The One Comment I Never Want to Hear Again

It seems like a compliment, but it's actually ageist.

By

Christine Schoenwald

 
Published October 23, 2025
illustration of flowers made out of speech bubbles
Kiersten Essenpreis

“You’re 65?” I was chatting with a younger man at a party. “You don’t look 65!” Not only was this guy committing a social faux pas by asking me my age, but when I gave it, he questioned me. Was he trying to be charming? Because he failed. I didn’t know how to respond. Did he want evidence that I wasn’t lying? Do I need to carry around my hanging-by-a-shred birth certificate with me? Or, did he want to count the gray hairs in my eyebrows to verify my age?

Instead, I said, “Do you think 65 looks old? Because I think it looks freaking fantastic!”

He didn’t have much of a comeback for that one.

Look, I like compliments as much as the next person, of any age. We all enjoy a bit of positive reinforcement. But what gets me are the comments that seem insincere and ageist, like “you don’t look your age”.

His seemingly innocuous comment reeked of this — when younger people think that all seniors are in decline, frail, and then they try to hide their opinion in kindness. They use “elderspeak” condescending language as if they’re talking to a child rather than a grown adult. In their mind, comments like “You’re still so sharp,” or “Look how active you are” are praise. Hardly, so.

If you’re constantly being told, either subtly or not, that you have less worth than you did when you were younger, you’ll absorb those comments, and that’s when internalized ageism sets in. You could start to believe that you’re too old to try something new, to be active, to act in a way that is viewed as “youthful."

Fighting Back

When someone says they can’t believe she’s that old, my friend, Violet, 70, says, “I tell them I can’t believe you think 70 is old.” Take that, closet ageist!

Ashton Applewhite best explains this in her book This Chair Rocks: A Manifesto Against Ageism. She points out that saying someone looks good for her age only works as a compliment if you believe most people our age don’t look so good.

I used to dread saying my age out loud, as though the number immediately made me seem uncool. But the more I say it, the more I own it. Age doesn’t erase my personality; it intensifies it, and it makes me bolder.

We all have our moments when we pass by a mirror and don’t recognize the face staring back at us. It can be an unpleasant surprise that chips away at our self-image. However, our looks shouldn’t have the power to make us feel old — we are so much more than that. If you are curious to learn new things and have new adventures, you’ll feel excited about getting up in the morning — and those are the key motives that can lead to a fulfilling and longer life.

My mother was beautiful in her youth, but as she grew older, her looks became less important to her. Her focus was on her animals, gardening and exercising. She accepted her age and lived a rich, healthy and full life up until she was 95.

Accentuate the Positive

Let my mom and your loved ones aging with hope and finesse inspire you to embrace your age and maintain a healthy self-image along the way. Do things you love with people you love, celebrating each day rather than obsessing about the inevitable changes in your body. When someone says, “You don’t look your age,” prod them to reveal their closet ageism by responding, “How am I supposed to look?”

I’m proud to be 65. I’ve earned my laugh lines, my aches and pains. One of my best friends died last year, and she’d have been thrilled to have another year to spend with her kids. For her and those others I’ve lost, I’m proud of how much healthier and happier I am now than I was in my 20s.

As Dr. Becca Levy, a top researcher in the psychology of aging and a professor in the Yale School of Public Health, writes in her landmark book Breaking The Age Code: How Your Beliefs About Aging Determine How Long And Well You Live “Thinking of everyone over the age of 60 as the same makes as much sense as lumping everyone between the ages of 20 and 50 in the same category.”

Her message that ageist beliefs and comments are destroying our overall health is amplified in this passage:

“I have found that above and beyond general emotions, such as happiness or gloominess, age beliefs are what drive outcomes, including how well we recall information, or how quickly we walk around the block. That is, it’s age beliefs, above and beyond the emotional outlooks of whether, say, you are a glass half-full or half-empty kind of person, that harm or improve our health.”

As someone who wants to live as long and well as possible, I say it loudly and proudly — I’m 65, and I’ll say it with the same force and enthusiasm with each passing year.

 

Do people often tell you that you don't look your age? What do you think of the statement? Let us know in the comments below.

Christine Schoenwald is a writer, performer, and humor essayist. Christine has written for The Los Angeles Times, Business Insider, Salon, and AARP’s The Girlfriend, and The Ethel. She’s currently working on a humor essay collection “Living Hollywood Adjacent,” and a memoir, “Everything Must Go Including Me,” about growing up with a mother who threw away everything, including occasionally, Christine. When not writing, Christine enjoys performing in storytelling shows, spending time with her cats, going to concerts, and having afternoon tea and other food adventures with her friends. For more information, please visit her website, Christineschoenwaldwriter.com or her Substack, Everything’s Slightly Off-Kilter.