# Retirement adjustments



## SFM in KY (May 11, 2002)

I only know three retired couples and two single women well enough to truly comment on how they have adjusted (or not) to full retirement but my conclusion ... from that limited exposure ... is retirees NEED to have outside interests of some kind.

One is myself and DH, of course. The other two couples were my parents and grandparents and the two single women (both widows) are good friends.

Both DH and I have things we like to do on the farm and don't want to travel as we've both done all of that we want. We're both in reasonably good health at 70 and 82, still raise horses, which we both enjoy and with a small tractor, the two of us can do 90% of what we need to do, a lot of it outside work. DH is an engineer and a lot of his winter inside projects get designed and built during the winter, I read or do artwork. 

My grandfather was in his mid-70s and my grandmother 15 years younger when they retired from the ranch to town. They continued to keep a big garden, produced enough for everything in the neighborbood in the small town where they retired plus canned enough for themselves and a lot of what my parents and I ate as well. My grandmother was more social than my grandfather and I think enjoyed town life more than he did. He read a lot but I have the feeling he was restless, he didn't really have any hobbies except reading, he'd started his working life when he was 11 years old and never had the luxury of developing a hobby. My grandmother quilted, which occupied a lot of her time.

My parents ranched as well, my mother taught for years at the local country school but when they retired, they did quite a lot of traveling in the winter, visiting places in the southwest, as my father had been a miner before he went back to ranching and he was a rockhound. They visited a lot of family that was scattered out over the country and I think my mother enjoyed that even more than my father did, she was (again, as with my grandparents) the more social of the two.

I have two single widowed friends that are retired, very different from each other. One I've known since we were both in our 30s. She's been an avid dog breeder/ dog show person ever since I've known her. As she's gotten older, she did switch from big dogs (St. Barnards) to Toy Manchesters but she has been extremely successful, breeding multiple champions from every litter she's produced, has qualified as an AKC judge and is still able to breed one or two litters a year. Though her traveling now is very limited, she has a number of dogs she's bred out on co-ownerships and follows the shows through them. She does watch TV and enjoys movies and is also a reader. She has lived in the same city many years so does have a lot of local dog show friends to socialize with and I've never heard her complain about being lonely or bored.

The other I've known for the last 12 years. She worked all her life in cities, does not have a good relationship with her children/grand children and has absolutely NO outside interests other than keeping house, watching TV and talking on the phone to friends. She is a very frustrated person. Her health is not good, she's no longer physically able to do many of the things she used to do to entertain herself, is never satisfied with the people she hires to do the heavy housework and the yard work and seems to be focused totally on what's "wrong" rather than what is right. 

At my age, having been retired for the last 20 years and living with a husband that is also retired for 12 years, my first recommendation to anyone planning for retirement would be to find something they were very interested in to occupy their time. For couples, it doesn't even need to be something they can do together, in fact I think sometimes having hobbies that take a couple in different directions can be a good thing ... but you need outside interests ... interests that involve your time and keep you active both physically and mentally.


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## Chief Cook (Apr 24, 2011)

SFM in KY, you are sooo right! Even though DH and I are far from retirement age, we have watched both sets of our parents. My Mom and Dad just kept at something, from gardening to the Grand Canyon. They had some good years until she developed End Stage Renial Disease. Mom fought the good fight for 5 years before we lost her. Dad is still going pretty good. He has a girlfriend and they do a little traveling and we get together and play cards and visit. Dad tells us all the time to get out and do things before we get too old or sick to enjoy it. On DH's side. His folks did things before they retired, but when he retired they just seemed to stop. They had nothing good to say about anything or anyone. They always were looking for the bad side of things. They ended up lonely and sad, even angry. Their health wasn't good to start with and when they stopped doing, they went down hill in a flaming basket. I hope that we have learned something from being around two different examples. We are getting debts paid off, planning some trips, we both love to hunt, and we are getting more active in our church. Thanks for the advice, I hope that others learn from you too.


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## tallpines (Apr 9, 2003)

Since we retired we are busier than ever!

Our top priority~~~~~~~~~~
15 grandchildren born in 14 years ------ 3 of them this year!

We garden, and can lots of food.

DH does some logging in our 40 acre woods, and cuts wood for all of our heating, plus for a handicapped neighbor.
He taps 150 maple trees each Feb-March.

I like to putter with fabric and sewing, knitting, crocheting.

We do some volunteer work.

We travel forest trails with the ATV ---- sometimes 90 miles a day.
We have a 2 seater snowmobile for winter, and a "good-enough" fishing boat for summer.

Never traveled much when we were milking cows but since retirement, we've gone on 3 travel tours, including Germany-Austria and Hawaii.
Next year -- Alaska.

Except for the aches, pains and sore joints, these are the best years of our lives!


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## HilltopDaisy (Feb 26, 2003)

Wow, really enjoying this thread!


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## Shrek (May 1, 2002)

My father raised me to keep in mind that he and my grandfather both retired from industry employment within a year of paying out their mortgages and planning and investing, frugal living and work related travel in their younger days cured their travel jones and after retirement life was just a different type of work but with better and more flexible hours.

They both got their travel jones quenched by serving in the military. I quenched mine by working for a company that supported military customers.


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## jwal10 (Jun 5, 2010)

I have just fully retired this week. Sweetie and I have the first year planned out, not completely but enough to make sure I have things to do. We won't travel a lot but will make short trips to places we want to spend some time. We have a home base so will work on a few things we want to improve. We want to get back to the off grid cabin but for right now it is all about getting everything ready for winter. We are at our cabin in Joseph Oregon for the next 2 weeks to a month, putting in a small lawn and general cleanup. My last job was high stress, 16 years, until it affected my health. When I went to management, I was laid off. I opted to take early retirement, I then worked a part time job for 5 months until I got my first retirement checks. Health is a big issue for us, maintaining it and hopefully improving it with less stress....James


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## yikes (Jan 23, 2011)

Great thread.
I retired in January. Decided not to make any drastic changes for one complete year. No debts, money is okay, health is good. Started writing my novel (isn't that what you are supposed to do?). Wife works 4 days/week; I think just to get away from me, but maybe that's just paranoia talking. The grandkids come for a weekend once a month or so. I have come to realize that I do not miss the work I did. I thought I would. Nor do I miss the people (except a couple) I worked with. I find that sad. Even more disturbing is that I find my driving slipping down to a normal persons level. I am confident that if I drove again everyday, I would improve again, but I have no desire to do that,,so watch out world. We have taken a couple of mini-vacations this year and as neither of us like to travel (rock band days worked that out of us) we will do that 5 or 6 times next year. Our stress level is at 0. I read a lot about health issues and warnings and chose not to join in. I guess my biggest complaint is with 26k dial up and seriously, if that is what I complain about, retirement can't be all that bad.


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