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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]First, it is not at all unusual to pass for being in your 20s at 40. I’m white and this happened to be all the time. [b]I think part can be explained by the fact that people don’t know what 40 looks like.[/b] In my experience some time after 49!you can still look good but you start to sort of look your age.

As for kids, isn’t the saying “they keep you young but they make you old”?[/quote]

This. It's because a generation ago, most 40 year old women had kids who were adults or nearing adulthood. Some were grandmothers. And the generation before that, most were grandmothers. 40 was old back then because people (but especially women) didn't have these long periods of young adulthood where they established careers, socialized a lot, maybe went to grad school or traveled, etc. You had kids young and then your life is pretty much over by 45 or 50. If you were lucky you looked forward to some travel in retirement, maybe old lady hobbies like gardening and knitting, tennis or walking if you were active.

I'm 41. I have a 5 yr old child, recently took up running, am mid-career and contemplating getting a second graduate degree, and have an active social life both with my DH and without him. I look remarkably similar to my mom at this age, but she looked old back then and I don't look old now. Because my life is in a totally different place. Her life at 41 is more similar to what mine will be at 61.[/quote]

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