It really depends on what you are used to doing. My dad climbed ladders until he was in his mid 80s. Now if he had fallen it would not have been due to lack of balance or clumsiness it would have been a stroke or an unexpected attack of vertigo or something to bring him down.

I know people in their 20's who have no business on a ladder or roof. They can fall over while standing still.

I like to ice skate. My body is too old to take the punishment of learning an axle. But I can still spin and work on my singles because my falls are infrequent and less likely to go wrong with those.

I know people who are in their 70's who still ride motorcycles, work out, hike and camp.

I knew an 80 year old who had two hip replacements and snow skied in the winter.

So I think you pretty much answered your own question. if one is physically and mentally fit then never is too old.

My Mother climbed on ladders into her 90's and never did fall.

Sue

I'd say I'm too old for that stuff. I'm just not as sure footed anymore. It depends on how you see yourself I guess.
DH still gets on the roof to blow off leaves and he's 66. He still thinks he can do just about anything.

We're both 60 and do everything around the house ourselves. Don't think we're too old yet. I know my grandfather was still working professionally as a paperhanger when he was well into his 60's. My great aunt was still climbing ladders to do stuff around the house until she died (she was only sick for a week) in her late 70's.

I don't think there's a 'too old' cut-off. Each person is different, and needs to decide what they can and cannot do based on their own health and situation.

What a great thread!

Like others have said, it depends on the individuals physical capabilities and what their comfortable with. I've been an active outdoors kind of person my entire life. My favorite vacation is still to strap on a 35 pound pack and spend a week backpacking at elevations from 9,000 to 11,000 feet. Of course, my 20 something kids always get to the next campsite before me. Two years ago none of the kids could make it on our annual outing so my brother and two friends and I went camping for a week. One guy was 79!! He did great. We set a slower pace and had plenty of breaks to stop and fish. We met a couple on horseback while hiking and they asked Bill how old he was. When he told them the man about fell off his horse.

No point in acting your age until you have to.

Ron

I read where "OLD" is always at least 15 years older than you are !!!

I agree with the above. As we get older we should just be more careful because bones break easier and our body takes longer to heal. Accidents can happen to anyone, of any age.

I think the most important thing when doing physical tasks off the ground is balance. When I was "younger" I really took my sense of balance for granted and pooh-poohed people with vertigo, thinking it was just something hysterical old ladies got. I have since become aware that if you don't have a good sense of balance, no matter how physically fit you are, you have no business even a few feet off the ground.

I seem to "think" like an old person, but act like a young person. :0) I believe if you want something done right.....yep...ya have to do it yourself! :0) Dh & I have been discussing IF we should install a new roof ourselves. We successfully installed a roof once before. DH thinks it's too risky since I'd be up 30' high and a fall could mean "death", not just injury. I still think DH & I should do this! :0)

DH isn't arguing that we're too old.....but it's too risky at any age and we have the money so why not pay someone else to take the risk. He's quite attached to me! :0)

When it comes to "age".....I look at working a job outside the home differently than I used to. Getting old is making me rethink how I spend what little time I have left....I've never been to the local art museum, coin museum, butterfly pavillion, aquatic display, nearby towns or parks...the list goes on...

My DH was on the roof yesterday, w/Christmas lights. He's always been good on ladders, but is talking about painting UP HIGH in the spring. That scares me! He's 73.

I like the way Minnie thinks!

Personally I realized I am getting old, when I moved my stuff out of the house over Thanksgiving. Took me two days to recover and quit hurting all over.

I am only 56.

Moni

amen, to what Minnie said. We are both in our seventies and still climb ladders, go on the roof. We walk quite a bit so I hope this keeps our legs and arms moving. Hubby has already been on the roof twice this year blowing leaves.

54. Just sayin'.
    {{!gwi}}

I clean house 1 hour at a time and rest. Sometimes when I stop to rest I have to force myself to get back up.

for us it isn't about how old is too old, we are young enough but for me it's about the possibility of ruining our lives when we could pay someone else better suited for the work. we do plenty of home repairs, lots of remodeling etc... but if it involves the possibility of severe injury i draw the line there, we have worked too hard completely evolving our lives to stay up on top and i won't risk our success to save a bit of $$. one bad choice can ruin the rest of your life... ~ liz

It really depends on the person like others have said. I get dizzy easily and won't climb any tall ladders...sometimes I get dizzy just standing on a chair changing lightbulbs. My DH is still in his 40's, but gets on the roof several times a year to clean the chimney (2 story drop on that side of the house), hang lights, etc. and my dad is nearing 80 and still climbs on his roof a few times each year.

In Oct. 1998 I fell off the top of a 10 foot ladder onto the sidewalk. Lucky to be here!!! I didn't break anything.
I was the one up on the ladder last week stringing the Christmas lights. DH had a stroke 5 years ago and knee surgery and is just not steady enough to be up there anymore. He'll be 60 in Jan. I turned 55 last month. If the younger neighbor guys see him outside with a ladder they come right over, and do what ever it is he needs done, to keep him from even trying!

Remember that as each birthday comes around it only means you've gone around the
Sun one more time. STOP thinking AGE
Think AGELESS!!

My uncle was 83, widower, a former engineer, living alone in a three-story Victorian house. He decided his house needed painting and he could do it. So he started with building a scaffold so he would not have to climb ladders. After constructing it, his grown children told him don't climb that thing, you'll kill yourself. But he felt fit and strong , so he started his project. One morning he fell off the scaffold, fractured his skull and was hospitalized. That led to immobility, pneumonia, and death. Would it have happened if he was 33 or 53? Maybe. Yet I am strangely proud I am related to such a rugged man! Of course, I am a female with a fear of heights. When my house needs painting, I look in the phone book, get some estimates and prepare to shell out.

I like Ron's thinking. "No point in acting your age if you don't have to to." LOL. I think that's how I feel too.

And minnie,..... never thought of birthdays in that way before! Good one.

But really, I am afraid to try things I used to do, knowing how one slip, can really bring on a slew of problems.

My mom has a mobile home and she needed her roof done ~~~the owner of the company came out to give an estimate she was 86 years old whipped out her ladder climbed all over the roof and told my mom nothing was wrong and not to let youngins tell her there was.

We have an 87 year old lady in my yoga class that just came to yoga a year ago and had a hard time getting up and down. Now she is doing wonderful~~~she is my inspiration:)

We prefer to ignore limitations of age.

I've sometimes questioned how old is too old when we've discussed the timing of parenthood. Nature starts narrowing that possibility for women when they hit their late 30's. But medical science now can make it possible for women as old as 60 to bear (surrogate) children. Men can sire children into their old age, but there is some evidence that assigns greater risk to babies conceived of 'older' sperm.

I bring this up as an illustration of the idea that age matters. Just because you probably CAN still do something, that doesn't make it WISE to do it. In the case of parenthood, IMO, a baby deserves to be conceived within his own family -- when committed parents are young and vital and when they have the best chances of continuing to be vital for at least 20 more years. It's a perspective I didn't have as a young person.

I could not have imagined at 45 what it would take out of me to be post-menopausal. I couldn't have imagined at 59, when I was spent months lugging around 20 pounds of home-building catalogues and samples, that I wouldn't be physically ABLE to do it now, ten years later.

It didn't occur to me that I couldn't always be Mrs. Fix-it around the house. However now I cannot see to focus adequately, with or without tri-focals. I cannot look up to change the battery in a smoke alarm because compressing my neck restricts the flow of blood to my brain: I get dizzy. DH and I dearly love our DGS, but we can't keep up with the energy in a six-year-old boy for very long!

We need to do some thinking before undertaking anything just because we used to do it easily, especially if it's not something we do often (gutter cleaning or snow shoveling). A positive attitude is great, but if you try to fool Mother Nature, expect *consequences*.

it scares me everytime dh get out there and on the roof..he had visions of putting lights up this year and said NO! very loudly! he's 62 but runs a mile every am on the tread mill...no matter what the age, you have to follow guidelines...

An 86 year old fellow from church fell off a ladder and broke his pelvis. He now walks with a cane but will never fully recover. His wife had told him to stay off ladders.

I think it depends simply on the condition of your bones. If you have still good bone density, I don't see any reason not to climb up a ladder.

If you've lost bone density and have osteoporosis, I would think climbing would be too much of a risk.

At my last DEXA scan, my bone density was still good, so I wouldn't worry about climbing and falling anymore than I did when I was younger.

DH and I have always been active, living in the mountains makes a difference. I really do not like hights, but now since we have moved, and DH has too many health issues makes a difference. Mainly it is the breathing, due to cancer and heart problems. No much climbing, but does rehab walking 3 times a week, and is now building up another computer. I keep forget that at 78 I should not be moving furniture like I use to. But the body reminds me the next day.

My mom is 65 and just finished building a scaffold over a basement stairway to paint her second floor walls and ceiling. No talking her out of it. Told her that's what her grandson was for, but she did it anyway. She's in better shape now than I was 10 years ago.

Maybe I'll get her to come put up my Christmas Lights.

Ladders are dangerous no matter your age. I know several people who have been badly hurt on them. There are some people who can keep doing that as they age. If you did a lot of something when you were younger it is second nature when you are older. I, on the other hand, avoid ladders over 6' because I don't feel confident on them. If I was 30 years older you wouldn't catch me up there, I'm just not good at it. My father, in his 70s, scampers up there like it is nothing. My MIL, who has basically done nothing physical for 30 years, can't do anything because she hasn't done anything. Not all people of the same age are equal, physically (well, or mentally for that matter).

"...a baby deserves to be conceived within his own family..."

Wow. So judgmental, I don't even know how to comment.

While I still feel able to do a number of things, including climbing ladders - it's seldom that my body says, "Listen, you darned old fool - you can't DO that any more!", I feel it important to exercise some discretion. I don't carry as heavy loads as earlier, in case I cause some injury to my back ... and back pain lasts a long time and can be danged uncomfortable ... including long-term such problem.

I'm somewhat more careful, also, after having an embolism in the lung a couple of months ago, that I'm now taking blood-thinner pills daily to forestall any further such experience.

Recently a fellow retiree with a pool right beside the back of his house wanted to install some honeycomb plastic lines in his gutters to keep the wind from blowing the leaves from his several trees into them.

He was somewhat reluctant to climb up, leaning out a bit to reach over the overhang ...

... but felt comfortable with doing so while I held the ladder.

I said that he was learning, at this advanced age, how a simple safety task can deliver much psychological comfort to one: I said that I really didn't do anything, that he wasn't going to fall into the (chilly) water, any way.

ole joyful

It's not age, but a matter of strength. My policy is: I must be able to hold my weight by hands alone. If I can't do that, then I have no business up a tree or a tall ladder. In an emergency, you must be able to hold your weight by hands alone.

Interesting thread. You'd never get me on a ladder although I walk two miles a day on the tread mill , lift weights and walk the dogs two miles.. Husband took early retirement 12 years ago. He has worked all these years at a local golf course and in the winter a ski resort. He goes to the gym and golfs a few times a week and skis in the winter. Our son is coming over tomorrow to string the icicles lights, gather leaves ,and carry heavy plants to the basement. I could not live in this big old white elephant of a house for a week. We have ponds and bee hives which require more strength than I have. I remember my grandmother, a frail woman in her 80's carrying wood up from her basement for her wood stove. The other grandmother sat in a chair most of the day. Old age ain't for sissies. I like that old age is 15 yeas older than what you are. I used to think 30 was old, honestly.

Hopefully ... age brings the benefit of some wisdom/discretion.

When I'm using a rather tall ladder, I like to try to find something to tie it to, so that it doesn't fall over - taking me with it!

Never had a broken bone: don't have any intention of starting now!

o j

When I entered the lane on Sat. night ...

... within about 40 feet, I was stuck!

Should I leave the car there, and dig it out in the morning to go to church ... or dig the lane and take it in to the shed?

I decided to try the digging, being careful and watching my reaction.

Dug something around a couple of hundred feet, in just under an hour, working rather slowly.

I'd wondered about possibly calling son, 20 miles away, suggesting that unless I called him in about an hour ... or a half hour ... and he called me to get no answer, that he should come out to check, in case I'd had a spell and fallen into a snowbank.

When I spoke of this to him on Sunday, he didn't seem concerned, as I rather expected that he might.

It would be a good time to have a cell phone. Available in one's pocket ... not sitting on the dining room table.

ole joyful

Oh yes please take your cellphone or cordless phone outdoors with you when you do anything home alone. My FIL outside shoveling dirt by himself suffered a heart attack and died. His cordless phone was on the kitchen counter. If he had had it with him, it might have been a different outcome. DH and I never do anything physical outdoors alone without a phone in our pocket.

I don't think age has much to do with it. If you're going to fall you are going to fall.
I do think there is a time in your life where you should not be thinking you are 25 years old anymore!!!!

Saturday morning we got up to wet carpet along an outside wall.

Our buildings are almost like a T in shape.

The snow and ice in a valley of the roof was melting (in the 30's the two days before) the water ran down the valley behind the vinyl siding to where it met the cement floor, then ran in somehow.

DH has used the roof rake at least 3 times this winter pulling piles and piles and piles of snow off the roof.You stand on the ground to use a roof rake. DS got up on the roof and used a snow shovel to clear the roof also. So 4 times its been cleaned off, but still a bad ice jam snow layer in this valley where the two roofs meet.

DH got up on the roof Saturday to shovel again, only in some spots this time because the snow was so packed down with the winds we've had he couldn't get it with the roof rake. He is not in top shape, he isn't out of shape either. He slipped on ice and started falling head first toward the parking lot pavement. He was trying to twist himself around so that when he fell he would fall on a side, arm,leg anything but his head. It happened so fast he couldn't get twisted around. So he "spread eagled" out as much as he could to try and stop himself with his hands and his feet. He stopped with his chin 4 inches over the eavetrough!
Scared the beejeepers out of him and me too!
It all happened in the blink of an eye there was very little time to react.
When I think about how he'd have landed if he'd hit the pavement (on his head) and how he could have been hurt I get so mad at him!!!!!!!! Leave it alone, I'd rather do anything to cope with a problem then to have him permenently injuried!!! He does not need to think he is 25 years old and can do anything anymore. He is 56!!!

Bottom line my opinion NOW is nobody needs to be on a roof unless you have proper shoes and a safety belt!!! I don't care how young or old you are.

OMGosh how scary that is. thank goodness he was able to stop himself!

That IS very scary. Thank heavens he got stopped. My husband was lucky he didn't land on his head. He was never unconscious. He had a head wound, but it was superficial. It will be soon almost three months since he fell off the roof, and he's back working at the ski resort..even went skiing himself. His back still hurts occasionally, but he's lucky to be alive. There was a man skiing the other day who's 93. My friend's son who is an ER doc said no one over 50 should be on a ladder. He sees more serious accidents from ladder falls.

Its not a matter of age; What's important is physical condition, agility, strength, and reflexes. For climbing a ladder, you should be able to hold you own weight. If you can not hold onto a lsdder rung and support your weight by your hand grip alone, you should rethink doing ladder work. You should have reasonably quick reflexes. A good reflex can make the difference between a simple slip and grab or a bad fall. Good reflexes are required to sense an impending shift or unsecure footing of ladders and other support equipment.