Telling women over 40 what they can wear

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puzzleannie said:
the whole point of being over 40 is you don’t have to listen to this c–p anymore and don’t have to obey the fashion police.
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Exactly. The powers that be (Madison Avenue and the principalities that run it) are just trying to control people. Here’s an interesting story,

A friend of a friend had worked in NY ad agencies for years, finally got fed up and left. He said that everyone in the advertising industry knows that when we go into a store to buy laundry soap (for example) we don’t remember ANYTHING about the ad on television or the jingle. What influences our purchase is packaging design, placement on the shelf, price, what our mother bought, etc. The ads are not in our minds at all.

Which begs the question – why do companies spend so much money on television advertising then?

This guy said (and this is also well known in the industry) that the actual purpose of advertising is to erode our self-esteem… and to raise our anxiety levels just enough that we’ll put down the remote, get out of the chair, and go to the store to buy something – anything – to relieve our anxiety.

Once in the store, we’ll buy whatever, and will be influenced by packaging design, placement on the shelf, etc. – because we don’t feel sexy enough, we’re worried that we smell bad, that we won’t be “cool”, or that we’ll miss out on fun, or love…

Eating disorders are continuing to rise at an alarming rate for young women, but are also now skyrocketing in young men, as they are bombarded by this onslaught. More and more young women are dreaming of plastic surgery, and a shocking number are actually getting it (like br*east jobs before age 20). And something like 37% of children are now on Prozac or some sort of antidepressant – is it any wonder?

Satan is an excellent fisherman. He drops delicious “hooks” in front of our faces to see if we’ll bite. Unfortunately, all too often we do.

Wear what you like! As long as you’re mindful of your environment (no flip flops and cutoffs to a wedding for example) and of your hygiene… the rest? It’s a manipulation game by the principalities – or cr*p as Annie says.
 
joamy said:
I’m not sure I would survive the 360 degree mirror (possibley it would be the mirror which would not survive?) I would, however, throw most of my clothes in the trash bin - just to save Stacy and Clinton the work. 🙂 🙂 🙂
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I dress pretty modestly, but even if I didn’t, I would not worry what others think of how you look. The important thing, to me, is comfort.

If others have a problem with how you look, they can always look away!
 
Zooey said:
👍

You know, that is true…But, my dear woman, a 12-14 is NOT “heavier”. A 12-14 is :gopray2: “Please God, just once before I die let me fit into one, even if it rips apart when I wear it!!!”
I wear 2X on the top & 3X on the bottom (and y’all have not lived until you’ve tried dressing that combination!)

I wear crocs (generic knockoffs, but the same shoes), & they are comfortable, & at 61, I am entitled to comfort!!!
I wear what is comfy, including jeans. I wear broomstick skirts…whatever!!
I think that the key is, to find your own style, & stick with it. Long skirts are comfy & very “me”. (So are the gold gypsy hoops in my ears, and http://bestsmileys.com/angry1/22.gif woe be unto anyone who tries to get me to give those up!!!)
No, you find your own style, & as long as you wear it, you will look–not frumpy–but like yourself!!

My hair is short. Very short; its easier to take care of…something I discovered when, some years back, I was washing my near-to-waist length hair in the kitchen sink (I am 😛 really old!! I have always washed my hair in the kitchen sink!!)
My hair managed to snake on down the drain, leaving me :bigyikes: permanently attached to said sink. (Did you know that human hair is the strongest fiber known to man??).
I scrabbled around blindly in the knife drawer (thankfully in arm’s reach!!)until I found the poultry shears, and just cut all that hair off…I felt lighter. I felt freer. I felt that I had let go of a terrible weight that I never knew I had…Of course,:hmmm: I had never been:blush: tethered to a sink before, either…

We will quietly pass over the incident when I caught an unexpected glimpse of my own backside in a ladies’ room full-length mirror, & turned around to see “who on earth that** fat** woman was, wearing a dress just like mine”…http://bestsmileys.com/blushing/2.gif
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Well, about 8 years ago I was a size 4X (actually, 3X on top and 4X on the bottom)…I think my dress size was 28, something like that (it feels like a lifetime ago now!)

I’m still heavy, or at least I look like it due to the gobs and gobs of loose skin around my midsection, due to all the weight loss (and no, before anyone asks, I did not have gastric bypass/other weight loss surgery…I lost it the old-fashioned way–a permanent change of lifestyle/eating habits.)

I’m a size 12 on the top and size 14 (sometimes 16, depending on the cut) on the bottom…I am restricted to buying only elastic waist skirts due to the quantity of loose skin from the weight loss (and my insurance won’t pay to have it removed, either…they say “its cosmetic surgery!”)

You know, life was easier before I lost the weight…it was simple to go into places like Kmart and Walmart to get a size 4X…they always had lots of them, esp. on the clearance racks. It is almost IMPOSSIBLE to find size 14 skirts, they stock few of them! And though I wear a size 14 in skirts/pants, the waist is often too small due to the skin folds…so I need elastic. If I buy a bigger size to accomodate the waist/skin folds, then the legs and butt are too big, or in the case of skirts, they are too long!

To top it off, I find myself with an identity crisis I never had before. When I was size 3x/4x. NOBODY disputed that I was fat. Now, as a size 12/14 who still looks fat (esp. around the middle), skinny people think I’m fat and fat people think I’m not!

(sorry for that vent…I need to let it out every now and then to keep from going crazy!)
 
Zooey said:
We will quietly pass over the incident when I caught an unexpected glimpse of my own backside in a ladies’ room full-length mirror, & turned around to see “who on earth that** fat** woman was, wearing a dress just like mine”…http://bestsmileys.com/blushing/2.gif
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That reminds me of my dad who walked kind of like Charlie Chaplin. He caught a glimpse of a guy walking really funny as he was walking down a store aisle. It was only when he turned the corner into the next aisle that he realized he’d been looking at his own feet in a mirrored border.
 
vinessa said:
Eating disorders are continuing to rise at an alarming rate for young women, but are also now skyrocketing in young men, as they are bombarded by this onslaught.
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The biggest eating disorder I see is not anorexia or bulemia but plain ol’ eating too much. I’ll get pasted on here for saying it but I have just come back from a group weekend where the biggest folk were eating the most food: all the wrong kind. (OK, OK, youl’ll say: why am I even NOTICING what somebody else eats; it’s none of my business.) I think the biggest problem these huge people have is that the body is naturally hungry to be fed AT ITS PRESENT SIZE, so people eat to satisfy the “beast” rather than calculating what the “inner man” of 175 pounds needs in order to be well nourished and feel good.

Back to the wardrobe and Sepharad’s comment about modest dressing – Yeah! Check out some of those “modest” clothing sites. It ain’t “modest,” it’s downright frumpy-dumpy. When was the last time a man went into spasms of lust at the sight of a female elbow? (Orthodox Jews are big on that one). What about the neckline rule that anything more than two finger-breadths below the collar bone is a ticket to Hell? Belted skirts & dresses are “vain”? Who thinks this stuff up? Colleen Hammond, anyone? Oi. Sorry. Not goin’ there!
 
mommyof4 said:
That’s all I need now- head scarfs!:rolleyes:

You know what? I’ll bet my cats would love playing with the tassles on them, though…😃
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Head scarves are because married religious Jewish women are required to keep their hair covered.

I’m sure you’re familiar with the statues of Mary, which show her with a veil covering her hair…that is why she is shown wearing it.
 
Guitar said:
(And some older women had these things drummed into them pretty hard when they were little. When I cut my waist-length hair for maintenance reasons approaching forty I was deluged with congratulatory comments from women of a certain age plus or minus about 2.5 years. I copped about 10 years worth of pent up tongue-biting because** I’d broken the rule that a woman over thirty shouldn’t have long hair because it ages her.** :rolleyes: )
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I never understood this “rule” either. I’ve always thought when a woman in her 30s or 40s cut her hair short, it made her look older. My mother always had long, gorgeous raven black, straight hair. She got it cut really short around 37 when my sister was born, then grew it back long again when my father didn’t like the way she looked in it. Now she’s 62 and has it in a bob and looks very nice and it doesn’t make her look old now. She still looks younger. Maybe it’s the age?

She naturally always looked about 10 years younger than her stated age, but when I look at the photos of her at 37, that short cut made her look “old”. The photos of her at 45 with the long hair actually made her look much younger.

I agree about the older women’s perceptions. My grandmother was always telling my mom to cut her hair for years after she grew her hair back. When she finally got it cut for maintenance since she was constantly just pulling it back in a ponytail (she didn’t start really graying until about 60), all the older women and women her age were congratulating her as well. 🤷
 
puzzleannie said:
the whole point of being over 40 is you don’t have to listen to this c–p anymore and don’t have to obey the fashion police.
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Hahaha! I’m not over 40 yet, but I totally agree. Heck, you don’t need to obey the fashion police if you’re under 40 either.

Common sense and being honest about one’s body type - that’s what I follow. I do like fashion, but I’ll only wear something if I think it looks nice on me.
 
Phemie said:
I HATE SHOPPING FOR CLOTHES! I’m 4"10 and NOTHING fits.
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You have my sympathies. It’s like the clothing companies believe all women are between 5’4" and 5’7". I’m 5’3" with long legs so I can get away with wearing misses sizes most of the time, but I always have to adjust straps and pin necklines for modesty because the top of my bust seems to be right below my shoulder: rolleyes: I can’t imagine what it must be like dealing with shopping being under 5’.
 
Just because something is comfortable does not mean you should wear it. (example, i may think boxers, and boxers alone are comfortable, doesn’t mean i should wear them alone).

Society has lost the concept of “looking good” while outdoors/not in private. One of the many tragedies the “Baby Boom” (aka, the ME ME ME ME ME generation) wrought upon American society.
 
Guess what I did??? I went out and bought a pair of fake crocs… but they weren’t the clog looking type… they actually looked cute with jeans or shorts…even wore them with a skirt on Sunday to mass…How’s that for rebellious? I’m 45 and I bought crocs… hahahaha!!! oh… and I actually bought a size 8 long pair of jeans… they fit but are just a wee bit snug… but it felt good to buy an 8 again.

Phemie… I hate clothes shopping because I have very long legs and most stores don’t sell talls… I used to work in a dept store and when the owner flew in to inspect I cornered him… we have petites… juniors, missus… and arghhh my bone of contention … Womens… someone please tell me why you aren’t a “woman” unless you wear size 18 or above??? But no tall section…I even tried the reasoning that we have a top 10 womens basketball team in town… and they need clothes… owner didn’t buy it!!! Every now and then I can find jeans but dress pants are a huge problem… Anyway, Phemie… I was gonna say at least you can have your hems done but what to do when there isn’t enough fabric to let them down???
 
BayernAnhaenger said:
Just because something is comfortable does not mean you should wear it. (example, i may think boxers, and boxers alone are comfortable, doesn’t mean i should wear them alone).

Society has lost the concept of “looking good” while outdoors/not in private. One of the many tragedies the “Baby Boom” (aka, the ME ME ME ME ME generation) wrought upon American society.
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Sort of true…however, I refuse to wear something uncomfortable just to “look good” in public, either.

I wear shorts, tank tops, and flip flops in the summer. Always. In the house, in the yard, and at the grocery store. I do not “dress up” like people did years ago (and I suppose some still do today) to go shopping.

I refuse to wear nylons. Ever. I refuse to wear high heels. They are both uncomfortable, hot, bind, pinch, and hurt my feet. Sure, I look good when wearing them, but I refuse to be in physical misery while looking good!

I am going to a wedding this weekend. I will wear a sleeveless collared top with a skirt or skort - whatever is less wrinkled 😉 - (highs are forecast in the 90s with humidity and the church in NOT air conditioned) and dressed up black flip flops. No nylons, no heels, and even no flats! (no flats, because I have learned the hard way with humidity, my heels get horrible heel blisters from the friction without nylons or stockings, and, like I said, I refuse to wear nylons, particularly when it will be in the 90s.

The bride is famous for always wearing flip flops to everything, so I will not be surprised if she even has flip flops on, at least at the reception!😃
 
Catholic90 said:
I wear shorts, tank tops, and flip flops in the summer. Always. In the house, in the yard, and at the grocery store. I do not “dress up” like people did years ago (and I suppose some still do today) to go shopping.

I refuse to wear nylons. Ever.
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Just curious, you teach in a Catholic school, what do you wear to teach? My son goes to a Catholic school and the teachers have a dress code. Is it the same where you are?

BTW, I may be the only person I know who finds flip-flops to be very uncomfortable.
 
ellammcg said:
Just curious, you teach in a Catholic school, what do you wear to teach? My son goes to a Catholic school and the teachers have a dress code. Is it the same where you are?
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Good question. As a parent, I chose a school for my kids where the teachers often wore academic gowns (honest: in the United States!) in class and always wore them in the daily chapel service.
BTW, I may be the only person I know who finds flip-flops to be very uncomfortable.
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No. There are two of us.
 
ellammcg said:
Just curious, you teach in a Catholic school, what do you wear to teach? My son goes to a Catholic school and the teachers have a dress code. Is it the same where you are?

BTW, I may be the only person I know who finds flip-flops to be very uncomfortable.
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Well, generally I and the other teachers wear skorts, longer shorts (think bermuda-type), capris, skirts, or pants with tshirts, tank tops in early fall and spring (no AC, so sometimes the inside temp is 90-95), etc.

The length guide for teachers as well as students is nothing shorter than your fingertips hanging at your sides.

The students have a strict dress code, but teachers is “nice”. “Nice” is pretty wide, based on personal preference, style, etc. Some wear heels and skirts every day; others, like me, prefer pants and tshirts that are clean.

Flip flops to me are like going barefoot. I love them! I hate wearing shoes.
 
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