Would like to hear from late 50, 60-somethings with teens

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Finding this string fascinating. Definitely shows there are two sides (at least) to every coin. I am 49 and my husband (>50) and I are pregnant with our first. Have led a wonderfully fulfilling life to date, as a high-paid professional, who has travelled the world, been the go-to aunt for my numerous nieces/nephews, and am looking forward to this new phase. And, no, I don't feel anywhere close to my age, and I don't have energy problems, or out of touch with the youth of today, so don't bother wishing me well if you are planning to retire at 53 as I've set myself up very well. You chose your lot and I chose mine and the decision was a very conscious, educated one. My kid is going to be very lucky to have me as its (we don't know the sex yet) mom at this age ... I can provide much better than if I had the kid in my 30s.

Insane. You will be 70 when your kid is 20.

+1. That's what I thought too. PP, it's not all about money and what you can provide. Your child will want to spend quality time with you and not just visit you in an assisted living facility. You'll be almost 70 at their high school graduation, yikes!

I guess the poster above comes from a family with poor genetics. My father, 86, still walks 5 miles everyday and is as sharp as ever. My in-laws, 77 and 80, are going on a Nordic skiing trip in Sweden over the holidays (they will be skiing from lodging to lodging). People in our families have lived into their 90's way before medicine has gotten to where it is today. I will be 65 when my child is 18 and fully expect to see her graduate from college and grad school.

You just don't know. My grandparents were all late 80s. We had a parent die at 69 and one at 76. They were both very active, healthy people. It's not a guarantee just because you have no cancer history, strong hearts in your family. Both had cancer. Cancer rates nowadays--1 in 2.

[Anonymous]

My bet is that many of your friends are ten years younger than you. If you're in good health this will really help rather than hanging around with old people. My Mom was 40 when she had her youngest and her younger friends helped keep her young.

[Anonymous]

Interesting thread.

My partner and I met around 40 and married and had two kids in relatively short order. So now we’re in our early fifties with two older grade school kids.

On the one hand, energy is a bit of an issue. We have to work a bit to keep up, my son will outski me in a couple of years, and I’m not quite as active with either kid as I would have been were I 30. And we’re definitely the older parents at our school functions, though most don’t believe it because I’m blessed with a wife who looks ten years younger than she is.

On the other hand...

I work out quite a bit to keep up and keep healthy. So having kids as an older definitely motivates me to take care of my own health.

I am mentally and emotionally a *much* better parent than I would have been when I was 30. I let a lot of little things roll off my back, and respond intellectually and with compassion when there are kid problems, as opposed to emotionally and with reaction. I’m a lot calmer parent, and looking at our peer parents who are younger, our parenting is a lot more consistent and values-driven. That’s not a knock on them, it’s just a benefit of maturity and stability that comes with being older.

I also get to learn from my friends. Most of them had kids around 30, so they are sending them off to college now. One, I get to see their parenting styles and learn from them. Two, I see how their approaches worked out, and I get to see which ones produced needy, clueless kids and which produced Ivy League kids who have good heads on their shoulders and are compassionate, balanced citizens. And three, they’re mostly looking around and saying “what now?” (and in some cases “who with?”) Later parents don’t have that yawning chasm of four decades in front of them with nothing to do.

And financially it is worlds easier to be a later parent. My wife and I busted our tails (and lived it up) before marrying. We know what single life is like, and it was fun, and we’re done with it. We had a much easier time agreeing on joint priorities and financial plans. And we are in peak earning years well before college expenses arrive, and so are well prepared. We don’t sweat the costs of travel league or enrichment courses. Some of that is hard work and good fortune on our part, but some of that is simply where we are at in life. The first few years were a lot of scrimping and saving, but hey, we had three year olds, we were too damn tired to go to Capital Grille anyway. Chinese on the couch was just fine.

Travel is actually a heck of a lot of fun now. We have kids who will engage in life, right at the time when we have money and experience to pick great destinations and travel in style. We can plan for Europe and Asia for lengthy trips that our kids want to join us in and will remember for the rest of their lives. And in our 50’s, despite the view of some of the younger parents here, we’re nowhere near old enough where physical limitations are an issue. I don’t think we’ll be tottering around Burning Man in our walkers just yet.

And when the kids launch and we’re in our early sixties, sure, we’ll miss them. But we’ll miss them from some great two martini dinner restaurants. We’ll bear up somehow.

We are not that concerned with being a health burden to our kids. That’s on us to manage as parents, not them, and we have planned appropriately for care and insurance and coverage to not be a burden. (We have those issues to an extent with our parents, and damned if we’re going to pass that on). Again, older parents can have the experience and the planning to solve the problems that come up.

The biggest downside is grandkids. We recognize that if our kids do as we did, we’ll be 80 when the grandkids are born. That’s not a gimme obviously. and we’d be sad if we missed that. But we hope to live well and healthily and make it to that time. The health outcome correlation with wealth and with social connection is quite strong. We hope that the advantage that late parenting provides will help manage that risk.

Sure, if you had asked us at the time we had the kids, we’d rather have started at 32 or 35 instead of 40. But there”s a lot of pros to doing it on the timing we were given. “Always look at the bright side of life, dah-dah, dah-dah#dah-dah-dah-dah”

[Anonymous]

The most important thing if you are an older parent is to have your estate planning done in the event you or your spouse die while your children are minor or even young adults. One thing we do not have is reliable family to take over in case DH and I pass away prematurely. We have made a good friend legal guardian if it occurs before our kids (twins) reach adulthood. They are in their first year of high school. We plan to downsize when they graduate high school and start college. We will put the next house in trust for them. We have name them secondary beneficiaries, after DH and myself, on all accounts and life insurance policies. Being older parents, we are concerned with leaving them without planning for the unexpected.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Interesting thread.

My partner and I met around 40 and married and had two kids in relatively short order. So now we’re in our early fifties with two older grade school kids.

On the one hand, energy is a bit of an issue. We have to work a bit to keep up, my son will outski me in a couple of years, and I’m not quite as active with either kid as I would have been were I 30. And we’re definitely the older parents at our school functions, though most don’t believe it because I’m blessed with a wife who looks ten years younger than she is.

On the other hand...

I work out quite a bit to keep up and keep healthy. So having kids as an older definitely motivates me to take care of my own health.

I am mentally and emotionally a *much* better parent than I would have been when I was 30. I let a lot of little things roll off my back, and respond intellectually and with compassion when there are kid problems, as opposed to emotionally and with reaction. I’m a lot calmer parent, and looking at our peer parents who are younger, our parenting is a lot more consistent and values-driven. That’s not a knock on them, it’s just a benefit of maturity and stability that comes with being older.

I also get to learn from my friends. Most of them had kids around 30, so they are sending them off to college now. One, I get to see their parenting styles and learn from them. Two, I see how their approaches worked out, and I get to see which ones produced needy, clueless kids and which produced Ivy League kids who have good heads on their shoulders and are compassionate, balanced citizens. And three, they’re mostly looking around and saying “what now?” (and in some cases “who with?”) Later parents don’t have that yawning chasm of four decades in front of them with nothing to do.

And financially it is worlds easier to be a later parent. My wife and I busted our tails (and lived it up) before marrying. We know what single life is like, and it was fun, and we’re done with it. We had a much easier time agreeing on joint priorities and financial plans. And we are in peak earning years well before college expenses arrive, and so are well prepared. We don’t sweat the costs of travel league or enrichment courses. Some of that is hard work and good fortune on our part, but some of that is simply where we are at in life. The first few years were a lot of scrimping and saving, but hey, we had three year olds, we were too damn tired to go to Capital Grille anyway. Chinese on the couch was just fine.

Travel is actually a heck of a lot of fun now. We have kids who will engage in life, right at the time when we have money and experience to pick great destinations and travel in style. We can plan for Europe and Asia for lengthy trips that our kids want to join us in and will remember for the rest of their lives. And in our 50’s, despite the view of some of the younger parents here, we’re nowhere near old enough where physical limitations are an issue. I don’t think we’ll be tottering around Burning Man in our walkers just yet.

And when the kids launch and we’re in our early sixties, sure, we’ll miss them. But we’ll miss them from some great two martini dinner restaurants. We’ll bear up somehow.

We are not that concerned with being a health burden to our kids. That’s on us to manage as parents, not them, and we have planned appropriately for care and insurance and coverage to not be a burden. (We have those issues to an extent with our parents, and damned if we’re going to pass that on). Again, older parents can have the experience and the planning to solve the problems that come up.

The biggest downside is grandkids. We recognize that if our kids do as we did, we’ll be 80 when the grandkids are born. That’s not a gimme obviously. and we’d be sad if we missed that. But we hope to live well and healthily and make it to that time. The health outcome correlation with wealth and with social connection is quite strong. We hope that the advantage that late parenting provides will help manage that risk.

Sure, if you had asked us at the time we had the kids, we’d rather have started at 32 or 35 instead of 40. But there”s a lot of pros to doing it on the timing we were given. “Always look at the bright side of life, dah-dah, dah-dah#dah-dah-dah-dah”

thank you for your perspective

[Anonymous]

Once we had kids we realized that our lives as individuals was pretty much over. I am 52 with a 13 yr old. I am glad that I did a lot of fun stuff in my youth without kids. Once you have kids it is 24/7. At this point, I feel that I would rather be a doddering old parent who is grateful when the day is over and I can hit the sack and blame it on my advanced age. + my desire to be footloose and fancy free is sooooooo diminished. Again I blame it on old age and not being a parent.

[Anonymous]

54/56. Have 13 and 16 yr old. Wow! I never new how tired I would be. It’s hard and given the choice I would have had them younger. I worry I might see grandchildren or be healthy enough to help with them. Our kids are great! We our very involved. But the energy level is just not there

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:54/56. Have 13 and 16 yr old. Wow! I never knew how tired I would be. It’s hard and given the choice I would have had them younger. I worry I might not see grandchildren or be healthy enough to help with them. Our kids are great! We our very involved. But the energy level is just not there

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For us it was important to have both kids by age 30. We did not want to look like our kids "grandparents" at school events, kids activities, etc. See so much of that now where is is hard to tell if the adult is a parent or a grand parent!. Sorry....IMO always best to have kids early in life, when you have the energy to play with and take care of them and also to ensure that you will be around to see them become independent!

And this relates to the OP how? Because she is not asking for advice about when to have children.

I don’t know anyone here who had all their kids by 30, BTW.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's a big difference between people who met their partners later in life and those who choose to postpone their child-rearing to enjoy married life for a decade or more prior to having kids.

The first isn't a choice, the second is, and the choice has consequences. In essence, the second type of parents prioritized their own careers and adventures over their children getting to spend as much quality time with them.

You may not see that now, but I guarantee your children will. I have many friends with older parents. Some have lost their parents in their early to mid-30s. Others are about 40 now but have parents in extremely poor health (in care or with movement difficult).

That's really tough on children, and I wonder if so many people would wait so long to have kids to "build their careers and travel" if they understood what the future likely held. Everyone thinks they will be the 75-year old who is in perfect health and playing tennis 5 days a week, but that's the exception to the rule.

This. I had my kids at 39 and 41, because that’s just the way life worked out (didn’t get married until 38, just never found Mr. Right until then). Raising kids as an older parent is fine, but the notion that people are doing this on purpose?!?! Crazy to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wow. When we're about 53, the plan is that DH and I are retiring and cruising the islands.

Good luck to all of you older parents on here! It takes a special kind. I couldn't imagine.

We did that in our 20s as singles and our 30s together. I see my parents limping along on retirement cruises and I didn't want to do that. But as others have said, people have different time lines.

Go to China and Egpyt, two of my favorites. Enjoy!

So, so true. We had SO much fun traveling both as singles before we met each other and in our 30s after we met. I feel bad for the people who didn't get to party and travel the world in their 20s and 30s!!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For us it was important to have both kids by age 30. We did not want to look like our kids "grandparents" at school events, kids activities, etc. See so much of that now where is is hard to tell if the adult is a parent or a grand parent!. Sorry....IMO always best to have kids early in life, when you have the energy to play with and take care of them and also to ensure that you will be around to see them become independent!

So you're saying is that you care too much about looks, appearances, and what other people think of you. Awesome.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wow. When we're about 53, the plan is that DH and I are retiring and cruising the islands.

Good luck to all of you older parents on here! It takes a special kind. I couldn't imagine.

We did that in our 20s as singles and our 30s together. I see my parents limping along on retirement cruises and I didn't want to do that. But as others have said, people have different time lines.

Go to China and Egpyt, two of my favorites. Enjoy!

+1 DH and I deliberately waited to have kids so we could travel and experience life together a a family of two before parenthood. It was so much fun. Built our marriage so much. I'm glad we didn't wait til retirement. You travel differently at 55 than 25.

Yeah. Fewer hostels. More showers. Better beds and food.

LOL! I was staying in NICE hotels and flying first class due to upgrades in my 20s and 30s. I had (and still have) a rewarding career and made A LOT of money. I could probably afford much nicer hotels then than I could now with two young children in daycare, but it was worth it!

[Anonymous]

I am 56 and got ice cream with my 11 year old daughter yesterday and she is still in the love Daddy phase.

I always feel sorry for folks who had kids young. They had no fun times in 20s and 30s and in 50s live in an empty house

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's a big difference between people who met their partners later in life and those who choose to postpone their child-rearing to enjoy married life for a decade or more prior to having kids.

The first isn't a choice, the second is, and the choice has consequences. In essence, the second type of parents prioritized their own careers and adventures over their children getting to spend as much quality time with them.

You may not see that now, but I guarantee your children will. I have many friends with older parents. Some have lost their parents in their early to mid-30s. Others are about 40 now but have parents in extremely poor health (in care or with movement difficult).

That's really tough on children, and I wonder if so many people would wait so long to have kids to "build their careers and travel" if they understood what the future likely held. Everyone thinks they will be the 75-year old who is in perfect health and playing tennis 5 days a week, but that's the exception to the rule.

This. I had my kids at 39 and 41, because that’s just the way life worked out (didn’t get married until 38, just never found Mr. Right until then). Raising kids as an older parent is fine, but the notion that people are doing this on purpose?!?! Crazy to me.

You did it on purpose. You could have had kids earlier with someone else, or on your own. You chose not to. So asinine to question other people's choices when you and they have different circumstances and experiences . DO YOU and stop trying to tell other people they are crazy .