He Gets Silver Fox. I Get Serums.Why My Husband Never Thinks About Ageing… And I Never Stop!

‘Oh, he’s like a fine wine,’ they say.

‘Age looks good on him,’ they add. ‘Who doesn’t love a bit of salt’n’pepper hair?’

Said nobody about a woman, ever.

Meanwhile, I’m over here debating Botox as if it’s a mortgage decision. Where to get a bit done. When to get it done. If I do it soon, will my face be ready in time for Christmas? Or should I save my money for January, entering 2026 with the smoothest optimism sales can buy? I’m spiralling. Frozen by indecision. As if my phone can feed off my insecurities, I’m targeted with an abundance of skincare for women over 40. Do I overhaul my entire routine? Should I stray from what I know? Is Korean skincare genuinely miraculous or just another trend with amazing PR? Should I aim to look dewy? Radiant? Glossy? All three?!

But the underlying question is always the same; will this make me look younger?

I turn to my husband, scrolling beside me as we lovingly procrastinate before bedtime. I lean across him, catch a glimpse of his screen. He’s watching football highlights. My thumb is hovering over ‘add to basket’ on a serum that promises to reverse gravitational pull whilst he just… ages. Blissfully unaware. I try to imagine what his anti-ageing equivalent might be, and all I get is floss. The man flosses religiously. That's as close as he comes to self-preservation. His bathroom shelf contains a toothbrush and two razors, surrounded by my museum of past and present attempts to stop time from eating into my laughter lines. To be fair, he once asked if I had any moisturiser for a bit of dry skin (I gave him the kids Aveeno).

Look, I’m not saying men don’t care about their appearance; they do. I just think the pressure sits almost entirely on our side of the gender divide. We aren’t only expected to age well, but age invisibly. If we can manage to knock a decade off our real age, we’re applauded, appearing to have baffled biology. But we’re also pitied if we haven’t. His wrinkles are ‘laughter lines.’ His grey hair is ‘distinguished.’ A woman’s equivalents are simply ‘something to address.’ Generally speaking, most women I know - of all ages and backgrounds - worry about looking older, and most men simply don’t care. If anything, they enjoy a bit of maturing. And yes, Botox is for everyone, but according to Botox Usage Statistics, 85.1% of procedures are performed on women. Ageing still feels like a female “problem”.

I try to think of women who have embraced ageing with sincerity and grace, women who are celebrated for it. Andie MacDowell springs to mind, proudly letting her silver hair shine. Kate Winslet is another, speaking openly about the beauty in growing older and refusing to chase impossible standards. And then I realise, wow, that’s my entire list. Two names. Now count all the silver foxes…

Oh wait. We haven’t got all day.

So how did we get here? Is it just social media? Filters? Clever marketing? Or is it older and complicated?

Well, it’s ancient. Literally. In Ancient Greece, a woman’s beauty was tied to fertility and health. Old, wise motherly figures were often respected, but youth symbolised reproductive value. If you gave birth to a healthy baby, you were hailed as beautiful. During the Renaissance, artists like Botticelli and Leonardo da Vinci painted women with smooth, pale skin to represent purity creating a culture recognising this as the ideal female face. Their brush strokes avoided wrinkles and grey hair, unless they painted a man - of course - portrayed with wisdom and gravitas. Men’s worth became increasingly tied to intellect, achievement, and reason, all traits that supposedly improved with age. However, a woman’s worth was tied to beauty, virtue, and social grace, qualities believed to fade with age…

…Oh hello, cosmetic industry!

Wigs, powders, lead-based foundations and dramatically frilly dresses were made and sold in abundance. Hurrah! This helped elite women maintain the illusion of youth. But it was a trap. If you didn't conform, you were judged. If you did, you spent your life and savings maintaining it. As corsets were tightened and wigs were secured, men were gaining all the power with each passing birthday. Older men became judges, scholars, intellectuals, leaders. Age made them authoritative. A woman, meanwhile, often remained confined to domestic roles raising children, managing households, and supporting her husbands’ rising prestige. Youth became her only currency and she quickly learned to guard it like treasure. But preserving it became a constant flow of labour.

And here we are. Centuries later. Have things changed that much? We’re still labouring away, just with fillers instead fancy wigs. Instagram filters have replaced oil paintings. We stay up way past our bedtime, our tired faces lit by the soft glow of our phones, researching ‘skin cycling’ and ‘collagen banking’. We compare ourselves to strangers, influencers, celebrities, our younger selves. We research eye creams like we're doing a PhD. But what if the the next purchase we make happens to be The One? We torture ourselves wondering how we can be doing it better. We experiment. We overspend. We hope.

When we were little girls, compliments were almost always about how we looked; ‘You look so pretty in that sparkly dress!’ We heard too often about women who ‘let themselves go,’ and how terribly sad that was! The message was subtle but relentless; your appearance is what people notice first, and what people value most. We absorbed it like sunlight. We earned attention, affection, and approval. And we didn’t question it, because who questions compliments? But slowly, it seeped into our bones. By the time we hit our teens, we had already learned the unspoken rules; look good, be liked. Our achievements, our ideas, our sense of self were secondary to the reflection staring back at us in the mirror. And we’re still suffering. The little girl who once tugged at the hem of a party dress hoping for a compliment is still here, scrolling at midnight, wondering if she looks enough. We fear losing our place. Our visibility. Our value. With every year, we feel ourselves drifting…while men are recast as charmingly mature.

And beneath the creams, the needles, the hair dye, there is something else we fear; time. Children growing up. Parents getting older. Life changing shifts. Mortality. Men feel this too, of course, but without the daily pressure of being visibly evaluated every time they leave the house. They age emotionally. We age emotionally and aesthetically, on display, with commentary.

No wonder we’re exhausted (and likely, broke).