I used to be 'mommy.' Now I'm not. While my adult children love me dearly, I am clearly something other than the identity that defined me over much of the past six decades. But that's not all. I also used to be 'Carol Orsborn.' Now I'm not that either.

'Seriously, Mom? What is wrong with people over 50?' my son asked me the other day. 'Everyone over 50 feels the need to explain how to get somewhere. It's annoying.'

No one wants to grow old before their time. But you should ignore the number of candles on your cake. Your real age is revealed by how active and supp...

In my experience, every single person who has mastered the great art of successful aging has had an inner grit. Not necessarily with any bravado or flourish, but with a steely determination to look loss straight in the face without blinking.

Peter, my baby, my teenager, my tennis partner for 30 years, who now vigorously covers 90 percent of the court when we are doubles parfners. Peter -- old? I mean really old? Like me? Yes, as I see the child in the man, I can see the elderly in the man, now strong in his middle years.

I had wanted to take horseback riding lessons for a long while, however well meaning friends cautioned, 'You're in your 60s, for heaven sake. You could break your bones,' .......as if broken bones would be less convenient or less painful at a younger age.

At 20 I was like many kids at that age: A youthful mixture of bravado and immaturity. Every thing seemed SO important. EVERY decision was larger than life. Here are six things that I know now, but wish I would have known then.

If you're like me, you've already experienced some of the difficulties associated with aging: weird moles, sagging everything, the death of people you love. I've been comforted by the fact that, any day now, I will wake up bathed in the glow of wisdom that is supposed to be the payoff for all this crap. Instead, I seem to be getting dumber.

SPECIAL FROM BetterAfter50 By Anne Kreamer What words would you associate with being old? I asked a few people recently, and here are just some ...

Among the indignities of getting older, the minute I turned 50 I started getting insulted by my mail.

At other ages I was defined by what I did. Schoolboy, father, husband, stockbroker, writer. Now, if there was only one thing you could know about me -- just one -- I would choose that you know I'm 85.

Don't kid yourself: Aging is a bitch who, in the end, wins -- no matter how hard you fight back. Think about it: Have you ever seen a 75-year-old woman with a facelift who didn't look like a 75-year-old woman with a facelift?

Marie de Hennezel is best known as the therapist who guided the late French President Jacques Mitterand through the final stages of his cancer. She's been leading the crusade to help people grow old gracefully, with dignity, and with joy.

The latest dream I have undertaken is to create a "not for profit" senior living and memory care campus that promotes actively living and thriving beyond the walls, rather than existing within them.

A couple of years ago, feeling sentimental and having just finished the seventh decade of my life, I suddenly realized that, at age 70, days pass like minutes, the years go by like days.