Midlife: is it a crisis or just a mess?

Midlife doesn’t need to be a crisis. How coaching and mentoring can support flourishing in the second half of life.

I turned 50 a few weeks ago, and several people said to me, "Does it bother you?" "How do you feel?" "It's just a number", "It's all downhill from here." For me, reaching 50 was actually a relief. My mum died a month before her 50th birthday, so the last year has thrown up a lot of thoughts and emotions about turning 50. Getting there felt like a positive milestone, and I am grateful to have made it. I know it's just a date and a number, but it felt significant.

Midlife, for men and women, often comes with the cliché of a crisis. I'm more inclined to see it as a mess rather than a crisis. Life slowly creeps up on you; your body isn't capable of what it was in your 20s and 30s. Things start to ache and go wrong. It's usually around this time that chronic health conditions like type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, COPD and obesity start to appear, which can feel inevitable. You don’t recognise yourself in the mirror, lines and wrinkles seem to pop up overnight, and you can’t go anywhere without your reading glasses.

If you have them, kids are usually in their late teens and leaving home, often with university costs which you haven’t been able to save for. Parents' health starts to fail, sometimes bringing care costs or difficult conversations about finances you never expected to be having, and you become sandwiched between the responsibilities of parenting and caring, often whilst managing a career you probably never intended to last this long. You can’t ever see how you will retire, and juggling finances with busy lives feels like an impossible mountain to climb every day. All the while, you're exposed to an unrealistic view of what life should look like from advertisers and influencers, which only adds to a sense of inadequacy about your own life, financially and otherwise.

It is natural to start looking back on what has passed: the decisions and opportunities you did or didn't take, all whilst wondering what the future holds from here. For me, this reflection involved remembering the person I used to be in my 20s, before the kids, the husband, the losses, the career. I don't recognise that version of me any more, because she has changed and will never be the same again, shaped by everything I have lived through. I think this is what causes the "crisis." Life has been messy; we have survived with the tools we had and to the best of our ability, and then we stumble across the imaginary midlife line and wonder what it's all about.

This phase of life can bring a sense of personal crisis and overwhelm: a feeling that life is running out, that it's all downhill from here, that you're stuck or trapped, that your health is faltering, that money worries are mounting, and that decline is all you have to look forward to.

Mentoring and coaching can help you untangle the mess, recognise it for what it is, understand why it's happened, and support you in flourishing through this next phase of life, creating one that's healthier, happier and more balanced. When we understand ourselves, our bodies, our behaviours, we can move forward positively, rather than simply enduring what comes next.

This article is written for educational purposes and does not constitute individualised medical advice. If you have a specific health concern or are managing a chronic condition, please speak with your healthcare provider before making significant dietary changes or beginning a new exercise programme or before beginning any supplementation.