It’s the simple things, like being able to finally do one of those things that soothes your soul. I know it wasn’t as long as 923 days, but it felt like it had been that long — maybe even longer. You can take the Greek woman out of the kitchen, but you can’t take the baker out of the Greek woman, especially during the holidays.
So, yes, it hasn’t been 923 days because there have been Christmases and Santa needed his cookies. There have been hungry baseball players traveling to away games, birthdays to celebrate and Tuesdays, when all I wanted was cake.
923 days? Maybe I’ve been in the ring too long with perimenopause and my math computational skills have tanked. Perimenopause has at least 34 commonly experienced symptoms; some sources imply the potential symptoms are three times that number — the ability to add numbers together must be somewhere in that triple-digit symptom list.
This isn’t all just brain fog. There is one thing I know with certainty when it comes to applying mathematics to the last time I baked one specific good: homemade bread. I know what I did last summer and it was to learn how to make my mom’s recipe for Greek-style homemade bread. It was a bucket list item checked off, but I need to get back into the kitchen to bake it, again — it’s been 173 days and that (number) is fact.
Beyond the brain fog, I’ll spare readers the lengthy list of symptoms middle-aged women potentially experience; if you know, you know.
For all the Joe-Frazier-type-of-hook punches perimenopause throws, the knockout blow comes only if a middle-aged woman does these two things in the bout: lose sight of who she’s fighting for and lose her sense of humor. The latter can feel like trying to climb Mount Everest (or Mount Annapurna, for those thrill-seekers wanting to climb the world’s most dangerous mountain).
The more-than-12 rounds of loss of speech and mobility aren’t funny, but the perimenopausal middle-aged woman must fight like a boxer in a professional boxing championship fight to seek out the humor in the unpredictability of the glorious life stage she is grateful to be in, because the sight of who she is fighting for, is her purpose.
For all the hard, unpleasant and wacky symptoms middle-aged women potentially experience, there is one seemingly universal one that is wonderful — caring less what others think about what we wear. If a middle-age woman wants to wear yoga pants, she is going to wear yoga pants. It’s freeing not to feel the need to conform to old-fashioned societal mindsets, like women over 40 shouldn’t have long hair or wear a two-piece bathing suit.
Over 40 (in fact, closer to 50) — check.
Long hair (albeit, Revlon helps revitalize the chestnut color) — check.
Two-piece bathing suit (red string bikini) — check.
Go ahead, and call me, “Ma’am,” because I accept and embrace it.
Suzanna Parpos is a single mom and writer that works in the field of special education. Her essays have appeared in the Sunday Boston Globe Magazine, Worcester Magazine and several other publications. Find her at: www.suzannaparpos.com.
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