Interview With Gail Sheehy: ‘More Life Passages After 50′ (VIDEO)
If you expect to ride your mid-life on cruise control, think again. As the bestselling author of books focused on life’s stages, Gail Sheehy points out that men and women experience more life chapters after age 50 than they do in the first half of their lives.
“We go through more passages after fifty than we do in our first adulthood,” Gail shared with genConnect.com at The Aspen Ideas Festival this summer.
“Passages” was really about a new concept. The idea that, as adults, we continue to go through stages and have to master tasks and go through periods of disequilibrium where it’s not about the choices we made that were wrong, but we’re moving into another phase of life. We already wrapped up some tasks and we want to be more.
Gail first brought the concept of life chapters to dinner-table conversations with the release of the 1976 book Passages. In her latest book Passages in Caregiving: Turning Chaos into Confidence, Gail shares her 17-year journey caring for her terminally ill husband Clay Felker – and the waves that came with it of struggles, victories, confusions, and tremendous love.
In a multi-ranging interview on genConnect TV, Gail speaks about life passages, her last date with her husband and connecting with the fifty million adults who are current caregivers. Watch:
Stay tuned for more video clips from our interview with Gail Sheehy.
Edited Transcript:
I wrote Passages in Caregiving because I went through the chaos of caregiving off and on for seventeen years taking care of my husband, Clay Felker, who had cancer four different times. I didn’t know anything; I was blind, I wasn’t trained for it, I wasn’t expecting it. I didn’t know how to pay for it, and I figured not many other people do either and there are fifty-million adults taking care of other adults that used to be independent. While I told my story throughout the book in kind of a novelistic form, and the stories of lots of other people in different situations, taking care of moms and dads who is wanting to take care of mom who is taking care of dad but is killing mom. Then I wanted to put in real concrete “what do you do” at each phase of this long journey because it may go on for years or even decades. The writing of this book was cathartic in that I relived and understood the path that I had been on for seventeen years and I appreciated so much more. The wonderful long reprieves we had during and between his illnesses. We had been victorious over this monster called cancer, so we really lived in those five– six year reprieves and I wanted to tell other people that you can do that. Today, diseases that were always considered to be death sentences are very often recurring, remitting, they drop off, they may never come back; so, live every moment that you have.
A couple of nights before my husband died, he knew he only had about a week left and I asked him if he wanted to do something wonderful. He played jazz as a kid, a jazz drum, and I went to the computer and I found out that our favorite club, Dizzy’s Coca-Cola Club in Lincoln Center, had a show that night. It was just a jazz quintet, and I asked Clay “would you like to go?”. “Yes.” He pulled all the energy he had left and went to his wardrobe and pulled out a nice jacket, a shirt, and a cap to hide his bald hair and he let me put tinted sunscreen on his face to give him some color; he look pretty good, he looked normal. We went out and got to the concert on time. The man who was playing was his age and was playing his own composition called “Life Is What you Make It,” so Clay was just filled with the music and beating on the table drumming to the music. We were there for two hours; it was the best two hours of our lives together.
“Passages” was really about a new concept. The idea that, as adults, we continue to go through stages and have to master tasks and go through periods of disequilibrium where it’s not about the choices we made that were wrong, but we’re moving into another phase of life. We already wrapped up some tasks and we want to be more. Basically, we always want to be more, and later we want to give back more. It’s still relevant today and people tell me they constantly go back to it to see: “What did I do at thirty – at cash thirty? Where did I make my midlife passage? Where did I go off track?”. The most important thing is when I wrote that book I was in my thirties and so I stopped parsing the stages of adult development at fifty because I thought what happens after fifty that could be interesting. In fact, I now know we go through more passages after fifty than we do in our first adulthood.
Related topics:
Do You Have a Bucket List? (Poll)
Category: 2010 Aspen Ideas Festival, Loss & Grieving, Relationships, Videos
Loading ...
Secured by
serwis drukarek…
i can agree with all the article…
andy62358…
very good submit, i definitely love this web site, keep on it…
Ogrodzenia PCV…
This is a list of phrases, not an essay. you might be incompetent…
Globalist Agenda…
Stop the Globalists and the Globalist Agenda by searching for Globalist Agenda…
Looking around…
I like to surf in various places on the online world, often I will just go to Digg and read and check stuff out…
backup…
Discover to write himself, the write-up from another supply…
Cebule Kwiatów…
I wish to show my thanks to the writer for bailing me out of this type of matter. Because of looking through the world wide web and finding thoughts that were not helpful, I believed my life was well over. Existing minus the solutions to the problems y…
Looking around…
I like to surf around the internet, regularly I will go to Stumble Upon and follow thru…
Penny Auctions…
[...] Great article I read yesterday [...]…
globalincomeforall…
very good post, i certainly love this website, carry on it…
web hosting…
acting class coach teacher los angeles actor muscle online kids auditions becoming actor study personal training tutor very nice post, i definitely love this website, keep on it…
makingmoneyquickandeasy…
very good post, i actually love this web site, keep on it…
Advice…
It would be great if I could post text and pics to the blog from my cell (iPhone). Maybe even video??. . I’m new at the whole blog thing, so it really would need to be free and pretty easy to use.. . THANKS!….
Penny Auctions Free Bids…
[...] Amazing post I read today [...]…
Blogs…
How can I install WordPress without losing all the indexed html pages?…
Vende Se Hotel Em Fatima…
Wow! This could be one particular of the most helpful blogs We’ve ever arrive across on this subject. Basically Wonderful. I am also an expert in this topic therefore I can understand your hard work….
Your article…
Some truly good info , Sword lily I detected this. “If you find it in your heart to care for somebody else, you will have succeeded.” by Maya Angelou….
Trackback Priority…
Great weblog right here! Additionally your web site a lot up fast! What web host are you the usage of? Can I get your affiliate hyperlink in your host? I want my web site loaded up as fast as yours lol….
Great…
[...]just beneath, are many completely not connected websites to ours, on the other hand, they are certainly worth going over[...]…
Great…
[...]Here is an excellent Blog You may Obtain Intriguing that we Encourage You[...]…
Seks T-shirts…
very nice post, i actually love this website, keep on it…
unlock iphone…
Can I simply say what a aid to find somebody who really is aware of what theyre talking about on the internet. You positively know easy methods to deliver a problem to light and make it important. More folks need to learn this and understand this aspec…
Mixed Martial Arts…
Can I just say what a relief to seek out somebody who really is aware of what theyre talking about on the internet. You positively know the right way to carry a difficulty to light and make it important. More individuals need to learn this and perceive…
Great…
[...]although web sites we backlink to beneath are considerably not connected to ours, we really feel they are essentially worth a go as a result of, so have a look[...]…
buy facebook coupon…
very good publish, i actually love this website, carry on it…
Trackback…
[...]you make blogging glance[...]…
Great…
[...]here are some hyperlinks to web-sites that we link to for the reason that we consider they may be worth visiting[...]…
Your post…
Very interesting details you have remarked, thankyou for putting up. “Curiosity is the key to creativity.” by Akio Morita….