A woman is considered menopausal after she ceases having her periods for a year. Naturally induced menopause begins sometime in a woman’s 40s or 50s. The average age for a woman in the United States entering menopause is 51. I entered menopause at the age of 48. It could not have happened at a crappier time. I was in the middle of the worst years of my adult life. It felt as if I’d been shoved off a cliff into an endless abyss of darkness. I filled my canteen with Sauvignon Blanc and held on for dear life. I was drowning in self-doubt, debt, and despair. I was also drowning in sweat. The sweat had started a few years earlier, and not a single doctor had answers as to why I was waking up in a puddle each morning. I’d moved so many times, I didn’t have a long-term relationship with a lady doctor. My periods stopped. I was angry. I was morose. I began packing on the pounds at an alarmingly rapid rate. It wasn’t pretty, people, not by a long shot.

I’m going to be really real now, because, as I said before, I think women should tell the truth. Some women float through menopause without a care. They’ll wax poetic about how easy it was and how they survived by doing yoga and eating copious amounts of kale. The rest of us feel a deeply rooted urge to smack them senseless. There are lots of books about doing yoga and eating kale and navigating menopause with ease. This isn’t one of them. That wasn’t my experience, and it isn’t most women’s experience. This is my experience.

Welcome to More Fun with Menopause, our irregularly scheduled moment to contemplate the fun-filled symptoms of the pause that is meno!

I’d like to report that it’s been a walk in the park for lo these past couple of weeks, when the wine wears off, the amount of dark chocolate needed for maintaining the status quo exceeds my body mass, escapist vacations fade into the mists of memory, and the herbal remedy Band-Aid™ bursts like a cork in the Hoover Dam after a flash flood, but I would be lying. It has been more like a crawl through gravel, in a heat wave, while being bitten by fire ants and pummeled with baseballs.

There are moments when I’m quite sure I’m functioning at 25 percent of my normal happy capacity. There has to be a word for that. Let’s call it “happacity.” My “happacity” is normally fairly high, mostly driven by an amazing gift for forcefully shoving gently placing those dark thoughts deep into the recesses of my subconsciousness. You know, denial. It’s taken years of practice.

Based on the sad, sad confessional poetry I wrote in my 20s when I received the nickname “Madge,” I have done a bang-up job of deluding convincing myself that I am generally a shiny, happy person. Most of life is perception; we become what we think. I grew weary of Depressing Feminist Poetry Madge. Besides, Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton pretty much have that market cornered, and you know how well that worked out for them. I like Glittery Uplifting Madge better. I’m fairly certain the rest of the world concurs. Yet, stalwart, irreverent, Glittery Uplifting Madge is being sorely tested by the current fuzzy-brained, tear-filled fright fest being brought on by her rapidly depleting hormones.

In other words, my happacity is in the shitter, folks.

If Depressing Feminist Poetry Madge were to write something about this current state, it would read something like this:

Crawling out of my skin,

Though impossible,

Seems the only option.

Therefore the lack thereof

Leaves me lacking

A place to hide.

Who is this stranger

Inhabiting my body?

Can I coax her out with

Vague promises of

Dark chocolate and

Wine?

Glittery Uplifting Madge would write something like this:

Hang in there, Madge-y,

(Which rhymes with Vag-y)

See how I did that?

Auntie Flo is leaving,

Soon you won’t be grieving.

This too shall pass!

No, really.

Just add glitter.

Lots and lots of glitter.

Will our plucky heroine find her happacity returning to above normal soon? How long will this emotional roller-coaster ride continue? Will regular use of an over-the-counter menopause remedy bring on brighter days? Is there enough wine in the world to keep her on the sunny side of the street? Stay tuned for the answers to these and any other questions that arise in the next episode of More Fun with Menopause.

I’m still free-falling, but I’ve grown more accustomed to the feeling. I’ve also found herbal solutions for most of the symptoms. They work well for around three weeks of each month, then, just like my cycles when I was menstruating, the fourth week is a crapshoot. Or more aptly, it’s crap. Shoot me. During my most recent lady prodding, my lady doctor recommended that I wean myself off the herbal remedies. I was incredulous! Without the benefits of any hormone-level testing or discussing my symptoms and complaints, this female doctor suggested that I should suck it up and stop taking supplements. What amazes me is that not a single lady doctor I’ve visited for my annual lady prodding since entering menopause at 48 has discussed any form of hormone replacement therapy or any solutions at all for the symptoms. My complaints have mostly been met with shrugs. The underlying message is that women should suffer in silence. I believe there is a vast menopause conspiracy.

Billions of dollars are spent researching, marketing, and promoting solutions for erectile dysfunction—a global crisis, apparently—but comparatively little money is spent researching, marketing, or promoting solutions for the symptoms of menopause.

I realize that not being able to get a boner is a tragedy, but not being able to function in your day-to-day life without wanting to run off into the woods screaming is a bit more challenging. I’m just saying.

cactus flower

I have been dragging three cacti around for years. They were given to me to care for, and I’ve done my best, despite my brown thumb. They’re barely hanging on, and only thrive in the summer months when they can sit outside and soak up the sunshine and raindrops. They’re bedraggled and half dead, and I have counted them almost out many times. Yet, ever the stalwart fighters, they continue to surprise me. One cactus has grown a flower every year. This little cactus is half dead. Yet, somehow, it summons the will to form a stem and grow a flower that blooms for eight glorious hours. Weeks of anticipation, for eight hours of triumph.

I can relate to this little cactus. Sometimes I feel half dead, bedraggled, and lacking in sufficient sunshine and raindrops. There are days and even weeks when I think whatever hope I had of blooming again is delusion at best. Last week was one of those, and it was a doozy. I was down, out, and being pummeled relentlessly. It was tragi-comical, emphasis on “tragi.”

There’s a pattern of late: A seemingly wonderful opportunity appears out of nowhere! I get super excited about it!

“Hooray! New opportunity!” Take that, Failure.

Failure: “Not so fast, honey.”

Then the new opportunity fizzles spectacularly.

Me: “Crap.”

I toss up my virtual white flag and surrender.

“Okay, Failure. You win, I give up. I’m just a half-dead cactus in a crappy clay pot.”

Resounding silence.

Me: “Whatever.”

This morning, I woke up with a renewed resolve. I remembered that I’m not alone. There are millions of women like me. Our knowledge has value, our passion has not faded. We’re not half dead, we’re fully alive. Late bloomers bloom best, because we’re survivors.

We’ve survived the unspeakable, we’ve navigated the impossible, we’ve been knocked down, shut up, and rejected over and over again. Yet, ever the stalwart fighters, we continue to surprise. We summon the will to form a stem and grow a flower even if it only blooms for a few hours. Then we do it again.

We may be counted out, but we’re only out for the count if we refuse to get up and fight. We’ve got plenty of bloom left in us.

Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about Menopause, But Forgot to Ask

What, exactly, is menopause? Well, first there’s perimenopause. Perimenopause is triggered by the decrease in the production of the hormones estrogen and progesterone. Perimenopause begins several years before the cessation of menstruation. As your estrogen and progesterone levels fluctuate, you experience physical symptoms. Menopause begins when menstruation ends, and once you are a year into menopause, you’re officially post-menopausal. That said, the symptoms can continue long after you have reached post-menopause.

Beyond the cessation of the ability to conceive a child, a woman’s body changes in myriad ways. Everyone is different, but here’s a fun-filled overview of what happens to a woman’s body when the production of these hormones is decreased enough to trigger menopause. You may experience some of these things, all of these things, or none of these things, in which case, go eat some kale and leave the rest of us alone.

• Menstruation ceases. I think we can all get behind that initiative.

• Your vagina dries up. This makes sex challenging, thus the lady lubricant market.

• The fluid that has left your vagina takes refuge in your tear ducts.

• Your bladder goes on strike. This makes sneezing, laughing, and coughing rife with potential for embarrassing leakage, thus the adult diaper market and jokes about older women peeing themselves.

• Sleep becomes elusive. You may find it difficult to fall asleep or find yourself waking up every hour or so staring at the ceiling. Lack of sleep will contribute to your rapidly declining enthusiasm. Whee.

• Sex, well, it’s complicated. For some women the libido exits stage left, for others it goes on overdrive. The good news is that accidental pregnancy is no longer a concern. There’s something upon which we might hang our cervical cap.

• Your mood swings rival Jack Nicholson’s in The Shining.

• You experience the hot, wet excitement of night sweats. It might be a good time to stock up on rubber sheets and terry-cloth pajamas.

• You run out of enthusiasm regularly due to lowered energy levels. Coffee will become your new best friend as you and Juan Valdez begin a steamy affair.

• Your belly bloats, making you feel like the saddest float in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.

• You are introduced to the joys of foughing and faughing. This is the combination of a fart and a cough or a fart and a laugh. These often happen in rapid succession. It’s especially fun in public, like, say, in the cereal aisle at the grocery store. Fough, faugh, repeat. Follow up with jazz hands—it adds a little something extra to the performance.

• Your bowels revolt, making processing last night’s dinner an ongoing challenge. We’ll call this New Adventures in Digestion, because at least it sounds like fun.

• Your skin starts itching an itch that no scratch can alleviate.

• Mood swings are soon joined by irrational, debilitating anxiety. This is most likely to arise in the wee small hours of the morning when you are wide awake and staring at the ceiling. This creates a phenomenon I call “brain spinning,” whereupon you obsess over things you cannot change. This can go on for hours, and is best alleviated by getting up and watching TV. This is how the home shopping industry was built.

• Your waistline, left unchecked, expands in direct proportion to your shock and awe. I recommend stocking up on stretchy pants.

• Your pores expand to the size of small craters. You find yourself eyeballing spackle with renewed excitement.

• Your bones become brittle. You will give them new nicknames like snap, crackle, and pop.

• Your heart becomes vulnerable in more ways than one.

• Your skin begins to wrinkle and sag, thus the multimillion-dollar magical cream market. You’ll wonder who that wrinkled, saggy old woman is in your mirror. It’s you. Surprise!

• Your face loses volume as underlying facial fat disappears. This is what leads aging actresses to overfill their faces with silicone in a futile attempt to regain their youth. There’s a procedure that involves taking fat from your posterior, processing it in a centrifuge, and injecting it into your face to restore volume. Yes, your face will look like your ass, but in the best way possible!

• Your neck becomes unrecognizable. You’ll start considering the logic of turtlenecks in August and stocking up on decorative neck scarves. See chapter 5.

• You feel as if your entire body is on fire while raging hot lava is pumped into your veins, rolling up from the tips of your toes to the top of your head. This is called a hot flash, which is a misnomer. It’s not a flash, it’s more like a firing squad.

• Your hair begins to go thin on the top of your head, usually toward the front, making it impossible to hide. Fret not because new hairs will begin to appear on your chin to divert attention away from your thinning hairline. What fun! I call them chiskers (short for chin whiskers) and I hate them. Fuck you, chiskers.

• Your feet dry out, your toenails thicken, your fingernails thin, and the backs of your heels crack and peel. Pedicures move up to the top of your to-do list.

• Your skin thins, turning seams on socks and tags on garments into torture devices.

• Your brain abandons you at crucial moments.

Menopause: More fun than a barrel of vaginal lubricant! Sign me up! Wait, don’t. Shit, someone already did.

Basically, menopause is the flip side of puberty. Back then, you were feeling the overwhelming rush of hormones and now you’re feeling the overwhelming angst of their departure. I’d like to take this moment to award my stalwart husband a prize for surviving the dual assault of puberty and menopause. Yes, my daughter and I went through the change together. I’m still changing, but she’s made the leap into womanhood. We all survived mostly unscathed. Mr. Potter has managed to maintain a sense of humor and much of his sanity. I believe this was achieved by the judicious use of headphones and extended walks with the dogs.

The thing is, no one seems to care very much about menopause, or menofuckingforever as I like to call it. It’s a lady problem, and you know how that goes. It’s also an old lady problem. This means we need to keep that shit to ourselves. We are expected to suffer through it silently, just as we suffered through puberty, PMS, periods, pregnancy, and childbirth. Keep your chin up, darling. Have another glass of wine. It’s not a big deal. Yet, it is a very big deal when you are attempting to deal with it and deal with the logistics of day-to-day life while maintaining the appearance of sanity.

But your experience does not have to be the same as my experience. You do not have to suffer silently. You can arm yourself with information. You can demand solutions. You do not have to participate in the great capitulation. There are days when I feel like running away and joining the circus, and days when I feel like I’ve got this under control. I just keep putting one foot in front of the other. It gets easier with every step. It helps to reach out to other women who are on the same path and share the road for a while. It helps to laugh at the absurdity of it all, especially when you feel like crying. It helps to scream into a pillow on occasion. Eventually, the good days outnumber the bad. It gets easier. It took some effort, but I found my groove and I’m making my way to the other side, and you can too.