What Book are You Reading?

About 20 years ago, my mother sent all her daughters one of those "everything-you-ever-wanted-to-know" books about menopause.

I was a long way off, so I tucked it away somewhere. In my various moves, I must have sold it a garage sale, because when I needed it (earlier this year), I couldn't find it.

I dragged my feet getting a replacement. Finally, I went to my local bookstore.

"Do you have a copy of Our Bodies, Our Selves?"

Of course. She led me to the place and pulled out the latest edition of this classic.

"Actually, I want the one next to it..."

She looked confused as I pulled out Our Bodies, Our Selves: MENOPAUSE.

"This way I could have you help me find the book without using the "M" word."

She laughed. I laughed.

But I was grateful for the brown paper bag they offered at check-out.

I took the book home, then promptly misplaced it. For weeks.

After a particularly bitchy weekend, my husband found it for me.

I have begrudgingly started reading it, but I'm glad I finally stopped putting it off. It's making me feel better. Well written, both grounded in research, yet with enough feminism to make me feel not so alone.

I recommend it.

It's Begun

Okay then. It's begun.
Just last month.
While my body has been changing for several years, this last month, evidence that I've entered "The Change" is pretty damn evident:

• I skipped a month.
• I'll just be sitting here, doing nothing, minding my own business, when a WAVE of heat washes through me.
• I'll wake up in the middle of the night and although not sweating, I'll be very warm and kick off the covers. Then I'll wake up not long later and be freezing.
• Sleep has always been my friend; I've never had trouble here. Now... insomnia.

And did I mention? I'm a bitch. I say things and some inside Self turns around and looks at me incredulously: why the hell did you just say that? I give her the bird.

Oh how fun.

On Becoming a Woman of a Certain Age

I've started this blog because as I reach the end of my 40s, I'm increasingly experiencing a disconnect between what I feel and what I see in the mirror. (Who IS that person? When did I become HER? What's happening to my SKIN, for God's sake?! I FEEL like a 25-year-old, but dear heaven: what's THAT in the mirror?!)

For example, while inside, I feel like this:



clearly this is not what I LOOK like anymore...

Instead, my body is increasingly looking like this:






I want a place to vent my frustrations (sometimes my terror), and to hear from other women who are experiencing a change in relation to their bodies. I want to acknowledge my fear and to find ways to move beyond it. I want to find a way to embrace this aging body, to find a new relationship to it.

More later....