I just took a hot dish out of the microwave, and it got me thinking: when I was a kid, I’d watch mom snatch hot potatoes out of the oven, and think, “How does she DO that?!” She’d yell at me when I washed dishes that the water wasn’t hot enough, and I’d protest that it was as hot as my hands could handle. Her showers always seemed really hot, too - I’d always have to adjust the temperature downwards if showering after her. She’d always joke that “Mom hands” came standard issue after delivering a baby, and they were capable of withstanding great temperatures.
Fast-forward 15 years, and I can snatch a potato out of a hot oven. I can carry a hot bowl safely out of the microwave, and I’m astounded at the cold water my son tries to wash dishes in. My daughter exclaims, “too hot!” when I wash her hands in anything warmer than chilling water.
So am I turning into my mother? Or, more to the point, do we somehow become less sensitive to heat, in our hands at least, as we get older?
So you’re saying that skin thickens as we age (until a certain point, I get that), and that skin thickening is responsible for a reduced pain sensation to heat due to the insulating effects of dead skin cells?
Sounds reasonable. Is this something you know or something you guess? There are at least three claims there, and I don’t know the factualness of any of them, off the top of my head.
What causes this skin thickening, in your estimation?
These are uneducated guesses, but I don’t think it’s much to do with any thickening caused directly by age. I think it’s a combination of several things:
thicker callouses
“kids” nowadays do less manual labor
conditioning
as we age the separators between noticing, feeling discomfort and feeling pain move to the left
as we get more experience we know better what painful actions we can get away with and not suffer injuries
My WAG is that it’s a type of tolerance. I worked at KFC for a couple years in high school, and during that time, I was able to handle much hotter things than I am now. It was fun taking things out of the oven without any mitts to freak my mom out.
I don’t have callouses on very much of my hands at all. Tiny spots under my rings, but nothing on my fingertips or palms or the backs of my hands, certainly.
Most kids, perhaps. My kids? They do at least as much manual labor as I did. My son is a real work with his hands kind of person, he’s always building something or modding something - actually, his hands are more calloused than mine.
I guess that’s what I’m trying to figure out. Do they? And why?
Now that’s a thought. I do certainly feel the hotness of a fresh baked potato, I just know that I can handle a few seconds of extreme heat and then it will be over with no damage. Doesn’t explain the dishwater/bath thing, though. I’m quite comfortable in my “hot” dishwater, and uncomfortable in my kid’s idea of “hot” dishwater - it’s cold!
Thanks for the WAGs, by the way. I know they’re frowned on in GQ, but I like them, personally. And they help keep a floundering thread afloat. I’m still hoping someone who knows a scientific and researched answer might drop in before we’re wished away to IMHO.
I wonder if it’s a function of just being an adult and having known pain (and knowing that life IS pain) vs. pain being rather new and shocking to younger folks.
Then again, my kids will play outside in freezing weather with no coats on till their lips turn blue, if given that choice.
I’ve noticed something strange. I had always been extremely intolerant of environmental heat. I’d sweat like a pig when other people were bundled up in sweaters. Couldn’t tolerate outdoor summer heat at all. Then one summer, two things happened: I had central air installed in my house, and I began taking medications for diabetes and high blood pressure. All of a sudden, my tolerance for heat changed. I can now go outside in the summer and not mind the heat, and being indoors in the winter, I don’t sweat like I used to. I cannot explain this.
I vote for tolerance. Anyone who cooks with any seriousness develops asbestos hands.
I don’t think it’s an age thing. Mr. Athena is 13 years older than me, and works with his hands a lot more than I do. But I can pick up stuff in the kitchen that makes him screech like a little girl if he attempts it.
I’ve noticed this as well, even as a child, especially with water. Every now and then as a kid I’d think to myself “Hey, my heat tolerance for water is higher than it used to be”; I could tell that the same heat which used to be painful to me was now the comfortable zone, and I figured that was just a natural part of aging. The way one might gauge their growth by checking their height against references points, I used to check or at least observe in passing how far I could turn the faucet up before I reached/surpassed comfort. I’m quite amused, in a way, to see that the underlying phenomenon here is more universal than just myself.
I don’t know if it’s a gender or age thing because I am a 19 year old male and I can handle hot water. I made my coworkers at Arby’s yelp when they reached into the sink for tongs or whatever. I made that water HOT! When doing dishes, I avoid the cold water faucet like the plague.
