As I head into my mid-50s, one of my fears of ageing is that I will be increasingly marginalised, and eventually rendered invisible, as I get older.

After all, when one’s career slows and then stops, one loses status and significance. As one’s health declines, one is gradually robbed of autonomy. It is not far a slide from there to a frail old age dependent on others. And then one day, I may be a patient in a nursing home, calling in vain for a nursing aide to get me a bedpan, and if she is slow, I may soil my bed; or, shudders, I might be deemed a “difficult” patient who needs to be physically restrained in bed.