Are we being discontinued?

I tried to buy my husband’s favorite shaving cream online today. Couldn’t find it. Apparently it has been “discontinued” and replaced with a new fancier version. He doesn’t want the fancy version. He wants his old shaving cream just the way it was.

This discontinuing has been going on a lot recently. My favorite line of cosmetics seems to have gone out of business. Same with a clothing line I bought online for my favorite pair of jeans. It has led me to wonder — what else is being discontinued?  Are we too?

To discontinue means — to end, put a stop to, no longer produce or offer. That could be someone’s definition of older people too. We get discontinued and replaced by newer, more attractive models (and yes, maybe literally “models”), and we disappear. We are no longer “seen,” or when we speak up, people tend to pat us on the head or tell us to “write the President”!! (Actually he’s our age, so that might work just fine….)

Discontinuing something happens because the item has become too expensive, is not selling well or can be replaced by a better version. In our capitalist society, old is only good if it’s a genuine antique that is worth something.  If we are on Social Security or Medicare, some politicians want to replace us so we don’t cost so much. Kinda makes me mad. So often, the older version of something is really the best version.  Like that shaving cream — foamy.  The new gel — not so foamy. Or the makeup — the old version went on smoothly even on wrinkled skin.  The new version? Made for younger skin and skin tones we no longer have.

I have occasionally tried to retrieve discontinued models of things. I have written the manufacturer and asked if there were any things left over to sell. Once a product has been pronounced “discontinued,” however, it is usually gone.  Those of us who snatched up the last versions have nowhere to go now. We get offered a “substitute” or an “another option.”  Even when we buy groceries online, we need to identify a substitute in case the item we want is out of stock or discontinued.

I guess we should be grateful there are choices. With everything going on in the world – earthquakes and war and all, we should not be complaining because we have multiple options for the products we want to buy, right? It’s actually embarrassing to be so demanding.

Still, the thought of being discontinued is a troubling one.  Nancy Healey has been writing on our blog about getting ready for end of life by getting things in order. It’s important to do that. Any of us who have had to go through our parents’ stuff after they died knows how difficult that is. We wish they had been more prepared, so we try to prepare ourselves so we don’t leave that burden on others.

Too many older people experience the feeling of being discontinued. That attitude by younger people is what they call “ageism.” If you are a certain age you may no longer be needed or valued. How should we fight this? It’s probably a topic for another post, but at the very least we need to advocate for ourselves. We need to speak up when we are ignored. We need to question and challenge “mandatory” retirement ages. We all have friends who are a lot older than we are, and in a lot better shape. I never feel as old as when someone suggests I might need a chair to sit down, when I didn’t ask for one and didn’t think I needed one!

We will be discontinued. That’s just a fact of life. We won’t be replaced, though. Nothing can replace us and we just need to know that and shout it out!