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A New Vision for Women's Optimal Life-Health Span · HER

0:07
Pam Peeke, MD: Hi, I am Dr.
0:08
Pam Peak, and this is episode number 543 of the Bold and the Brave, her podcast.
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Now, today I am going to be joined by.
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One of my all time friends and colleagues and a repeat offender,
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yes, she's been on before.
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by popular demand, I've gotten her again and what can I say?
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Her name is Ashton Applewhite.
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And with the name like that, honey, you're gonna remember this she is.
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Absolutely extraordinary.
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She is the author of this Chair, rocks, A Manifesto Against Ageism.
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And that's the book we're gonna be really concentrating on in a big way today.
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I first heard about Ashton, when I saw her Ted Talk.
1:02
Which was in 2017.
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I stalled her and got her, so that we could have ourselves a royal time.
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And I'm telling you right now, everyone needs to go to the TED
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Talk done by Ashton Applewhite.
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It was absolutely.
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Brilliant.
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it articulated so much about where we stood then, not
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quite 10 years ago now, right?
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2017.
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on this whole issue of ageism, which is probably one of the last things we
1:35
could try to get away with these days.
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and we do, on a routine basis.
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So Ashton is an internationally recognized expert on ageism The book,
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the Manifesto Against Ageism, this Chair Rocks, was an absolute bestseller.
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She's a co-founder of the Old School Hub.
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Look it up, it's awesome.
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And it'll keep you abreast of everything she does as an activist in the field
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of, this whole issue of ageism.
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And of course, she's written for so many different.
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publications including the New York Times and The Guardian.
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and she speaks widely and that also included, I loved this part, the United
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Nations here she was, recognized, as one of the healthy aging 50 50
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leaders transforming the world to be a better place, to grow older.
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Okay, with that lovely intro, Ashton, what up?
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Girl, haven't seen you forever.
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Oh my goodness.
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Ashton Applewhite: Yeah.
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What up A lot is up.
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Pam Peeke, MD: Yep.
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A lot is up.
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Well, you know, a bunch of my team members said, we all went
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back to your fabulous TED Talk.
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we were wondering, you know, since it was, eight years ago right now, how
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much has changed, from the time when you were saying these precious words in
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your opener, what's one thing that every person in this room is going to become?
3:10
Older and most of us are scared at the prospect.
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How does that word make you feel?
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I used to feel the same way.
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what was it that I was most worried about?
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Ending up drooling in some grim institutional hallway.
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And then I learned that only 4% of older Americans are living in nursing
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homes and the percentage is dropping.
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What else was I worried about?
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Dementia?
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Turns out that most of us can think just fine to the end.
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Dementia rates are dropping to the real epidemic is anxiety over memory loss.
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Alright,
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what up with that,
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Ashton Applewhite: all that continues to be the case.
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there are things in the talk, I wouldn't say, for example, my niece
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who's a physician heard me speak and.
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And I used the, I referred to, you know, people really incapacitated
4:08
people as drooling, and she said, auntie, a lot of my patients drool
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and they really don't like it.
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They're embarrassed and I wish you wouldn't say that.
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And I thought, okay, that is something I'm never gonna say again.
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So I am constantly revising and thinking about how I talk about these things, but,
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I'm happy to say that that statistic, 4.5%
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of Americans over 65 ending up in nursing homes.
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And remember, not all senior living.
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Nursing homes.
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Nursing homes provide skilled nursing care.
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That statistic has since dropped in less than 10 years to 2.5%.
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Pam Peeke, MD: Whoa.
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Ashton Applewhite: So the odds of anyone of you listening to this ending up needing
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skilled nursing care are dropping and so are the odds of getting dementia.
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That too has continued to drop.
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People are getting diagnosed at later ages.
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and staying healthier longer.
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So again, the odds of that happening to you continue to get lower.
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It's not that our fears aren't real.
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I think it's really important to say that there are a lot of people out there
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usually trying to sell you something.
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And the only thing I'm trying to sell you is my book, and if you
5:20
can't afford it, I'll send you PDF.
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but you know, if you do, everything right, if you exercise, if you drink their
5:26
magic supplement, if you just have a good attitude, everything's gonna be all right.
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Having a good attitude really helps having an accurate attitude, right?
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Not having our fears.
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Be out of proportion to reality.
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But that's pretty much the only thing about our aging that we can control.
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So that is why I continue to work on the discrepancy between our understanding
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of aging and the reality and our fears about aging and the reality.
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Pam Peeke, MD: Well look at our culture.
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as a physician I can tell you, you know, people just run
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from the whole issue of aging.
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Ashton Applewhite: I call that age cooties.
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Pam Peeke, MD: You got it.
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It's like, oh, is this gonna like infect me?
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and whatever.
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But what's happening is a lot of people are getting older themselves
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and suddenly it's Oh yeah.
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And a lot of people who have, a mic in front of them.
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are aging.
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And now what's happening is they're starting to say, okay,
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I really kind of get this.
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so then in no time at all, we had longevity medicine.
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This is a new thing.
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It's longevity medicine.
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Alright.
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What the heck is longevity medicine Ashton?
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Ashton Applewhite: Well, I feel you as a physician are better
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positioned to answer that than I am.
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I wanna make one point, which is that everyone is aging.
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And we are aging from the minute we are born.
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aging is not something sad that old people do, right?
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Everyone wakes up a day Older.
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Older people are making up a bigger percentage of global population in
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the US and everywhere else, which is a function of declining birth rates.
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Kind of counterintuitively, there's fewer young people being born,
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but this is not a crisis happy to talk about that separately.
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but, you know, longevity medicine, there is not anything in the entire
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world that is gonna make you younger.
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It doesn't happen.
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Right.
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we know that there are behaviors that can keep you healthy and,
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and I'm sure everyone listening to me knows what they are.
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You know, exercise, try not to smoke.
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try not to have a whole lot of extra weight on you, although people who
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are heavy can also be super healthy.
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Right.
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I am not a physician.
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I am in the culture change business.
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So that has more to do with, educating people about the way we think about aging.
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And so it helps to think about it as not something sad and icky that old people do,
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which is where the age cooties come from.
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And also to acknowledge that we.
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Are aging.
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It is this fascinating, powerful, lifelong universal human process, right?
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There's not much that every human being shares, but it is that, and that's
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really powerful and interesting to me.
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Pam Peeke, MD: Okay, so I would like to, go to that place with you where you're
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talking about, you know, the cultural, aspects of what this is all about,
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especially in the USA, longevity medicine.
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I was sort of being rhetorical with you, you know, clearly I know what it is 'cause
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I, I'm actually writing my next book and it's got a whole lot to do with that.
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But, here's the gig, a lot of what I'm seeing right now is kind of formulaic.
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You wanna be able to continue to do X number of pushups, you
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wanna be able to do, this and that so that you can be strong and
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independent and all the rest of it.
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That's admirable.
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That's fantastic.
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Put together your own recipe of whatever's gonna work for you uniquely.
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Find your A team and make it work, one way or the other.
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Okay.
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I love that.
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but.
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We're missing the whole piece, about the mental attitude here, who, where
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people who, you know, research now shows that you have a more positive
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attitude about the whole aging process.
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You do so much better.
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I really wonder how one then, can approach aging in a more
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healthful way, mentally, right?
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Mentally and themselves.
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And then also surround themselves with people who are
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like kindred spirits who are.
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People who are really, developing the same kind of ethos and, are
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supporting one another throughout.
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This is why I love communities
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of
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Ashton Applewhite: that's that's a whole nother really interesting subject.
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Pam Peeke, MD: Oh yeah, yeah.
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I mean I've, I've watched what happened in Boston when they put together
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those little neighborhoods and,
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Ashton Applewhite: Yeah.
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Pam Peeke, MD: where, exactly.
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Exactly.
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And, you it's kind of interesting how people are doing this.
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I'm looking at the epidemic of loneliness, among so many
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Ashton Applewhite: older people.
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It is not age.
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We, you know, we think of, we imagine these, you know.
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Little old people, sadly, you know, looking, the, the, the photo, the
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stock photo that bugs me is, you know, the, the ancient lady looking
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sadly through her, you know, lace curtain at the big world outside.
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I like to talk, uh, in terms of having a accurate understanding of aging
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rather than a positive attitude because.
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It's hard to be positive all the time, right?
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There is scary things.
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You are worried about getting sick, ending up a loan, running out of
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money, and those are legitimate fears.
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I will tell you that when I started out on this, and it's now almost 20
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years ago, as it's cleared my TED Talk, I started out with all these
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fears, many of which were baseless.
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So counterintuitively, the more you actually learn and know about.
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Aging, the less fear it holds because you understand more facts and the
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fear itself is bad for us, right?
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It is anxiety.
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It is stress.
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And how many things do we know Dr.
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Peak about how stress is bad for all our body systems?
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That is what?
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Doctors think is the basis for this finding that people with who you know,
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who see later life as a time of growth and purpose, just like the decades
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before it do live, an average of seven and a half years longer for sure.
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They live happier.
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Because it is not healthy to go through any stage of your
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life, dreading your future.
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And also our psychology changes as we get older.
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We get better at not sweating the small stuff.
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And that is a buffer, for example, against, loss and all of that.
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And, as I said before, the one thing you can control, you
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can't control your temperament.
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Some people are optimists, some people are pessimists.
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But you can control your attitude by learning.
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And that is why I co-created the old School Hub Oldschool info.
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it contains hundreds of free, vetted resources and all kinds of different
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formats to educate yourself about ageism in whatever form and in from whatever
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angle, Speaks to you, and the books are not free, but everything else is free.
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And we also hold a weekly open to anyone Zoom, go to our events page
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where you can talk, listen to people talk, anything ageism related.
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ask a question.
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You know, bring up something you heard, something that happened to you,
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something you hope doesn't happen to you.
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And you'll find yourself in a community of sensible, well-informed people who can
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help, discuss it and place it in context.
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Pam Peeke, MD: So I'm a realistic optimist.
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especially as a physician, I know how, where this is going.
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at the same time, I'm just naturally more optimistic.
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not happy, wacky, silly, stupid.
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It's just, you know, I just have that optimistic, edge to me
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Ashton Applewhite: I think it's, you know, people dread getting older and then when
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they realize like, oh shit, I'm actually older and, you know, it's not so bad.
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And that there are all kinds of, processes and ways in which aging enriches us and
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makes us more confident, especially women.
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Pam Peeke, MD: Exactly, and I'm seeing more and more about this online.
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I never really saw about it before because you know, women,
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you know, there's that word.
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Here comes Ashton.
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Women were invisible.
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nobody wanted to see them.
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Ashton Applewhite: invisibility is one of the toughest concepts.
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I think it is typically applied and feel free to disagree with
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me, but in a heteronormative context and under patriarchy.
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Okay, those were two $50 words, but they are relevant.
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that.
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Under Patriarchy, which is a society that serves men's interests before
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women, and benefits women who see their value in their relationship
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to more powerful men around them.
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And sometimes we gotta make deals right?
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That is the way ahead in the world.
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No judgment ever against any woman who does what she needs to do to feel good
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about herself and protect herself.
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Emotionally and socially, but under patriarchy, our value is tethered
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to whether, how thin we are, how white we are, how pretty we are, and
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our, whether we stay young looking and our reproductive value, right?
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we are here to make more babies and menopause.
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The amount of new stuff around menopause is fantastic, but a lot of it.
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Also expensive stuff that, it's medicalized.
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It's pathologized, like everything that has to do with our bodies.
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so I think the invisibility often means for women that
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they become invisible to men.
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The male gaze, right?
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And the most helpful thing I read about invisibility was just a one
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sentence comment by a writer named Grace Paley, invisible to whom?
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And on whose terms, and we are seeing a tremendous amount of women
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online and out in the world, Dr.
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Peak, I agree.
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Who are saying, you know what?
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I am not buying those terms.
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That degrade me and diminish me.
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I am full of, whatever you know, of grit, of vigor, of good ideas, of, whatever.
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And I am not shuffling quietly off stage.
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And if I can't find community and support in the men.
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For whom I once looked for that invisible to whom And on whose terms often not
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invisible to the other women around me.
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I'm not invisible to the people who wanna hear what I have to say
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and learn what I have to teach.
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so it's, it is a shift, you know, especially.
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If when you were younger, you got a lot of your self-esteem from
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turning heads when you enter the room because that does stop happening.
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But that is a very short window under capitalism, and I do believe
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that if we can look to see our value more broadly and not tether it to
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appearance, although we have a really, really long, fascinating road ahead.
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Pam Peeke, MD: One of the things that I have seen.
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That really, I think is great is that in the field of fitness, for instance,
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there's a pivot away from, skinness, that used to happen in the seventies,
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eighties, nineties, it was all about that.
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Now it's about being strong and healthy
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Ashton Applewhite: You don't see Skinness on the uptick because of ozempic.
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Pam Peeke, MD: No, not at all.
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Not at all.
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what I see is a lot of people, I mean, right now remember we're in beta land.
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Ozempic is beta, and also what you need to know.
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Ashton is that there are at least another four categories of related drugs.
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they're not, GLP one, at all.
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They come from different origins and, you know, some are gonna be converting
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some of our fat into more brown fat, you know, et cetera, et cetera.
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So I'm looking at all of this.
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knowing that this is a real moving target and we can't hang our hats
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Ashton Applewhite: Yes.
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So many people participating in a mass experiment with no idea what
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the long-term consequences will be.
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Again, no judgment with all this m.
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Emphasis on fitness, but it is a lot easier, of course, to take
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a shot or take a pill, whatever, than it is to change habits.
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And we know how hard it is to diet and how hard it is to keep weight
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Pam Peeke, MD: Well, you know, the grand majority of people who are taking
17:58
the GLP don't become thin at all.
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What they do is they'll drop.
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a certain amount of weight and then things happen.
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They either go off the drug or they plateau or whatever.
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A lot of it depends upon lifestyle habits.
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we can't assume that there's this skinness outcome 'cause it's not happening.
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That will happen, you know, when one of the celebrities who can pay
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through the nose can, drop a few before she hits the red carpet, and
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of course she'll, shoot up her GLP one and that'll be the end of it.
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I'm talking about people who, you know, women who currently weigh a 250 pounds
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and pray to God to be able to see 200.
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And the last time I looked, that's not skinny.
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And you know
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something, I'll tell you what it.
18:50
No, no, what I'm saying is it's healthier.
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It's healthier, and it's getting people to, where they need to go.
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And so it's exceptionally important, to make certain, we
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know that there are shifts now.
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Ashton Applewhite: Mm-hmm.
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Pam Peeke, MD: Away from some stereotypic body of a, some influencer
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who's shredded and, ripped and skinny in a tiny waist and forget it.
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that
19:21
that actually.
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No, no, I know.
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I'm right because there was a recent survey that came out that said that
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people, especially women, are completely turned off by those kinds of people.
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What they're now looking for are people who look authentic.
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And authentic means you're not, some kind of bizarre,
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manufactured stereotypic body.
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instead, you've got a little something going, you know what I love more.
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Anything else?
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I'm on working with the Senior Olympics and I've, competed with them
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and, what I love about those people is that the average age is 68 and
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you start at the age of 50, right?
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And then of course it goes on odd infinitum.
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I mean, we have people who are 105 still kind of doing their little track and
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field thing, albeit a little slower.
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So, what I love there is I love looking at their bodies.
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I'm looking at women who swim and break world records in the pool, right, who
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have extra weight on board, didn't stop them from becoming a world class athlete.
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Now, in swimming, you can get away with that track and field, probably less
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so, you know, for the obvious reason.
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But you know, from sport to sport, I'm watching this and
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then triathlon, which is my babe.
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you could see the same thing you
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Ashton Applewhite: and often a little extra weight can confer
20:50
protection, especially in later life.
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Pam Peeke, MD: Well, you know something, there's a researcher, from
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the University of, South Dakota.
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Becca Jore is her name, and I always see her at the Senior Olympics.
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'cause every two years when we compete.
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she comes through and she does, assessments, physical exams and
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performance assessments of the athletes, who wanna do this.
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And she follows 'em year after year.
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And one of the things she's found is that, you know, if you roll up that little
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t-shirt, you're not seeing a six pack.
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I'm just saying, you know, and you're not seeing some shredded
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abdomen on the part of a woman.
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Instead, you're seeing basketball players, softball players, All
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kinds of athletes, badminton, on and on who are just crushing it.
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but they've got some nice little
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padding there
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Ashton Applewhite: bodies.
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I mean, you know,
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not
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Pam Peeke, MD: It's authentic and
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that's why that's why people are, are so excited about them.
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They're like, oh, real people who knew?
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It's, so radical and, and back and forth.
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So, you know, I think that's kind of a piece of where it goes.
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You know, the other thing too is, what does a healthy 80-year-old look like?
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Now I'm just throwing it out there.
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Think about it for a
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Ashton Applewhite: Well, You know if I could put one fact about aging in every
22:12
head in the world, it would be the.
22:14
Us.
22:15
The longer we live, the more different from each other.
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We become
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every right.
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Pam Peeke, MD: a minute.
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That's a keeper.
22:23
That's a
22:23
Ashton Applewhite: Yeah, I mean every newborn is unique, right?
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But, a whole bunch of 17 year olds have way more in common,
22:30
developmentally, physically, socially, than a bunch of 37 year olds who
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are way more like each other than a bunch of 67 year olds and so on out.
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So at the heart of ageism is stereotyping on the basis of age and
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stereotyping is always divisive and.
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Ignorant, but it is especially so in the case of age, the older the
22:54
person, the less their age tells you about them, what they look like,
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whether they can swim or sink, what they're interested in, et cetera.
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We become more different from each other and it becomes less and less accurate
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to guess anything about someone on the basis of how old they happen to be.
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Pam Peeke, MD: I've never heard that before.
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I love this.
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So where does that come from?
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You know, we, we get older, so we look at people our own age.
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You know, once you're over the age of 60, say 70, you know, whatever.
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Ashton Applewhite: You must know this as a, fitness expert.
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When you see a bunch of 70 year olds, do they all look alike?
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Do they all, I mean, I mean, random, not athletes, do they all look alike?
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Do they all perform alike?
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Pam Peeke, MD: no, of
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Ashton Applewhite: No.
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Right.
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Not at all.
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Any more than, you know, 40 year olds are different too.
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I mean, think of an, a good exercise as a high school reunion, right?
23:43
No one looks, I mean, it's a little, if you go, went to a small school from a,
23:47
and everyone's from a similar, you know, region and socioeconomic status, you're
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gonna have more homogeneity than if it's a giant, School with a lot of kids from
23:56
all over the place, but still, as we age, we grow more different from each
24:01
other than the it's, and it's based in solid science, in biology, in sociology.
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The nerdy way to put it, which I bet your listeners will understand,
24:10
is that the defining characteristic of late life is heterogeneity.
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the opposite, being different from each other.
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Pam Peeke, MD: And you know what's interesting?
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I'm just reflecting on this as you're talking, and that is that,
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you know, when you're younger, you wanna be like everyone else, okay?
24:29
You wanna have the
24:29
Ashton Applewhite: And the
24:30
Pam Peeke, MD: hairstyle, you want Exactly.
24:33
Ashton Applewhite: getting older, especially
24:35
Pam Peeke, MD: Ah, now I get it.
24:36
So now what you're really saying is that, you know, when you're younger
24:41
and you're insecure, and you're trying to develop a sense of self and, and
24:45
confidence and worth and all the rest of it, you know, you really kind of, you're
24:49
driven to look at people around you and say, you know, how are they doing?
24:54
Should I look like them?
24:56
and then when you conform, there's a false sense of security when you conform.
25:01
it's kind of interesting.
25:02
But then as you get older, you know, and I notice this of course we
25:06
have literature that supports this.
25:08
After the age of 50, you're like, you got a problem with me?
25:12
Leave.
25:13
There's the exit sign.
25:14
Honey.
25:14
Ashton Applewhite: I mean.
25:15
If we compare.
25:17
We compare ourselves to people lifelong.
25:19
My grandmother used to say, and I thought, I thought she made it up,
25:22
and I've discovered that she didn't.
25:24
Comparisons are odious and it's a really good maxim because I mean,
25:29
if you have two your kids and you compare them, you compare your kids
25:32
to the other kids in the grade.
25:34
That way lies, madness, lies, insecurity, you know, we all do it.
25:38
as animals, as you know, we have these sort of tribal
25:41
instincts to see who's like us.
25:44
in the business world, it's referred to as culture fit.
25:46
What that really means is someone like us, someone who will understand
25:50
my references, someone with whom I'm culturally similar, often, or
25:54
perhaps have the same interests.
25:56
And, the more diversity we have in our.
26:00
The people that we mix it up with and meet in our lives.
26:03
in my utterly prejudiced opinion, the richer our life is because we
26:08
get to question our assumptions about anything about people who like Bruce
26:13
Springsteen, about people who are heavy, about people who like to garden.
26:18
You name it.
26:18
Because there is always so much diversity and any group of those
26:22
people, if it's older, it's gonna have more diversity than a bunch of younger
26:25
people who are doing the same thing.
26:28
Pam Peeke, MD: All right.
26:28
Now when we come back.
26:30
I'm gonna ask Ashton to help us, navigate a lot of our own biases
26:38
that we don't even know exist.
27:41
And we're back.
27:42
Alright, Ashton, now let's look at some actionable items here.
27:47
You know, as we look at this, I mean, like, we could be here, I don't know,
27:51
we'll have you back on again on a weekly basis to remind us yet again.
27:56
but seriously.
27:57
Actionable items, things that we can do.
28:00
So, you know, what I like to do is I like to catch myself, and reflect,
28:06
when I think I'm beginning.
28:09
Oh no, I always do.
28:10
It's a self-reflection that I've learned along the way, as I, try to develop a
28:16
judgment-free zone, um, where I'm not like, well, you know, no matter what.
28:23
Is in front of me one way or the other.
28:26
actually, you know what I do?
28:27
I'm gonna tell you Ashton and everyone out there in the Herb Podcast land, one
28:31
of the most fun things I do with my brain and that is, I look at life sometimes,
28:38
like one big outta control sitcom.
28:41
It's just a sitcom.
28:42
And then I, I look at what central casting has sent me today.
28:47
It's like, oh, the lady with the yellow hair and the multicolored outfit.
28:53
that, doesn't exactly fit right, but it's interesting.
28:59
So central
29:00
Ashton Applewhite: may be a challenge is an idea you had, which is a little
29:03
bit unnerving, but also it's how we grow and it is how we, you know, bias
29:09
is really hard to deal with, to, undo.
29:11
it is deeply ingrained habit.
29:14
Habits are hard to change.
29:16
That's why it's easier to take a pill to lose weight than to diet and
29:20
document everything you eat, et cetera.
29:22
So we do have to do exactly what you're saying.
29:24
You do, Pam is, and it's fantastic that you develop it as a habit.
29:27
I try not to.
29:28
I find myself being critical of what someone looks like or
29:31
whatever, and then I do say, why?
29:33
why am I doing that?
29:34
Like, where's the win?
29:35
Pam Peeke, MD: it's almost like, you know, the more something
29:38
weirds you out or even irritates.
29:40
Hate you the more you learn about yourself.
29:43
Ashton Applewhite: Good point.
29:45
And when it comes to aging, the best thing you can do, if everything start all change
29:50
starts within always right, is to look at your own attitudes towards age and aging.
29:57
And think if you are afraid of something, you know, worried about something, think
30:01
about like where the negative messages come from, And what's the purpose?
30:05
And the odds are really good.
30:07
It is to make you buy something.
30:09
Or to divide you to make, you compare yourself to other people
30:13
your age or to another generation.
30:15
those lazy, you know, millennials, those greedy boomers do not get me started on
30:21
generational labels and even the idea of generations themselves, 'cause they
30:25
just divide us and lead to stereotyping.
30:27
How could anything be true of the millions and millions of people
30:31
born, roughly around the same age?
30:33
'cause there's not even an agreed upon definition.
30:36
Of generation.
30:37
Right?
30:38
nothing's easy to, when it comes to changing habits and challenge
30:41
bias, but here's a way into that.
30:43
Think about how you use the words old and young.
30:47
Do you say, I'm too old for that?
30:49
We all do ps.
30:50
We all do.
30:51
No judgment.
30:52
Well, you're never too old for it because there are other people
30:55
this your age doing the same thing.
30:58
Who can do it faster?
30:59
Who can't do it at all, et cetera.
31:01
You might be too lazy.
31:02
You might be out of town.
31:04
You might have done it yesterday, but it is never ever about age.
31:09
Pam Peeke, MD: I have to reflect on a story.
31:11
Ashton, I think you're gonna like, and this is actually something in my new book.
31:16
So here it comes.
31:18
So when I began the triathlon, why did I do that?
31:21
Because I got bored with marathon.
31:23
It's like, you know, I mean, seriously, 20?
31:26
No, no, we're not doing this anymore.
31:28
So I finished that little Hummer and then I went right over to triathlon.
31:32
It's really good for people who have attention deficit issues,
31:35
especially because if the swim doesn't work, you got biking.
31:39
If the biking gets boring, you got the running.
31:41
So, you know, it's sort of a joke among all the triathletes.
31:44
So.
31:45
There I was, and I was brand new, newly minted, and I didn't know
31:49
much of anything about anything.
31:51
So I trained and you know, I had a great little coach and everything, and there
31:55
I was my very first sprint triathlon.
31:58
Right?
31:59
So that's the lowest level on the triathlon,
32:01
you
32:01
know,
32:02
iron
32:02
Ashton Applewhite: have never even considered going anywhere
32:04
near a triathlon, so you need to treat me as a beginner.
32:08
Pam Peeke, MD: So, so here I am and you know, you have to learn all the things,
32:12
you know, you have to rack your bike and you have to set up a little transition
32:16
zone as you kind of, you know, transition from one sport to the other and on and on.
32:22
So I'm busily doing that next to two.
32:25
Absolutely precious.
32:27
21-year-old young women they're in college, they're just finishing their
32:31
seniors and they're all excited.
32:33
It's their first sprint triathlon, they can't even handle it.
32:36
They're so excited.
32:38
so we were all just sort of talking and laughing and having a great time.
32:42
And then all of a sudden a loudspeaker, happened.
32:44
And he goes, would everyone who hasn't been inked, please get inked?
32:50
And I'm like.
32:51
Who's inking, what's happening?
32:53
And they go, oh, you have to have your number put on your arm.
32:56
And I'm like, oh yeah, that's right.
32:58
I'm new at this, what the hell do I know?
33:00
So I showed up for the inking dude, and he puts my number on my arm, which is good.
33:06
And then he starts scrolling on my calf, the back of my calf, and I'm
33:12
like, what the hell are you doing
33:13
back there?
33:16
I can't.
33:16
What up?
33:17
and he said, oh, that's your age.
33:19
Ashton Applewhite: Huh.
33:20
Pam Peeke, MD: And so I said, oh, that's interesting.
33:23
See in marathon, when you line up for Marathon, you do it by speed.
33:28
So I'm a mid packer, so that would be the way it
33:32
is.
33:33
But in triathlon, yeah, in triathlon it's all done by age for a boatload of reasons.
33:40
part of it is the fact that I think, I mean, I'm just sort
33:43
of throwing it out there.
33:45
You don't want a bunch of 17 year olds smacking you in the face, in the water.
33:50
They tend to be, fairly aggressive out there.
33:53
you want it to be a little bit more controlled, but it is what it is.
33:57
And then, the other piece is safety.
34:00
The water is the most dangerous.
34:02
so they have boats out there and they'll watch for the color of your cap, and
34:07
they will also, be very, on the alert.
34:11
for people as they're getting a little older.
34:13
'cause many of them may not be as strong.
34:16
We don't know.
34:17
Some are very strong.
34:19
but you never know.
34:20
Anyway, so I'm out there and I got inked and I went back to my transition place
34:25
where the 21 year olds were finishing up their bike racking and the rest of.
34:30
And you know, we were chatty Kathy before and then I bent over and I was
34:34
working on my stuff and making sure my bike shoes were there and whatever.
34:38
And then it was got real quiet
34:40
and I thought,
34:41
Ashton Applewhite: how old you were.
34:42
Pam Peeke, MD: yeah, and I turned around, I said everything okay.
34:46
And both of them were staring at me, kind of with an interesting look on their face.
34:50
And finally one broke out and she said.
34:54
I wanna look like you when I'm your age.
34:59
And I had never been told that in my life.
35:04
And I think at that time I was like, I dunno, 57 or something.
35:08
And they said, you're older than my mom.
35:10
Which would make sense since they're 21.
35:13
than my mom, you're older than.
35:15
And I sat back and I had to reflect like, what the hell was going on in their heads.
35:20
And I thought.
35:21
I get it.
35:23
kind of see where they're coming from because at 21, is older,
35:27
Ashton Applewhite: I mean, it's hard to imagine getting older now.
35:30
I think a little bit of that is age and we live in.
35:32
The culture that you know.
35:33
Doesn't encourage reflection and paints old as inherently bad.
35:39
but we don't, you know, a huge problem with American society is that it is
35:42
the most age segregated in the world.
35:45
We spend most of our time with people our own age, and so naturally we assume
35:50
that the reason we get along that there's affinity is because we're the same age,
35:54
and in fact age has much less to do with affinity and collective interest.
36:00
Than gender, than socioeconomic background than where you're from then
36:06
what language you speak and so on.
36:07
I paradoxically, we give age more credit than it deserves.
36:12
So I'll just mention one more habit to break.
36:14
I mean, that's very, literal, which helps me 'cause I'm very literal.
36:19
Try to break the ageist habit.
36:21
We all do this.
36:22
No judgment of making a beeline for people your own age when
36:26
you enter the ri the room.
36:28
Or I'm meeting, Because the more time you spend in mixed age company, the
36:33
more obvious it becomes that you may or may not like so and so, but it's
36:37
gonna because you don't like their politics or you don't like whatever, but
36:41
not because you don't like their age.
36:43
That's not how it works.
36:46
I wish, I mean, perhaps for your first.
36:48
Athletic event.
36:49
They don't know how fast you are.
36:51
but I would certainly vote for your age to be revealed.
36:55
I'm all for age, being out there in the open, but not, right from the get go.
37:00
Like I would like medical charts.
37:02
Your age is a really important part of your biology and doctors need to know it.
37:06
I'd like it to be on page two.
37:09
Of your medical chart dating profiles.
37:11
I don't think it's smart to lie about your age.
37:13
I definitely don't think it's smart to place to put a picture up that
37:16
was, you know, taken years earlier.
37:18
You don't want the person's face to fall when they set eyes on you.
37:21
But I'd like it to be on page two.
37:23
I would like the assumptions that we make the minute we have a number,
37:28
which we all do, no judgment, to have a little harder time to, let's be a
37:32
little more confused for a while so that we don't categorize according to age.
37:39
And actually, here's a, experiment that's analogous.
37:42
orchestra.
37:43
An orchestra in Europe was entirely made up of.
37:46
White men and they realized like this has to change.
37:50
And you know, they started to conduct auditions behind a curtain.
37:54
Pam Peeke, MD: I remember this experiment.
37:56
Yep,
37:56
Ashton Applewhite: put in a curtain.
37:57
So you couldn't tell how large someone was.
37:59
You couldn't tell whether they were wearing girl shoes or boy shoes.
38:02
And the orchestra diversified because even though they wanted it to be
38:07
diverse, their biases and habits.
38:10
Habits die hard.
38:12
You hire people who look like you.
38:14
And once they no longer had information about people's size,
38:18
their skin color, their gender.
38:20
It diversified.
38:21
So that's the world that I want, right?
38:23
Where age is both more overt, but it's stripped of value.
38:28
You're not better 'cause you're older.
38:30
I don't think old people belong on pedestals, but you're not
38:33
devalued because you're older and you're, same goes for young, right.
38:36
Ageism cuts both ways.
38:38
And young people experience a lot of it assuming that someone is too young for a
38:43
task or a relationship, is ageism also?
38:46
Pam Peeke, MD: I think that, you know, I have a friend
38:48
right now who's visiting Italy.
38:50
visiting some families up there.
38:53
she just says time and time again, how much the family is
38:57
valued and that the elders, are really held in much higher esteem.
39:03
and you can see this, when you have the multi-generational families and, the
39:09
value that's placed on making certain that, an elder whatever, whether it's
39:14
a grandmother, grandfather, aunt,
39:16
uncle, Yeah, is just beautiful respect.
39:20
And then at the same time I pivot over to Japan where things
39:24
are really changing there.
39:26
They have such a large population of aged and the kids aren't really showing up.
39:33
And many of these people, are living in, Pretty much, abject,
39:38
loneliness, that breaks my heart.
39:41
I also look at this whole issue of the family.
39:43
what's going on with that?
39:45
are we really stepping up
39:47
Ashton Applewhite: Well, one thing that I do, there's a lot more of,
39:49
than was the case 10 years ago, is interest in inter age, families.
39:56
Living society.
39:57
Tremendous amount.
39:58
I mean, I'm dead center in the baby.
40:00
Boom.
40:00
And you know, one of, you know, I hope not to end up in an institution.
40:04
If I do, if I need care, then I will obviously.
40:08
But, I would like to live surrounded by people of all ages.
40:12
And I've thought like is that ages by partner and I, I mean, I'm 73, he's 79.
40:16
And we went and looked at a couple of adult, residences, senior living stuff.
40:21
And they were really nice.
40:23
And the people we met there were interesting and honestly,
40:26
they were a lot like us.
40:27
They were reasonably well off, they were white, they were educated, and you know,
40:30
it felt super comfortable because of that.
40:33
But I personally don't wanna spend the last decades of my life surrounded by
40:38
old white people because I want, Break my legs stumbling over a tricycle.
40:43
I wanna be woken up by, weird music in the middle of the night.
40:47
I mean, I'm exaggerating, but I want, to be challenged like
40:50
you're saying, you are looking for new ideas and always questioning
40:54
the way you think about things.
40:56
I think that is what makes life interesting.
40:58
It's part of what wards off dementia, right?
41:00
We're constantly dealing with new input and new challenges
41:04
Pam Peeke, MD: Well, that's what research shows.
41:06
Ashton research shows that when people hang out with younger
41:10
people, it could be a 50-year-old hanging out with a 20-year-old.
41:13
It could be an, uh, 75-year-old hanging out with, you know, of, of.
41:18
40-year-old or a 20 year, well, it doesn't matter.
41:21
There's, a very positive health effect because it keeps you on your toes.
41:27
One of the things that's really important, and we're circling back to this point
41:31
about the entire aging process is that you continuously need to learn.
41:38
You continuously need to stay curious, like, what's that about?
41:44
You continuously need to embrace adventure.
41:48
You know, life's either a daring adventure or nothing at all.
41:51
That's Helen Keller's motto.
41:53
and mine, I absolutely believe it.
41:56
that's an understatement.
41:58
I just, um.
41:59
Ashton Applewhite: a birthday, so I feel a special affinity
42:01
Pam Peeke, MD: Ah, I see, I see.
42:04
but really at the end of the day, that's such a huge piece of
42:09
Ashton Applewhite: It is
42:10
Can I bring up something?
42:12
Speaking of Helen Keller?
42:14
Yeah.
42:14
She, she was brave.
42:15
I mean, Helen Keller didn't run any triathlons and I just wanna put
42:21
out there, I mean, I am no athlete.
42:23
There are an awful lot of people who are unable to run, maybe even unable to walk.
42:29
who live, who don't perhaps have the, you know, the financial capacity to,
42:34
cost money, to take time, to train, to hire a trainer, and all of that
42:37
who don't have that extra income.
42:39
And I think it's really important to celebrate people like you who
42:44
do these remarkable athletic feats.
42:45
I just, I live in New York City and I cheered my brains out for all the marathon
42:50
runners, especially like the ordinary people doing this incredibly brave
42:53
challenge, but it's just as important.
42:57
To realize that those people are outliers.
43:00
They set a marvelous example for people who aspire to that.
43:04
But it's really important to recognize that most of us are in the messy
43:08
middle, and that even people with chronic illnesses, even people who
43:12
can't even leave the house, lead lives with meaning and value if
43:17
they have social connection, right?
43:19
If they have something that gives their life meaning, and
43:21
it's, there's such emphasis here.
43:24
Around active aging, and it is great to be as active as you can, but don't beat
43:29
yourself up if you are not an athlete.
43:32
Right?
43:33
Remember that the proverbial skydiving octogenarian, she is an outlier.
43:38
You don't have to jump out out of a plane.
43:40
Pam Peeke, MD: Well, I wanna, I wanna clarify the fact that, you know, I
43:43
do what I do, but the grand majority of people clearly don't do that.
43:48
What I always say is that there's a basic foundational level of use of your body
43:56
that affects your mind tremendously, and you'd simply do what you can and go out
44:04
of your way to try to get up and celebrate the fact that your body can do whatever
44:11
Ashton Applewhite: I love that you put, if you can, we need to stay as healthy
44:14
as we can, as active as we can, and get rid of the idea that there's a binary.
44:19
You don't go from independent to dependent, from mobile to immobile.
44:23
We're all on a spectrum, and the idea is to challenge
44:26
yourself as much as you can and
44:28
Pam Peeke, MD: It's all relative to
44:29
who you are.
44:31
It's all relative to who you are, and this is why, the grand majority of
44:37
people, the mass majority of people, are just doing the best they can.
44:43
And they're making do, they're finding workarounds.
44:48
they're kind of trying to hack their own system, figure it out.
44:52
if one leg isn't working that well, well the rest of my body is, what can I do?
44:57
But, at the very basis of aging.
45:02
Foundationally is a mental attitude of meaning and purpose in life.
45:08
If you have whatever it may be, that gives you meaning and purpose in life,
45:15
that's why you get up in the morning.
45:17
Ashton Applewhite: That's why I do the work that I do because what
45:20
is the biggest force in the world telling you that as you age you are
45:23
worth less, especially as a woman.
45:26
And it's very, very hard not to let that corrode your sense of your own value.
45:33
Change the way we feel.
45:35
And again, please go to oldschool.info
45:37
or my website, this chair rocks.com.
45:40
I work really hard to make my thoughts available to the public
45:43
for free and just noodle around.
45:45
I guarantee it will make you feel differently about the years ahead.
45:49
Pam Peeke, MD: I love it and I just wanna leave it with, the fact that.
45:54
Again, I would say that Ashton and I are both, realistic optimists, meaning that
45:59
we live in the real time, the real world.
46:03
We're mindful of that.
46:05
at the same time, you know, we've got that little tinge of optimism
46:09
and I could see that all over your
46:11
Ashton Applewhite: I am an optimist.
46:12
you asked what was different since the TED Talk and honestly
46:15
the fundamentals of that.
46:16
Everything I said then is as relevant today as it was
46:20
minus the line about drooling.
46:22
and there's a few others I would tweak, but since then there is
46:25
so much more awareness of ageism.
46:28
no one says, what's that anymore?
46:30
Right?
46:31
And that is huge because you've got to be, so much bias is unconscious
46:37
and ageism has not bleeped onto our radar yet as much as sexism and racism,
46:43
and I don't ever wanna compare them.
46:45
They all matter.
46:47
And we are not gonna get rid of ageism without undermining these
46:50
other forms of stereotyping and discrimination because they all
46:55
intersect and reinforce each other.
46:57
But we are much, much, much more aware of ageism and you can't fight
47:02
something you're not aware of.
47:03
So that is the thing, you're right, I am optimistic because I really do see culture
47:08
change I ask people, you know, what would you think of as criteria for diversity?
47:13
what makes, and people say, well, typically, you know, race and gender
47:17
and maybe socioeconomic background.
47:20
And if they don't say age, you know, they're starting to say age.
47:23
If I say, what about age?
47:25
No one says that's a dumb idea.
47:27
They say, why didn't I think of that?
47:29
Pam Peeke, MD: Well that's because it's the level of awareness, you
47:32
know, I see this also paralleling what's happening in women's health.
47:36
so now we say the M word, we say menstrual.
47:40
Who knew?
47:41
we say.
47:42
Well, perimenopause starting with the age of 40.
47:45
So we're now thinking way earlier than, when menopause
47:50
hits and then post menopause.
47:52
Given the fact that you're gonna, the postmenopausal period is huge.
47:56
You
47:56
know, it's like decades and.
47:59
Ashton Applewhite: it.
47:59
Ladies.
48:00
Pam Peeke, MD: Yeah, I know.
48:01
Seriously, it's, nice on the other side.
48:03
it's just one of those situations where I just want everyone to
48:07
know that, this is an evolving.
48:12
issue and movement.
48:14
And, Ashton Applewhite is one of the great leaders and activists in this field.
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thank heavens for all of your activism and work and bringing together communities
48:24
and having your retreats and all the rest of the great stuff you could learn about.
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when you go to, what was that website hub?
48:33
Ashton Applewhite: The old school hub Oldschool Info and my personal
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website, this chair rocks.com.
48:39
Pam Peeke, MD: Absolutely.
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And your, your mind will be blown.
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and you'll learn so much and I don't care how old you are.
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Be curious and go ahead and run on over to those websites.
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I.
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Dare you, Ashton, I can't thank you enough for being on the Herb podcast.
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I want everyone out there to Google Ashton Applewhite Ted Talk and just listen to it.
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It is absolutely positively brilliant.
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There's no,
49:12
Ashton Applewhite: 11 minutes long.
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Pam Peeke, MD: 11 minutes long because, I've done my TED
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talks and they're quite strict.
49:18
They're like, okay, you know, the cane comes out at, but at
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the end of the day, listen to it.
49:24
It's beautiful.
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It's fabulous.
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She'll have you.
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Smiling and laughing at the same time.
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your mind will be blown.
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So the TED Talk as well as the book, this chair rocks a manifesto against ageism.
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And then, the websites and this will all be up of course, when we
49:43
go live and you can, look at all of the, social media handles as well.
49:48
So, Ashton.
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Thank you, thank you, thank you.
49:51
And you are a repeat offender, so of course I'm gonna have
49:54
you back again and again.
49:55
Okay.
49:56
Ashton Applewhite: Thank you, Pam.
49:57
I.
49:57
Pam Peeke, MD: Okay.
49:58
And that was a promise, not a threat, but it could be a threat too.
50:02
And I wanna thank my sponsor, so Array vitamins, minerals and
50:05
herbs, rooted in nature and the new Her Life Stages products.
50:10
I want you to scope 'em out since we've been talking about aging
50:13
at so array, S-O-A-R-A y.com.
50:17
And take a moment to leave us a review because we love your feedback.
50:21
Just saying, okay, this has been a production of Podcast Health and I got
50:27
a little something to share with you.
50:29
You know, your time in this world may be limited.
50:33
Maybe limited, but the things that you can do with that time are
50:38
not so CAR A dm, seizes the day.
50:42
Everyone out there.
50:44
Thanks for listening.