Thanks for this thoughtful post, Michelle.

It seems to me that suicide rates are up all around. Growing up, I really didn't know anyone affected by suicide (or maybe a friend of a friend - something like that). Now, every three months or so, someone who is really close to me loses someone to suicide. It's an epidemic. You wrote: "Because many of our churches are focused on family-based programming, the unspoken message to those who don’t fit the target demographic is that they don’t matter the same way that younger people do. Pollster George Barna reports that baby boomers are leaving the church in surprising numbers." Wow. This is true (the church focusing on families) and alarming (I really didn't know that baby boomers were leaving the church in "surprising numbers."

This is a great article, and many helpful comments. I think my church does most things right. The thing it doesn't do right is they don't realize how exhausted the congregation is. Sometimes I leave church so discouraged because they want so much more from me than I am able to contribute. I don't see that as an age issue - I see young families struggle with that as well. Another thought is that women in their 50s to 60s see life ebbing away from them. Often their husband has traded them in for someone newer, the time they have left to live out their hopes and dreams is getting shorter and shorter, and they see their plan of growing old with someone they love turn into growing old alone. Finally, I think there should be more hugging in church. For some people that is the only touch they've received all week. I hate it that I have to go to a psychologist to get someone to listen to me, and to my doctor to find a nurse who is willing to let me cry on her shoulder.

Paul's comments are right on. After a few years of lethargy, realizing I was never going to be the right demographic again for a business model church, I left. I'm now part of a Christ centered church instead, growing, happy, and doing well. This church speaks my worship language, values what I value, and guess what? It successfully reaches ALL demographics, not just one. It is populated with refugees from corporationchurch. We left with our money, our time, our talents, and our experience. Where we left is struggling. So be it. For me at least, joy did come in the morning.

Paul Almas, your advice to find the things that Jesus said are worthwhile, 'serving and helping others in need' and that, rather than turning inward to review losses each morning, we,instead, should move out with the understanding that serving others is the best therapy in dealing with sadness and loss, was great advice. Abraham Lincoln once said he believed that people were about as happy as they made up their minds to be. Happiness is a choice. We just need to choose life!

Wow. That is a lot of responses. I might recommend Paul David Tripp's book "Lost in the Middle." He is a counselor with CCEF and a deeply biblically-grounded teacher who clearly discusses grace and the particular struggles facing people in mid-life. Check these out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOn-KqXqp2A

I am 45 this year and found myself succumbing to serious depression and spiritual darkness earlier this year. I'm on week 9 of Beth Moore's "Breaking Free" study and I feel like a new woman. God has brought me back into light and restored our relationship through the deep introspection and study of His word that this study facilitates. There were many circumstances in my life that brought about my struggle but I allowed these circumstances to drive a wedge between me and God and began to neglect my own spiritual health, time alone with God, prayer, study of the Word, etc. Hope this is encouraging to someone out there who is reading this article & the comments looking for help. By all means get counseling, consider medication if it is needed but first and foremost, seek God. You may need the additional structure of something like the Breaking Free study to help you start digging out of the rut. The enemy had built up such a wall that at the beginning I had to read the material and the scripture out loud, sometimes repeating it two or three times before my brain could comprehend it. I have also found that praying specifically for comprehension helps. Praying for all of you sisters in Christ!

This was like an arrow straight into my heart. I resonate with every word. I feel invisible at work, at home, and only a little less at church due to a great woman pastor in our congregation. I am caught in a full time job (husband in construction and we all know where that went) to support our family, a teen still at home, a disabled sibling who lives with us (with no money), wanting to be with our grandchildren, working like a dog all day, and then no energy or desire to connect with my husband or anyone else. it is not a prosperity gospel to realize that life is not working, it is a call out to God. Psalm 73 has been my life saving chapter-especially the end.

This sounds like depression, more than a mid-life crisis; but it could be a combination of things, as such things often are. I've written a piece on my blog called 'Struggling with Depression, which anyone might like to check out by clicking on my name. I think that the worst deressive states can be a kind of spiritual malaise, rather than being just physical in cause. Also, of course, these states can be exacerbated by things going wrong in your life. And let's be honest here folks, men can also have depression and mid-life crises too! As ever, praying about this will help, because Jesus has the answers as always. And, it might help if we read some of the less cheery sections of the Bible, like Jeremiah and some of the psalms attributed to David, and even Ecclesiates. These are often not easy reads but if we know that God's chosen were also struck with depression and feelings of worthlessness, and so on, it might help us to see we are not alone; that's a start anyway.

Michelle, what a beautifully insightul post; you made many people visible. We need to think about how we can love one another and enfold one another into each other's lives in all of our seasons. I'm 33. My family and I need Cathy's wisdom and experience and friendship and the friendship and experience of Paul who commented. While I love my peers and welcome them into my home and as friends, I also need the wisdom of those who have gone before. Jesus told Peter that those who have left everything to follow him would receive a hundred fold in brothers and sisters and mothers in this life (and also persecutions). For those of us whose families are far away or who come from fractured familial circumstances the love and presence of those in midlife and beyond in our lives is indispensable, priceless even. But it's not just those whose families are fractured or far away. Even those with good families close by need their extended family. I am who I am because of many such people in midlife and beyond. One of my favorite pastors was 83 and kicking and a beautiful hilarious soul and one who ministered tirelessly to our entire congregation! Many of us who are in our 20's, 30's, and 40's are hungry for familial frienships with those who are older. Whose wisdom do I seek if I am thinking about buying house and my parents are unavailable? What insights does a single woman or man have to share with my family, about how to live? I need all of you. Really. If we could just realize we need each other and then be able to find each other in the body, if we could just speak up, and be vulnerable. Thank you Michelle and the rest of you for sharing on this important topic. God sees you and hears you.