When do you consider a person elderly?

Whatever age qualifies you for the Senior Discount at Old Country Buffet.

One day older than me!

this changes for me as I get older hahah. but for practical reasons such as medicine I would say maybe 70?

That old man done stoled my answer. Curse you, @Tropical_Willie!

Fifteen years older than me. My inner child is still stuck at 12. He refuses to get old and I don’t want him to.

Retirement age.

Somewhere in the 70’s I guess.

Some people seem elderly at 50; others still seem youthful at 70. It’s really hard to say. I know my concept has changed with time. I don’t mind terribly if I’m considered a senior, but I’m not yet ready to be elderly. However, I remember when I thought 26 was unspeakably old.

One thing I firmly believe is that we are a lot younger than our grandparents were when they were our age.

50

65…ish

If you are 70 or over you are old, and if you are 70 or over and are in real bad shape, with a bad back and need a lot of pills, then I would consider you to be elderly.

Elderly to me, is a word that is more related to your health than your age, even if it is a word that denotes at least some level of age.

When they start to complain about young people’s music.

Age has very little to do with becoming elderly.

I’ve seen a 40 year old using a walker and no teeth that I would call elderly.

There is one athlete who is 101 years old that I would not call elderly.

Fauja Singh completed a full marathon last year at age 100 a world record for his age. Fauja also set several world records in various distances while running the marathon. Fauja is now retired from the marathon but still walks 8 miles a day.

In my mind people become elderly when life finally takes its toll on them and they just give up and let themselves go.

@Imadethisupwithnoforethought Nailed it. New definition of elderly: When you complain about my AC/DC

Over 75, but really, for me it’s a matter of mobility. My ex mother in law started having problems walking at age 65. My mom was pretty mobile until her stroke at age 77. I had a friend who was riding his bike 250 miles a week until he was 85.

@zenvelo I want some of what your 85 year old friend had for breakfast.

@poisonedantidote I think I am elderly except I am only 45

@anniereborn Why do you think that? It isn’t how you come across.

plural noun
old people, pensioners, senior citizens, geriatrics (derogatory), OAPs, retired people, old age pensioners, wrinklies (informal, derogatory) The elderly are a formidable force in any election
as defined in the dictionary.
However todays seniors are much more fit than their parents, so this definition may change?

@adirondackwannabe oh just kinda jokingly going by what you said. I do take a lot of pills for conditions I have. And I am not in the best physical condition. But that CAN be worked on. I sure do feel elderly sometimes tho.

ug….I am messing up names. see, I AM elderly

he’s making it difficult on porpoise

@anniereborn I like to stay active. It keeps me feeling good. That’s mind and body. You are as old as you feel. JB is ok, but watch out for his other half if you flirt with him.:)

Retirement age is older. Elderly is 80s on up.

Elderly is a state of mind and of being, IMO.

My immediate thought when I read this question: Above 80.

However, I know people that could qualify for elderly status at a much younger age due to rigid attitudes and thoughts and/or aged health & well-being.

I also know/have known people that were in their 90s and were no where near elderly.

It’s partly in your head and partly in your body As long as your mind is active and you can move without much problem, you won’t be received as particularly old. You can’t do much about either situation. You have to work with the cards you are dealt.

When age causes incapacitation to a significant degree.

@Adirondackwannabe He was a vigorous bike rider from when he was a teenager in pre war Germany, escaped the Holocaust by getting to the US in 1936, his two passions were cycling and violin playing.

I agree with everyone who said it’s more about health/mobility than a specific age, but if I have to get specific, I’ll say 85.

When they start going down hill. There is a 90ish yr old who has that quote.

When things start getting easier you are going down hill. She is active in her church, keeps up on the news, teaches classes at the university, plays bridge, comes up with different crafts to do and sell keeps up with family and writes letters and much much more.

She still takes care of her appearance and walks at least a mile a day.

How ever I have seen 20 year olds who are too lazy and sick to do anything much but eat sleep drink and park in front of a tv all day. I once had a friend who had a roommate who told me he wore diapers to watch marathon tv shows and play video games. He would leave them for his roommate to clean up. He was in his early twenties when I met him and had no health problems.

When labels use the term elderly I don’t think they are thinking of an age or it would have said as much. The doctors and advisors are endeavoring to be as subjective as possible.

I have seen “elderly people” well over sixty looking so youthful and energetic, active and the picture of wholesome health. They seemed to me of a mature age but I could not bring myself to call them elderly. On the other side, myself included, 40 and 50 year olds I have met, were exactly what one would call “elderly”. Physically and mentally oldish, lacking energy, feeling down, giving up on it all etc. So nowadays, the “elderly” title is not what it once was and it is all up to how a person has lived his life. “Elderly” people could outrun me any day! I may not be or look elderly but I certainly feel as if I have one foot in the grave!

There seems to be some loose agreement here that “elderly” is associated with a degree of decrepitude or at any rate loss of faculties or functions. It’s not just a matter of age or appearance. I have to agree that there are subjective associations with the term, much more than the dictionary seems to express. In other words, the connotations of “elderly” entail visible decline and limited capacity, even if the denotation is more objective.

Among responding jellies here, it seems to be a pretty loaded word.

As I’ve probably mentioned before, I saw my mother go overnight from a robust, healthy 75-year-old who walked a mile a day to a hunched, feeble, elderly woman. The difference was a stroke. (And don’t forget that rule about getting to a hospital within 3 hours of a stroke! She didn’t. She sat around and waited for her husband to come home from work.)

I do believe that twenty years ago people would have answered this question differently. I think most would have picked 60 rather than 70 or 80 as a dividing line. I’m not sure what’s been the most significant change: our general state of health, the overall aging of our population so that more of us are past 60 now and still going strong, or the fact that those of us who are over 60 have brought different attitudes with us (from the time of our own youth) that make us feel, act, and look younger than our grandparents did.