Family, Aging, and the Time We’re Given

At The Palmer Law Firm, we believe that the practice of family law isn’t just about statutes and courtrooms — it’s about people, their stories, and the legacies they leave behind. As an attorney, I walk alongside clients who are facing some of the most difficult chapters of their lives, and I know that questions of mortality, resilience, and purpose often come to the surface during those transitions. In that spirit, I want to share something more personal — how my own family history of illness and my survival of a massive heart attack reshaped the way I think about life, aging, and what truly matters.

I sometimes joke that my family tree reads like a medical warning label. My grandfather died from diabetes. My father from Alzheimer’s. And me? I survived a massive heart attack in 2021 that doctors told me should have killed me. Three generations, three different exits, all tracing back to that inescapable reality most of us spend our younger years avoiding: we’re all on borrowed time.

That brush with death didn’t just change my diet or exercise routine—it shoved me into the classic middle-aged rite of passage: the existential quest (or crisis, depending on your flavor of drama). Mortality had moved from an abstract concept into my medical chart.

The Longevity Hype—and Hope
Hardly a week goes by without a breathless headline about the latest “fountain of youth” breakthrough: drugs that make mice live 40% longer, gene edits that roll back cellular clocks, or supplements influencers swear will keep you young forever (spoiler: they won’t).
For every charlatan peddling snake oil, though, there are serious scientists making real progress. In the 1990s, researchers discovered that changing a single worm gene could double its lifespan. Since then, they’ve mapped the “hallmarks of aging”—from DNA damage to faltering immune systems—and developed drugs that make lab animals not just live longer, but live healthier. Imagine a pill that didn’t just fend off cancer, but also dementia, heart disease, and diabetes at the same time.
Compared to that, curing cancer alone looks like a rounding error.

And while the longevity revolution is still in its early innings, there’s real promise that within our lifetime—maybe even within the next five years—we’ll see the first medicines that treat aging itself. Not immortality, but extra innings.

The Outliers Among Us
Then there are people like Maria Branyas Morera, who died last year at 117. She didn’t have my grandfather’s diabetes or my father’s Alzheimer’s. Instead, she ate yogurt, walked her garden paths, played the piano, and somehow hit the genetic jackpot. Scientists who studied her found her immune system was unusually “efficient” and her microbiome produced anti-inflammatory compounds. Her DNA carried protective variants most of us can only envy.
She aged, but she didn’t get sick—not until the very end. That distinction matters.

So, What About the “Midlife Crisis”?
Here’s the funny thing: psychologists have been telling us for years that the dreaded “midlife crisis” is more myth than reality. Studies show that happiness doesn’t nosedive in your 40s and 50s—it actually climbs steadily into later life. We get better at regulating emotions, pruning our priorities, and focusing on what matters. The highs may not be as high, but neither are the lows.

But statistics don’t blunt the shock of mortality. When your cardiologist looks you in the eye and says, “You almost didn’t make it,” you don’t respond by buying a red convertible. You respond by asking: What do I want the rest of my time to mean?

Where I Landed
For me, the “existential crisis” wasn’t about fearing death so much as squaring up with life. I don’t want to just avoid the diseases that killed my grandfather and father. I want to age like Maria—wrinkled but vital, knees aching but mind sharp, still walking my garden paths (or maybe the beaches of Galveston).

I don’t pretend to control the genetic lottery. But I can choose how I live: how I eat, how I move, how I love, how I work. Science may one day hand us the tools to push back aging, but until then, I figure it’s my job to give mortality a good run for its money.

Because if there’s one lesson in all of this—heart attacks, funerals, and centenarians alike—it’s that the crisis isn’t midlife. The crisis is wasting the life you still have.

At The Palmer Law Firm, we see echoes of this lesson every day. Divorce, custody disputes, and family transitions all remind us how precious time really is. We can’t control the past, but we can shape the future. My personal journey has taught me that resilience, perspective, and purposeful choices matter most — both in life and in the law. If you’re facing your own turning point, know that we are here to help you navigate it with compassion and strength.

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