Abstract:

Old persons are faced with the imminent prospect of physical & mental infirmity, dependence, & death, making problematic their ability to project & maintain a desired self-image in the future. The uncertainty of the how & when of death are recurrent topics of conversation among old women. By listening to conversations among women over 70 years of age & conducting intensive interviews with old women, the strategies employed to eliminate the uncertainty in order to maintain a desired self-identity in dying & death were discovered. Strategies delineated are: monitoring warning signals, symbolic maintenance of self-identity, & planning for sudden physical malfunction.