Aging Interview

Introduction

To learn aging process more, I interviewed an older woman on Sept. 10, 2015. She is 72 years old living in an urban area with her husband, and her initial is K. She does not hate aging, and she satisfies her life and her aging process. She is active, and she keeps her mentally fresh. The main discussion here is about physical changes caused by aging such as how she is aging, what she thought and when she realized. She said “I was and am aging in many aspects, so I could not remember everything, but I can tell you some impressive aging”.

Her Physical Aging Process

According to the textbook, people are more likely to define aging in terms of physical changes (Hooyman and Kiyak, 2011). She was same. The first time she felt that

she aged is when she was in her late thirties. Her facial skin began to lose moisture, and she got age spots and nasolabial folds. At the time, she did not feel old, but she just thought that she is not the young anymore. She had believed that the aging would happen in the distant future, so she was surprised and shocked. After the change of her skin, she began to make herself look young for a while. However, she realized it is natural process of human beings, so she quitted youthfully made-up and dislike of aging to accept aging process. “I changed the way of thinking. I decided to get age-appropriate beauty.” She said. From that time on, she gradually has lost a firm and elastic skin with healthy glow.
When she was in 40s, she became tired easily.

Particularly, she has felt out of breath when she goes up and down, and she thought that it became difficult to relieve her fatigue. She does not much about aging and medical difference by the age, but after she experienced menopause, it has increased to realize process of aging especially in the aspect of physical strength. For example, she became to get tired when she does things she used to do lightly such as cleaning, cooking, and shopping. When her children were being independent, her physical strength significantly decreased. She told me that it was because she moved her body for especially child-rearing, so after her children became independent, she had not

moved.
Her hair turned gray and became thin when she was around 50 years old.

She did not realize soon, but her husband told her. She vaguely had thought she would not get gray hair. She told me with a laugh. The reason she believed do is that her friends were earlier to get gray hair. Hooyman and Kiyak (2011) explain that some people might never get gray hair, but others might get gray hair in their 20s. During the same period, her food preference changed significantly. Her stomach became to have none of fatty food. In the concrete, she liked meats especially beef more than fishes, but now she is more likely to want to eat fishes than meats.

Her eyes became presbyopia when she was in her 50s. She always reads newspapers, so she noticed immediately the condition of presbyopia. She thought it is getting difficult to see characters. Also, currently, she got a cataract. Because of cataract, her sight is unclear, and a light dazzles her. The cataract disgusts her a lot, so she is thinking of having cataract surgery. Her family members are in anxiety about the surgery because she is old, but she says, “there is nothing to worry about. I do not think I am too old to have the surgery. I will live much

more”.
After she turned 60 years old, she developed a knee joint pain. She is afraid of sprained lower back. Thus, she does not have heavy staffs as much as possible. Now, She suffers not only knee joint pain but also back and fingers’ joint pain. As aging, her joints have bent. The reason of her knee joint pain and bent joints is that her cartilages between bones have worn thin with age. Since the cartilages play the role of impact absorption, the pain and distortions occur when cartilages shrink. Her doctor told her that her joints probably would bend more with age. The pain becomes strong when it is cold, so she is trying to warm her body to abate pain.
Recently, she has gotten age-related forgetfulness. For her, it is sometimes difficult to remember the name, and she often uses pronoun. She also has gotten age-related diseases. As her physical strength decreases with age, she is prone to illness, especially the cold. This is because the elderly’s organ system does not function as same as young peoples’ organ system (Hooyman and Kiyak, 2011).
Things she is doing to keep her physical function.
She puts anti-aging into practice in everyday life. She accepts aging process, but she does not want to be confined to bed or to be an older person who needs care. To keep her physical function, she is walking everyday in the past few years because her doctor recommended light exercise as a way of preventing aging. The speed is not fast, but she knows that it is better to do low-intensity training. According to Hooyman and Kiyak (2011), low-intensity training is better than high-intensity training because high-intensity training can be a cause of orthopedic injuries. Also, she currently began to go bodily exercise with her husband and friends. She is doing slowly muscle training to encourage hormones to secrete. In the textbook, growth hormones are introduced as the way of reversing and delaying aging (Hooyman and Kiyak, 2011).
Conclusion
Through this interview, there is some new information. Mrs. K. taught me about her aging process comparing her friends. The aging process varies depending on each person, so no one experienced the exact same process. She did not experience all aspects of physical aging introduced in the textbook, but she experienced some aging process the textbook does not explain.