[Rive1976]

I like her. I really do. Shes down to earth. The thing is she is old. Do I really want to invest all this time with her and then have her retire or croak on me. Then I will have to start all over again or should I find someone a little younger. Its hard to find Ts you click with. To much shopping has to be done. She also takes lots of vacations in the summer. I like old therapists because they have so much life experience. I dont think I will be done with therapy ever though. I am 42 and shes in her early 70s. I dont know what to do.

[coolibrarian]

Young Ts die, too.

[Salmon77]

I don't think there's any therapist you can count on being there for you until you die. You'll have to find a new one some time. That said, if your current T is healthy and not planning to retire soon, you probably have a couple of years before you need to worry about this.

[piggy momma]

Early 70s isn’t that old.

If she’s working for you, I’d hang on to her. Good Ts are hard to find.

[Skeezyks]

Hey... what's wrong with old? I'm old! Better an old T you "click" with than a younger one you don't. Besides... as others have pointed out... younger therapists die too, or move away, or change jobs, etc. I guess my thinking in this regard would be that this might be an excellent topic for discussion with your T. I think it could potentially lead down all sorts of interesting pathways. After all, at 42, you're at least approaching, if not already within, middle age yourself with all of the uncertainty & discomfit that age range can foment. My suggestion would be to look at this as a welcome opportunity to perhaps explore some new & interesting territory. Plus... a part of the discussion could include some give-&-take regarding how long your T plans to continue practicing & how to ensure as smooth a transition as possible as the end approaches.

[Ididitmyway]

First off, there is nothing wrong with the old age, if the person is fully capable of performing their professional duties and has been helpful to you so far.

Secondly, even if your fears of her retiring or dying happen to materialize, it doesn't make sense to end the good experience before it ends naturally. It's like being afraid to invest emotionally or in any other way in any good life experience because it might and, most likely, will end. Everything ends in this life, every single life experience. If we can't enjoy it fully or make the full use of it in the present just because it's going to end some day, then we are not living.

Yes, there is a chance that she may retire, but, ethically, she is supposed to give you a very advanced notice about it and to prepare you for this event gradually over a long enough period of time for you to get used to the idea and to be able to transition to a new therapist. So, it's not going to happen out of the blue, again, assuming that she fulfills her ethical responsibility.

As far as her "croaking" on you, I think, early 70s is too early for that to happen if the person is relatively healthy with no life threatening illnesses and if they take a good care of themselves. Hopefully, this is the case and her health is as good as it can be at her age. But, if it does happen, I believe, it's better to deal with that at some point than to interrupt the generally good therapy process that has been helping you so far and to embark onto a long and exhausting therapist hunt, which would take God knows how long until you find someone that would work for you, which may not happen. Just think about all that time you'd waste on looking for a new therapist when you could continue to use it for your benefit if you stay with the therapist you have now.

What you can do though and what I'd highly recommend that you do is to talk to your therapist about your fears and ask her how she plans to take care of her clients in the event of her retirement or sudden death. She should be willing to explain to you how she is prepared to deal with this. Therapists who are close to the retirement age are ethically obligated to have plans and make arrangements in case of such events. Of course, oftentimes, the death cannot be foreseen or anticipated, and, if that happens, it is what it is. But there are cases of long time chronic or terminal illnesses that, in combination with the old age, can be anticipated in advance. In those cases, the therapist should make their best effort to make arrangements that takes care of the clients.

[ArtleyWilkins]

Age is a number. Is you therapist in good health, still doing her job well, not planning to retire right away? Then I wouldn't worry about it yet. You might want to have a conversation about what her retirement plans are, but I wouldn't make the assumption that she's on death's door just because she's in her 70's. The retirement concern is realistic and worthy on conversation.

[LabRat27]

My therapist is "older" but not "old old," like maybe mid 60s.
The thought has occurred to me. More about retirement than dying. But he also just moved from a group to private practice, and I doubt it would have been worth the hassle if he was planning to retire anyway.
I remind myself that it's very likely that I'll have to move elsewhere once I finish my PhD (3-4 years from now if we're being pretty optimistic). So even if I found the perfect therapist I would only have a few years with them max.

Finding a therapist I can work with and trust is rare for me. So I can't really be "picky" about other things like age (though I rule out younger therapists because of the experience factor).

I'm going to disagree with what seems to be the general consensus here, but...
If you can work equally well with many therapists and being able to see the same person for a long time is important to you (like that it would be really hard to work with anyone else once you got attached), I think it's okay to consider age as a factor.
It might help to consider your absolute requirements and then preferences. So for me, my absolute requirements are restrictive enough that a preference like age falls much lower on the list. If you don't have particularly restrictive absolute requirements and long term work is high on your list, why not factor it in?
Yes, young therapists can die. But it's a lot less likely, and it's a lot less likely that they'll retire soon.

[stopdog]

I have known a lot of people younger than 70 who just died no matter how healthy they seemed. My own family tends to die youngish from sudden events rather than lingering illness. I also had the experience of the second therapist I was seeing, the one who although in her late 70s kept insisting she had no plans to retire, retire suddenly because her 90+ yr old husband had a major health crisis. It happens. I don't think fear of it should necessarily keep you from a therapist that is otherwise not completely unsatisfactory, but I would like to acknowledge that things happen to people, even therapists, all the time.

[nottrustin]

Unfortunately, this was very real to me it did happen with T. However, I would not change our relationship. We accomplished a lot over the years. Her passing was/is really painful but had I stopped working with T when I started worrying about her retiring I would have missed 3 productive years.

Now I see a much younger T. I worry she might get in an accident and die...I worry that she will have another child and decide to be a stay at home mom.

[mcl6136]

Well, the age thing cannot be ignored.
Are you able to surface it with your therapist? It could result in a very healthy discussion and if not, that is key information in and of itself.
I think it's easy to assume that only older therapist are going to abandon their clients through death or retirement but my T, who is probably about 45 or so, did the same skedaddle routine by leaving my city with no plan on when she would return, and no clear communication about her absence.
Having a T vanish can happen for a lot of different reasons and I think it's worth dealing with the anxiety and its roots and reasons can be a really positive thing that we can do as clients.

[SlumberKitty]

T's of all ages have things come up in their lives that prevent them from carrying on in their current capacity. That said, as others have said, it's worthy of a conversation to see what T's plans are and how T is preparing for unforeseen events. I wish I would have had that conversation with my former T. She was in her 70's ended up getting sick with MS (which usually strikes you when you're younger) and had to stop practicing. She had no plans on retiring when that happened and I don't think she really had a plan on what would happen if something happened to her and she was unable to continue. We sort of went along for six, seven months, doing the best we could and then it became obvious I needed to find a T that could actually come into the office and see clients. It was a terribly difficult decision and one that has been incredibly painful for me even today. Not to scare you, just life happens. It happens to young people, old people, middle aged people. Doesn't mean you give up on the relationship, just means there is more to talk about. Kit.

[peacelizard]

Is this actually serious?

[Rive1976]

Originally Posted by peacelizard

Is this actually serious?

Yes it is. I have abandonment issues and I dont want to be suddenly left.

[Lrad123]

My therapist is in his early to mid 60’s and I actually asked him when he’s planning to retire because I couldn’t shake some of the worries that I had about that. It felt better to bring it up.

[LonesomeTonight]

My T isn't particularly old (close to 50), but I did ask him a while ago if he had a plan in place if he were to die. Like, would I find out somehow? He clarified that he did, which made me feel a bit better. So I'd suggest talking about these fears with your T.

[susannahsays]

Ask her if she gets a pneumonia vaccine. That's what almost did for the last therapist.

[Anne2.0]

Originally Posted by nottrustin

had I stopped working with T when I started worrying about her retiring I would have missed 3 productive years.

My T is 64 and he currently has no plans to retire, but I think he is considering doing so at 67, when his social security would kick in at "full" payment or whatever they call it. He currently works only 3 days per week so it might also be that he "retires" at 67 but continues to work one day per week or whatever the rules about receiving SS allow.

I don't think I'm going to be done in 3 years, unless I move away from this community which is quite possible. I anticipate at least monthly therapy until I retire, which is at least a decade off. Maybe never. But I very much agree with nottrustin that having whatever productive years might be left is worth it. I think I could do fine with another T, but I'd prefer to stay with this one.

And as you probably know, the average lifespan for a woman is 85 years, with many more professionals in head-based occupations working well into their later years. RBG, for example, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Supreme Court justice.

[WishfulThinker66]

Agree - 70 isn't old, young T's have their own issues too.

Enjoy what you can take away from this experience and relationship you can. Hope instead for enough of a recovery to become less dependent on therapy (Instead of planning for a lifetime of therapy, have some hope this won't always be the case). When the time does come that her practise comes to an end I am quite sure she will do everything she can to find appropriate placement for her patients.

[Ididitmyway]

Another thought on this.

I think, in this day and age, age is largely a meaningless concept, because, as others mentioned, there are so many instances when young people get sick and die or become disabled.

I am not saying it's totally irrelevant. Generally speaking, of course, a person in their older age feels different from how they felt 20-30 years ago and a general loss of vitality that comes along with various health problems is a real thing that is age related.

But, people are so diverse and there are so many factors that play role in how healthy and functional a person can be. My husband and I had a mutual friend who died of leukemia when he was 32. We knew some people of our age, who died of various diseases. At the same time, I see people in their 70-s in my neighborhood who jog every morning, some of them even run, which is something I cannot do, even though I am about 20 years younger. I barely force myself to take a walk every day. I've seen many people who can be officially called "old", not just "older" and who had so much vitality that I've never had in my life, not even in my young years. The amount of work they could do in an hour would be something I'd do in a week or in a day, on a very good day.

Age, in and of itself, doesn't determine how healthy, functional, energetic and mentally alert a person will be. It's a combination of so many factors and variables which determines that, which, as I said, make the concept of age largely meaningless.

[nottrustin]

I am in a little better place today
As somebody who has experienced the fears or retirement or death of my T, extreme abandonment and then having T die in an accident here is my advice for what it is worth.

T knew my abandonment fears and we discussed this early on. She told me she had no intention of retiring or stopping our work. If she were to retire she would give me a long notice. She also told me anytime my fears it was okay to check in. She would always be honest with me. As she got older and moved away it became even more real in my mind. She was great at reassuring me. Part of the reason I started seeing Emdr T was I felt stuck in regards to my trauma and feared her retirement. I figured a few visits with Emdr T woukd mean I would be all set and never need therapy after. Her sudden passing did cause those abandonment issues to resurface like more than ever before.

Fortunately Emdr T expected this and has been wonderful. I explained how I use to check in with T. I told her not only did I fear something would happen to her but also that our work was more complicated and not what she signed up for. I feared I would be to much and she would want to call it quits. She assured me was enjoyed working with me and had no intentions if stop working. She said life may happen and that she couldnt predict but if it were to happen she would give me as much notice as possible. She also encouraged me to check in any time I need to.

As I said in my last post had I stopped working with T when she became if retirement age and started to have minor medical issues, I would have missed out on the great years