- My family was kind of different, from everybody else in town.

- The dress, you see it, like that?

- Well, here we have it.

So you and your husband were married for about 30 years, - Almost 30 years.

- I bought a house that looks like a mansion to me but it cost about half what my house in Marblehead cost.

- Some scientific evidence to support that they are, they help with brain aging.

(chime music) - Welcome to getting dot OLDER, the new TV series where Americans over 50 share intimate personal revelations about aging.

I'm your host, Roberto Mighty.

This series interviews people live and online and asks everyone the same questions, like #4 The thing I hate most about my age now is?

#8 I felt old for the first time when... You can answer these questions on our online survey.

So join us, stay tuned on TV, and I'm looking forward to hearing your story online.

(jazz music transition) In this episode, we're going to meet Catherine, the corporate executive, and revisit Danny the clothing designer.

We're gonna ask Rochelle about widowhood and we're going to meet Catherine the expat writer We'll have our healthy Breakfast SmackDown.

This episode's guest expert is Dr. Halima Amjad on risk factors for dementia and what we can do to help prevent it.

We're gonna test your boomer IQ.

Stay tuned!

(chime music) I first interviewed Catherine at her home in 2014.

At that time, she was an executive with a lifelong wish to become a writer.

- Hi, my name is Catherine Marenghi, I'm 60, later this year, and I currently work in public relations for a software company.

I'm also a writer.

- Hold up now, did you notice how she said that?

She stated her job with authority and then, [Roberto] You mentioned, oh, and by the way, I'm an author, I love how you appended that to, - Oh, by the way, yes, - [Roberto] Not yet accustomed to saying that, - Yes.

- [Roberto] Tell me why you decided to become an author?

- I've always been a writer, I always wanted to be a writer, every job I've ever done has required writing.

Maybe writing a press release might not strike somebody as great writing, but it requires skill.

And I've done a lot of ghost writing for other people, I've written business stuff, websites and brochures and case studies and white papers.

And so every job I've ever done has required a lot of writing.

- Lots of people say they want to write, Catherine chose the key time in her life to actually get started.

- When my son graduated from college last spring, I thought, well, now I can do some writing.

I can do some serious writing, and I went to a writing retreat with the thought I'm gonna hole myself up for a few days and write poetry.

And just in the process of telling stories around the dinner table, one of the men who ran this writer's retreat said you really need to write a memoir.

Never would've occurred to me to do that, didn't think my story was something that was important enough to tell in a memoir.

- In fact, Catherine does have an interesting backstory.

- Well, I grew up in a town in central Massachusetts, a blue collar town, but my family was kind of different from everybody else in town.

We were sort of on the rural fringe of the town.

My family had a one room farmhouse without indoor plumbing, without central heat, without a telephone, really dirt poor, very, very, very poor family, and I never really understood all the reasons for that.

I just knew that my family, I was one of seven.

I was the fourth of five kids, and I never understood why we were so poor, but it was something that I didn't really want to share with anybody.

I didn't invite kids to my house.

I didn't want them to see how I lived, because it was different from anybody else.

Everybody else had indoor plumbing in town, we were just in a category of our own.

So I did well in school, and that was my, my escape plan, I was gonna do well in school, I was gonna get to college, I was going to get away and have a very different life.

- Now, eight years later, Catherine is a retired executive, an expat who lives in Mexico, and a published author.

- So, hi!

- Hi, Roberto!

- Hi, Catherine, so tell me a little bit about yourself.

- Well, my name is Catherine, I have two homes, I divide my time between San Miguel de Allende in central Mexico, and Wareham, Massachusetts.

I am a writer, and a poet, a memoirist, and soon to be, a novelist.

- How did this happen?

(laughs) I'm sure that people want to know, I want to know.

- I think that it takes a certain point in your life where you decide I'm tired of working for other people, jobs I don't like, at what point do you say, I want to do the thing that I want to do?

At what point do you stop deferring and putting off all the things that you'd like to do, because you have a job, because you have a house, because you have a mortgage.

And I really just happened upon this place in Mexico, because I went to a writer's conference here.

I couldn't believe how beautiful it was.

I had never known a thing about Mexico.

Never imagined moving here, I didn't speak Spanish when I moved here, never even thought about the country.

We are taught very little about Mexico in US schools and how vibrant and how rich the culture is, how rich the art is, how rich the history is, and how wonderful the people are.

I've got a retirement fund that I've diligently saved for.

I was 62 when I decided I'm going to sell my house, quit my very good job at a very well paying job, I'm going to leave everything behind and move to Mexico.

- [Roberto] Wow.

- And of course, it's extremely inexpensive here.

I bought a house that looks like a mansion to me but it cost about half what my house in Marblehead cost.

The taxes, if it isn't too crass to mention, I pay $100 a year in property taxes.

- Oh, come on.

Wow.

- I don't want to focus on the cost of living, but the cost of living is low, and the quality of life is extremely high, especially because of the rich creative community here.

- A lot of people dream about moving to a place where the cost of living is lower.

But I think a lot of those people also have concerns about the quality of life.

This is something that you are addressing right now, you're saying that the quality of life is in fact wonderful, is that right?

- Extremely high quality of life, not just the low cost but there are flowers blooming the whole year.

- We're going to hear more from Catherine in a later episode, about her personal transformation and her new life as an expat writer.

But, what about you?

Have you always wanted to just chuck it all, leave everyone you know, and start a new life somewhere else.

If so, what's stopping you?

If you have, please write and tell me about it, and send some photos of yourself, in your old life and in your new life.

(chime music) We met Danny in Episode One of getting dot OLDER, he's a clothing designer, a caterer, and a man who came out to his family, when he was quite young.

I asked him to show me how he makes his signature dresses from a single simple garment.

- Now, what I'm doing here, is I'm making a prom dress, two piece, I make two piece, out of a regular men's Hanes Fruit of the Loom T-shirt, see?

100% cotton, but it's best to use a, 50/50, 50 polyester, 50 cotton.

Because they don't shrink, but cotton will shrink.

I just use scissors, I don't use thread, needles, anything sewing, anything.

So this is the, this is the skirt of the dress, See, like that?

So I cut, strategically cut them, and then after I cut them, I stretch them like this, they're like that before you pull them.

- That's amazing.

- You got a blouse, or for a smaller person, a dress.

And no stitch at all.

You have another one that could be longer, but right here, it's like that.

Okay?

- [Roberto] Amazing.

Thank you very much.

We'll hear more from Danny in another episode, about how young he was when he realized he was different and how he dealt with that at a pivotal moment in his life.

(big band music starts) ♪ Ooh, can't you see that look in my eyes, ♪ ♪ we're running out of time, ♪ ♪ running out of time, ♪ ♪ can you hear it when I talk to you, ♪ ♪ there's something going on.

♪ (chime music) - Thanks to all the viewers who are filling out our getting dot OLDER online survey.

Here's a viewer survey response from Erica in Cape Cod, Massachusetts.

Here's her answer to question #11.

I am like my parents in that... Erica says my relationship with my parents was unresolved because they died relatively young.

Well, that's rough, but thank you for sharing, Erica.

We're sorry to hear that, and hope you can make peace with this issue.

(chime music) - Ah!

Do you ever walk into a room and forget why you went in there?

Do you find yourself misplacing common items like your keys or your wallet or your phone?

How do we know if it's just forgetfulness or something worse?

A lot of people worry about this.

So I decided to ask an expert.

For those of us who are concerned about this, which is probably everybody, what are some things we can do to lower our risk for developing dementia, from any of these causes that you mentioned?

- Yeah, so we do know that there are a number of different or modifiable or changeable risk factors.

Actually recent studies estimate that up to 40% of dementias actually could be preventable meaning there's things that we can do to, decrease the risk or delay the onset of dementia.

And they differ by, - Yeah, please just go ahead and tell us, (laughs) We want to know.

- So they differ by stage of life, in later life, the things I think that people can actively take up or do are really what we think about as sort of healthy lifestyle factors.

So the thing your doctor might lecture you about, related to protecting your heart, are also protective for the brain.

So we think about physical exercise, we also think about cognitive and mental exercise.

So keeping your brain stimulated and engaged, even in retirement.

We know that social engagement and social connectivity also help, both in certainly improving your mood and your quality of life, but also in again, keeping brain kind of active and engaged.

And then, if you do have what we consider to be vascular risk factors, keeping those under controls whether it's diabetes, high blood pressure taking the medications or again, doing those lifestyle factors to try and maintain and control those conditions, and certainly a heart healthy diet as well.

There's a lot of diets that are being studied, but again big picture it's Heart-Healthy Diet, you may have heard about the DASH diet or the Mediterranean diet, and those are diets where there is some scientific evidence to support that they help with brain aging.

So those are the things in later life that are helpful, we're also learning more about things that you can do in middle life or earlier life, Education, it's protective.

- Is That right?

Now wait, do you mean, pardon me, Doctor, you just said education is protective.

Do you mean like going to continuing education classes or what do you mean?

- So one is education in earlier life, So the education that someone got as a child, or young adult, but then I think when it gets to that cognitive stimulation, I think that's where the idea that continuing education and that mental stimulation may be helpful as well.

Then in midlife, I think it's a lot of those same kind of risk factors of having, physical activity, controlling blood pressure, avoiding excessive alcohol intake and a more recent risk factor that people are looking at too, one is sleep deprivation and sleep quality, and then also hearing loss, and I know that's something where a lot of people as they get older, feel stigma or don't want to wear a hearing aid, but there's increasing evidence that hearing loss and potentially treating that hearing loss could be protective for brain and brain aging.

- Doctor, that stuff is gold, for us because those of us who are in sort of, in the time of our life, when we are beginning to become quite concerned about cognitive function decline, we really want to know just the kinds of things you just told us.

So that, that was enormous.

Thank you so much.

We'll hear more from Dr. Amjad throughout the getting dot OLDER series.

If you or someone you know, has a mental illness, is struggling emotionally, or has concerns about their mental health, there are ways to get help.

Use these resources to find help for you, a friend or a family member.

(big band music starts) - We met Rochelle in another episode.

She is the retired social investigator and former pregnant librarian.

To refresh your memory, here's what Rochelle had to say about getting married.

- The most profound transition was falling in love with my husband.

- Sadly, Rochelle's husband died some time ago.

- How long ago did your husband, did your husband pass away or did he, - Oh, he's been dead for a long time.

- About how long?

- 31 years.

- 31 Years.

Wow, and how old are you, how old were you when you got married and how old are you now?

- I was, it was one month before my 23rd birthday, so I guess I was 22, and I was 81 on my birthday in January.

- Wow.

- So I'm 81.

- So you and your husband were married for about 30 years, - Almost 30 years, and we were together for 30 years.

- Really together, for 30 years, wow!

30 years is a long time.

And you were young, you were at like, 50?

- I was 50.

I was just 50, I had just had my 50th birthday actually.

- Oh gosh.

- He was 52.

So we were both young and he just, he was just a, he was a drug, you know, smokers sometimes, are drug addicts, He was a drug addict.

I call it, you know, it just, he wouldn't, I, I stopped, I used to smoke.

I stopped smoking.

I thought maybe he would come along for the ride.

- Yeah.

No.

And did you date after your husband?

- Well, I knew that question was gonna come up.

(shared laughter) - We have to get there.

- I know we have to get there, I have not really dated a lot.

I did have a couple, a couple of people I dated and I, I discarded them rapidly.

- Discarded.

That's a great word.

- That's a good word.

And I have, I have had a friend, a close friend who does not live here.

It's out of state and a long distance relationship.

- Yeah.

For a very long time, and it's, it's never gonna be more than that, but it's a very, it's a very intense close relationship.

- Now, what do you think, did you want to get involved with another, another person?

- Another person?

Well, I'll tell you how I I've thought about it a lot.

- Yeah.

How'd you feel about that?

- I've had time.

When my husband died, I was just being promoted to a new job in my job.

Very, very stressful.

So he died in December, and in January I was in this new job.

- Wow.

It was, it was really hard.

It was really hard.

I mean I was, I was managing myself, my kids were gone.

- According to the American Psychological Association, The first year of widowhood is the most harmful to mental health.

- I couldn't even think about another person in my life.

I couldn't think of getting, I could barely get up in the morning.

I was in, I went right into therapy because I knew I needed help really desperately.

And that was helpful, I mean, as well as can be expected.

- So at that point, - What did you need help for?

Was it that you needed help because you were a widow or you needed help for some other deeper or some other previous behavior?

- Well, I think just being alone and not knowing what to do with my, I just, I couldn't come to terms with everything.

It was just too much.

- Yeah.

- It was hard to, it was hard to bear.

I mean, I went to my, and then I did I had a very responsible job, I was managing a lot of people.

I couldn't go there when I was in shreds.

- Yeah.

- So when I went to see my therapist I just did nothing but cry and talk, talk of course, I always talk a lot and cry, and at least it relieves some of that.

So when I went to work, I was quite, put together, you wouldn't have known that I was, well if you knew me very well, you probably would've.

But you know, I did my job.

- So Rochelle got through it but then what?

Did people try to fix you up?

Did friends say hey, Rochelle, - No, I didn't, no.

- Oh, I got a guy for you.

- No I didn't have that.

And I'd find people who were just really not very smart.

They were fine.

You have to have a sexual thing, attractive too, it has to be an attraction, and I just never, except this one person, and that's never gonna be more than what it is and that was too bad but you can't get everything in this life, and I've had a good life.

- Well, Rochelle's life isn't over, and she is not alone.

According to the US Administration of Community Living, widows accounted for 30% of all older women in 2020.

There were more than three times as many widows 8.8 million, as widowers, 2.6 million.

If this is the case, why does being a widow seem to be such an outlier?

What about you?

Have you lost a spouse or long time partner?

If so, did it happen way in the past or recently?

How did you feel after that loss?

How do you feel now?

Did friends and family pressure you or are they pressuring you now, to just get back out there and find someone new?

Well, how did that make you feel?

Have you found fulfillment without a romantic partner?

Please write and let me know and send a photo if you can.

You know, when we were kids, meal times were different than they are now.

My Mom used to say that breakfast is the most important meal of the day.

(film projector clicking) - In the 1950s, I'm fairly certain my Mom was following the United States Department of Agriculture guidelines.

They recommended the basic four food groups, milk, meat, fruits and vegetables, and bread and cereals.

(flamenco music) Nowadays, there are countless organizations and commercial interests that issue diet advice ranging from Mediterranean diets to vegan diets, to seafood diets, et cetera.

As of 2020, the official US government dietary guidelines placed more emphasis on vegetables of all kinds whole fruits, plant sources of protein and whole grains.

But even these updated guidelines are being criticized by nutritionists and public health experts for not going far enough to address chronic disease states, environmental impacts, and income disparities.

So, let's have a getting dot OLDER (ring bell chimes) healthy Breakfast Smackdown!

In this corner, 1959, in this corner, 2022. Who will be the winner?

You decide!

(fast paced music) (cooking sounds) (crowd sounds as music ends) - Well, here we have it.

1959 and 2022.

Number one, which would you rather eat?

(laughs) Hey, I'm not a cook, okay?

I'm just a regular guy, but it's just fascinating.

So here we have the bacon, eggs, hash browns, grits with butter, lots of it, and biscuit.

I cheated on the biscuit, I made it from a mix, but Mom made 'em from scratch, cornflakes and raisins, and I can't really drink milk, so I'm using coconut milk, and of course, orange juice.

Here in 2022, we have eggs, sunny side up, avocado, blueberries, arugula salad, some leftover veggies from last night, which in this case is string beans, and a tall glass of water.

Yeah.

That's kind of what it's come to.

(laughs) (ring bell chimes) So what do you think, which era is the winner of the getting dot OLDER healthy Breakfast SmackDown?

In this corner, 1959, full of grains, white flour, white potato cured meat and loads of butter, or 2022, weighing in with greens, salad, no bread, no added sugar, no table salt and no processed fruit juice concentrate.

You know, Mom was following the nutrition guidelines of her day, and I'm following the nutrition guidelines of my day.

Now, what about you?

Have your meals changed from the time you were a kid to now?

Most importantly, would your grandparents recognize the stuff on your plate today as food, or even appropriate for breakfast, please write and let me know.

Oh, and if you have photographs of what you had for breakfast today, let's share that too.

This season on getting dot OLDER, - So the most profound life transition I ever had was when I switched gender two and a half years ago.

- A lot of times when I go and I play with my group of ladies, everybody's pulling out their Advil or their Aleve.

- And when I call back, they said that Ms. Taylor would like to have an appointment.

- Many people feel that the ages between age 50 and 70 that you identify are the best years of their lives.

- Thanks so much.

Please go to our website and take our survey, and let us know if you're interested in doing a video call interview with me.

I'm really looking forward to hearing your story online.

(chime music) (xylophone music) (violin music) (outro music)