This will be another "sub-log" which I'll add entries to from time to time, many of which may be "mined" from other posts, from this or other forums. The following was on the NPD forum, on a thread on narcissism and ageing.

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How I see myself, externally and internally, fluctuates. Often, when I look in a mirror or reflective surface, I will still see a young man of 28. I'm sure it depends on the lighting, its intensity or quality. Other times, in certain predictable mirrors I tend to avoid, I see a man every minute of 57, or older. Even when I see the young man, if only in the back of my mind, I wonder, or strongly suspect, that there's "magical thinking" going on, that I'm filtering out what my mind fears to see, and filtering in what it wants. But I never know for sure, one way or the other. In any case, even if time's treated me well for longer than others, my magical thinking can't last for ever, and I know I must get old, visibly and otherwise.

Why does this matter to me? Intellectually, I know it shouldn't, but it does. Gerascophobia. I've been obsessing about the passing, the racing by, of my youth, since my mid-20's. Most people are worried about the big 3-0, I was agonized about the big 2-7. It really shouldn't be all that surprising. In my struggle to rise above it, to let it go, I've been delving into the literature, film and lore----of gerascophobia---and have been compiling a bibliography and filmography about it of sorts. I'm not the only one who's had this disease. It has a long, long history. And I'm sure, though they've all had the basic similarities, the fine details of the feelings of every gerascophobe, I suspect have been very different.

It's not just the loss of youth. It's the loss of a time, a place, a world-----an identity.

We may all know the old saying, "One picture is worth a thousand words". So far, the cold, clinical, binary, reductionist language of "clinical psychology" (or whatever it is) cannot convey what my gerascophobia feels like. So what I have done is posted links to a couple film clips, which, in their "thousand words" have some chance of hinting at, much closer to any "scientific" formulation, what I feel.

I was hoping to include a clip from the 1935 version of She, of the final words of "She Who Must Be Obeyed", but I couldn't find one separate from the film itself. They were painfully poignant-----"I remember......long ago.......a garden.......in the sun...."

The Guest not only has gerascophobic themes, but perhaps narcissist as well. But it's not the glamorized narcissism. It's the tragic and nightmarish. The scene of young Tess, only 18, in the graveyard with the young drifter is just so powerful. I saw this episode decades ago, maybe as a teenager myself, and it stuck with me all these years. I only just watched it again on DVD.

The Guest, Outer Limits

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJs7pZg_ngQ

I'm not a stud or Casanova like the swimmer, but I can relate a lot to him. All the dreams of strength, power and competence...and all the emptiness that finally finds you. I was hoping I'd find a trailer with the final scenes of his dark homecoming, but I couldn't, so I settled for this one. You can't really put all this into words, tie it up in a neat explanatory bow. It speaks its own language.

The Swimmer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIegoQAayFs

The sadness of aging is probably ineffable. It cannot be easily analyzed. Now, I don't feel it all the time---often, I'm just fine----but sometimes, when I do, it can be so intense, it's excruciating. Glib advice about the benefits of "cognitive behavioral therapy" or "neuroplasticity" are so inane in the face of it, if they weren't so clueless and insulting, they'd be laughable.

If I live any longer, I am going to get old and be old for a while. I'm working on coping strategies for that, but please save your pieties and platitudes. It's going to take a lot more than the usual pats on the wrist and pep talks to get me through it. But all I can do is try. Maybe it'll be a day at a time for the rest of my life.

Would plastic surgery alleviate any of the problem, at least, on a physical level?

No. Older people who get plastic surgery look like just that, older people who got plastic surgery. It usually looks fake.