Women are resilient. They don’t even know it. They just get on with life, which just so happens to be as a woman. How did women get on in the past, without the internet and self diagnosis? The menopause is a bloody nightmare. You don’t just question your body, you second guess your mind too.
For more than a year I’ve struggled with physical problems – am I poorly? Am I menopausal? Am I just a tired mum? Is it my thyroid? Is it something l’m too tired to Google? Turns out I’m peri-menopausal, but there isn’t a test for that…so I just have to get on with it.
Yet, every second week I have a dreadful period. Every week I have awful pains. Every day I feel like I’m having a hideous hangover despite drinking little. The good thing is I have a reference to my female side of the family – menopause by 38 years old is in my genes. And I just have to get on with it. That’s life. My boy won’t have a sibling. Awful to say out loud, because it means I must accept my fertility/ mortality in one sweep. And likely much sooner than most. But what can be good? Well… the hideous pain in all areas will be gone, maybe the hormonal extremes of my emotions will go, the awful physical period and all it’s drama (blankets down etc) will be a distant memory and perhaps I should be excited about the next step in my life?
This general under-the-weather feeling – the idea that it is fleeting is amazing – it helps with envisaging myself in the future; because it’s only for now… just a little longer.
But by god, it’s easy to get caught up in it, to be wrapped up in the hideousness of it all, when really it’s just a phase. Here’s to those women in the past that just did it. And carried on with all the other shit that is a women’s daily duty – kids, work, the home and wife. I hope I can be that strong.
Getting to grips with middle age
I’m really struggling at the moment with my body and mind… they seem to belong to other people.
I physically am working on keeping fit and healthy but find my mind is happy being mischievous and naughty. At work I say and do things that are misleading because I can’t stand the person I’m talking to. And then I send an email that makes it better. I honk the car horn at someone that wants my side of the road…it’s never mattered before. I’m going to get in trouble if I don’t stop.
Perhaps this is my midlife crisis. Emotionally I’m all over the shop. Perhaps it’s because this peri menopausal stage has me guessing at every step. I can’t keep up with periods every second week. But of course, peri menopausal means it can’t be diagnosed and in turn has nothing that can help. Doctors must be relieved that they have a year or two of non diagnosis.
Is it related to my hair colour? I’ve been blonde for a few months and feel like I’ve stopped being me – I don’t stand up for my beliefs, I like to lurk in the shadows… don’t draw attention to myself. Tonight I’m colouring my hair – back to red. Even though I convinced myself that at my age I needed to be blonde – red is too severe and I can’t carry it off. Turns out my mind has other ideas.
I stood up for a belief recently at work…am I resorting back to type? I hope so. I’ve been so busy worrying about other people and their feelings that I’ve forgotten to be me. Turns out I do have a moral compass, and if you don’t like it you can shove it up your ass.
Where has my fight gone? Did it fall away with the placenta? Did I get so tired I couldn’t do more than one task at at time? I have struggled with thinking that everyone thinks like me… I’m so disappointed that I get proven wrong. Why don’t people want world peace and happiness for all? Why don’t people want to help others? Why do people want to shit on me from a great height to prove they are good at what they do? Why do they need to treat me like shit to make themselves look good? Who cares if they look good? I’m just the emotional baggage discarded on the way. Problem I’m having is I’m at the bottom of the school food chain – there’s nobody for me to shit on. Nobody for me to ask for help.
How much longer can I last?
Holidays almost gone….
Just one more week and it’s back to work… this last week is number six of my first summer off in almost 25 years and not sweating buckets in a grubby hole in retail.
Heaven. No back to school dramas of mums who shop the week before school goes back (why does your inability to manage the inevitability of new term become my responsibility?). No shitty clueless manager trying school playground games for attention (nobody likes you or rates you. Dry your eyes and move on prick). No fat greedy pirate pissing my pension into the Mediterranean (I don’t think karma or the government are doing enough). Instead I have a garden that looks cared for and a son that is happy with his lot. I’ve managed some decorating and keeping fit. My time has been spread between family and English Heritage – no deadlines or rushing. No excuses for not having the time to meet up and catch up. And all the while I haven’t had to phone in sick to enjoy my sons company- palming him off to a (brilliant) childminder when he just wants to be at home. So, thank you new job for enabling me and my life choices; I choose poor bank account and contented heart which = me at ground zero. Now I’m ready to rebuild, rediscover and re-establish that which makes me, me.
Kinda daunting though.
After all the superficial people and things in retail (I was good at what I did and was distracted with all the shiny-shiny) I’m considering a new career in education… I’ve narrowed it down to KS3 and the public sector. However, private schools give you a free lunch, gym membership and lots off school fees…
But despite that, will I be able to juggle a government led syllabus with helping young people make sensible life choices? Will I just be tired and repetitive going through the motions because I’m down to cover three maths classes instead of preparing for an exciting hour of discovery? Will my enthusiasm be knocked out of me in the first week? Changing my career now – was that the right thing to do?
I can’t go back. I don’t want to go back, but at least I know the past. My future’s a little blurred around the edges and I’m uncomfortable with not being able to work out the details. But there’s no choice really- I’ve begun this roller coaster ride and can’t get off……………. education here I come!!!!!