I think I’m going through a premature menopause.
Think about it: I already have granny arms. I’m saggy in places that 22 year-old girls should normally be perky. I’ve got an odd smell about me (I skipped the shower today—I was too hot to bear it). It’s so obvious. Menopause.
The menopause is starting to affect my marriage. Poor Kyle couldn’t get me out of the house quick enough when I was planning my departure for Arizona last week. I had the choice of flying out on either Thursday or Friday (I was flying standby and there were five times more seats available Friday than Thursday), and when I asked Poor Kyle what he thought, he said, “Oh, you should leave Thursday. Definitely.”
“Even though there’s only going to be three seats available for me?” I asked, stalling with the hope that he’d come up with something sweet to say, like, oh, I dunno…MAYBE YOU SHOULD WAIT ONE MORE DAY SO I WON’T HAVE TO MISS YOU AS MUCH, MY SWEET WIFE?
Instead he said, “Yeah. Thursday. For sure. Where’s your suitcase? I’ll help you pack.”
I can’t be certain, but I’m pretty sure that when I paused in the airport entry to wave a final somber goodbye to my husband, I caught a glimpse of him punching his fist in the air with glee. He was thrilled to be rid of me.
I don’t blame him, really—I am going through premature menopause, after all, and I’m not that fun to be around these days. I would want me to leave Thursday, too, if I were Poor Kyle. See, lately I seem to get annoyed by the smallest of disturbances (translation: I’ve become a grouchy old broad thirty years before my time) and blow them way out of proportion. Seriously.
Exhibit One: Trying to deposit a cheque from a Canadian bank into my American chequing account proved to be much more tiresome than I had planned. Instead of taking it in stride like a young, vivacious girl ought to, I grumbled and growled and clacked my dentures at the poor bank teller who thought he’d entered some sort of geriactric twilight zone where all the crazy old hags look deceivingly like college co-eds.
Exhibit Two: Facebook has really gotten on my nerves lately (oh, my poor nerves!). If I have to read one more Obama quiz marked “STRONGLY DISAPPROVE I HATE THE MAN’S VERY EXISTENCE AND EVERYTHING IS ALL HIS FAULT,” I will probably delete my account. Not to be dramatic, or anything. But yes, to be dramatic.
Exhibit Three: I’ve been replying to emails all day, but the Mail program is having difficulties sending them. As it stands, there are twenty messages in my outbox that keep trying to send themselves every few minutes, but to no avail. This is just the sort of thing Poor Kyle could fix for me if he knew I was having a problem, but he does not. It makes me hopping mad. Some people might simply delete the unsent messages and call it a loss, but I hate to go to so much work responding to comments just to have them lost in cyberspace. So if you randomly receive an email next week (after I sort out my email issues) in response to a comment you made on yesterday’s post, please forgive me my trespasses. I am but a lone girl drowning in a sea of technological advancement; all the lifeboats are full of first-class passengers, and I don’t have a penny to my name.
Exhibit Four: I just bawled through My Sister’s Keeper next to my (also bawling) dear friend in an empty movie theatre. Who even does that? It’s the menopause hormones; I’m sure of it. After the film ended, I talked to my own sister on the phone and told her I loved her. I always tell her I love her, but I don’t usually call to tell her that and only that. She asked me if I was getting ready to commit suicide or something. Nope, just covering my bases.
Exhibit Five: Today, while trying on clothes in the fitting room at my local JC Penny (menopause), I started sweating profusely. I had to sit down on the little corner bench in the fitting room and fan myself with a crumpled up tissue I dug out from the bottom of my purse. As sure as I’m typing this blog post right now, I was having a hot flash. A hot flash. I, who wear closed-toe shoes to movie theatres and restaurants because I’m always so cold in public places, had my first hot flash!
Exhibit Six: I’ve been feeling a bit gassy. A sure-fire indication of menopause, no?
This is all very disturbing to me, to be experiencing symptoms of menopause at such a young age. But, as per my new take-charge attitude of “Get Over It,” (i.e. If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em), I’m attempting to fight my way through the darkness. Do any of my more life-experienced readers have suggestions for me to deal with these unexpected changes?
I would just Google™ it, but I seem to have misplaced my trifocal reading glasses, and you know I’m lost without them.
Pingback: Archives of Our Lives » Crowning Glory