You can age overnight! Here’s what made us look ten years older and the photos that prove it

Most of us like to believe that we look older than we really are, that we age gradually and gracefully. But as any woman who has ever had a scare opening her camera phone upside down knows, Mother Nature can be a cruel mistress.

And now it’s been officially confirmed thanks to new scientific research revealed last month. Rather than experiencing a slow, gradual decline, our bodies change dramatically between the ages of 44 and 60. The Stanford University study found that rapid bursts of aging occur at the molecular level at these ages, which it described as a “precipice” of sudden decline.

Although these changes typically occur between the ages of 40 and 50, dramatic aging can also occur at other times in our lives; researchers say this may be related to a stressful lifestyle or behavioral factors.

Here, three brave writers reveal the year they fell off the aging cliff, examine why, and share the pictures to prove it.

At 54, chronic financial stress made me unrecognizable

By author Kate Spicer

Last year I turned 54 and almost overnight I started dragging myself along like an old refrigerator that needs to go to the landfill.

My body transformed into something I barely recognized. When I say body, I mean my face. Or what used to be my face. In 2023, I did a photo shoot for a newspaper article. I was wearing no makeup, old clothes, and needed a haircut. I didn’t expect to look beautiful in the photos, but I was surprised by my grayish, pasty skin, my brown eyes, and my shapeless lips.

Looking at the photos, I felt a pang of anxiety. Who was I? Where had my former self gone? I’m not saying I’m a supermodel, but I looked like an older lady, not the vivacious woman I thought I was. It was a real dose of reality.

I needed a break, but I was working as a freelance writer to survive. I didn’t have money available to update my appearance or buy clothes that would reinforce my sense of identity and pride.

In fact, my taste in clothes had become peculiar. One day, while preparing lunch for friends in our cold kitchen, I was wearing a gigantic wool jersey dress; both my boyfriend and my friend commented that my outfit was “questionable.” The knee-length brown cable knit was the fashion equivalent of a potato sack. “You look like Friar Tuck,” someone said.

I used to love the whole process of getting ready to go out. I could do it quickly because I took advantage of the occasional visit to a cosmetic doctor to make sure I could wear minimal makeup and still look flawless. I would add a little filler here, a Botox injection there for a good 15 years. That rather expensive habit had to go.

The tricky thing was that my partner was doing great and was super busy with his successful life. He would come home talking about some big international deal and I would be sitting in my sweatpants telling him about how another publisher had rejected my book proposal and what kind of poop the dogs had gotten into that day. I couldn’t help but suspect that I was a bit of a disappointment compared to the woman I had been in the past.

I had little energy and never seemed to get enough sleep. I had pain in my neck, knees, and big toe. Wearing heels was unbearable. If I sat down to write, my hip flexor was so tight that by the end of the day I was limping and panting spectacularly. I was also officially in menopause.

However, I think that this aging was compounded by financial stress. Sometimes, I wondered if I could pay the mortgage or pay off the credit card. I was always in fight-or-flight mode. Was I depressed? I’m not so sure. But that horrible photo galvanized me.

In April, I took steps to combat my chronic stress and my rapid ageing momentum seemed to slow down a bit. I tried my best to eat a healthy diet and went back to taking a daily dose of fish oil. I walked more and used the car less. I cut my hair, bought cooler jeans and gave away the oversized brown jumper dress. I spent a fortune on a £329 Ultrahuman Ring Air, a smart ring that helps me monitor things like sleep, heart rate, stress and exercise.

I push myself up off the floor without using my hands (it’s a great test of agility and strength); and I swing on the monkey bars at the playground when I walk the dogs. In short, I do little things to take care of myself.

I’m not an old refrigerator. I’m me. I’m 55 now. Life is still a bit chaotic, but I’m getting better at it. And a few months ago, despite feeling terribly guilty, I went to have a few milliliters of filler put into my shrunken middle-aged bones and I can’t explain how glad I was about that. Call me shallow, call me vain, but you can’t call me old yet!

Caring for my parents – ‘the long goodbye’ – took its toll on my face

By beauty expert Ingeborg van Lotringen

I always thought I looked younger than I was. That’s what I was told, but by the time I hit 40, they’d stopped guessing that I was five years younger than my actual age, so I should have gotten the hint.

However, it wasn’t until 2021, at age 51, that age quickly caught up with me. My eyes, jaw, and neck all collapsed at once. Which made me furious because, frankly, I felt I had a right not to age poorly. With a drill sergeant attitude toward exercise and self-control, I thought my healthy lifestyle combined with lucky genes would keep the obvious signs of decline at bay forever.

I suffered from insomnia since I was 39 and was well aware that sleep deprivation can severely damage cell lifespan, but my skin was still glowing well into my 50s. As a beauty journalist, I also took for granted my access to excellent skincare products and injectable skin enhancers, including Profhilo and HArmonyCa fillers.

The sleep deprivation was compounded by the loss of my father (and my job as beauty director at Cosmopolitan) in 2019.

Grief and stress really wear you down. My mother was not well either (she is now in a dementia home) and I realised I was on a path I call “the long goodbye” – a slow and painful departure from my parents and the home where I grew up.

Two years later, I found myself in a state of chronic anxiety, aided by menopause which, even using hormone replacement therapy, did its best to exhaust my body and mind to a point where I needed every ounce of physical, mental and emotional strength.

My eyes went from tired to permanently watery, with droopy eyelids and dark circles that became wrinkled and puffy. The skin on my face (and body) thinned, foreshadowing deeper lines, sagging jowls, and a creased neck. I even developed perioral dermatitis, a stress-related condition that leaves me with irritating little blisters when I try to use anti-aging skin products.

I became aware of my situation, identical to that of middle-aged women everywhere. I mourned the loss of a carefree youth, had too many work and family responsibilities on my shoulders, and was worried about the direction my life might take. No one gets away with anything without it sticking in their face. I suppose I should consider myself lucky it took this long.

‘I was living middle age and when I was about to turn 60, my body broke down’

By wellness expert Jane Alexander

I was in my early 60s when my body broke down spectacularly.

It all started with a bang (or rather a thud) in 2019, five months before my birthday. Turning 50 had been a joyous surprise: I’d never felt so good and I don’t think I looked so bad. My career was going great guns; I’d weathered a breakup and a radical move to downsize my home with relative ease.

I thought I was getting over this middle-aged nonsense. Then my sneaker caught on the hem of my pants and I fell headfirst (and handsfirst) into the street. Everything changed. I had broken my nose and left elbow and shattered my right wrist. Drugged up on painkillers and unable to exercise, my weight increased and my confidence plummeted.

In 2020, everything fell apart, and it wasn’t just because of the accident. My freckles turned into age spots, my gums began to recede, my eyesight went to hell. Badger stripes appeared in my hair, I grew a moustache, my jawline faded and my eyebrows went wild. I continued to gain weight until I was 19kg heavier than I was 12 months earlier.

My back started to hurt and then started to spasm. I was diagnosed with stress fractures in two vertebrae. I have no idea how it happened. All my joints hurt. My mental health plummeted too. As my self-esteem evaporated, my old adversaries, depression and anxiety, came knocking. I didn’t want to take antidepressants (I’d taken them before), so I managed to get by.

What seemed unfair to me was that I had done everything I could to stay fit and healthy in my 50s. I ate right, exercised every day, practiced yoga and meditation, took supplements, didn’t smoke, and barely drank.

Now, at 64, I have started hormone replacement therapy. I monitor my blood sugar and am trying the ketogenic diet. It is my duty and that of my family to keep me fit and healthy for as long as possible.