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. ‘Psychotherapy in the third age’. British Journal of Psychotherapy, 11, 2, 1994, 221-31.
. ‘Creativity and the third age’. International Journal of Psychotherapy, 76, 1995, 825-33.
The complexity of relating to age and ageing is well illustrated in these three papers, which approach the issues raised from different angles. All the authors agree that old age is a stage of life which, with a few exceptions, has been relatively neglected by the analytic and psychotherapy profession, and that this lack needs to be redressed. They also agree on the difficulty of generalizing in view of the immense range of experiences at this time of life, which is referred to as the third age, meaning people in their sixties, seventies and eighties. Whilst it is generally accepted that there is likely to be a slowing down or deterioration in physical and mental activities, all the authors quote exceptions. Reggiori records that Vaughan Williams was 85 years old when he finished his ninth and last symphony, and that George Bush ran for Presidential Office for a second term when 69 years old, amongst other examples of people continuing to function in an active creative way in their day-to-day lives. With this in mind one could say that the only non-variable in the third age is the inevitability of death. However there are a whole range of challenges and the authors consider these in different contexts.