I'll be starting my program in the fall. I'm just a few years younger than you. What kinds of difficulties have you encountered? What assumptions are being made?
By and large, I haven't had to deal with too much overt ageism. The questions I tend to get are subtle, such as "I see you have a prior career and life experience -- how will you feel about being supervised and dealing with the experience of being a trainee?" or "Oh, I see you live in __ town. That's a long commute every day for internship. How do you think you'll handle that?" I had one supervisor at a practicum site tell me flat out -- "I wasn't in favor of hiring you. In my experience it's harder for older students to adapt to learning the clinical work." That last comment was a shocker! But I think she must have been an outlier, because no one else has ever been this blatant.
In my program I've felt great acceptance of older students. In fact, I've always felt they value students who bring something different, whether culturally or in some other respect. Once or twice I felt I was expected to attend events on the weekend, which is harder for me to do because I have three school-age children. Overall though, people have been great -- both students and faculty. I think some supervisors are slightly uncomfortable advising older students. We can be intimidating, I guess
. On the other hand, far more of my supervisors seem to enjoy the challenge of working with someone more "seasoned". I've been told that I pick things up quickly, and I believe it's in part due to the wealth of experiences working with people and organizations which I bring to my work.
Anyway -- I think when you interview around you'll get a sense of programs that are more welcoming to older students. I felt comfortable at my PsyD program from the first time I arrived there on interview day. I could feel in my gut that they valued me. For the most part, I've been proven right.
edit: I just realized you've already been accepted somewhere, so ignore this last point! Sorry I missed this. Hopefully you've gotten the vibes of acceptance from the program already. Good luck with that. Also, in reading Mark's last post, I think he makes some good points. One challenge for me has been more of a personal one: before I began grad school I thought I knew myself and had little desire to open all of that up and "reassemble it." There was a time in my doctoral program when I felt like I was sort of falling apart -- the old me was no longer the same but the new me was a work in progress. Everything I thought I knew I was forced to approach differently, from the lens of a psychologist. Anyway -- this was a temporary "crisis" and I'm better for having gone through the process. In fact, I'm grateful for it. I say this not to scare you, but just as a way of communicating that I've had to be open to changing some of my personal style and values along the way. It was harder than I thought it would be, but very rewarding. I wouldn't change a thing!
