Deloney made a comment recently about my testiness. While he may have been joking, he actually hit the nail on the head. (If anyone tells me that my writing is ripe with idioms I'm going to bop them... and I'm going to bop them twice if they tell me that I should have written “rife” instead of “ripe”.) Even I have noticed how incredibly cranky I am these days. It's not only the things that might irritate anybody that are getting to me--like today, I'm sure someone in the grocery store called me “sir” and yesterday, when I was buying tickets for a concert with a friend who is 12 years older than me and he paid the senior's price and I paid the adult's, they tried to hand me his change as if I was the senior. No, my irritability is all-encompassing; it's sort of like my own personal pandemic.
This irritating state of affairs has arisen only in the past six months. Prior to that I was fairly easygoing. Because I'm turning 50 this year and at the risk of sounding like someone who uses hormones to excuse any sort of behaviour, I can't help but wonder whether my irritability is a symptom of menopause (I don't have any physical symptoms yet like hot flashes or changing periods). Someone described the hot flashes she experiences as feeling like an alien has taken over her body. They make her want to scratch her skin off and run away from herself. That's similar to how I feel about my irritability: it's like something alien has invaded and I want to get away from my mind because it's not mine anymore and it's driving me crazy.
The only potentially beneficial thing about my current situation is that it is forcing me to think about my self and what that means. Can the me I think I am change so dramatically because of some change in my body's chemistry? And if so, is “me” just a bunch of chemical substances? When I look at disorders like schizophrenia or dementia and how bio-physiology can cause such changes in perceptions and personality, I can't help but think that who I am is determined by whatever my body is or isn't producing. Even though I'm not religious, the thought of such soullessness is rather frightening. Or perhaps what frightens me is that it may not be mind over matter but the other way around, which means that, essentially, I'm at the mercy of a meaninglessness of molecules.
I also wonder whether this is the new me or whether it's only a temporary state. And if it's the latter, how long is temporary? I have a group of women friends who are about 10 years older than me. One of them reassured me that women feel great and regain their energy once they are postmenopausal, although she's been waiting and waiting and growing increasingly irritated by how long it's taking her to reach that stage. On the other hand, a coworker reported that her grandmother went through menopause in five minutes. She had a hot flash during the Lord's prayer at church one morning and that was it, done.
Deliver us from protracted menopause...
Go to these ones too
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
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(Of course I was joking.) (Susan says that soy products help with menopausal symptoms. So when the time comes...) (On my good days I believe in a soul. Not the same as personality...but these big questions are beyond my pea-brain.) (Happy St. Paddy's.)
I don't think anyone really and truly believes that he or she is a meaninglessness of molecules. "O, that way madness lies; let me shun that."
I was going to comment, but was afraid you'd get mad at me.
(My word verification is hydra. Does that piss you off?)
Yes. It's making me want to grow a bunch of heads and strike you dead.
You're a regular pit viper.
(Hautata - my word verifications just keep getting better)
Did you ever hear that joke about the viper?
I haven't. Let's hear it.
As I sit here wondering why it seems I can never get enough accomplished and suspecting that I'm just not as productive as I used to be, being kicked in the ass by my still-regular (thank god) period, and feeling rather hurt and testy after receiving an e-mail from my 83-year-old boyfriend/author who is once again feeling neglected (I never write unless it's business!), I can only completely appreciate, once again, a beautifully honest Helen post. Thank you. And, I've often marveled at how chemically based we are. And you're right, it's scary. And I'd write more about this, but frankly, I'm feeling exhausted and fat and bloated.
A woman gets a call one day.
I am the viper, and I am coming next week.* (All italicized text is said in a menacing European accent.)
The woman thinks it’s a prank call by some pesky teenagers with bad accents. A few days later though, she picks up the phone.
I am the viper, and I am coming in a few days.*
Now she gets a little worried. She becomes alarmed when two days later she gets the following call.
I am the viper, and I am coming tomorrow.*
The woman doesn’t sleep at all that night, terrified of the fate about to befall her. The next morning, the doorbell rings. She opens the door.
I am the viper, and I have come to vipe your vindows.*
Groan. And I was so looking forward to hearing it, too.
Now I just want to hear about IB's 83-year-old boyfriend.
While we're waiting for Indigo, how about this one:
Why did the viper want to become a python?
He got the coiling.
I edit a quarterly journal and he's an author I've worked with for the last 14 (?) years. We are destined to never meet in person. He is feeling neglected. And he is testy.
Ask him if he's going through andropause.
It is March 17th and I am not drunk. Is that what andropause means?
Brilliant - the post, the exchange. Further comment is meaningless.
Mali, I agree with you completely. However, it's after midnight (whatever difference that makes), so I have a few things to say.
A pit viper, therefore, must be a person who vipes pits. The question is, are these the sort of pits that are dug underground, or are they pits like cherry pits? I prefer to think that the Pit Viper has OCD and vipes the cherry pits (and peach pits, and avocado pits) before placing them, one by one, in the garbage.
Deloney is right: eat soy! And find a reputable homeopath to help with the moods. Seriously, I felt at the mercy of my hormones for years and years. I love the post-menopausal calm.
MM: I just realized that the reason the joke wasn't so funny was that it was supposed to be said in a menacing Eastern European accent. Reciting it the same way one would say ciao bello just doesn't have the same effect.
Deloney: A textbook sign, although I don't think it appears in most textbooks. But it should.
Mali: Thank you, you're an old soul.
Susan: What are you doing up after midnight? I'm impressed. You're living proof of post-menopausal energy. And I love your pit viper musings. MM will probably groan though. And I do eat soy... lots of it.
Indigo: How come you two have never met?
Helen: We live nowhere near one another, and the one time I offered to fly out to an event to meet him, he demurred.
http://44for365.blogspot.com/2006/12/311365-gordon.html
Sigh, once again late to the party. But my comment verification is angr...
But speaking of "late" to the party...is it bad that I'm extending breastfeeding in order to continue my false post-menopausal state? I'd nurse this kid til he was wrestling me down for it if it kept my cycle at bay...
Sorry to say I hardly qualify as the poster girl for post-menopausal energy. I was up late because I don't get home from work until 10:00 p.m. at the earliest. I'm tired most of the time. But I will say I had a lot of energy in my first PM decade. Maybe because I was thinner then.
My verification word is VULTING. Sounds rather harsh.
If that was a serious question, Bridgett, I'm all for baby-led weaning. So my advice is to leave that decision up to him. (See? No guilt involved!)
I know what you mean about testiness, Helen. I've been testy for quite some time. (I always think of Shirley Mclaine in Steel Magnolias (the movie) saying something like, "I've just been in a bad mood for a decade" when I think of my testiness. It has been almost that long...
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