I was sitting in my office today, my short term memory

on the fritz, a little flushed,and wondering why.

Yet sadly I knew why, perimenopausal, menopause, whatever.

I am there. Doctors explain in clinical terms all that

body will now be going through. Yipppeee.

Depletion in hormones, mood swings, hot flashes, short

term memory blurs,weight gain, weight loss, chin hairs.

My hormones aren't depleting, they're jumping ship and not

leaving a forwarding address. Hot flashes what a huge ball

of fun. I was standing in line in a store not to long ago,

when that warm flush starts near my knees and creeps

slowly upward, till there is a rivulet of sweat running

from scalp down my back, all the way down till it hits my

waistband and then the sweat has found the next venue, yep

off my scalp, down my neck into my bra. It's so attractive.

Curiously I sneak a glance at the next person in line. They

don't seem to be sweating like a pony at the Kentucky

Derby in the home stretch. I am fanning myself hard enough

that I could make Tinkerbell fly. Finally by the grace of

God the line moves quickly and I could flee outside. Yep,

outside, anticipating the coolness. Only this is Fl. and

it's friggin' 84* outside.

Now I've always been chubby,sans the 4 years I weightlifted

my way to a single digit in clothes. So I can only say that

menopause has not helped my chubbiness. It's harder to lose

weight.


Mood swings haven't really been an issue for me, I mean I'm

usually a bitch, so really only my voice projection has

increased slightly from time to time.

Yeah, uh, okay, possibly my temper does get a little

testy when my family yells to me from the other end of the

house and I have no bloody clue what the hell their saying

and then they get clippy with me because they have to

repeat themselves. Or when I go to bed leaving a clean

kitchen only to wake to find that there was a party in my

kitchen as I slept and look, oh goody, they left me the

dirty dishes,a dirty stove and enough bread crumbs to out do

Hansel & Gretel.

I had heard the folklore of chin hairs and was somewhat

skeptical. They come one at a time or in a pack. At first

I was kind of mesmerized. Then I was filled with abject

horror,and mentally thinking-- WTF !!

Usually most of us have handled 40 plus years of our cycle,

then the damn elves show up one day, they sneak in and

carry away our eggs one at a time, suck up our hormones

and leave.

I listen to those still filled with eggs and hormones as

they complain about their cycle. Lucky them, seriously.

They truly have no clue what's in store. Because they

can only imagine it.

Perky breasts, taut skin, ovulating, their cycle, all

will be replaced with an older woman they don't recognize.

Yet she'll remember them very well.