Is reduced mental function a natural part of aging or is it more related to a reduction in physical activity?

Well, have you already tried it and found it a challenge? I think you will be surprised at how fast your chops come back at coping.

It’s all about practice. You will get back to where you need to be. I think age thing aside the brain can get lazy if not used and needs to be ‘restarted” once again in different situations. I only started my degree at 28 and I felt a hundred in my head.

I went through a period of a few years of really worrying about my memory and the diminishment of mental functioning. For some reason, in the last six months, I have felt my mind to be sharp and clear again (except for spelling which seems to be gone.) I do think that physical activity plays a part in mental capacity but so does mental stimulation. The job may be just what you need! Good question, by the way.

Think everybody would be anxious about starting a new job, whether they had been out of the workplace or not.
Once you have been doing it for a few months, I am sure it will become second nature to you.
I don’t think it is an age thing at all.

I was on a Medical Leave from my police department for several years. i was finally given the okay to return to duty. i was amazed at how much had changed in that small length of time. i mentally told myself, “you can do this. you can bring yourself up to date, just keep an open mind accept anything new that comes to you”. i did make it back without any problems. the key here is your mind controls your body. if you tell yourself that you can do something, you will be able to do it. i did this at the age of 58. put your mind in gear to tell your body what to do. it will work for you. john

Physical and mental activity are related. Exercise helps keep you mind more alert.

How old are you, and what have you been doing for the past x years? In particular, what have you been doing that required staying sharp and/or learning something new?

And—is it fast-pasted like Starbuck’s (which does take remembering a lot and acting very swiftly, so I am not minimizing the challenge) or like a hospital emergency room, or more like high-tech software engineering?

54. At 46 I was a waitress at two different restaurants I worked 5–6 days a week at one and nights and weekends at the other. I did this for two years and was good at it. When I was younger, I worked a couple of times in factories and was much faster than ALL of my co-workers. I’ve been extremely active and driven, working two jobs most of my life. Once my sons were on their own, I didn’t have to work so hard and I could focus on getting myself together. I became much more organized and did not have to function in a frenzy. I was able to work only one job. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve been less active mostly because I’ve enjoyed being able to relax more. I also remarried nearly 5 yrs ago and having someone to relax with makes it more desirable to do so. I keep my brain active and cannot ever be still without doing something to occupy my brain. I know people slow as they age, but I am still much more active than most of the people I know that are my age. I just wondered if it is inevidible that one slows with age or is inactivity a bigger culpret. I have been called “hyper” most of my life, so a slow down is much more obvious with me and I miss being able to function at the pace I once did.

You’ll be fine. It sounds like you have just been enjoying having a bit of a breather and are still plenty active. I’m in my late 50s now and I get more exercise than I used to; I don’t think there is a necessary correlation.