THE PSYCHOLOGICAL BOX

Don’t let anyone put you in a psychological box! For some reason when we get to a certain age, it’s expected by a considerable majority of the population that we dress in such a way so as to advertise our chronological age. I was the victim of this insidious expectation.
When I was 48 years old I met a younger man and we have now been together for 21 years. One day not long after we’d been together we were walking through a department store when my partner saw two short black dresses on a rack.
He immediately went over to these two dresses and said, “Try these on they’ll look good on you.” I immediately refused to try them on and told him that these dresses were for younger women and he replied with, “If you don’t go in there this minute and try these two dresses on, our relationship is over.”
Secretly I really wanted to try the dresses on but I was psychologically in the grip of the accepted thinking that short black dresses were not for ladies over 45. However my partner’s strong ultimatum somehow gave me permission to try them on. When I put the dresses on they both looked great because I was the right shape to wear them.
My partner bought both dresses for me and I wore them and wore them. That was the beginning of my assessing clothes by how they looked on me, not by how old I was. If the particular garment looks good on you, wear it. Don’t be put off because of your age.