Werewolves can do many things, and undoubtedly, they have an incredible amount of powers. But it’s generally accepted that werewolves are not immortal and that, although it’s difficult, they can be killed. This got me thinking, sure they can die, but do they age? And how exactly does that happen? Why do some werewolves seem to stay teenagers for a long time, while there are also werewolves that are elderly? They must age, but just how does that work?
Werewolves certainly do age. But they can kind of control their aging in a way. And even though Stephenie Meyer may have taken great liberties with her take on the vampire, she did keep it pretty close to common folklore when it came to the wolves and how they age. Like Stephenie describes in the books, werewolves can age. However, as long as they continue to shape-shift and take on the form of the werewolf, they will not age. This means that werewolves can stay a certain age for as long.
Once werewolves stop shifting permanently, they will continue to age as they normally would. But even this aging won’t happen right away. The wolf first has to demonstrate that they have to control to keep from shifting and that they can maintain that control over a prolonged period of time. No one really knows how long it will take before the shifting will stop completely and aging will begin.
There are some parts of werewolf folklore that have werwolves living thousands of years. Even though they’re not immortal, they stay alive for this long even if they stop actually shifting into wolf form. These myths are few and far between and even within them, the wolves who can actually live that long are even fewer. And of course, there’s always the fact that werewolves are things of great mystery. And so, we’ll probably never know what the actual truth is!
– Kate
