COMMUNITY COMMENTARY:Embrace aging at women’s conference

Editor’s note: Jane Glenn Haas did not win the door prize to be publisher for the day at the Daily Pilot after recently winning the Community Leadership Award at a Leadership Tomorrow event, but the actual winner knew how badly she wanted it and gave it to her.

Tom Johnson asked me to write about aging because I “won” him at a Leadership Tomorrow event and because I’ve been writing about aging-related issues in Orange County for 16 years at the Orange County Register.

What can I tell you about something you do every day? I guess I hope you know you’re not alone.

By 2030, the number of Americans 55 and older will jump from 60 million to 107.6 million as the boomers reach retirement age. During that same period, the number of Americans over 65 will just about double, from 34.8 million in 2000 to 70.3 million.

The age-watchers tell us the next generation of retirees will be the healthiest, best educated and most affluent in history. Also the most influential. And I believe those influencers will be women, not men.

Shock and awe? Only if you haven’t been paying attention to the generation that launched the women’s movement and is now retiring with life riches their mothers never knew.

No, I’m not talking about money — although financial independence is a hallmark for many of these women who worked outside the home. I’m talking about the sense of freedom that comes from authentically knowing yourself, from moving beyond being Harry’s wife and Mary’s mother into the realization that you are your own person.

Is this new? Ask the 600-plus Orange County women who are members or associates of WomanSage, the nonprofit I founded for women at midlife. They are among the 3,800 women internationally who responded to my survey “How Is Your Life Different From Your Mother’s?” You can read the survey — and even fill it out — at www.womansage.org .

More than 95% of these respondents say their lives are different because they had opportunities their mother never had. They understand how money gets in and out of the bank. They are savvy about their health. They are partners with their husbands in family decisions. They want to keep learning and WomanSage keeps them empowered.

On April 21, we are sponsoring a Health, Wealth and Caring conference at the Sheraton Park Hotel at the Anaheim Resort, 1855 S. Harbor Blvd., Anaheim. We’ll have Chris Crowley, co-author of “Younger Next Year: A Guide to Living Like 50 Until You’re 80 and Beyond” talking about how to stay healthy and sexy; Liz Pulliam Weston, MSN columnist, on “How to Get Out of Debt,” plastic surgeon Dr. Loren Eskenazi discussing her new book, “More than Skin Deep — Exploring the Real Reasons Why Women Go Under the Knife,” plus 12 other speakers and 60 exhibitors. We’ll even toss in breakfast and lunch.

If you’re a woman at midlife — and midlife is a state of mind, not a chronological age — maybe you remember the time when you thought you would change the world. Join us on April 21 and we’ll show why it’s not too late to do just that.