The Infantilization of Older Adults

How well-meaning people guide seniors into helplessness and incompetence

Yesterday on my way to my part-time job at the home improvement store I work at, I came to a section of road where it was limited to one lane that ran east due to a large construction project. The westbound lane was completely closed, so people wanting to travel west had to take a detour to another road.

As I was making my way into the one-lane passage, I saw a pair of headlights barreling straight toward me. Alarmed, I pulled to the side of the road and began to blow my horn to alert the driver. I wasn’t sure if it was someone just ignoring the detour because they were in a hurry or someone who didn’t realize they were going the wrong way on a one-way street.

As the large, red SUV zoomed past me, I saw the driver. She was an elderly woman with curly gray hair who was 80 if she was a day. I watched her through my rearview mirror and hoped that she made it where she was going without incident. Thankfully, she made it to where the road was again a two-way road, and I assume she made it safely to her destination.

There’s an old joke making the rounds that goes something like this. A middle-aged daughter hears on the radio that a person is driving the wrong way on the interstate. Her father is driving on that interstate, so she calls to warn him of the possible danger.

Daughter: “Dad, be careful driving on the freeway. There is someone on it driving the wrong way!”

Dad: “There’s more than one. There’s hundreds of ‘em!!!”

And so the joke goes. As a matter of fact, there are a lot of old jokes that target the elderly. For instance, one day my dad was showing me his new hearing aid and telling me how well it worked for him.

Dad: “Hey John. I just got my new hearing aid. See?”

Me: “Yeah. It looks like a good one. What kind is it?”

Dad: “It’s about half-past nine.”

I’m not at the age where I find these kinds of jokes offensive. Not yet, anyway. Hopefully, I never will. Seeing ourselves with a degree of humor makes life a little more bearable. As a matter of fact, it’s crucial if you want to hold your mud together as you age.

Still, I can’t help but notice with each passing year there is a growing tendency among well-meaning people to treat me more and more like a child. There seems to be an invisible fulcrum at play. For most of our adult lives, we are seen as more mature and competent as we age, and once we pass over this tipping point, we begin to be seen as less and less competent.

Just where that fulcrum lies depends, I suppose, on the individual. Some of us age better than others. Some of us begin that journey of losing our mental and/or physical abilities much sooner than others. Another way of saying it is being “over the hill.”

So too, whether we are “over the hill” is in the eye of the beholder. Some people tend to write off older people much earlier than others. Some students of mine last year were shocked to find out I was 65. They apparently thought I was younger. One student said they thought I was around 49 or so. She got extra credit. You probably think I’m kidding about this.

What exactly is infantilization?

In short, infantilization is treating someone who is not a child like they are a child. A very common form of infantilization occurs when children are getting older and their parents insist on treating them like they are still small.

Some parents seek to keep their children childlike in ways that are not age appropriate. Unrealistic or unfair curfew times, refusing to give them spending money, and choosing their clothing for them are techniques some parents use.

Of course, there is a fine line between infantilization and just good common sense. Whenever I get the notion to buy a motorcycle, my wife quickly talks me out of it, pointing out how my reaction time, balance, and healing ability are not the same as when I was younger. Giving up bar fights is also a good idea when you are in your 60s. These kinds of things aren’t really so much infantilization as they are smart ideas.

The early signs of infantilization

For most people, the earliest sign of impending infantilization comes in the form of a senior discount. It’s not so much the discount itself that can be infantilizing, but it’s delivery.

Often there is a certain tone in the voice of the person giving the discount, and other times the person gives a look not unlike the kind they give when waiting on a child. They mean well. They are glad to see you and give you the discount. It makes them feel good.

It is also not usual to find “senior parking” in the parking lots of many businesses. For someone like me who is perfectly capable of walking, the special designation of certain spots as “senior parking” seems silly, almost insulting. I understand their reasoning. They create these spaces on the assumption seniors can’t walk very far anymore.

While that is no doubt true for many seniors, it seems like the inability to walk is more a product of disability than age. They are not the same thing. These same people who need senior parking would be just as well served using a handicapped parking space. Putting the sign “senior parking” in the lot simply promotes the stereotype that older people are feeble.

It gets worse.

As we get older and our physical and mental capabilities begin to fray, infantilization fires its booster rockets. Younger people will begin to describe older people as “cute” and maybe even talk to them using baby talk.

It is not unusual for the adult children of older people to become helicopter children, constantly hovering over their parents to “make sure everything is OK.” These helicopter children feel it is their responsibility to supervise the lives of their aging parents in the same way helicopter parents monitor every aspect of their children’s lives. They don’t want mom or dad “making the wrong decision.”

These helicopter children feel they are doing what they are supposed to be doing. They are looking out for and protecting their parents. It makes them feel good to be protective of the people who were protective of them when they were growing up. They tell themselves they are doing it out of love.

The problem, however, comes when they rob their parents of their adulthood. There is a fine line between looking out for someone and taking over. When adult children take over more than is necessary, the aging parents are under-challenged and slowly lose their ability to take care of their own affairs. Taken to the extreme, adult children might not only verbally disapprove of what their parent does, but might actually take over things like managing finances, overseeing their diet, and getting rid of their material possessions to “simplify things.”

Institutionalized infantilization

For older adults, the idea of moving into a nursing home is frightening and rightfully so. Nowhere are older adults stripped of their adulthood and dignity more than in nursing homes.

As physical strength and mental acuity fade, the level of infantilization increases.

Or is it the other way around? How much of an older person’s physical strength and mental acuity fade because well-meaning attendants take care of all of their needs so that the only thing left to do is wait to die?

Some nursing home workers use baby-talk when addressing the residents. Some coin cute nicknames for them. Some workers will speak more slowly to residents than they would to other people, or talk louder than is necessary. Worse yet, some speak to residents in a sing-song voice and the person’s dignity dies long before they do.

Final words

No one deserves to have their dignity stripped away, least of all those who spent their earlier years raising and caring for us. If you are looking after an aging parent, don’t be too quick to do things for them, and never underestimate their capabilities. If you do, you might be contributing to their decline.

For those of us who are getting older, refuse to allow people to treat you like a child. Set boundaries with your children. Correct people who treat you with less dignity than you deserve. You are an elder. You are not elderly.

And as the saying goes, we’ll get by with a little help from Depends.