About ageing
Eventually each of us is confronted with the question of age.
The most noticeable changes in humans that develop over time are physical changes. It also depends on our genes that to one person this happens little sooner, while others are a little longer in the enviable position. Ageing is a process that cannot be stopped. We are all getting older, from birth onwards. Alternatively, regular activity, movement, limiting harmful habits, eating plenty of fluids, especially water, slows the aging process.
When we talk about age, we can talk about chronological age, biological age and psychological age.
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Chronological age is the one that tells us how old is a person, it is determined at birth, after birth anniversary. We know from experience that the chronological age often differ from our estimates of the age of the person concerned. Mainly due to the different environment growing up, lifestyle, genetic, health status and type of other factors that can rejuvenate the appearance of a person or downplay, regardless of chronological age.
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Biological or functional age tells how old the body is in relation to changes in the functioning of bodily functions, cells in the body, the health status of the body. It is difficult to measure because there are some dates tests that could determine or calculate. For many people it can be said that it looks older than it really is by his chronological age, and vice versa.
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Psychological or experiential age says that a person is as old as he feels. Every individual for himself knows best how he feels, what is his perception of himself and how much he thinks he`s old. Each form will be defined by their age, their feelings of social factors.
In everyday language, we often talk about the interweaving of all the above forms of aging. Very famous phrase: "you're a good at hiding your age" or "you look very youthful for your age."
Among the elderly, we include those over 65 years of age and are called the young elderly (65-74 years). The next group includes persons between 75 and 84 years and are called midle elderly. The last group is 85 years of ageand is called the old elderly.
In Slovenia, the number of old people is increasing. Although there is much more discussion in our society about aging of the population for some time, it was to late, and now it happened that there are many people older than 65 years and this proportion is increasing. Since the system is not ready for this situation, it happened that in many places, is not appropriately taking care of this people. There are no relevant programs, which could help this people be included and actively spend their old age, so they are left to take care of themselves. The state must adapt to an aging population and social protection, health care, and economic security. They must be allowed as many services and opportunities, because many people do not want to live alone, but some are no longer able to live alone and take care of themselves. They need special care, homes for the elderly and other forms of assistance. Some individuals who are sufficiently vital and healthy, desire social joinings, they can visit day centers and all other activities tailored to the age and capacity. We must not push people away from happening only because of their age. We should offer them a range of different activities, which are able to participate by their ability. Even people, who are suffering from various diseases, including dementia, may be involved in these activities.
Old age can be very nice, if a person is in good health, socially active with preserved social network and status in the society. Every individual after retirement decide how he will spent his mature years, what will continue to do, how he will expand (maintain) his social network and how to take care of actively spending his time. However, we cannot force anyone to behave and care for their physical and psychological well-being in later years.