Age Spurts: You Are Not Alone
You know about growth spurts. Before going to sleep, your vital stats were (for example) age, 7, height, two-and-a-half feet, weight, 4 stone. But on awakening, great distress. Your revised vital stats? Age 7, height, two-and-three-quarters feet, weight 4 stone 8lbs. All very kooky, all potentially devastating.
BUT back then, tight-knit caring communities appointed growth spurt monitors. In my case, Betty from just up the road would just happen to rock up with much bigger, smellier Dunlop Volleys and a frayed selection of more appropriately sized outer garments. And Betty knew her job was to calm me down. Once, when I told her I was surely, surely headed for the back blocks of Idaho on a college basketball scholarship, she said: No way KJ - that’s just being right up yasself. It’s just a little growth spurt…..
Not so, with the potentially devastating syndrome that is the age spurt…….
I had my latest spurt overnight Monday.  When I arrived at work in a state early Tuesday, everyone stared, everyone whispered behind my back about how much older I suddenly looked but no one had the guts to come right out and say: Gee, KJ, you’ve had an age spurt.
So, I am speaking out. To tell you what the powerful geriatrician lobby, refuses to publicly acknowledge.
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!["No Drama": Age Spurter (flickr credit: [!!!] Sweet Peas Photography [!!!])](http://www.kerriejean.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/sweet-peas.jpg "sweet-peas")
- “No Drama”: Age Spurter (flickr credit: Sweet Peas Photography)
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Your ageing process is NOT linear. You are ageing in spurts. You CANNOT control age spurts. Your age spurt imprint is in your DNA. The time between age spurts for individual men and women falls somewhere between two and eight months. So, if you look 56 but are only 37, don’t be too hard on yourself. Going organic, walking across Siberia, joining a temperance group or submerging your head in a bucket of costly moisturiser will do nought if your age spurt interval is on the lower end of the spurt scale.
So, why did God decide to go with the age spurt format? Because He’s not only good and forgiving and sent his only (incredibly handsome) Son to save us…. but very sensible as well. You see, after the initial shock of a spurt, you then do have time to get used to your new, sadder, spurt-ravaged face.
Take, for example, my spurt earlier this week. When I looked in the mirror as part of my normal morning ablution routine, my first impulse was to fall apart.
Overnight, my eyes had sunk a further .0876 cms back into their sockets, a big beige, scaly age spot was resident on the left side of my forehead and lip mass was down 43%. Applying blusher was impossible because I had been rendered cheekbone-free. Yes, it was nightmarish BUT four days later, I’ve left the house, am back at work and getting used to my new aesthetic arrangements. Simply put: I am getting on with what passes as a life.
Yes, somewhere in my subconscious is the knowledge that there will be another, and another, and another age spurt but God decided he would not, could not let me dwell on it.
He is indeed merciful.
Always love to hear from you…….How do you handle age spurts? Are you lucky when it comes to your age spurt rhythms? Have you ever had a particularly harrowing age spurt? Or perhaps you still sadly believe that the ageing process is linear……
Just click on the ‘comment’ thingo and follow the simple instructions. The place to write your gems is at the bottom of the last published comment. *A little bit of counsel for people new to this caper. Your email (just called ‘mail’ in this case) address does NOT come up on site. And just ignore the ‘website’ space - not necessary!
October 24th, 2008 at 11:21 am
KJ, this is not relevant to the above post but I thought you might be interested - it comes under the broad subject of Education.
There is now scientific evidence for what many of us already know - conservatism is a set of neuroses rooted in fear and agression, dogmatism, an intolerance of ambiguity and a preference for moral certainty.
I can’t confirm if John Howard or George W Bush were examined in the course of this study but the full results can be found here:
http://terpconnect.umd.edu/~hannahk/bulletin.pdf?source=cmailer
MP
October 24th, 2008 at 11:47 am
Hello there Marmaduke - A truly remarkable contribution from the Academy. Just serves to remind us of the great differences between our post-Dawkins Report institutions and Ivy Leaguers.
However, I CANNOT agree with you about this timely research NOT being pertinent to age spurts. The text is littered with descriptors like ‘terror management’, ‘fear of threat and loss’ and ‘epistemic and existential needs’. Try telling an age spurter they’re NOT relevant!
October 24th, 2008 at 1:26 pm
Anyone noticed, that along with the age spurt, the growth spurt of facial hair?
October 25th, 2008 at 7:43 am
Hello country gal - ANOTHER thing that scientists refuse to go public on is that everyone aged 55 and over is biologically male. You days of being eligible to apply for a Government grant on the basis of being a regional estrogen producer, are long gone. BUT, don’t worry. I suspect you come from one of those close knit, caring rural communities. And this year you will make your mark as THE very busy volunteer community Santa Claus. Good luck.
October 26th, 2008 at 10:24 am
KJ,
Try reading Harlequin Mills and Boon, preferably 2-3 a day. You’ll not notice any age spurts or anything else for that matter. Your mind will be pure pulp, your body youthenised by extraordinary hormonal activity (books written by Betty Neals and the much earlier Violet Winspear won’t achieve this medical feat), and you won’t go insane with envy re the likes of our age defying stupendous FA minister, Stephen S, or Julia G.
KJ, you’re from the Murrumbigee Irrigation Area. Surely that fruit fuelled air did wonders for your skin. Isn’t that why Nutrimetics has apricots as a major ingredient in beauty products?
Guess the marketing manager didn’t smell the Letona canning factory during the high season.
October 26th, 2008 at 11:07 am
Dear Meg,
You may be interested to know that the Letona canning factory (then the biggest on the Pacific Rim) tragically collapsed more than 10 years ago. I blame the self-righteous anti-obesity lobby. What on earth was wrong with a big bowl of ice cream overlayed with tinned peaches or two-fruits in what was proudly promoted as ‘heavy syrup’? This particular combo propelled me through all though tiers of schooling and concentration was never a problem. I am sick to death of city people (who probably think that peaches come from trees) telling everyone else how to live. And all for what? So, a couple of heavily subsidised, boutique Pitt Street quince farmers can turn a couple of tonne of quince into some sugar laden confection called quince paste. Apparently, that passes for sophistication. Shame.
October 26th, 2008 at 12:27 pm
Dear KJ, food for thought. I have grown to look forward to your sagacious treatment of topics that others seem to find taboo.
KJ, I don’t handle age spurts; my gut is telling me that it is in control. Having read your missive, I have withdrawn from pump, pilates and yoga…and all other vicious attacks on my person.
October 26th, 2008 at 6:13 pm
The Ginger Man has noted that young men are always talking about cars. They dream of a BMW.
Later in life, from their conversation, they dream of a BM, that is a Bowel Movement.
Bill’s in for a hernia op…Jack’s having his Prostate done…Boy, these piles are giving me hell…
Doctors find their rooms filled with Aged Old Buggers Who Have Access to the Internet.
The doctors, of course, are not getting any younger either.
I’d not be surprised if a GP said: “Why don’t you SHUT UP!
“Do you think you are the only one with Impetigo of the Groin?
“Look at THIS!”
Occasionally the GP does come up with a cure for an ailment.
That does rather spoil things.
As Denis Norden, or was it Frank Muir, pointed out in My Word:
“You can’t have your ache and treat it too.”
-The Ginger Man
PS What about ABC Awards Night for…..
The Most Digusting and Repellent Disease in an Aged Australian Male.
(I am in for a ‘procedure” at RPA tomorrow).
October 26th, 2008 at 6:33 pm
Oh My Ginger Man,
You are very frightened, very nervy, very angry. Definitely NO chance of the Ginger Man going gently into the night. Are you a Believer? Do you have family? Acquaintances? I pray you have shitloads of both at this most uncertain of times. Your procedure will happen. Take heart. One way or another you WILL be going home.
October 27th, 2008 at 3:46 pm
The older I get the faster the annual office Christmas party comes around - and the more I fear it.
It all goes back to a single event - the year the Boss* (known behind his back as The Old Dude) was leading a conga line of employees, urging them all to join him in the Liverpool FC anthem:YOU’LL NEVER WALK ALONE…as the conga line rounded a corner, the door of a broom cupboard burst open, and out tumbled Wendy (the O.Ds wife) and young Mohammad - a strapping lad from the mail room - both were flushed, very excited and completely naked.
I know this sort of thing would never happen at the Radio National Christmas party which I imagine to be a far more sophisticated affair - I see Phillip Adams wheeling Geraldine Doogue around the dance floor, with all your colleagues cheering them on - lubricated only slightly by a seasonal punch concocted by Dr Swan. I see Alan Saunders - dark and handsome (the office Mr Darcy) standing in a corner by a wonderful spread of food - discussing the contents of an avocado dip with Julie Rigg.
Then, again you may have had different experiences at Leeton.
I may be be being silly but I’m especially fearful about this year’s office party. I know RN is very good at guiding people in how to live their lives - so what Miss KJ can be done ?
* All names have been changed to protect the innocent and the guilty.
October 28th, 2008 at 8:24 am
Man In Grey - So, you fear office Christmas parties. Well, I fear that your colleagues may fear you in full Yuletide action. I suspect you are one of those staffers who hang around the punch bowl and smorgasboard ‘just looking’. And revellers would rather starve or die of thirst than have to hear you go on and on about your recipe for the best ever turkey glaze.
On your other creepy ponderings - RN always has a wonderful Xmas party. The highlight? Science and Religion Unit staffers (numbers sadly down this year) taking to the podium to debate the possibilities of a virgin birth. Laff?….do we laff…….