Top Ten Warning Signs of Good Health

I was thinking about what it is that most people are looking for in a potential romantic partner and I saw this list at a friend's house. I can't determine the original source, but it was a description that I thought you'd like to hear.

Top Ten Warning Signs of Good Health
1. Persistent sense of humor
2. Sense of spiritual involvement
3. Increased appetite for physical activity
4. Persistent presence of support network
5. Tendency to adapt to changing situations
6. Repeated episodes of gratitude and generosity
7. Episodic outbreaks of joyful, happy experiences
8. Tendency to identify and communicate feelings
9. Rapid recovery of stress response systems to repeated challenges
10. Chronic positive expectations and a tendency to frame events in a constructive light.


Isn't that who you'd like to meet - for a friend or a partner: someone healthy?

Minor Missions

I see from our poll that most of our regular bloggers have had some time to adjust to single life. How well we are doing at that varies widely. This probably depends a lot on why you are single and how you define "well".

Do you still feel some pride when you tackle a task that your previous significant other always handled? It could be big, or it could be small. Or when you simply took on a problem that you would usually pass on to someone else - and you did it.

For example, having started out in Plan A as a fairly traditional household, I had never mastered the fine art of grilling. I had hardly ever grilled. I missed it, so I had to learn.

My first attempts drew a candid, "it's not as good as Daddy's." I was determined to do better.
The last time I served steaks, they were hailed as delicious. Another minor mission accomplished.

Next?

Fattening Season

This is a tough season to maintain healthy food choices and to include exercise in your day. I still have stashes of Halloween candy in various corners of my house, and then we had the pie onslaught of Thanksgiving. So many delectables dive into my grocery cart this time of year that I usually avoid. I even think the "holiday cookie" air freshener in my car is making me gain weight.


Of course maintaining your weight becomes increasingly more challenging as you age. More responsibilities crowd potential exercise time, more exhaustion beckons you to the couch.

I'm not sure which is more fattening: marriage or break-up, depression or happiness, stress or relaxation. I suppose it is different for everyone.

One of the problems of dating at mid-life is that you are dating middle-aged people - well, except for those May-December types. So many factors create our bulging waistlines: injuries, illness, lack of motivation.

Now that you are single again,
do you feel more or less pressure to strive for physical fitness?
How important is physical fitness in your dating choices?
Is marriage fattening?
How does your physical fitness level affect your confidence?

Running into Exes

Have you ever noticed that the worse you look when you run to the grocery store, the more likely you are to run into someone that you once dated or that you were hoping to date?

Stereotypes

How do our preconceived ideas about different ages affect our self image as we age?

Honestly, the first time I felt bad about my age was when I turned 26. It was in a different age bracket: 18-25, 26-35. I couldn't round down anymore. I had a new mortgage to pay. I recognized a little ruefully that I wasn't a kid anymore. Well, I felt like one on the inside. My life was growing up around me.

40 was a new beginning. So even though I may have looked like I had just gone through hell, I felt hopeful. What I looked like was the least of my worries.

I still feel like a kid now - just as self-centered and prone to mood swings. But now I'm in this different set of roles at middle age. And my body is beginning to show the wear and tear of more than four decades of use and abuse. I don't know how much
longer my knees will hold out. My eyesight is doing something weird. Then there's just gravity and the constant battle with weight.

I recognize my good fortune that my body has not suffered a calamity in these four+ decades. I have met many strong, smart, sexy women that I want to be like when I grow up - well, at least when I reach their age.
Did you see Nora Ephron's latest book, "I Feel Bad About My Neck"? She cuts right to the truth about how many women feel about themselves.

Do men feel this way? Maybe not about their necks, but worry about how the affects of aging are changing your bodies? It seems that men get off easier in the media. The older man is still hot and he always gets the girl 20 years younger. That scenario isn't necessarily helpful.

I have seen the 15 year age difference in both combos of older husband or older wife. Sometimes they work. Sometimes they don't. So I guess age isn't the factor that matters, since those odds aren't any worse than the general population.

Even so, I still put night cream on my neck.