, dislike of children, career goals. These are all reasons why this generation doesn't have children, not some misunderstanding of biology.
There's absolutely nothing redeeming in this book. It's just one long cranky, unfounded rant.
"Never Say Die" is just a cranky screed with no real evidence or argument. Jacoby seems to believe that people actually buy into the image presented in commercials of old people being vibrant and physically active at 80 and 90. No one actually believes this any more than people believe any of the other nonsense presented by advertising. Advertising certainly says a lot about our fears and insecurities. Americans are so terrified of getting old because we are all so familiar with the reality of dementia and nursing homes. With this straw man Jacoby just rants and rants at the boomer generation and their supposedly unrealistic views of old age.
The book manages to get even stupider when she turns her attention on younger generations. This section takes on a real "get off my lawn" tone. The absolute height of stupidity is when she claims (with no evidence whatsoever) that declining birth rates are the result of people in their late 30s believing they can put off having children until their 40s. As someone in this demographic this was news to me. Crushing student loan debt, looming global environmental catastrophe, dislike of children, career goals. These are all reasons why this generation doesn't have children, not some misunderstanding of biology.
There's absolutely nothing redeeming in this book. It's just one long cranky, unfounded rant.
November 22, 2015
The author continually categorized me, as a reader, in her stereotypical viewpoints of her imagined audience base.
Because I don't ascribe to her idea that "everyone" thinks aging is likely full of vibrant 90-year-olds skydiving into the sunset, I was continually put off by her tone and suppositions.
I can see, perhaps because of her Manhattan relatively affluent lifestyle and writing for AARP for a while that she would be weary of what common media depict for older people. But c'mon, it's advertising. So what if the actor for an old age product is 50 and trim and has whitened teeth? The author seems in an uproar that the actor is representing a false vision of old age. To me, it's the product company doing what advertisers do: create an image that appeals emotionally to entice humans to buy stuff.
The author may have taken her experience with books on old age, magazine articles on old age, and advertising of products for old age as being literally applicable to society. I do not.
On the other hand, the general message Jacoby sends is a valid one: old age is not necessarily going to be good, if/when we encounter it. To deny it might cause dire disappointment.
Maybe this book is more about setting low, or realistic, expectations for our futures. The author sent me a pessimistic, fatalist message about aging.
I'm still going to try to have a good life, or at least contribute as best as I can to my family and society in my old age. But if I become an unwelcome drain to those around me, and I'm not able to know what's happening around me and it's getting worse, then I hope my time is cut very short.
Because I don't ascribe to her idea that "everyone" thinks aging is likely full of vibrant 90-year-olds skydiving into the sunset, I was continually put off by her tone and suppositions.
I can see, perhaps because of her Manhattan relatively affluent lifestyle and writing for AARP for a while that she would be weary of what common media depict for older people. But c'mon, it's advertising. So what if the actor for an old age product is 50 and trim and has whitened teeth? The author seems in an uproar that the actor is representing a false vision of old age. To me, it's the product company doing what advertisers do: create an image that appeals emotionally to entice humans to buy stuff.
The author may have taken her experience with books on old age, magazine articles on old age, and advertising of products for old age as being literally applicable to society. I do not.
On the other hand, the general message Jacoby sends is a valid one: old age is not necessarily going to be good, if/when we encounter it. To deny it might cause dire disappointment.
Maybe this book is more about setting low, or realistic, expectations for our futures. The author sent me a pessimistic, fatalist message about aging.
I'm still going to try to have a good life, or at least contribute as best as I can to my family and society in my old age. But if I become an unwelcome drain to those around me, and I'm not able to know what's happening around me and it's getting worse, then I hope my time is cut very short.
June 14, 2011
Seriously depressing and I publicly apologize for making other people read it. That said, it was interesting and probably it's better to know what I now do, even if what I now know includes things like the fact that most "old old"--80s and 90s and beyond--people are women, who are alone, and have very low quality of life because of health issues that just happen if you live that long. The book's trying to confront the American idea/l that we can stave off old age by exercising, eating healthfully, and buying stuff. (Jacoby basically says old age *is* easier on you if you're rich, but even if you are, bad things will happen.) She also puts the lie to the notion that age automatically brings wisdom, or that we once typically took care of the elderly in our multi-generational homes (mostly we didn't because people simply didn't live that long).
The strongest component of the book, for me, is Jacoby's weaving her personal experiences with age into the text: in particular, during a touching and revelatory chapter on Alzheimer's, which made me cry, she describes her experience caring from a partner with the disease, his good and his bad days, the helplessness a caregiver feels, etc. Enlightening and powerful. That chapter was astonishing, really--I'd recommend people read that chapter and the one on women as "eventually the only sex," and maybe just skim the rest...
The strongest component of the book, for me, is Jacoby's weaving her personal experiences with age into the text: in particular, during a touching and revelatory chapter on Alzheimer's, which made me cry, she describes her experience caring from a partner with the disease, his good and his bad days, the helplessness a caregiver feels, etc. Enlightening and powerful. That chapter was astonishing, really--I'd recommend people read that chapter and the one on women as "eventually the only sex," and maybe just skim the rest...
December 14, 2021
An important book, especially for women to tend to live longer than men and who spend so much energy and money trying to avoid looking old. I wish I could get my children to read this, especially my daughter, that they might be better prepared for their own old age and better understand what their loved ones may experience along the way. The author touches on a wide variety of issues, and I could have done without her personal opinions, but she makes some good points that are worth thinking about. Where I once hoped to live to 100, that now seems like a terrible idea. To die with my mind in tact and with minimal suffering is as much as anyone can realistically seem to hope for.
March 17, 2015
An intelligently written opinion piece on aging. Jacoby touches on tons of pertinent subjects from Alzheimer's to universal health care to retirement planning to Social Security and Medicare. The subjects of aging, the elderly, diseases of the old, terminal illness and death are highly uncomfortable ones in our society. Jacoby tackels these issues with passion, care and an unflinching pen. These issues are social and political issues, as well as personal issues. [Highly recommend.]
August 11, 2016
An important book about the realities of aging. Not for the faint of heart (sorry, folks--80 is not the new 50), but a worthwhile read for those in middle age or approaching retirement.
August 14, 2012
3.5 stars for the good advice. Susan Jacoby is a good writer. I like the way she expresses her thoughts in much of the book. There were sections, however, that I tried to read more than once, and when my eyes just glazed over for the second time, I gave up. Ms. Jacoby seems to have little tolerance for those who do not share her political or religious views, which I also found a bit off-putting, at times. That being said, there was much of her book with which I agreed.
Here are my favorite passages:
p. 36: "When all our faculties have left, or are leaving us," Jefferson wrote Adams in 1822, "one by one, sight, hearing, memory, every avenue of pleasing sensation is closed...when the friends of our youth are all gone, and a generation is risen around us whom we know not, is death an evil?...I have ever dreaded a doting old age; and my health has been generally so good, and is now so good, that I dread it still." Then, sounding not at all like a man resigned to death, Jefferson described reading as his chief delight and added, "Altho' I know it is too late for me to buckle on the armour of youth, yet my indignation would not permit me passively to receive the kick from an Ass." Only ten days later, Adams replied that Jefferson's letter was "the best...ever written by an Octogeneanarian." He agreed with Jefferson that although death was not an evil, "we ought not to wish for it till life becomes insupportable; we must wait for the pleasure and convenience of this great teacher."
page 100: And those who live in the kingdom of the well cannot even be certain about the unawareness of a terminal Alzheimer's patient. "At least she doesn't know" is the conventional salve applied to those grieving for someone who has lost all powers of communication but is still technically alive. It is indeed terrible to suspect that, in the broken synapses of a broken mind, there might still be seconds or moments of reconnection in which the person is aware of helplessness--rather like those rare patients who become conscious in the middle of surgery but are unable to move or cry for help. This worst case scenario has not been ruled out by scientific research.
page 103: I could not have ventured an explanation ten years ago, before I had witnessed the long mental deterioration of the person I loved most in the world, a man who, until he was stricken by the curse of Alzheimer's, possessed a great, subtle, witty, and disciplined mind. He was ashamed of his condition; he never used the word "Alzheimer's," even though he knew perfectly well that he was losing his memory, his spatial skills, and his command of language...Even a scientist like Elkhonon Goldberg, in The Wisdom Paradox: How Your Mind Can Grow Stronger As Your Brain Grows Older (2005), talks on the one hand about Isaac Newton's dramatic mental and memory decline near the end of his life and asserts, on the other hand, that a lifetime of hard intellectual work can armor us against brain malfunctions in old age. The wishful and illogical subtext is, Though a life of the highest intellectual endeavor didn't protect Newton, it will surely protect me. Humans are the only species capable of lying--to ourselves even more effectively than to others.
page 124: That it would be much cheaper, not to mention more humane, for the government to pay for palliative care or aides to help keep as many Alzheimer's patients as possible in familiar surroundings--as opposed to forcing couples to spend down their assets so that Medicaid can take over and pay for an expensive nursing home--is part of the madness of a health care system still based on the idea that individuals and nuclear families ought to be able to pay any price and bear any burden to care for loved ones who need round-the-clock supervision. Medicare does offer a hospice benefit for those who are expected to die within six months, but it offers nothing to help pay for the open-ended care of those who may live for years with Alzheimer's.
page 126: Yes, we can hope that science will come to our resuce soon rather than later--but hope is not a plan of action.
page 156: "This piece ought to be anthologized, along with William Osler's 1905 speech on chloroforming men over sixty, in some sort of special volume of ageist rants by Englishmen. I wonder what has made sixty-something Brits of the male sex so cranky over so many generations.
page 171: It is difficult to conceive of a scenario in which the increasing numbers of the old old are to be supported except through higher taxes on just about everyone--something that no one in either political party has the courage to say. Although many economic and political analysts have long anticipated a rebellion by younger American workers as the baby boom generation begins to retire, they did not take into account the possibility that the largest single generation in American history, primed by medical advances to live longer than any previous generation, would suffer severe financial reverses just as its oldest members entered their sixties. There is already a loud and angry chorus of boomer bashing that portrays an entire generation as a group of selfish, profligate babies who bankrupted themselves--and, potentially, the nation--through their eagerness to snap up easy credit and their unwillingness to save money. But, as numerous experts have pointed out, the boomers were only doing what many Americans of all ages were doing by taking the money offered them. And Depression babies, as well as some greedy members of the revered greatest generation, made a lot of money by providing free-lunch credit to the boomers. As the advanced age of many of Bernard Madoff's clients clearly demonstrates, no generation has a monopoly on greed and stupidity.
page 176: ...a decent life for the old old cannot, in most cases, be financed by individuals. If we are not going to kill Granny, we are going to have to support Granny...But even if twenty-five-year-olds--unless they already have high-paying jobs--were to start putting aside 10 percent of their income every month, that does not mean they would accumulate enough to live comfortably into their nineties and beyond.
page 181: Even if one concedes that a mentally sound seventy-year-old is likely to possess more wisdom than a forty-year-old, that does not support the idea that a ninety-year-old is wiser than a seventy-year-old.
page 188: Oh, what danger lurks in ones' storehouse of already known truths! Life experience can lead people of all ages to unwise conclusions. I was sixty-two when Barack Obama began his campaign for the presidency, and he was my candidate almost from the beginning, but I never thought that an African American had a chance of being elected until the final weeks of the 2008 electoral contest...The mistake we all made was that we interpreted the current level of racism in the United States in terms of our own childhoods...during the civil rights era.
page 279: Money is not a problem for Jake, and he could easily afford the kind of home services, from aides to help im bathe to deliveries of precooked meals, that would enable him to live on his own. What he is not capable of doing is overseeing the complicated financial arrangements for a return to his own apartment and organizing the care he would need. Without active help from his children, he will remain in an institutional setting where he is compelled to eat bland food he does not enjoy, stay indoors most of the time on clear days when he is perfectly capable of pushing his own walker down the street (because the rules require him to be accompanied by an aide), and generally abandon control over his everyday activities. "I should have planned better," he tells me. "But I just didn't realize how difficult it would be to get myself out of here once I moved in for my wife's sake."...The assisted living facility does not want to lose a paying customer. The children do not want to involve themselves in a complicated rearrangement of their father's finances that would enable him to live in a manner more consistent with his personality and his tastes. Hiring a lawyer, which this man has thought about doing, would mean fighting his flesh and blood. And he does not have the energy to fight alone.
There is a lesson for fifty- and sixty-something boomers in my ninety-year-old friend's experience, which underlines the importance of thinking about and planning for various possibilities, including worst-case contingencies, when we are strong enough and healthy enough to resist pressure from others...Acknowledgment of generational interdependency may be crucial to any attempt to deal with large health care and economic issues on a social and political level, but it is useless on an individual and familial level unless it includes real respect for an old person's desire for as much autonomy as possible. My friend is mentally and physically capable of handling a significantly greater degree of independence, but it is more convenient for his children to foster his continued dependency in a place that frees them from anxiety about his falling and not being able to summon help quickly enough. But safety is not necessarily the most important thing in life. Not at any age.
page 281: No sensible person could disagree with the position that the culture of excessive autonomy is at its worst when dealing with the needs not only of the very old but of the very young...loss of independence, both real and perceived, has been the most painful experience of their adult lives. And while some diminution of autonomy is inevitable in advanced old age--a complete loss is inevitable for those with terminal dementia--it is not inevitable for everyone. In many instances, the fading away of control over one's own life seems inevitable only because other people--often much loved people--tell the old that it must be so. They are not always right.
page 283: Today I look at the Rockefeller Plaza picture frequently and reflect on my mother's trips to the city, because I know that she will never be able to travel here again. At eighty-nine, she is too frail...She has a vital mind, but her body has failed her. Mom needs help, but I can no more give up my life now--or, to be honest, I am no more willing to give up my life--than I was fifteen years ago. Nor was my mother willing to give up her life so that she could provide her own mother the kind of full-tine care than Gran provided for my great-grandmother.
page 285: One of the few worthwhile pieces of positive advice for people contemplating retirement and relocation is that they move to an apartment in a city with taxis and decent public transportation instead of moving to either the Hurricane Belt or the Sun Belt, where life without a car is not life at all. Some will surely accuse me of what Russians call gorodski patriotizm (which literally translates as "city patriotism" but probably ought to be translated as "civic boosterism"), but there is no doubt in my mind that the greatest place to grow old in the United States is my hometown, New York City. In this amazing city, frail octogenarians and nonagenarians--many of whom would be sitting in their condos watching television in Sun City, Arizona, or in East Lansing--are taking their dogs to the park in the morning (even if the leash is attached to a wheelchair or walker), using the lifts provided for the disabled on every city bus, and setting off for concerts, museums, restaurants, or, yes, Bloomingdale's. Anyone lucky enough to be a New Yorker is already a resident of an assisted living community. The cleaner, the drugstore, and the liquor store all offer free delivery for young and old alike. It's just considered part of the cost of doing business, and if you're a longtime customer living on a fixed income, no one sneers at a small tip...One of the big advantages of living in a walkable city is that walking is good for your health. While average life expectancy in the United States has increased by two and a half years since 1990, the life expectancy of New Yorkers has increased by more than six years...walking not only increases life expectancy but...the faster people walk, the longer they live. Not only are New Yorkers famous for their pace on the sidewalks but they also walk to parks--and they spend moire time in parks than other Americans because they do not have to drive to them.
In most of the nation's suburban and exurban sprawl, however, these choices do not exist--and that's something aging boomers ought to think about before contemplating retirement to some sunny, sprawling clime that turns into a trap for those who can no longer drive themselves to the gold course in order to ride on their golf carts. If you want to stay active and engaged with the world around you, forget about Money magazines' annual list of the best places in America to retire...I've been to all of the so-called best towns for retirement, and they have many attraction. But if you can't drive and aren't rich enough to have someone else drive you where you want to go, you're stuck in your air-conditioned condos (during the endless summers in Florida and Arizona) and in your centrally heated houses...
Retirement is undoubtedly a cherished and much-needed goal for people whose bodies are marked by decades of hard physical labor or for white-collar workers who have always hated their jobs, but it is a passport to boredom and purposelessness for many old men and women who like to work and are healthy enough to do so. Work, both paid and volunteer, makes people feel useful, and the sense that one is no longer of use...is one of the most fundamental losses experienced by too many among the old. And that just about sums up my "positive advice": live in a place that forces you to stay on your feet, and look for work wherever and whenever you can find it.
Maintaining a sense of dignity and a sense of purpose in the final stages of life is, however, much more complicated than simply picking the right place to live and hoping for good health--or good enough health--to be of use in society...means a old age...means a sharp and unwanted transition from a sense of themselves as people valued by family and community to a diminished sense of themselves as burdens who serve no purpose. It is a shift from active to passive, from being a caretaker to being a care recipient, from independence to dependence, and it is experienced as a personal loss at the deepest internal level, regardless of out circumstances. This unwanted transition can be delayed but not denied, unless one dies in vigorous young old age, in full command of one's life. I am not counting on any of my supposedly age-defying health habits (lots of exercise, lots of vegetables moderate drinking, and lifelong nonsmoking) to serve as a talisman against an enforced late-life transition to dependency. If these habits keep me healthier longer, well and good. And if they don't, and my appointed fate is a drawn-out ordeal, the way I treat my body makes my life better now. I am certainly not counting on pro-longevity science to serve as my dus ex machina if I live...long...Should scientific breakthroughs against the most fearsome diseases of old age become realities, I will greet them as welcome surprises, in the same way that I will greet a passionate late-life love affair or a financial bonanza. But I am not counting on being the fortunate exception in any of these areas.
Here are my favorite passages:
p. 36: "When all our faculties have left, or are leaving us," Jefferson wrote Adams in 1822, "one by one, sight, hearing, memory, every avenue of pleasing sensation is closed...when the friends of our youth are all gone, and a generation is risen around us whom we know not, is death an evil?...I have ever dreaded a doting old age; and my health has been generally so good, and is now so good, that I dread it still." Then, sounding not at all like a man resigned to death, Jefferson described reading as his chief delight and added, "Altho' I know it is too late for me to buckle on the armour of youth, yet my indignation would not permit me passively to receive the kick from an Ass." Only ten days later, Adams replied that Jefferson's letter was "the best...ever written by an Octogeneanarian." He agreed with Jefferson that although death was not an evil, "we ought not to wish for it till life becomes insupportable; we must wait for the pleasure and convenience of this great teacher."
page 100: And those who live in the kingdom of the well cannot even be certain about the unawareness of a terminal Alzheimer's patient. "At least she doesn't know" is the conventional salve applied to those grieving for someone who has lost all powers of communication but is still technically alive. It is indeed terrible to suspect that, in the broken synapses of a broken mind, there might still be seconds or moments of reconnection in which the person is aware of helplessness--rather like those rare patients who become conscious in the middle of surgery but are unable to move or cry for help. This worst case scenario has not been ruled out by scientific research.
page 103: I could not have ventured an explanation ten years ago, before I had witnessed the long mental deterioration of the person I loved most in the world, a man who, until he was stricken by the curse of Alzheimer's, possessed a great, subtle, witty, and disciplined mind. He was ashamed of his condition; he never used the word "Alzheimer's," even though he knew perfectly well that he was losing his memory, his spatial skills, and his command of language...Even a scientist like Elkhonon Goldberg, in The Wisdom Paradox: How Your Mind Can Grow Stronger As Your Brain Grows Older (2005), talks on the one hand about Isaac Newton's dramatic mental and memory decline near the end of his life and asserts, on the other hand, that a lifetime of hard intellectual work can armor us against brain malfunctions in old age. The wishful and illogical subtext is, Though a life of the highest intellectual endeavor didn't protect Newton, it will surely protect me. Humans are the only species capable of lying--to ourselves even more effectively than to others.
page 124: That it would be much cheaper, not to mention more humane, for the government to pay for palliative care or aides to help keep as many Alzheimer's patients as possible in familiar surroundings--as opposed to forcing couples to spend down their assets so that Medicaid can take over and pay for an expensive nursing home--is part of the madness of a health care system still based on the idea that individuals and nuclear families ought to be able to pay any price and bear any burden to care for loved ones who need round-the-clock supervision. Medicare does offer a hospice benefit for those who are expected to die within six months, but it offers nothing to help pay for the open-ended care of those who may live for years with Alzheimer's.
page 126: Yes, we can hope that science will come to our resuce soon rather than later--but hope is not a plan of action.
page 156: "This piece ought to be anthologized, along with William Osler's 1905 speech on chloroforming men over sixty, in some sort of special volume of ageist rants by Englishmen. I wonder what has made sixty-something Brits of the male sex so cranky over so many generations.
page 171: It is difficult to conceive of a scenario in which the increasing numbers of the old old are to be supported except through higher taxes on just about everyone--something that no one in either political party has the courage to say. Although many economic and political analysts have long anticipated a rebellion by younger American workers as the baby boom generation begins to retire, they did not take into account the possibility that the largest single generation in American history, primed by medical advances to live longer than any previous generation, would suffer severe financial reverses just as its oldest members entered their sixties. There is already a loud and angry chorus of boomer bashing that portrays an entire generation as a group of selfish, profligate babies who bankrupted themselves--and, potentially, the nation--through their eagerness to snap up easy credit and their unwillingness to save money. But, as numerous experts have pointed out, the boomers were only doing what many Americans of all ages were doing by taking the money offered them. And Depression babies, as well as some greedy members of the revered greatest generation, made a lot of money by providing free-lunch credit to the boomers. As the advanced age of many of Bernard Madoff's clients clearly demonstrates, no generation has a monopoly on greed and stupidity.
page 176: ...a decent life for the old old cannot, in most cases, be financed by individuals. If we are not going to kill Granny, we are going to have to support Granny...But even if twenty-five-year-olds--unless they already have high-paying jobs--were to start putting aside 10 percent of their income every month, that does not mean they would accumulate enough to live comfortably into their nineties and beyond.
page 181: Even if one concedes that a mentally sound seventy-year-old is likely to possess more wisdom than a forty-year-old, that does not support the idea that a ninety-year-old is wiser than a seventy-year-old.
page 188: Oh, what danger lurks in ones' storehouse of already known truths! Life experience can lead people of all ages to unwise conclusions. I was sixty-two when Barack Obama began his campaign for the presidency, and he was my candidate almost from the beginning, but I never thought that an African American had a chance of being elected until the final weeks of the 2008 electoral contest...The mistake we all made was that we interpreted the current level of racism in the United States in terms of our own childhoods...during the civil rights era.
page 279: Money is not a problem for Jake, and he could easily afford the kind of home services, from aides to help im bathe to deliveries of precooked meals, that would enable him to live on his own. What he is not capable of doing is overseeing the complicated financial arrangements for a return to his own apartment and organizing the care he would need. Without active help from his children, he will remain in an institutional setting where he is compelled to eat bland food he does not enjoy, stay indoors most of the time on clear days when he is perfectly capable of pushing his own walker down the street (because the rules require him to be accompanied by an aide), and generally abandon control over his everyday activities. "I should have planned better," he tells me. "But I just didn't realize how difficult it would be to get myself out of here once I moved in for my wife's sake."...The assisted living facility does not want to lose a paying customer. The children do not want to involve themselves in a complicated rearrangement of their father's finances that would enable him to live in a manner more consistent with his personality and his tastes. Hiring a lawyer, which this man has thought about doing, would mean fighting his flesh and blood. And he does not have the energy to fight alone.
There is a lesson for fifty- and sixty-something boomers in my ninety-year-old friend's experience, which underlines the importance of thinking about and planning for various possibilities, including worst-case contingencies, when we are strong enough and healthy enough to resist pressure from others...Acknowledgment of generational interdependency may be crucial to any attempt to deal with large health care and economic issues on a social and political level, but it is useless on an individual and familial level unless it includes real respect for an old person's desire for as much autonomy as possible. My friend is mentally and physically capable of handling a significantly greater degree of independence, but it is more convenient for his children to foster his continued dependency in a place that frees them from anxiety about his falling and not being able to summon help quickly enough. But safety is not necessarily the most important thing in life. Not at any age.
page 281: No sensible person could disagree with the position that the culture of excessive autonomy is at its worst when dealing with the needs not only of the very old but of the very young...loss of independence, both real and perceived, has been the most painful experience of their adult lives. And while some diminution of autonomy is inevitable in advanced old age--a complete loss is inevitable for those with terminal dementia--it is not inevitable for everyone. In many instances, the fading away of control over one's own life seems inevitable only because other people--often much loved people--tell the old that it must be so. They are not always right.
page 283: Today I look at the Rockefeller Plaza picture frequently and reflect on my mother's trips to the city, because I know that she will never be able to travel here again. At eighty-nine, she is too frail...She has a vital mind, but her body has failed her. Mom needs help, but I can no more give up my life now--or, to be honest, I am no more willing to give up my life--than I was fifteen years ago. Nor was my mother willing to give up her life so that she could provide her own mother the kind of full-tine care than Gran provided for my great-grandmother.
page 285: One of the few worthwhile pieces of positive advice for people contemplating retirement and relocation is that they move to an apartment in a city with taxis and decent public transportation instead of moving to either the Hurricane Belt or the Sun Belt, where life without a car is not life at all. Some will surely accuse me of what Russians call gorodski patriotizm (which literally translates as "city patriotism" but probably ought to be translated as "civic boosterism"), but there is no doubt in my mind that the greatest place to grow old in the United States is my hometown, New York City. In this amazing city, frail octogenarians and nonagenarians--many of whom would be sitting in their condos watching television in Sun City, Arizona, or in East Lansing--are taking their dogs to the park in the morning (even if the leash is attached to a wheelchair or walker), using the lifts provided for the disabled on every city bus, and setting off for concerts, museums, restaurants, or, yes, Bloomingdale's. Anyone lucky enough to be a New Yorker is already a resident of an assisted living community. The cleaner, the drugstore, and the liquor store all offer free delivery for young and old alike. It's just considered part of the cost of doing business, and if you're a longtime customer living on a fixed income, no one sneers at a small tip...One of the big advantages of living in a walkable city is that walking is good for your health. While average life expectancy in the United States has increased by two and a half years since 1990, the life expectancy of New Yorkers has increased by more than six years...walking not only increases life expectancy but...the faster people walk, the longer they live. Not only are New Yorkers famous for their pace on the sidewalks but they also walk to parks--and they spend moire time in parks than other Americans because they do not have to drive to them.
In most of the nation's suburban and exurban sprawl, however, these choices do not exist--and that's something aging boomers ought to think about before contemplating retirement to some sunny, sprawling clime that turns into a trap for those who can no longer drive themselves to the gold course in order to ride on their golf carts. If you want to stay active and engaged with the world around you, forget about Money magazines' annual list of the best places in America to retire...I've been to all of the so-called best towns for retirement, and they have many attraction. But if you can't drive and aren't rich enough to have someone else drive you where you want to go, you're stuck in your air-conditioned condos (during the endless summers in Florida and Arizona) and in your centrally heated houses...
Retirement is undoubtedly a cherished and much-needed goal for people whose bodies are marked by decades of hard physical labor or for white-collar workers who have always hated their jobs, but it is a passport to boredom and purposelessness for many old men and women who like to work and are healthy enough to do so. Work, both paid and volunteer, makes people feel useful, and the sense that one is no longer of use...is one of the most fundamental losses experienced by too many among the old. And that just about sums up my "positive advice": live in a place that forces you to stay on your feet, and look for work wherever and whenever you can find it.
Maintaining a sense of dignity and a sense of purpose in the final stages of life is, however, much more complicated than simply picking the right place to live and hoping for good health--or good enough health--to be of use in society...means a old age...means a sharp and unwanted transition from a sense of themselves as people valued by family and community to a diminished sense of themselves as burdens who serve no purpose. It is a shift from active to passive, from being a caretaker to being a care recipient, from independence to dependence, and it is experienced as a personal loss at the deepest internal level, regardless of out circumstances. This unwanted transition can be delayed but not denied, unless one dies in vigorous young old age, in full command of one's life. I am not counting on any of my supposedly age-defying health habits (lots of exercise, lots of vegetables moderate drinking, and lifelong nonsmoking) to serve as a talisman against an enforced late-life transition to dependency. If these habits keep me healthier longer, well and good. And if they don't, and my appointed fate is a drawn-out ordeal, the way I treat my body makes my life better now. I am certainly not counting on pro-longevity science to serve as my dus ex machina if I live...long...Should scientific breakthroughs against the most fearsome diseases of old age become realities, I will greet them as welcome surprises, in the same way that I will greet a passionate late-life love affair or a financial bonanza. But I am not counting on being the fortunate exception in any of these areas.
July 8, 2018
This is my second book by Susan Jacoby. I also read The Age of American Unreason. The title of this book is Never Say Die. It is in reference to the avoidance of talk or consideration of death in the USA. Yet this book ended up being about old age and not any pretty old age. It was almost as though after slugging through this book (and at times I did have to force myself to read a chapter a day) and its portrayal of old age, death will be a relief or a reward. This book was written in 2011 and has been on my shelf probably since then. I thought it was about dying and one has to be in a particular mood to read about dying so it just kept sitting there on the shelf. Finally this year Barbara Ehrenreich wrote a book also about dying called Natural Causes and I was able to read that. It was more a tirade about the things we are willing to do with the fantasy that they will somehow keep us from dying. Despite Dr. Ehrenreich (Ph.D. cellular biology) treatise on cells and macrophages and Jacoby's more psychological-political take, neither of these ladies went to quite the description that Dr. Sherwin B. Nuland did in How We Die. Since planning is one of my better skills, I am interested in studying what my future might be. This would also include at least starting to read Mary Roach's Spook--Science tackles the Afterlife.
Having seen dying close up enough times and having become extremely fond of my independence and autonomy as a widow, I have never had any great desire to live beyond 80. Jacoby tells me that 50% of people over 85 get dementia. I have been exposed to enough people with that diagnosis to know that it isn't something I wish to experience. Ehrenreich tells me that at 76 she is "old enough to not incur any more suffering, annoyance or boredom in the pursuit of a longer life." She is willing to seek medical care for urgent problems but is "no longer interested in looking for problems that remain undetectable" to her. I am younger than her but of much the same mind set. I was greatly relieved that I now live in a state where euthanasia is legal and this is especially true after reading Jacoby. She honestly brings up what most people don't seem to think very clearly about---what happens when you outlive your money? As a single woman with no children, Jacoby doesn't have the fantasy that somebody will be there to take care of her. Even though I have a child and multiple friends as well as siblings, I don't feel any assurance that someone will "love me enough to accompany me through the valley of the shadow." Maybe I should have read this book in 2011 when I was still working and still definitely in the early stages of what she calls "the young old" but I waited until the year I am the same age as my mother died.
It is a scary book because it is so brutally honest about the possibilities of old old age and the process of getting to death. I have heard that people don't really fear death when it comes down to its being inevitable but that they do fear the pain or process that gets them to that stage where they can just let go. Even though a large percentage of our population will be "seniors" soon, we are a youth-loving culture and so the care and respect elders will need has not been part of the American DNA. Perhaps as Kaplan in one of his books on the American experience says, "we will need the young immigrants from central and South America to work and pay taxes to support our older population in this century." Unfortunately at this time the rich old men in Washington don't see it that way.
Having seen dying close up enough times and having become extremely fond of my independence and autonomy as a widow, I have never had any great desire to live beyond 80. Jacoby tells me that 50% of people over 85 get dementia. I have been exposed to enough people with that diagnosis to know that it isn't something I wish to experience. Ehrenreich tells me that at 76 she is "old enough to not incur any more suffering, annoyance or boredom in the pursuit of a longer life." She is willing to seek medical care for urgent problems but is "no longer interested in looking for problems that remain undetectable" to her. I am younger than her but of much the same mind set. I was greatly relieved that I now live in a state where euthanasia is legal and this is especially true after reading Jacoby. She honestly brings up what most people don't seem to think very clearly about---what happens when you outlive your money? As a single woman with no children, Jacoby doesn't have the fantasy that somebody will be there to take care of her. Even though I have a child and multiple friends as well as siblings, I don't feel any assurance that someone will "love me enough to accompany me through the valley of the shadow." Maybe I should have read this book in 2011 when I was still working and still definitely in the early stages of what she calls "the young old" but I waited until the year I am the same age as my mother died.
It is a scary book because it is so brutally honest about the possibilities of old old age and the process of getting to death. I have heard that people don't really fear death when it comes down to its being inevitable but that they do fear the pain or process that gets them to that stage where they can just let go. Even though a large percentage of our population will be "seniors" soon, we are a youth-loving culture and so the care and respect elders will need has not been part of the American DNA. Perhaps as Kaplan in one of his books on the American experience says, "we will need the young immigrants from central and South America to work and pay taxes to support our older population in this century." Unfortunately at this time the rich old men in Washington don't see it that way.
July 20, 2024
As all of Jacoby's books that I've read so far, this one is well researched and remains interesting throughout. I found her discussion about the 'young old' versus the 'old old' a skillful way to contrast how our society manages and deals with the elderly as a group. As our culture often does, a rosy picture of healthy retirement is cast upon the young old (60-70's). If we eat right, have a sunny disposition, and continue to remain active, we are promised and assumed to expect "Golden Years" ahead. We can be a member of the 'well-derly', as one overly enthusiastic writer put it. Most conversations about retirement and aging don't bring up the all too real situation of our 'old old' (80's and beyond). As the Baby Boom generation ages and enters retirement, we seem ill-equipped to provide for those in that life stage. AARP doesn't write articles in its upbeat publications about the despair and poverty facing so many elderly people. Depression and mental illness are a real concern in these life stages. Many economic and medical resources will be strained, both on an individual level and a social one. People's incomes will be eventually stripped if they haven't been wealthy in their middle age. Few people working today can save up enough money to last to age 100. Poverty will be the only path unless government programs step up to assist those who live longer than their savings and social security benefits. Also, Jacoby spends much of the book reminding us about the reality of dementia, Alzheimer's Disease, and just the normal and expected cognitive decline as we age past 80. These conditions just add to the problem we will be facing in the not-so-distant future. How will we humanely treat and house the folks who live past their own memories and brain functions? Medicare will need to be upgraded to assist. Families will need financial assistance. As her title suggests, Jacoby is trying to warn us that 'not talking about it' will never be the solution. Avoiding it will only make the situation worse for real life people.
January 5, 2020
Though this book took a bit to fully engage me, it was ultimately an intriguing, informative, and valuable read.
The central thesis concerns the "young old" myth of aging our society promotes and propagates with abandon, the idea that all aged ought to be "sexy skydivers" living their best life right until the very end.
That is not, of course, the typical experience, and it is precisely the promotion of such atypical "golden years" that causes much grief when the reality is a gradual decline toward a predictable finale.
The most interesting chapters are "A Mind is a Terrible Thing to Lose" and "Women: Eventually the Only Sex." Dementia is going to strike most of us eventually, and as the population ages the majority of people over seventy-, eighty-, and ninety-years old will be women.
This is a call-to-action for people to address the inevitable issues of growing older head-on. People don't like to discuss such things, may even be afraid that such discussion somehow invites decline and death, but such magical thinking will not keep the inevitable at bay indefinitely.
How will you address dementia-related challenges? How can elderly women in particular combat the loneliness that disproportionally affects their gender?
On a larger scale, we need to address these issues as a society and create a better system that caters to the old and helps foster a better life experience not rooted in the fanciful idea of the geriatric daredevil.
The central thesis concerns the "young old" myth of aging our society promotes and propagates with abandon, the idea that all aged ought to be "sexy skydivers" living their best life right until the very end.
That is not, of course, the typical experience, and it is precisely the promotion of such atypical "golden years" that causes much grief when the reality is a gradual decline toward a predictable finale.
The most interesting chapters are "A Mind is a Terrible Thing to Lose" and "Women: Eventually the Only Sex." Dementia is going to strike most of us eventually, and as the population ages the majority of people over seventy-, eighty-, and ninety-years old will be women.
This is a call-to-action for people to address the inevitable issues of growing older head-on. People don't like to discuss such things, may even be afraid that such discussion somehow invites decline and death, but such magical thinking will not keep the inevitable at bay indefinitely.
How will you address dementia-related challenges? How can elderly women in particular combat the loneliness that disproportionally affects their gender?
On a larger scale, we need to address these issues as a society and create a better system that caters to the old and helps foster a better life experience not rooted in the fanciful idea of the geriatric daredevil.
February 26, 2020
"Here’s what one cannot do and be considered a person who is aging successfully: complain about health problems to anyone younger; weep openly for a friend or a lover who has been dead more than a month or two; admit to depression or loneliness; express nostalgia for the past (either personal or historical); or voice any fear of future dependency -whether because of poor physical health, poor finances, or the worst scourge of advanced old age, Alzheimer’s disease. American society also looks with suspicion on old people who demand to be left alone to deal with aging in their own way: one must look neither too needy for companionship nor too content with solitude to be considered a role model for healthy aging rather than a discontented geezer or crone. Successful aging awards are conferred only on those who have managed (often as much by biological good luck as effort) to avoid, or convince others that they have avoided, the arduous uphill fight that eventually consumes all who live too long to retain control over either the mundane or the important decisions of every day life. It’s great to be old - as long as one does not manifest too many of the typical problems of advanced age. The reality evaded by propagandists for the new old age is that we all are capable of aging successfully - until we aren’t." Preface
March 9, 2022
Hoo boy. Jacoby definitely makes some salient points here (aging has been misrepresented and underrepresented in our culture; we would better served to better understand and accept the harsher realities of aging bodies and minds; aging is disproportionately a women's issue since women tend to live longer than men... often acting as a caregiver for a spouse but not having the same care as they reach their final years.)
BUT. Man does she get in her own way. Spiraling tangents, equating work with purpose, frequently bringing up studies just to say she doesn't believe there's any way survey respondents could be telling the truth. She often rails against glossy AARP articles highlighting vivacious and stereotypically beautiful older adults... while casually mentioning she used to pen such articles for those publications. She props up morning news coverage as the end-all be-all analysis of public opinion without ever examining the motivations of the people and companies involved.
A swing and a miss.
BUT. Man does she get in her own way. Spiraling tangents, equating work with purpose, frequently bringing up studies just to say she doesn't believe there's any way survey respondents could be telling the truth. She often rails against glossy AARP articles highlighting vivacious and stereotypically beautiful older adults... while casually mentioning she used to pen such articles for those publications. She props up morning news coverage as the end-all be-all analysis of public opinion without ever examining the motivations of the people and companies involved.
A swing and a miss.
February 23, 2017
The most serious and thought provoking book in a while for me, this author brings up a problem of great importance; yet one that may challenge all of us beyond our ability to solve it. It is not enough to try to understand the old old or to internalize the relevance of natural aging and its problems, like dementia. One must come to peace with the fact that curing age may not be a better alternative if the quality of life turns negative. Again, this book is heavy and not for most. It left me in deep thought.
May 20, 2019
Susan brought up a lot of questions as I contemplate growing older that I never thought about or seriously considered. I learned a few things about Social Security and other topics related to aging that even as an avid reader and natural curiosity I had never come across. This is a book that should be read by people of all ages. I loved the audio book and to me this was one that I was anxious to get to and listen to every chance I got.
October 1, 2023
What Barbara Ehrenreich's Bright-Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America did for positive thinking, Jacoby does to the anti-aging scam.
July 30, 2024
This book is not for the faint of heart as it encourages us not to romanticize old age and to take a clear-eyed look at our future. I felt it would have been improved by condensing parts; it sometimes seemed rambling or repetitive.
February 24, 2025
Absolutely required reading although couple issues: I understand (and largely agree with) her left-leaning but a times a bit strident, more personal with some she disagrees with. Also overly long, at times difficult to get through (too many page-long paragraphs).
November 16, 2025
350 pages of bullshit. Uni is a joke cause how was this mandatory reading.
April 5, 2026
Very well written and informative, but extremely depressing.
September 12, 2013
I love it when an author goes there on a topic! Never Say Die The Myth and Marketing of the New Old Age by Susan Jacoby is a non-fiction read that I recommend any mature adult read because there are topics in this work that will make you think on a very personal level about your life choices.
There are five distinct things that I like about this book.
1. Jacoby raises the issue of how boomers are being lead to believe that we can defy reality via marketing schemes that promote new old age. This particular theory is one that annoys me personally because it basically leads people to believe that our generation can somehow beat the odds of aging out in the same manner that our parents did. It is okay to grow old but you want to do so youthfully. This particular message is annoying as hell to me personally because it also promotes the use of products, surgery and regimes that may help you feel good but they definitely do not erase the reality of aging.
2. The insight that Jacoby shares on the old old which are people who are seventy plus is truly thought provoking. Longevity is only great if a person is capable of taking care of the overall needs. Jacoby challenges the notion that living longer without the benefit of economic independence and a healthy body is not that great of a situation. She raises the subject of end to life decisions in a way that should be seriously considered before a person reaches that status in life. She shares intimate details of her life as a caregiver to her man before his death, her grandmother's eventual move into a care facility, and her mother's fragile health situation due to health issues. Jacoby raises some valid points about the lack of a health care system that actually supports the needs of an aging population.
3. I especially like how Jacoby ties in the need for older and younger people to recognize that we have to work on developing a health care system and a social safety net system that is mutually balanced. I found myself cheering inwardly about this idea because it is not sensible to me that older people should expect a younger generation to pay into a system that provides no benefits to them before they reach old age.
4. Jacoby raises the point that aging is actually a women's issue because females tend to live longer. She points out that older women are often economically devastated by the death of a partner or spouse but that we also find ourselves often pushed out of circles where couples still exist, our intimate relationships are sparse because there of the number of available males and also because of the cultural ideas that older males act upon. She points out that even the major figures within the women's movement do not openly project the realities of older women in public, instead they opt for the isn't it great to be older narrative that does not deal with hardcore life issues.
5. Jacoby talks about the division of race and how class privilege is a major factor in what occurs in the lives of older people. She provides information on how race provides a different aging experience and what she knows created this division among the boomer generation.
This is not a book for anyone who wants to explore another avenue on how to become a new older aged person. This is a book that is designed to make you think about your own personal attitudes about aging, what you need to consider doing to make things easier for yourself and your family members as you age. I think that any adult who is mature enough to realize that there has to be some serious planning done for days ahead needs to read this work. There is good advice given throughout this work on the type of planning strategies that individuals and couples should consider establishing in their lives.
I did the audiobook version. The reader is Laural Merlington. There are twelve discs in the set. Merlington gives this non-fiction work a great breathe of life with her expressive reading style.
There are five distinct things that I like about this book.
1. Jacoby raises the issue of how boomers are being lead to believe that we can defy reality via marketing schemes that promote new old age. This particular theory is one that annoys me personally because it basically leads people to believe that our generation can somehow beat the odds of aging out in the same manner that our parents did. It is okay to grow old but you want to do so youthfully. This particular message is annoying as hell to me personally because it also promotes the use of products, surgery and regimes that may help you feel good but they definitely do not erase the reality of aging.
2. The insight that Jacoby shares on the old old which are people who are seventy plus is truly thought provoking. Longevity is only great if a person is capable of taking care of the overall needs. Jacoby challenges the notion that living longer without the benefit of economic independence and a healthy body is not that great of a situation. She raises the subject of end to life decisions in a way that should be seriously considered before a person reaches that status in life. She shares intimate details of her life as a caregiver to her man before his death, her grandmother's eventual move into a care facility, and her mother's fragile health situation due to health issues. Jacoby raises some valid points about the lack of a health care system that actually supports the needs of an aging population.
3. I especially like how Jacoby ties in the need for older and younger people to recognize that we have to work on developing a health care system and a social safety net system that is mutually balanced. I found myself cheering inwardly about this idea because it is not sensible to me that older people should expect a younger generation to pay into a system that provides no benefits to them before they reach old age.
4. Jacoby raises the point that aging is actually a women's issue because females tend to live longer. She points out that older women are often economically devastated by the death of a partner or spouse but that we also find ourselves often pushed out of circles where couples still exist, our intimate relationships are sparse because there of the number of available males and also because of the cultural ideas that older males act upon. She points out that even the major figures within the women's movement do not openly project the realities of older women in public, instead they opt for the isn't it great to be older narrative that does not deal with hardcore life issues.
5. Jacoby talks about the division of race and how class privilege is a major factor in what occurs in the lives of older people. She provides information on how race provides a different aging experience and what she knows created this division among the boomer generation.
This is not a book for anyone who wants to explore another avenue on how to become a new older aged person. This is a book that is designed to make you think about your own personal attitudes about aging, what you need to consider doing to make things easier for yourself and your family members as you age. I think that any adult who is mature enough to realize that there has to be some serious planning done for days ahead needs to read this work. There is good advice given throughout this work on the type of planning strategies that individuals and couples should consider establishing in their lives.
I did the audiobook version. The reader is Laural Merlington. There are twelve discs in the set. Merlington gives this non-fiction work a great breathe of life with her expressive reading style.
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