I know; not the happiest of topics. I offer no excuse. It just happens to be on my mind.
I know all of us would love to live long, fulfilling lives, but that isn’t likely to be the case with every single one of us. If you had to take a guess right now, based on your family history, your current health, and maybe your assessment of your own luck, how old do you honestly think you’ll be when you die?
I tend to be very pessimistic when it comes to my own life. In addition to that, my family has a history of heart disease (my father died of a heart attack at 49), I don’t take fantastic care of myself, and I’m already diabetic. On the plus side, my mom is 62 and still quite healthy. My guess for myself would be somewhere between 50-55 if I’m lucky.
Both my father and grandfather lived to 88, and they never ate anything that was good for them, and smoked like chimneys. I’m 82, so aiming for 102. Wish me luck.
I live healthy now, but I did smoke for 20-something years and have a horrible family history of heart disease, diabetes, and cancer. So I’m going to put a lot of faith in the future medical system and say I’ll last to 70.
History of breast cancer, suicide, and alcoholism on both sides of my family. My only living grandparent is around 75 right now but if it meant surviving to her condition, I’d just rather kick the bucket. Based on the stress and anxiety I get all the time when I’m stressed, I wonder if I’ll give myself a stress-induced heart attack before I hit middle age. I’ll be pretty surprised to live past 40.
My dad’s 81, and you’d never guess to look at him. Never took very good care of himself until recently. I could see him going another 10 years. His mom was a chimney-like smoker and fish-esque drinker, and lived into her mid 80’s. My mom’s parents did, too, although they were teetotalers. Then again, my mom died last year at 71 - of lung cancer, and no, she never took so much as a drag of a cigarette in her life.
I’m trying to take the best care of myself I can - eating well and excercising daily. I’m shooting for, oh, 90. But you never know.
I expected to be dead already. Heart attack 44 years ago and still going (relatively) strong. I do not expect to go another ten years, but who knows. I have already, at 72, lived 9 years longer then my father, 6 years less than my mother.
Mid-seventies, tops, and I wouldn’t be surprised to buy it a lot earlier than that. My family has no great tradition of longevity, I take poor care of myself, and I’m going into a profession (law) that has a nasty effect on life expectancy. Depression, alcoholism, and so on. I also expect to be single for the overwhelming majority of my life - I might date for a year or so here or there, but I’d be shocked if I got into anything that lasts. Statistically, that’s another ding to the ole life expectancy.
My wife and I are planning our retirement funds as if we will live to 100. We might not make it, but I would rather plan on that then run out of money! Anything left we would leave for our daughter and any grandkids we might have.
Her grandma lived to 94, both her parents are in their low 80’s. My dad is 82, his older brother is still alive at 90 and my dad (take with a grain of salt) tells me his dad lived to 105. No family history of heart disease or cancer on either side–so who knows.
We both turn 50 this year, both are height and weight proportional and are in very good shape, we take care of ourselves and work out 3-5 times a week. Eat very healthy–I would say the last 5 years I have eaten healthier then I ever did before. Neither of us has a super stressful job, both have optimistic outlooks on life (which I think is critical to a healthy life). So I will say 85-90 and be happy with that as long as I have a solid mind and am mobile.
Gosh, family history of heart disease, I’m taller than average, heavy (but not obese, 'cos tall guys get away with it for some reason), between quitting smoking… probably 50 or so, which is depressing. But I always have this idea that when some event happens, I’ll be finally convinced to turn things around, live straight, well, and into my 100’s, which will be long enough for those immortal drugs to be created, and then I won’t die unless I’m kidnapped and some asshole won’t pay the ransom.
Mid-sixties, if family history is a guide. Mum died at 68, Dad at 64. Only one of my four grandparents lived to a ripe old age (92) but she had dementia for the last ten years of her life so I’m kind of hoping not to follow in her footsteps.
I’m 55 now so I reckon I might have ten good years left.
Women on both sides of my family tend to live healthy, active lives well into their ninties, excelt my mom who has hardly stirred from the couch for most of her adult life. I’m trying to take after the grands and great aunts myself.
Met with a women who was 96 yesterday and it occured to me for the first time that I may not meet too many people twice my age anymore.
I’ve always wanted to live forever. So far, so good.
Actually, if my health doesnt start to deteriorate rapidly around 50 I dont see any reason to not live for a very long time. If it does I can expect an unhappy decade before dying around 60. I have a 50% chance of having a degenerative neurological disorder that afflicts my dad’s side of the family and begins to show symptoms around that time.
As God is my witness, when I was a teenager I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I had absolutely zero chance of living to 30. I figured nuclear war, conventional war (as in, Reagan would reinstate the draft and I’d be sent somewhere to die in the fight against the insidious spread of communism), a fatal accident, or my own devil-may-care views on mortality would catch up to me before my 30th birthday.
I’m 38.
Now that I’m past all the imaginary drama, I’m going to hazard that I live to right around 80. None of my grandparents made it past their middle 70’s.
Well, I’m obese but I don’t smoke or drink at all and I get fairly regular exercise. My family tends to live into their early 80’s (except for my grandmother who drank so much her liver gave out on her in her mid 60’s) and they all have at least one major vice so I feel like I am doing okay right now. I’ve been trying to eat better but I lose that battle more often than I win it right now.