All year long I have told anyone who asked my age that I was 38. Now my thirty eighth birthday is coming around the bend and I have a choice to make: I could start saying I'm 36 to anyone who asks and wait for them to do the math (
she had her daughter on her 18th birthday and her daughter said proudly she turns 20 this year hmmmmm) or I can stay 39 for the next 3 years or so, except for the weekend we spend my 40th birthday in Vegas by the pool at the Hard Rock.
I
never would have imagined myself at the fork in the road where you begin to embrace middle age and say good bye to post adolescence, but here I am, about to have a daughter in her twenties and thank GOD above she isn't pregnant or doesn't already have kids.
I think about what that must have been like for my mother when I came to her 21 years ago at the age of 17 and she was just 37 finding out she was gonna be a grandma. I cringe every time someone I went to high school with announces on the Facebook that they are going to be grandparents via their unwed, unsuccessful, single daughters.
I hate to think that just because they can, they will, and they do go out and repeat the mistakes we made as young sluts in high school. It continues to smear in my face my choice to disbelieve in
generational sin against my mothers hounding.
I refused to believe that my daughter would fall victim to the same s#!t that I did just for the fact that I
did make a mistake. Why should she be "cursed to follow in the same footsteps"? Why couldn't MY daughter end up being the exception to the rule? I think that's more my Mom wishing the same f*cked up life on me that she had but I don't want to get into that right now.
Soon I will be forty and as my body begins to ache in the same places the elderly complain about, my hormones are going bonkers and the days of light, simple menstrual cycles have turned to passing still born blood chunks and hot flashes I feel myself changing for the first time in my life and it's strange.
I suppose the best way to go about it is just to deal with it as comfortably as possible and pray that no one gets hurt. In the meantime, I'm 36, I'm not a grandmother, I own my home and my marriage is intact after 11 years of blended family bliss. Aside from an achy back, manic depression and the sudden need for Midol once a month, I can't say going through the change is all that bad. Really it's more of what you make it.
Anyone else out there going through this? What was your experience? Is "the change" as horrible as they say?
True
Comments (2)
Next March I will turn 29. I have never considered telling a false age to anyone, but I cannot say how I feel in 10 years. I say be truthful to yourself, accept you for who you are and live life. After all, it's just a number, doesn't make a difference for the experiences you've had or will encounter in the future. I agree, you should make the best of life. I'd consider you to be in a good position to have a wonderful family and a home, regardless of age.
Be real, be true, and take good care of yourself. Menopause at age 38 is early. You are young! Please do yourself a favor and pursue high-quality nutrition, eliminate factory foods, and see an endocrinologist. mw