“Hi!” he said.
“Hi!” I said, stopping to talk while immediately wondering how to deflect the inevitable question “what books did you get?”
Fortunately, he didn't ask that question and either missed or ignored my nervous juggling of the books as I tried to mask titles, spines, and glaring back cover lines announcing “Hot Flashes and Night Sweats!”
Menopause is a topic and an experience that takes some getting used to and it is not something you want to broadcast to one of the cute PTA dads. Whether he noticed the books or not I don’t know, but I took solace in remembering that he, his wife, and I were all born in the same year, 1961. Menopause was likely a topic and an experience he was becoming familiar with.
The internal panic I felt during that awkward masking-a-secret-while-talking-to-a-cute-guy conversation was only surpassed by one other in memory – a time when a super cute boy entered my open dorm room right after I had farted. I was sitting at my desk while on exchange at the University of Delaware looking at a photo album when he came through the door. As he approached me to look over my shoulder at the album I whipped those large cardboard pages back and forth in hopes of dissipating the gaseous hangover cloud we were now both in the center of. (sigh)
Sometimes your complicated humanness is going to seep out in any number of ways, and life goes on – even if a 35-year old memory can still cause a cringe.
When menopause symptoms first begin, you don’t really know that that’s what’s happening, especially as some of them begin earlier than you might think. What is this? Is this...? How is this whole thing going to go down?
One of the books I checked out of the library had a chirpy, humorous tone as it outlined the litany of things one could experience: hot flashes, mood swings, fatigue, hair loss, sleep disorders, decreased sex drive, lack of concentration, weight gain, dizziness, incontinence, bloating, anxiety, brittle nails, irritability, memory lapses, headaches, panic disorders, dry itchy skin, dry vagina, vaginal atrophy, digestive issues, constipation, and something called “electric shock sensation,” (among other things.) I was really not prepared for the barrage of every single thing that could happen, and especially not ready for the perky tone of that one book. I might lose my ability to concentrate, AND leak in my pants while working for my new much younger male boss! Ha ha! My vagina could dry up, but it may little matter with my new decreased sex drive! Ho Ho!
I told my friend, Donna about the “panic disorders” and “mood swings” being brought on by reading the first few chapters of the “funny” menopause book and she wisely and simply said, “take the book back.”
The reality is that menopause (like everything else) is unique to each woman. We won’t get every possible symptom so why focus or fret on what could happen? More importantly, what will happen will happen regardless of the books we read, and as they do, you just need to accept or alleviate as best you can. (I chose hormone replacement with a low estrogen patch which has helped considerably with the main symptoms I experienced: hot flashes, dry itchy skin, and short-term memory loss. As for the va-jay-jay, one word: Vagifem, an utter godsend first mentioned to me by a woman older than I. Every woman over 50 ought to know about this option just in case.)
Here’s something as unexpected as learning of the litany of possible symptoms: menopause can free a woman in a way she has never known, with age and experience besting the freedoms we may have had in our 20s. Estrogen is a hormone which, in part, drives us to keep the peace at home and at work. Estrogen does some wonderful things, but also participated in fueling the good girl, the helper, the supporter. One of the (more serious) menopause books I read said that when your estrogen drops, you may find yourself saying "make your own god damned sandwich!” At its best, menopause can be a time for a woman to find herself, figure out what she likes, wants, needs. It can be a time to pursue long-buried dreams or interests, to learn how to paint or skydive or brew beer; to travel or start a business or leave an unhealthy relationship. Menopause can provide an opportunity for a new start and a new perspective.
Imagine running into someone as you come from the library with a stack of books under your arm and being asked what you checked out. Imagine showing them books about learning to brew beer or starting a new business or reading up on Japan in preparation for a trip there. There are so many plans to make when you’re awake in the middle of the night!
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