Wednesday; eldering...

[ozarque]

Twenty years ago, my husband George was your prototypical angry adult male homo sapiens. On a hair trigger at all times, ready to fight at the drop of a syllable. I dreaded his eldering, because I was sure he was only going to get angrier as the years went by

Comments

[voxwoman]

was that because they all met bad ends before 35?

[rozasharn]

Huh. Your descriptions of life with George now, combined with the anecdote about the first year after you married him and the time you woke up and said "Peter?" and he said so gently "Peter is dead. I'm George," gave me the impression that he had always been a steady, quiet, thoughtful man.

[lisamoe]

It's always different when you live with someone, I know, but I've known you both for almost 30 years and he has always seemed very kind to me.

[writerwench]

My husband says that he used to be like that - very stressed and angry a lot of the time, ready to blow his top and rage at random triggers.

What calmed HIM down was having two severe heart attacks on the same day, arriving dead at the hospital, and being resuscitated... after that, as he says, 'Once you've been dead you get a different attitude to life'. I've never yet seen him lose his temper in four years, although he has been angry and deeply moved on occasion.

[lyonesse]

a similar thing happened to my dad (now 80). he had ptsd from having been a ww2 refugee, became an angry adult, and is a much mellower elder.

(i should also remark that in the past decade he's started eating better and exercising, so the effects of self-care as well as pure passage of time probably count.)

anyway, here's to us all striving to become better people, all throughout our lives :)