6 Mistakes Women Make After Retirement

Retirement is about more than money. It is also about deciding what you want the rest of your life to look like.

Retirement is one of those things we spend years preparing for financially.

How much money do I need? When should I take Social Security? What am I going to do about Medicare? Can I afford to stop working?

Those are important questions. Retirement can last 20 years, 30 years, maybe even longer.

But there is another question we do not talk about nearly enough:

What are you actually going to do with the rest of your life?

I am a retired physician, and I can tell you that retirement is about much more than whether you have enough money saved.

And I do not know about you, but I do not intend to spend the rest of my life sitting in somebody’s recliner watching The Price Is Right.

Nothing against The Price Is Right. I just have other plans.

Here are six mistakes I think women can make after retirement, and more importantly, what we can do instead.

1. Making Retirement Only About Money

One of the biggest mistakes women can make is having a financial plan for retirement but no plan for their actual life.

Do not misunderstand me. Money matters.

You need to know what you have, what you are spending, and whether your money is going to last.

But some women know exactly what is in their 401(k) and still have no idea what they are going to do on Tuesday.

And Tuesday comes every week.

For most of our adult lives, somebody or something else controlled a large part of our schedule.

We had jobs. Children. Meetings. Appointments. Deadlines. Responsibilities.

Then one day you retire and suddenly nobody is telling you where you have to be.

At first, that can feel wonderful.

You can sleep late. You do not have to fight traffic. Nobody is emailing you at 7:30 in the morning asking whether you saw the email they sent you at 7:15.

But eventually, most of us need more than free time.

We need purpose. We need structure. We need something to look forward to.

That does not mean you need another job.

Your purpose could be volunteering, traveling, spending time with your grandchildren, gardening, taking classes, mentoring younger women, creating something, or finally doing something you never had time to do before.

So yes, make a financial plan.

But also make a life plan.

Ask yourself:

What do I want my days to look like?

That is a very different question from asking how much money you need.

2. Losing Your Identity When You Leave Your Career

Nobody really prepares women for what can happen when a large part of our identity has been tied to our career.

For 20, 30, maybe 40 years, a big part of who you were was connected to what you did.

You were the teacher.

The nurse.

The business owner.

The manager.

The doctor.

Then you retire.

I understand this one personally because I spent most of my adult life being a physician.

When you have spent that many years saying, “I’m a doctor,” that becomes part of how you see yourself.

But eventually I had to realize something:

Retired is my employment status. It is not my identity.

I am still a physician. But I am also an author. I create content. I travel. I make people laugh. I try new things.

And I am still discovering parts of myself.

You can be more than one thing in a lifetime.

Sometimes other people have trouble seeing you in a different role because they are accustomed to the version of you they have always known.

But that does not mean you have to remain that version forever.

One of the wonderful things about this stage of life is that you get to ask who else you might become.

Maybe there is another version of you waiting to come out.

Give her a chance.

3. Waiting for Somebody Else to Start Living

I could probably do an entire thesis on this one.

You want to take the trip, but your girlfriend cannot go.

Your sister does not want to go.

Your daughter has to work.

Your husband does not like to travel.

Or maybe you are single and do not have a partner to go with you.

So you say, “Maybe next year.”

Then next year comes.

Now somebody has a bad knee, and that somebody may be you.

Somebody has a wedding.

Somebody does not have the money.

Somebody does not want to fly.

And somebody else wants to go, but she wants to stay in a hotel that costs $39.95 a night.

Now we have another problem.

At some point, you have to realize that if you wait until everybody else is ready to do the things you want to do, you may never do them.

That is one reason I became comfortable traveling solo.

But this is not only about travel.

Maybe you want to go to a concert. Go to dinner. See a movie. Attend an event.

You do not always need somebody to go with you.

There is nothing wrong with companionship. I enjoy being with other people.

But I refuse to make somebody else’s availability a requirement for me to enjoy my life.

If somebody wants to come along, wonderful.

If not?

I am still going.

And you should consider doing the same.

4. Letting Your World Get Smaller

One of the easiest things to do after retirement is to allow your world to get smaller without even realizing it.

When you are working, you interact with people whether you want to or not.

You even interact with coworkers you do not particularly like.

Then you retire.

You do not see coworkers anymore.

Maybe your children live somewhere else.

Friends move away.

People get sick.

Life changes.

And gradually, you can start staying home a little more.

Then a little more.

Pretty soon the biggest event of the week is the Amazon person bringing your package.

We need more than that.

Staying connected after retirement sometimes requires being intentional.

Join something. Volunteer. Take a class. Go to the gym. Travel.

Call somebody and say, “Let’s have lunch.”

And here is another thing.

Make some new friends.

You might be thinking, “At this age?”

Yes. At this age.

Everybody you meet after 60 does not have to have known you since 1987.

New people can introduce you to new ideas, new experiences, and completely different ways of looking at life.

And your friends do not all have to be your age either.

Your world does not have to automatically get smaller because you are getting older.

If anything, now you may finally have time to make it bigger.

5. Believing You Are Too Old to Start Something New

If you have ever said, “I’m too old to start something new,” I have one question.

Says who?

Women will say:

“I’m 65. It’s too late.”

“I’m 70. Who is going to hire me?”

“I’m too old to start a business.”

“I’m too old to travel by myself.”

“I’m too old to write a book.”

According to whom?

Where are these rules written? Because I have not seen them.

I started doing things later in life that I never imagined I would be doing.

I wrote books.

I started creating videos.

I built a community online.

I started a business.

I began talking to hundreds of thousands of people on social media.

None of that was part of some master plan I created when I was 35.

It happened because I was willing to try something new.

Sometimes we misunderstand what starting over means.

You are not necessarily starting from scratch.

You are starting with decades of experience.

You know things now that you did not know at 30.

You know yourself better.

And hopefully, you have stopped worrying quite so much about what everybody else thinks.

That alone can be an advantage.

So if there is something you have been thinking about doing, stop automatically asking:

Am I too old?

Ask instead:

Do I still want to do it?

That is the question that matters.

6. Spending Your Retirement Taking Care of Everybody Except Yourself

Women are very good at taking care of people.

We spend years taking care of children, spouses, parents, patients, employees, grandchildren, friends, and sometimes people we did not even like that much.

Then you retire.

Suddenly everybody notices that you have “free time.”

Your children need something.

The grandchildren need something.

Somebody needs a ride.

Somebody needs you to babysit.

Somebody needs you to help with something.

And before you know it, everybody has a plan for your retirement except you.

Listen to me.

You can love your family deeply and still have boundaries.

You can help your adult children without organizing your entire life around them.

You can adore your grandchildren and still say, “No, I cannot babysit that day.”

You are allowed to have plans.

And your plans do not have to seem important to anybody else.

If your plan for Wednesday afternoon is to sit in your house, drink coffee, and do absolutely nothing, you are busy.

You do not have to justify it.

And like I always say:

No is a full sentence.

A lot of women reach retirement and feel guilty about finally putting themselves somewhere near the top of the list.

I am not telling you to become selfish.

I am telling you that your life belongs on your own priority list.

Your retirement should not become everybody else’s emergency fund of time.

Retirement Can Be Your Second Wind

If you are retired or getting close to retirement, think about what you want this stage of life to look like.

Do not just plan your finances. Plan your life.

Do not lose yourself because you left your career.

Do not wait for somebody else before you start living.

Do not allow your world to get smaller.

Do not automatically decide you are too old to begin something new.

And please do not spend the rest of your life taking care of everybody except yourself.

Retirement is not necessarily the end of your productive years.

For some of us, it may be the first time in our adult lives that we finally get to ask:

What do I want?

Not what does my boss want?

Not what do my children want?

Not what does everybody else expect me to do?

What do I want the next chapter of my life to look like?

I call that your Second Wind.

And your Second Wind does not have to look like mine.

Maybe yours is traveling.

Maybe it is starting a business.

Maybe it is writing that book.

Maybe it is moving somewhere you have always wanted to live.

Or maybe it is simply creating a quieter, happier life where you finally have more freedom to decide how you spend your time.

Whatever it is, do not assume your best years have to be behind you simply because you retired.

You may have another whole chapter waiting for you.

And now you finally have time to write it.

If you are a woman over 55 figuring out what you want your next chapter to look like, I invite you to explore more of my Second Wind content on health, travel, reinvention, and enjoying this stage of life on your own terms.

And I would love to know:

What is one thing you want to do in retirement that you have not done yet?