\n<\/p>\n
R<\/span>umman Talukder\u2019s favourite circus trick is called the Mermaid. Every Sunday, the 60-year-old IT consultant drives from his home in Stanmore to a circus school in Ware to practise it. Hanging from a trapeze by one arm, with his back arched and his legs wrapped around the rope, he says it makes him feel \u201cstrong and graceful\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cMy wife thinks I\u2019m mad but in the run-up to turning 60, I decided I wanted to challenge myself; to find things not normally associated with people my age,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n Talukder is one of a small but increasing number of people discovering circus after the age of 50.<\/p>\n <\/span>A Generation Circus class in Hertfordshire.<\/span> Photograph: Emma Taylor<\/p>\n In Hertfordshire, Generation Circus has spent the past year running a pilot project for older adults and now runs weekly sessions. Their oldest participant is almost 97 years old. In London, the National Centre for Circus Arts in Hoxton has just begun classes for older people and is due to launch a six-week aerial course later this year. In Eastbourne, Sweet Circus recently started monthly sessions. All are looking for funding to expand.<\/p>\n Emma Taylor, the founder of Generation Circus, said the sessions were transformational. \u201cA lot of our participants signed up for classes simply because it sounded like a fun way to get fit,\u201d she said. \u201cBut circus immediately opens up a whole new world, and suddenly they\u2019re buying hula hoops and rigging up circus equipment in the garden.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/span>Generation Circus: \u2018Circus immediately opens up a whole new world.\u2019<\/span> Photograph: Andy Holloway<\/p>\n Evidence specifically on circus remains limited but small studies have found improvements in balance among older adults learning juggling and poi, with some also reporting gains in attention and processing speed. Separate brain-imaging studies have found that learning to juggle can even change brain structure.<\/p>\n For Talukder, though, the attraction has little to do with neuroscience. \u201cAchieving something this physical at my age makes me feel indomitable,\u201d he said. \u201cI see people in their 70s and 80s, and realise there isn\u2019t an age where you should feel constrained from trying something new.\u201d<\/p>\n The social side matters too. Taylor said members of circus school quickly feel part of a team: no little achievement at a time in which Age UK estimates that about one in 14 people aged 65 and over in the UK are often lonely.<\/p>\n \u201cThey begin to dress differently: they\u2019re more bright somehow,\u201d said Taylor. \u201cThey look up tricks on YouTube and talk about them and go to see shows together. And it\u2019s all because, every week, they train in a proper little circus school.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/span>Carol Masson: \u2018After every class I feel like I\u2019ve had a shot of life in the arm.\u2019<\/span> Photograph: Andy Holloway<\/p>\n Carol Masson, 70, candidly admitted that she might not be here today were it not for circus school. The retired housekeeper struggled after the death of her daughter four years ago. \u201cI would stay in bed and sometimes even think about suicide,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cNow I can\u2019t wait for Sundays to arrive. After every class I feel like I\u2019ve had a shot of life in the arm. There\u2019s so much fun and joy. Everything else just disappears.\u201d<\/p>\n Masson had a hip replacement in February but isn\u2019t letting that thwart her newfound enthusiasm: she returned to class last month, concentrating on juggling and hula hoops while she rebuilds her strength. \u201cGeneration Circus is mental and physical therapy in abundance,\u201d she said. \u201cI just wish I could do it every day.\u201d<\/p>\n Claire Howard, 54, who uses a wheelchair and has had 121 transient ischaemic attacks (TIAs), often called mini-strokes, never dreamed she could do circus skills. \u201cThe first session, I looked at the trapeze and just wanted to turn around and leave,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n But she stayed \u2013 and a year later is so skilled with her own wheelchair adaptations of the hula hoop that she teaches able-bodied participants. \u201cI\u2019ve gone from having no purpose in life to rediscovering my inner child,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cCircus has shown me that life can be fun. I\u2019d forgotten that. As a wheelchair user you\u2019re reminded all the time what you can\u2019t do. Here, I have skills that lots of able-bodied people don\u2019t have. I can be useful,\u201d Howard said.<\/p>\n <\/span>Corinna Hartwig: \u2018I can be playful, happy and creative.\u2019<\/span> Photograph: Andy Holloway<\/p>\n Circus has been similarly transformational for Corinna Hartwig, who lost her mother when she was 12 and her father four years ago. \u201cI was advised to reconnect with my inner child but I didn\u2019t know how until I started going to circus,\u201d she said. \u201cNow, once a week, I can be playful, happy and creative again.\u201d<\/p>\n Diane Bernier, recreational programme manager at the National Centre for Circus Arts, said circus helps older people \u201crealise their life doesn\u2019t have to go down one path simply because of their age\u201d.<\/p>\n She said: \u201cPeople discover they can still learn completely new things and that\u2019s such a powerful revelation.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/span>Sarah Hodson: \u2018Never in a million years did I think I\u2019d end up doing circus.\u2019<\/span> Photograph: Andy Holloway<\/p>\n Back in Ware, Sarah Hodson, 63, still laughs at the fact that she now spends her weekends learning circus skills alongside her 96-year-old mother, Jane.<\/p>\n \u201cNever in a million years did I think I\u2019d end up doing circus,\u201d she says. \u201cPeople of our age often think they\u2019re only good for water aerobics or chair yoga. Then you look around the room and see people older than you hanging upside down from a trapeze, with someone even older swinging from their arms.<\/p>\n \u201cIn some ways it\u2019s better than being young,\u201d she added. \u201cBecause we\u2019ve rediscovered that joy, fearlessness and freedom without the self-consciousness of youth.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Rumman Talukder\u2019s favourite circus trick is called the Mermaid. Every Sunday, the 60-year-old IT consultant drives from his home in Stanmore to a circus school in Ware to practise it. Hanging from a trapeze by one arm, with his back arched and his legs wrapped around the rope, he says it makes him feel \u201cstrong<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":50914,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[16435,24927,659,3626,1403,7984,7416],"class_list":{"0":"post-50913","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-circus","9":"tag-fearlessness","10":"tag-find","11":"tag-generation","12":"tag-joy","13":"tag-older","14":"tag-roll"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=50913"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50913\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/50914"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=50913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=50913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=50913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}