!8: Purchase Floor Magnifying Lamp: December 2011

!±8± Memory Concerns in Your Forties and Fifties

Well here we are, in the one way street of time at a point where there is still 'so much to do' and hopefully still 'enough time to do it in'. The immortal days of the twenties are over, the shock of actually being in your thirties overcome and now the forties and fifties trundle by. Where did all the time go? Now where did I put my glasses?

This is the time when we begin to get critical of our abilities, when we start noticing any changes to our performance. Are we still able to function and do all the things of the past decades just as well or has the spectre of age reached us?

Health is usually the concern but so is memory. Thousands of people are worried about their memory at this stage of life. The most concerned age group are the forties and fifties, in fact nearly forty per cent of them believe they see signs of memory fading. Even those of good health, happy family circumstances and are successful in their work spot signs of memory degradation. It is usually down to small episodes of being forgetful, that stand out, that are not ironically forgotten.

What are these apparent signs?

For myself, having reached well into that age group I have found that to be the case. Since wearing glasses for reading I personally can account for the hundreds of times that I have put down my glasses only seconds before attended to something, only to forget where I put them. Worse than that, then having to spend often quite a few minutes walking around the house trying to find them.

People often account of times where they have walked purposefully into another room to do something, but once they get there, completely forget what it was that sent them. They may remember the source of their action only after a few minutes but infuriatingly many times they will completely forget.

Another common one is forgetting where you parked your car when you have been out and about, you return to the car park and suddenly stop and get that lost feeling. Where on earth did you leave it!?

One of the most embarrassing things, I know, could be forgetting your PIN number after getting a load of shopping. As luck would have it, it would happen when you have a rather restless and large queue of people behind you impatiently waiting to pay for their goods and get out.

Is this the start of senility, "old timers", or whatever discriminatory phrase that comes to mind? Is this the beginning of memory loss, a part of the aging process?

Well, fear not, forgetful friend, it is not down to this. There are of course a very small percentage of people that do require medical advice, but largely it is down to lack of memory strategy. We have an incredible amount of experience and knowledge stored away and need now a good system to improve upon it. We have our most productive years ahead if we learn this.