We walked around the park, and a tall man (with an interesting taste in shoes), told me about his hard, terribly challenging last few years. So much in the mix; deaths of friends, neurodiverse kids and a drawn-out battle with an ex-wife. Bloody awful. Of course, I only heard one side but I felt his struggle and listened closely. I bought him a small tub of lemon-curd ice-cream, and we sat in the sun for an hour, dissecting his current state of being.

I wished him well. I knew I wasn’t ready for app life, and this encounter only served to amplify my quiet self- knowledge. Funny how I still felt the need to keep testing things, despite knowing beforehand, just in case.

It is my default, to keep assessing, trying, but ultimately, I always know what is to be done. I would ordinarily try to smother any feeling of quiet self-betrayal once it started to arise, but now I hear its muffled tones and lift the pillow. These released murmurs cannot help but propel you down the road of further enquiry.

As I drove home after ‘park date’, I realised that by leaving to live solo, what I had fundamentally done, was practice self-care.

The term ‘self-care’ is everywhere at present, it peppers our vernacular, but there seems to be some confusion as to what it actually means. In the wider understanding it has become synonymous with ideas of beautifying ourselves; run through the sausage mincer that is self-serving patriarchal interpretation to emerge, (mashed and misshapen) in line with ideas of external preservation so as to sustain male adoration. The real meaning is macerated amongst deeply ingrained standards of female attractiveness set by our society and swiftly packaged up as another harmful anomaly to women’s understanding of their self-worth.

We are mercilessly judged on our appearance and our ability to ascertain the aesthetic of nubile beauty. Men escape this expectation of impossible upkeep, and so we hear of their ageing wrapped up in euphemisms that signal value beyond appearance; men are said to improve with age like elegant, fine wines (FFS!). Many have faces like ball-sacks, but apparently that’s ok, it is their complex character that we are to appreciate! Yet we are expected to have the ability, (or inclination) to be able to turn back the evolutionary process; our lived experience and qualities placed only as secondary.

Now, I am in no way pointing the finger at any woman who enjoys a pamper and preen, who slathers on skincare, oils her body and colours her tresses. As a self-professed skincare whore, I like nothing more than a jaunt around Space.NK and the likes, dipping my fingers into glosses and beautiful eye colours. It is both pleasing and fun. Self- decoration is everyone’s right, but that’s not where the true power lies. And so, we are shoe-horned into a negative space, encouraged to view ourselves in a state of lack, physically, intellectually, emotionally, as we move away from youth; our desirability is now called into question. Do I want to look the best version of me for the pleasure of myself? Yes. But do I therefore need to look younger than I am to do so? No, I really don’t believe I do.

I do happen to feel more at home and beautiful in my skin now, than ever before.

However, obtaining complete confidence in your body ain’t the nub of it by any stretch, because the above ideology is mainlined directly into the vein of external validation, when it is internal autonomy that we need to seek. If we really want to access the higher plains of ‘self-care’, know that what lies at its heart is complete self-trust in the way you express and choose to live your life.

This is where the power lies.

Let me gently unwrap it and lay it bare before you.

Yoga, sitting in a sauna sweating your ass off or screaming into forests in organised group situations may be tools or practices you wish to use to enable a greater level of awareness, but acquiring knowledge of a practice is not the same as understanding how it looks and feels when stretched into the everyday. Self-trust equates to attuning and choosing your desires over the needs of others. Admittedly this goes against everything we have been conditioned to understand as women, and is radical in the extreme to some, but what does this look like?

It is not being selfish, as is often the branding used of destabilise female agency, but the practice of radical honesty; to expose what brings out the best in you; you can then move from this place of knowing.

But it’s hard, because very often you desperately don’t want to even think about taking the first step, uttering the first word; you’ve flipped the book, read the last page of the novel, you know how it will end. Instead, you hold your breath for longer, sigh a little deeper, and so freeze. We stall and we, despite the big bubble of love we hold for that other person, know that we cannot ask them to have the capacity to love us fully, if first we have not the capacity to do that for ourselves.

Sharing what you feel to be true, risks collapsing a structure or way of life that you have poured yourself into and so become accustomed to. You will try everything else rather than dismantle the scaffolding that has kept you safe within what is expected for so long. There is love and you resist, as you know the loss will be colossal, but what of that far away horizon, that new dawn? If you want to pursue a truer version of you, it sometimes requires losing people, situations, comfort, security, long held beliefs; you are ultimately required to let go of the idea of finality and open.

What we find ok today, may prove problematic tomorrow. The question is, do we feel safe enough to say it?

I am now sat at a rooftop bar in Seville’s old town. The swifts chase and weave about the ancient structures of Giralda Cathedral in excited flights, creating intuitive patterns in the sky that only they can navigate. I have always loved their speed, precision and excited shrieks of joy. They are totally present, as am I.

I’m not sure whether my mood was directly influenced by the physical climb in altitude earlier in the day, but once secured in a steady flight path, a deep relief, a lightness of being took hold. I was heading out; four days away. Alone yes, but not lonely.

I have spent my first day soaking up the colour of the city; faded mustard walls, powdery terracotta hues. The loud hum of vibrant streets settles in my chest and warms me. So much life and stimulus. Beautiful.

The light softens into sunset, and I breathe in the warm, Spring air. This is just what I needed. Earlier, I had been standing queuing at airport security and had been totally swamped with the feeling of being totally alone; no wingman to chivvy me along towards organising myself, no dual coffee orders, tag-team of watching the bags whilst the other wanders Duty Free. There are always so many firsts in being completely single. Although admittedly (whilst busy journaling), I did hit last call to the gate but … I got there.

And as I’d raced, my small suitcase catching my ankles as I dragged it and ran towards boarding, the momentum made me smile. We move through life sometimes with a learning that maybe we are too much, and so our nervous system makes the quiet decision to stay just below the threshold where exposure becomes problematic. We pay no heed to the fact that our bones may ache from the pressure of holding everyone else’s dreams aloft, and you can find yourself performing what is expected and observe yourself doing so. It is then time to question why. No matter how large or small your conclusion is, ultimately, if you know, you know.

I remember being on the phone to my son in London last year. I was at a low point, weathering waning resilience when he suddenly said.

“But mum, I watched you shrinking”.

I wondered at my life pattern. Was it escapism or just that I will I always seek new, bold, expansive experiences? Is this the way of me that I have tried to quell and tame, in favour of what is deemed suitable; to settle and stay. I am in fact denying a very important part of myself by curbing this desire for movement towards the unexplored in life. And in that, I realise that I have somewhat shunned self-acceptance. I have not taken care of this vital part of me, rather collapsed into other people’s patterns, perhaps so that I am accepted and loved. But how can you be fully loved, if that part of you is not shown, celebrated and met? Maybe there is a certain knowing that there is not the capacity to truly be held, in entirety; that it is not an option. You cannot expect yourself from other people.

And so, over these last few years I have become my person again. I now realise that I had forgotten her, that I was somewhat left by the wayside as I’d hitched a ride. In a wheel spin exit I had headed out on the freeway of love without looking back. It is only now that I have returned to hold her hand and lead her through monumental changes, heightened growth, the new and revisited connections.

Like everything in life, our movements and choices spread out to the world around us. If I was to make positive change for myself, led by my desires and intentions for the better, then there was a huge possibility that it would spill over into the lives of others, however, should it prevent you moving forward?

We may need to find our way again, and even though our pockets are loaded with pebbles of discomfort, we can start on our path and begin to drop them one by one. The trail left behind us may not lead us back, but act as a guide to help others move towards their future.

A friend was telling me about a couple who had married each other on three separate occasions, in between their two divorces. I smiled. I still am, but not at their expense or with any strain of supercilious judgement, but because my reaction marks how much I have changed.

In my forties, the very same story would have elicited a balk of disbelief. Having just gone through a divorce myself, I would be agog as to how anyone could go through two, let alone with the same person!

How little I understood back then.

But now, two years down the line from a rather messy separation that lacked clear boundaries, I just accept the tale for what it is. In a way, it’s oddly endearing. We all weave our way through life, and at these middle stages of our journey, become acutely aware of how limiting all these social concepts and norms really are. We are all just bobbing along, and no amount of legal binding, vows made or mortgages shared, can ever really hope to contain all that love is; the longings and ever altering states of the human heart. We are not linear. We may to and fro, and to, again; so be it. At least this couple are holding up their hands and admitting they don’t get it; who does?

For example, today, at this very minute, I would probably say that I couldn’t live with anybody ever again. Tomorrow, a chance conversation with a man who smiles with his eyes, may eventually lead me towards unbridled co-habitation. You just don’t know. And I love that.

It’s 6.30pm and I am in a local eatery, alone, sipping a glass of fizz. I have ordered a plate of pumpkin ravioli, just because I fancy it. I am treating myself increasingly like the woman I am now. My identity has shifted to a newer version, a system update, and I’m learning to lead myself fully again. It may be that I want to sit on the sunny front steps of my best friend’s house, eat salty crackers, drink beer, and watch the people traffic go by. It matters not, because the gift in both these separate instances is the ability to be purely present, to embody the moment.

During this separation period, I have been cracked wide open; completely ripped apart and cobbled back together, several times. What has often felt like being repeatedly kicked in the chest by a stilettoed banshee, has somehow birthed many precious realisations and brought through to the bruised surface, the most beautiful parts of who I am.

But not only that…

…also, the shadows have come to light. In trying to heal, I have come to understand how I denied access to the deeper, more vulnerable parts of me. I contributed to my relationship ending by hiding. The unrest, the disassociation, the self-abandonment, all resulted in favouring performative measures over how I was truly feeling. I failed to honour what I was experiencing and express this. I treated this as an inconvenience for others, rather than it becoming an invitation for more meaningful connection.

I will now carry this knowing into my next love.

It is this extraordinary accumulation of pain mixed with elements of whimsy and wonder, that have pulled me through this period; either gushing with compassion, or white knuckling with fear. I’ve had to dig deep, both privately and in public. Instances of talking myself down in toilet cubicles lest I should leave a party within ten minutes of arriving, times I’ve had to drag my ass to places I would rather not be, swimming in nausea, or having to concentrate extremely hard on someone’s eyebrow whilst in conversation, in order to prevent myself from spiralling. Many times, my mind has raced towards projection and panic about my life’s trajectory, because now I am alone.

I am learning again, and it can be scary.

Around six years prior to my departure from our home, J had one day found me crying in the garden. I’m sure plenty of people have had a little weep in their backyard, but this outpouring had been building steadily, and for weeks I’d been swallowing it down. He sat by me as I struggled to find the words to explain. All I could really utter, in between sobs, was the fact that I was totally overwhelmed by the ‘plight of women’.

It had all gone a bit Jane Austen, as I clutched the washing I’d unpegged from the line, but in that moment, I’d suddenly been side-swiped by thoughts of the enormous legacy of toil that women endure. I was seeing myself clearly for the first time in years, as part of a collective of females; midway through life, with little to no idea of how to best actively mold their futures towards their closely held dreams and desires. The prospect of continuing to fit around the lives of everyone else didn’t fill me with glee.

Considering this revelation, what dawned on me that afternoon, was that I seemed only to have two choices. Having stopped taking my SSRI months ago, I could continue along this path of rejecting this medication, thus opening myself up to tricky feelings, heightened sensitivity and a backdrop of hopelessness, or I could carry on swilling them down. Like peering through a crack in a door, I could see into a room where realisation sat; these serotonin tabs were perhaps just keeping me going in the furrow of this rut. They merely numbed me to my challenging job, the tasks and roles assigned to my gender, and dulled any sparks of creativity into mere transitory moments, which were soon stamped out by limiting beliefs and procrastination. In total, despite being a sharp, intuitive gal, anti-anxiety pills just took the edge off my critical thinking. Was that what I wanted, to live in a constant state of desensitisation to any discomfort?

I wanted to feel like I still had choices in realising projects and potential, rather than just nullifying these feelings of dissatisfaction and burnout. It’s difficult to see when you’re at a low ebb and ensconced in all that family is.

I’d first been prescribed Citalopram prior to my divorce, to help aid my engagement with a counsellor; (the wonderful, wild and white-haired Valerie). Back then, the toll of putting on a smile and muddling through work and the kids’ primary school years, along with increasing marital jarring, had really taken it out of me. Mum-friends, socials and shitloads of white wine could no longer cut it. I could not mask my crumbling marriage anymore.

I remembered the palpitations, lying in bed awake whilst my then husband slept next to me. I’d feel as if my heart would push through my chest as it raced chaotically. I would try to count to five and hold my breath, in an attempt to slow and still my breathing. Scared and crawling with anxiety, I would see in the small hours, and then at first light slide out of bed, wired on cortisol and adrenaline. I would grab a head torch and head out over the frozen fields, believing that running at dawn would help to calm me. I was desperately trying to counteract the obvious hole in my soul, with the twisted logic that I was keeping healthy in body and mind! I felt desperate.

I think it all started then at 39.

Weirdly perimenopause was not on my radar, it certainly wasn’t anything ever mentioned by doctors, nor had this essential information surrounding women’s health gained any media coverage at this time. I like to think of myself as pretty informed, but I must admit that this all remained a bit of an anomaly to me. Subconsciously, I also think I was guilty of a level of arrogance surrounding menopause in general, almost believing that it was something that other people would go through, but not me. Funny, because clearly, old Peri was waving at me in the distance, I just hadn’t been formally introduced.

Riding high in the heady throes of a new relationship with J; long nights in, mini-breaks, and of course, lots of drinkies, a band-aid was placed over old wounds. These surreptitiously continued to fester. Additionally, the emotional toll of being a single parent to two, strong minded teens, left me washed out. As my daughter reached her soul-rocking, hell-cat years, I was teetering on the edge of keeping it all together. With the re-emergence of a few old ailments and discomforts and nothing else offered to quell my symptoms, my doctor did his best to persuade me down the only avenue of perimenopausal care available, to continue with the tabs.

Thankfully, years later, hormones were offered, but those feelings of being a bit lost didn’t dissipate. I was changing, there was no getting away from it, and yet nothing else around me seemed to be aligned with this shift.

If there is a deep knowing, a disorientation and uncertainty, know that it may well be a wish for wandering. How you wander is up to you (geographically, emotionally, spiritually) but know that its presence is perhaps leading you to discover some new truths. We may keep going, once cut loose, or sometimes we may return to what was with new learning, awareness and growth to move forward. We may believe that we now have what it takes to show up in full capacity, to hold the complexity. This may be with partners, places, or mindsets, we can veer away, and then return once again, for a short time or maybe forever.

And so, in my view, the aforementioned boomerang couple of many nuptials, are well within their rights. Who knows of their reasoning, motives or the depth of their devotion. Gluttons for punishment, maybe? They have gone their own way, against the grain, and it really is ok to do that. Live your own life.

They may be very happy.

Although, he is said to be a bit of a knob.

My left leg protrudes from under the duvet. A light rain smatters the window, a warmish breeze gently bats at the half-slung blind. Morning. However, there is no sense of a body next to me, just the soft remembrance of his waking. The sighs. The way I would seek out his foot and push the top of mine into the underside of his, Hobbit-wide in comparison. My arm is wrapped around the pillow as a poor, unsatisfactory simulation of his form.

I have now lived here, by myself, for five months.

Still, we were very much in each other’s lives.

October. It had now been a year since the initial conversation surrounding my ideas about separation, moving out in May. Yet this sometimes-surreal process had somehow bought us closer together; a bitter-sweet evolution of our relationship was taking place. We spent slower mornings together; coffee, checking in on a level that instigated and intensified to a new level of emotional intimacy. Funny how that works, when it came to the crux, we gravitated towards the other. We resonated.

During these first months of me being at the cottage, J had been away to Australia. He was due to tour Asia in the new year, between ending one job and starting another, less demanding role. A change, that in hindsight, came too late.

The power of manifestation has never really been central to my belief system, but it was becoming so. The house-porn surfing that had taken place at the beginning of the year had kept my eyes alert to a particular small cottage, a mile away. Whilst trying to sort through my conflicting feelings about taking time away, I seemed to be weirdly synchronised to this very area. I knew it well, situated on a steep hill I had run up for years, below the wooded hilltops. The Rightmove aerial shot presented the house, nestled in amongst the others in the row, as illuminated by a shard of sunlight. The very name of the village seemed to pepper my interactions or fall directly into my line of vision, regularly. I had the sense I was being led. Whether that be astray, or not, was yet to be seen.

Once I had begun to work as a yoga and Pilates instructor, my body and mind were transformed. I started to grow, becoming strong, taking up more literal and metaphysical space in the world, in new ways. My mind began to clear, no Eureka moment, but a clarity crept in to sit quietly behind my thoughts, residing over the racing, fearful, looping about how I wanted to live my life. My limbs lengthened, lean muscle became visible, I achieved better balance and held myself with a sense of grace. I felt lighter, like I was trying on a different version of me and revelling at the way it felt. This was such a contrast to being within our shared home or at the college, (rushed, disconnected and knee deep in some thankless and/or often mind -numbing task) You see, I had come to realise that my authenticity had, over time, been replaced by exhaustion. What was now taking place in the studio had started to translate to life, the stretch and release proved both good, and not so, for those close to me.

I hadn’t realised how much I had just needed to bloody breathe.

With decreasing levels of oestrogen, some major neuro-chemical shifts take place. These can be of tectonic proportions, because as the brain re-wires, people pleasing behaviour is essentially kicked firmly to the curb. It is no coincidence that at this very juncture of life, that a niggling, dissatisfaction with the world around us comes to the forefront. This is when the rigid structures of gender programming start to fall away and we begin to feel into this new era. Feeling heavy and out of sync, I felt like I just clunked along, a cog in the rusty wheel of patriarchal invention, rather than embodying my very existence in line with my desires and longings. The spark that once lit me, seemed to splutter in a struggle to stay ignited.

This is when ‘the meh’ becomes a regular acquaintance.

Like an annoying last guest that just won’t leave your overly long dinner party, ‘the meh’ brings her particular brand of apathy to perimenopause. She slorms, morbidly pissed, on your sofa, lights a fag, chuffs and flicks ash at the carpet. She rocks up at any time and can stay for a few days, or even weeks, you never quite know. You fear ‘the meh’ will take up permanent residence. You struggle to shake her off. Even during your most sacred and revered moments that usually make your heart fizz, she drones on in monotone, managing to dispel a thick fug of monotony to quash even your smallest of joys. She enjoys nothing more, than pissing on any parade you can muster.

Nothing quite hits the same. You wonder if you’re depressed, if you’re ill, but no…

This phenomenon is touted as ‘low mood’, which also seems to oddly align with a glaring, midlife realisation that all is not well in your world. Like a weighty, itchy, homespun jumper of the 70’s variety, it doesn’t sit right on your body, it continuously interferes with your presence and peace. You just want it to fuck off, along with everything else (TBH).

You try different stuff: long walks, girls’ trips, meditation, bastard body brushing. You attempt to mix things up in a bid to defibrillate your flatlining existence; induce the joie de vivre that has gone AWOL. You search desperately for relief. Meaning. Anything.

I channelled everything into my new vocation, teaching as many movement classes as studios offered. I felt this flicker, this licking of flames in my belly, I was learning again, doing something completely new. I guarded and protected it, the one area of my life where I could ground myself and escape my oscillating emotions. I spent most of the time driving at speed between various bookings, with very little time to think.

Let’s not sugar-coat it. This whole process of arriving at such big decisions is savage and terrifying. You have inhabited a specific space for years, subconsciously stifling the hushed whisper that there is, in fact, more, whilst also butting up against the idea that being in survival mode can be strangely comfortable. You get used to suppressing all that bubbles up under the lid. This is because you know damn well, that if you lift it, you’ll blow up your entire life.

And that is what I did.

Midlife is not a longing to claw back the past, but an augmented awakening to ideas of undiscovered potential. Daily, small acts of self-abandonment become almost ritualistic. Whether consciously or not, you participate, and so unwittingly allow yourself to slide ever further down the list of priorities, so much so that we may no longer have the means to hear our own voice from underneath all that we carry. This third age, therefore, is a time of reconnection, a chance to turn down the volume on distractions, so that we may listen in to ourselves. We can embrace this mid-point misperception, as an opportunity to sharpen our focus; hone our vision for our next chapter.

Everything is called into question, and even though this can be hugely destabilising, I am becoming more convinced that this is really no bad thing. Some may mock this time of questioning by throwing terms like ‘existential crisis’ around, by way of oddly minimising the experience toward a stereotype, an umbrella term that bats away the fundamental importance of key realisations that can occur. However, as women, I feel that this period of self-reflection has much more to do with our sociological gender assigned roles and the weight placed upon us, than perhaps our male counterparts. Although, we must remember, that these socially structured systems vastly disappoint men also. They too feel the failings of a world that struggles to meet them in meaningful ways also. Women of the world, take over…

For, what we will come to realise is that we are hot, and strong, in mind, body and opinion.

Out there are women owning these very years with sass and style. The women who transcend fads, fashions and patriarchal mainstream direction, in favour of a deep, all encompassing, knowledge of who they are and what they want from life. Having spent time in the wilderness that is the perimenopause, they have fine-tuned themselves as an individual and tapped into a newly formed sense of self. They reject that which has been constructed for them to follow. Their self- love, care and wisdom shines through as a beauty which has taken a lifetime to obtain but is totally their own, and their power. This is main character energy! There is a profound and rooted confidence, an acceptance in who they know they now are, rather than an insecurity in trying to keep hold of what they once were. They throw off the need for any exterior validation, cultivating an appreciation of their unique, unapologetic selves.

We are learning that continuously trying to prove ourselves hasn’t brought us peace or any clarity. In fact, quite the opposite. We become acutely aware at this time of life, that there is discomfort surfacing. This isn’t failure; it’s the nervous system rejecting an identity structure that has outlived its usefulness. Therefore, a new emergence which celebrates women within our later stages, should be reflected in the choices presented to us. Instead of being pressured to hold back time so that we may try and cling to youth, to placate and adhere to what society tells us is beautiful, is it not time to address the real issue? How we now choose to invest in ourselves through nurturing our strength, wisdom and vast experience. We can evolve, expand and grow towards our next stage of life with autonomy.

I was getting a taste of it. As I padded barefoot down this different set of stairs, I began to feel like I was arriving in my own life and slowly, (if not shakily) landing.

I was letting go of what was and moving into what is, all the time wondering, who would want to step forward and announce they’d come with me.

I had my first drink nine days before my second birthday. I had been ushered into my parent’s room, where my mum lay propped up at the head of the bed, exhausted, but smiling. To the right, two midwives held my sister upside down by her ankles. Her body dangled, like a hare hung up in a butcher’s shop window, long limbed and purple in hue. The midwives were satisfied that she was breathing well, and so my dad passed me a beaker containing no more than a few millimetres of champagne. I remember the little, orange cup that felt awkward in my chubby, clumsy fingers. As I grappled with the sharp, angular, plastic handle, my father guided it to my lips for a sip. The sound of my breath echoed back at me from the bottom. I can’t recall the taste, but I can remember the jubilant atmosphere and the print of purple flowers on the eiderdown that had slipped from the bed to the floor.

It was then that perhaps my celebratory relationship with alcohol was sealed; something special, a treat to be savoured and cherished, an expression of joy. So it is not surprising that it has peppered my life, as it has so many of us, firstly through my parents’ habits, and again during formative years. As a Gen X’er a bottle of acrid, cheap wine or cider was often brought by my sister and I from an off license that cared not about underage customers. They’d even open it for us, and with a straw each we’d sit in the park and demolish the whole thing, before staggering into the local pubs.

I am in no way a hardened alcoholic, fresh from recovery, but what I do duly note is the presence of alcohol and my changing use of it. It has always been touted in my family, as not only as a prerequisite to almost anything, but also as a coping mechanism for difficult times.

Many women, during the stressful early years of child rearing look forward to ‘mummy wine-time’; a nice, crisp glass of white, waiting at 6pm can be a carrot in front of the often-obstinate donkey that is bath and bedtime. Again, during the on-set of perimenopausal symptoms, it is used as a way to numb your frayed nerves, curb any chattering self-criticism.

I thought back.

Mum was vibrant and social in her thirties and forties, she loved to party. When in a good place she was lively, funny, bonkers. She would roar with laughter and have a way about her that would draw you into daft behaviour. As a kid I would think nothing of finding her thrashing on her bed, a fork in the zip of new jeans, as she desperately tried to jam herself into uber tight flares.

And yet I feared her.

I remember being woken and slung into the back of the car. I think it was an attempt to put the frighteners on dad after another late-night marital row. My sister and I slid about the leather seats of the Volvo as it rolled around corners, my mum teary, gripping the wheel. We did four loops of the block and then, with mum’s mission accomplished, we were returned to our rooms.

Both my parents enjoyed a rise of status in the 80’s, that my dad’s successful business brought. Money rolled in, wine started to appear nightly at the dinner table, designer clothes were secretly ushered into the house and stashed in my mother’s wardrobe. With the economic boom, they soon sought a life change, away from the urbanisation of Buckinghamshire, and so relocated to a large house in the Peak District; closer to their roots. It was a major upheaval to the middle of nowhere, a clashing contrast to the private members clubs and relentless dinner parties of the time. We were now faced with a tiny village, with a bus timetable that read - Wednesday.

There was always alcohol at night, and way too much if you consider current health guidelines. But of course, back then, it was an expected and constant presence. I can almost still hear ice-cubes rattling in mum’s G&T, as she stormed up the corridor. Evening dinners, rambling, long Saturday afternoon sessions, drawn out Sunday lunches with their friends around our kitchen table, vino flowing.

However, later, as food was cleared, I would hear my dad clattering with the dishwasher. This is when mum would regularly visit my room. She’d be half sloshed but coherent enough, her teeth catching on her own words. It would go one of two ways, emotional and sad, or spiteful and frustrated. Sometimes she would want to revisit a particularly nasty row we’d had that day, picking at the edges of it further, or she would sit and simply tell me how much she hated her life, how much she had wanted to be and do, and how much she felt she had sacrificed by having children. I can now see my mother was someone who was struggling with terribly low self-worth. Cut off by the move up ‘tut Midlands, she was unfulfilled, lonely and desperately battling with herself. As perimenopause persisted, she had little to help her make sense of what was going on. Let’s not forget that forty years ago the term didn’t even exist in the lexis of the medical profession, let alone the mouths of long suffering women. She lacked support and was strapped into the rollercoaster that were hormonal fluctuations, with nothing to guide her.

Shite.

And so, she swung like a pendulum of dysregulation between tipsy and hungover, this layered on top of erratic moods, poor self-esteem, battles with weight gain and increasing social anxiety. With no HRT, (or anything) all was soothed, yet compounded, by a wine-spritzed nervous system. Impassioned rows would erupt regularly and linger in the air for days, the atmosphere thick and curdled. Can you imagine, two women, at polar opposites of their womanhood, locked up in a house on the moors? It was the stuff of Angela Carter! As her oldest, my new surge of hormones and sense of self were as new to her as they were to me, and what was worse is that they were now at war with her ever depleting stocks. I now realise that what I had witnessed back then, was a woman losing her identity, whilst at the same time she watched me try to find and nurture my own.

I’m an ‘up’ person when drinking, it’s always been so. I’d sworn that had I ever taken on the poisonous stare that was my mum’s expression when alcohol hit her wrong, I’d be teetotal. However, I caught myself a couple of years ago, beginning to regularly eye the fridge door, fatigued and anxious, longing for the sweet relief of a tipple whilst I cooked. It had become too easy to go there, Thursday was becoming the new Friday, my weekend health pursuits were mostly carried out with a muzzy head. Alcohol had stopped hitting highs and instead was only a half-arsed sedative to my burgeoning emotions. The next day I would pay, big. My brain (and face) felt shrivelled and devoid of fluid, and my grey matter was about as much use at conjuring cohesive thought, as an old, blackened, dusty walnut from underneath the sofa. Falling oestrogen levels, a slower metabolism, and lower body water, causes alcohol to stay in the system longer and hit harder. Two glasses could cause a severe hangover. It was time to reassess.

Sadly, my mother never did.

“It’s been a long time since I sat in bed with you, not since it was all red and green roses”.

As I lay next to mum on the bed, I tried to work out her reference. She was crumpled next to me, as best her contorted body would allow, and was drifting off into a nap. I had buffered her twisted, now unrecognisable form with pillows to provide some level of comfort as she attempted rest. She hadn’t wanted me to leave her, and so I settled down to lay by her side, sporadic tears leaving the corners of my eyes and dripping into my hair.

I hadn’t seen her in two and a half years and so had caught a plane late the previous afternoon to France, now that travel restrictions were easing after COVID. What had greeted me, after stepping into my parents’ house, was the stuff of nightmares. I had heard her decline long before I saw it. The weak, slow sound of a shuffle of footsteps came before she reached the door and peered around it to see me. She was bent double, her head lolled, unsupported by her neck and upper spine. A large pocket of skin dangled from one side of her head. So long had her skull been in this unnatural position, that fluid had collected and now hung, contained by a paper-thin membrane from the lower side of her face.

Parkinson’s disease not only distorts the body, but the mind also. Hallucinations were common, gradually becoming more pronounced in her conversation, but I could often unpick her vivid imagery. I deduced that the red and green roses she spoke of referred to the flowered wallpaper of her old bedroom, when I was growing up. I was transported back, to a time when I’d sit in her bed, chatting about friends, school etc. A time before the shit really hit the fan of our relationship.

And now, here by my side, lay what had once been my robust and tenacious nemesis. She was the best cook, inspired and instinctive in her love language of food, she fed all, well. Preparing dishes together had been our way of getting on, a glass of dry, white to hand as we worked. The steady demise of her spine had started many years before, a slight hump at the base of her neck, she stood, forever chopping veg at the kitchen counter, stooping in servitude. She’d settled into middle age with a willingness to almost wallow in self-neglect, no exercise or health conscious choices, she shrank into functional. Her every day revolved around planning food and what to drink. If lunch was not on the table for dad at 12, she’d announce, “Your father will feel like his throats’ been cut!”

She’d barely eat now, unable to chew or swallow well. Whilst visiting, I cleaned, batch cooked and stocked the freezer. Although agitated by discomfort, she’d try to sit with us whilst we ate. No plate, but my father, (ever the problem solver), had crafted an extra-long straw for her wine glass. He’d lift it to her lips for a sip.

This was the year of five solo trips to France and then her funeral. Teaching English four days a week, I’d catch a flight Friday returning Sunday eve. With this and taking a yoga qualification, her death was barely processed. I buried it deep, along with everything else I was feeling, afraid that if I let go, I’d break apart. All these disjointed, floating fragments of me seemed to loosely hang in my shape, but they felt like a flimsy representation, only just held together by a few, crude cross-stitches.

Life at home continued as normal, an ever-revolving door of comings and goings. I watched proudly as the kids, now older, began to carve out their own lives. J was taking on ever increasing work responsibility, with it came flights, gigs, holidays, half-marathons, but I somehow felt I was just bringing up the rear, a straggling child, more interested in the view than the hastened destination. I longed for him to hang back with me and wander, but there seemed to be such a shortage of time to do so. I needed connection, he strode ahead toward distraction. And so, like cloudy contrails, we streaked across the atmosphere that was our life together, yet crossed but briefly.

One’s upbringing can impact our adult relationships, the models of behaviour demonstrated by our parents can bleed into what we believe we should emulate. I have fought hard against the dysfunction of mum and dad, but do feel that as for many women, we sometimes fall into a role whereby our true potential becomes suppressed. I think back to mum. Lives that may look good on the outside, can lack the fulfilment that many crave, women may find themselves existing, rather than living. I broke free of my marriage under similar circumstances, acutely aware of a need to expand. This was no snap decision or whim, but a slow, palpable dawning. And now, settled into a nine year, committed relationship and familial unit, I had to ask myself honestly; was I really here again?

What was clear, was that a deep, emotional excavation process, was long overdue.

If husbands and partners of women in mid-life were to have unadulterated access to their phones, peruse the top app usage, peek behind the curtain of secluded scrolling activity, do you know what they’d find?

Maybe hook up sites for cougars, older women searching for some energetic, optimistic sex? Perhaps a secret gambling site addiction, or Tinder obsession?

Nope.

Rightmove.

Small house, tucked away, easy to manage, up to two bedrooms, a bench to drink coffee on in the sun.

Somewhere where you are not. Or more precisely speaking, space and time away from the dominating rhythm of domestic grind and litany of requests.

The number of women who troll Rightmove regularly, fetishising on leaving it all for a simple, unencumbered existence is staggering. I kid you not. The weighing up of finance, the fear of poverty, the social suicide, the loneliness… these are the issues more than likely whirring about her head, rather than hot-rod action (although…)

Whether your relationship is in good shape or not, so much more is bound up in this idyll. My own married female friends, relatives and extended social network, do quietly admit to these longings, and keep eyes on properties they lust after, their ‘favourites’ ready to roll, for the days they feel shockingly shit. So, what does it say about the state of our love lives, the nation and the conflicting feelings around outdated dynamics surrounding cohabitation? Because despite finding yourself contemplating the painfully hard and excruciatingly emotional scenario of leaving, it seems that for quite a few, the protection of our peace becomes more important.

I find it funny now, that whenever anyone has ever posed the question of what my type is, regarding men, I’ve always prided myself on my answer; I don’t have one. I’ve never subscribed to the idea, believing that because the personality styles and appearances of all my romantic partners have been poles apart, that they had all been wildly different. How naïve. Because what transpires is that the two major relationships of my life, have been with men who were both very similar in one key area, work. Driven, active and talented at their in their corporate fields, somewhat restless in nature, intelligent, quirky, attentive. I am independent, quick, warm, but once a meeting of hearts and minds had taken place, I’d settle in to demonstrate my capability and aptitude to adapt to the greater good of all, as well as supporting their increasing career demands.

It’s barely detectable at first, in between the nights away each week in London or abroad, you’ve still got it, you keep communication quick, fresh, sexy, you long for their return while you hold the fort, work, cook like a bitch, tend to the teens, etc. Your timeline then inevitably becomes intrinsically intertwined with theirs, the tendrils of their work schedule wrap about your plans, before long, your life is absorbed fully, as if you are converging into a slipstream. But you love them, love what you have, still smell their clothes for a gorgeous whiff of them.

Months and years pass, unnoticed, but all that distance and the lost weeks amalgamate. Suddenly, the gold-dust that is the minutiae of your everyday becomes lost. We begin to stall at checking in, the finer details of days begin to blur into convenient soundbites, too tired to explain, too spent for real connection. You love, you share, fit into different shapes, then tag team, passing the baton of chores between you both, in an attempt to establish elements of life outside. In a precis of my experience, your world can gradually become about waiting your turn, as opposed to running the distance inextricably bound to the one you love. And so it goes.

I had my own home, once my marriage was behind me, with his divorce too, I willingly, threw open my heart, small family, and front door wide to J and his girls. All those tentative, beautiful, baby steps, adjustments and accommodations, sleepovers, extra pillows, six for breakfast, were eagerly made with love and a messy, sticky, fizzy joy. My strength of feeling rocked me, it was all.

Although now it has slowly dawned on me, that I have very much followed a repeating pattern. I had again auditioned and secured a leading role that I’d previously portrayed and subsequently cancelled, mid run. Yet again I’d lost me in a sterling performance. It’s easy to do, but as we mature the signals rise within us, calling for change, the emergence of unrealised dreams, the call of autonomy. Lots of women abandon themselves in a trade-off for acceptance, love and the needs of family, until they can suppress no more. No blame, no shame, but what does this say?

I really was not fully aware of any feelings of unfulfillment for a long while. I could not name the enigma with any definitive sounds, but I could overtime, almost feel the dull, resonation of a struck bell within, an echo, marking the emptiness, a truth I was yet to explore. It was a warning, a sign, but being so emersed in hormonal exhaustion, I failed at any effective communication. I didn’t know where to start. I had become so entrenched in the blueprint of our life, that I could not see how to make any alterations, nothing was at a scale I could contend with. I was in overwhelm. There were discussions, there was comfort and concern, he could see that something was not right and tried, when time allowed.

For my part, I found that I could not properly tune in, the noise in my head was like static on the line of a long-distance phone call. I could make out the odd word, but so pronounced was the disconnect, that the context was lost. Our household and their subsequent needs whirred about me, all I could do was try my best to keep up and ruminate, quietly.

What you really crave is your partners awareness, a lifeline to pull you up from the depths and help you break through the surface tension. For your love to take your face in his/her hands and hold you up to breathe in a steady, pull of air. You want them to look into you, and give like never before, to meet you in amongst this confusing, exhausting space and to know you are truly held. To sit with you, whilst you’re in the wilds, and hear your cries, fearlessly, to watch you scratch about for a semblance of understanding and share your discoveries; to look on, without judgement.

Share Vital & Strong

Look for signs, take that day off work, post-pone that trip, if she’s struggling along, she needs you to find the capacity for all of her, not a one off, but repeatedly, ad infinitum. We don’t need fixing, pragmatism ‘aint going to cut it, only consistent presence, limited distractions and real, heart led connection. Time limits don’t apply, nor linear trajectories, nor token gestures. A weekend away won’t suffice, this is big stuff, this is evolution. As a woman, you are in between worlds, and part of you is leaving. Therefore, significant others, tether yourself to her before the waves start to hit, know that you’re in for a lashing here and there, but ultimately a love that is for life. If you fully commit, you can make it through, brave, intact, together.

What you’re not changing, you’re choosing.

I remember staring out to the wooded bridle way that runs across the hills that overlook our town. The trees are old and tall there, beautiful in their responsiveness to the sporadic blasts blowing up the valley. Clouds rolled over the fields, that is where I wished to be, a place to lean into myself, listen and reclaim the parts of myself that had gone missing. I needed to dust them down, polish them up, perhaps restore some, and relinquish others.

I did not know how this would look for us, or even whether it was possible.

That’s when the house-porn began.

There is a change a-foot. A conversation is beginning to take shape around what it means to be a woman approaching mid-point. Not the facile bollocks about feeling or looking younger, how to prevent the bodily signs of a life lived appearing more clearly upon us, but a change surrounding what it means to step into this transitional process, this wild ride, this illuminating portal. The real narrative encircling peri/menopause has for a long time been stifled by ideas of ‘withering woman’. One happy to grin and bear it, only to seamlessly blend into a beige background, now that her biological service is done. No, a more truthful discourse is emerging.

A chance conversation in a café yesterday, with a thirty something new mum, again highlighted how little honesty there is surrounding women’s real, lived experience. So much fanfare around pregnancy and birth, but knak all about the aftermath. This sound woman and I compared notes. She said that she almost felt lied to. Why did no one tell her how hard it all was? Nothing was shared on the mental and emotional adjustment, the sheer fucking panic that you were disappearing.

I remembered.

The babies. The darling babies and the smell of their heads, their fat wrists and gummy smiles, the feeling of overwhelming love that could rip your chest open…

and…

…the exhaustion, the boredom, the rocking and soothing, (‘cause only you’ll do), the cloying and mauling at your body, and your thousand-yard stare. The sick, the shit and the guilt, the guilt you swallow down at not finding this as fulfilling as they said you would. In fact, you want to run, run back to a time of spontaneity, freedom and mid-afternoon sex, of interesting conversations that make you laugh, or aroused (or both) to feel full abandon, and joy…and not this.

Where are these conversations, the ones that offer up truth, that help us dilute the strength of the disconnect we feel between the reality and the romanticised view?

I told her that things were the same at mid-life. Only so much is divulged, like some bloody trade secrets act. There are, to date, 37 symptoms and counting, all listed (without any dissection or description), in neat, little, digestible packages – irregular periods, sleep disturbance, fatigue. But cut the string, and these gifts will burst open, explode with the pressure of all they really contain, all they truly wish to reveal. There is only the faintest of nods to the vast psychological alterations that can wreak havoc on your nervous system, which is listed, lazily, as ‘mood changes’ - it doesn’t even touch the bloody sides! Why is this area so overlooked? Is it not the very source from which much of our difficulty springs? The ever-oscillating emotions and subsequent altering mindsets are surely much more central to the conversation than a blithe; low-mood or irritability. What are our bodies and minds trying to communicate, wake us up to? Maybe a decline in oestrogen, ultimately lifts the veil from your eyes, as to the injustice of a woman’s existence. With rose-tinted spectacles slipping since our 30’s – enter underlying anger (stage left).

The media, only now catching on to the mid-life phenomena, proffers books, advising women on how best to navigate the physical changes that occur. Radio shows and podcasts address the many questions women have on how to improve their health and well-being, so long neglected by ill-informed health practitioners. Many of us are clamouring for answers, information and guidance regarding how best to cope. Furthermore, said resources seem sketchy, to lag very far behind, especially regarding the physiological, multi-faceted flow states we can encounter during these sometimes daunting years. What is worse is that still, women hold their tongues around these subjects. Is it a learned behaviour? Do we somehow lack the language required to fully expose the beast? She does ultimately bring with her beauty, but so rare and dangerous is she, that words can fail us.

I could feel her stirrings. A simmer that gently, rolled just beneath the surface of my skin. I felt a longing for depth of connection, greater sensuality, a need to escape the every-day. Familiar sounds jarred at me, my bones would ache, indecision became protracted. I began spending more time alone, trying to tap into what was now, clearly, leading me towards ideas of a greater sense of autonomy. I grappled with every variable, small changes that I could make, to scratch the itch that was becoming more persistent. I often struggled to dress, my laser focus, marred by my failing to define which woman I was that day. Some days, en pointe, others, I resented my wardrobe as so little felt me. Clothes were flung at the floor, as I tried to align with this shapeshifter, before the bedroom mirror.

I am now out the other side of perimenopause, which in my experience can only be described as a vastly over-budget renovation project, (complete with full electrical re-wiring and countless burst pipes). We need a hand to hold through this re-build. Someone to scoop-up you up as you strain to locate yourselves, to help guide you to places of realisation, as despite the initial slog and disorientation, there can be elation, empowerment and wisdom and happiness. But only if we share! Only if we commit ourselves to enquiring dialogue that’s rough and ready – the times you can find yourself wailing on the floor, questioning your identity, worth and the very purpose of your existence, the surge of emotion that seemingly comes from nowhere, the rage, the sexual rejection and/or desire. Nothing is one and the same, all co-exist.

After years of employment, possible child-rearing, and balancing the domestic realm under the weight of limiting, deeply ingrained (and frankly fucking impossible) gender expectations, we feel we have been left high and dry (no pun intended :) We are/will soon be women experiencing the world around us through this lens of, and it can, if utilised and channelled positively, be an exciting and enlightening time. Much has changed for the lives of women. Women work full-time, lead company’s, oversee boards and are at the forefront of their fields, and yet despite this, our responsibility for most domestic duties lingers, like a ghostly image in an overexposed photo.

My sister (a nurse), and I regularly revisit the theme of the seemingly never-ending toil women undertake, during ‘phone-cleaning’ calls. If our ‘day off’ happens to coincide, we shoot the shit whilst embroiled in some grim, menial task - like swilling out the kitchen bin. With earphones in and phones stuffed in our back pockets, we carry out our separate chores, venting within our geographically separate, yet parallel lives.

It’s true, we kick serious multi-tasking arse at an Olympic level. The dexterity, speed and endurance employed as we disseminate these finely tuned skills, is a fucking phenomenon. The demands are endless. But, as we have witnessed with so many athletes, such ability, and the subsequent pressure it involves, comes at a high price. Mental health and well-being can suffer when pushed too far. World be warned, we are burning out.

We need Peri-doulas. Just as with the birth process, we need women to teach, to warn, to hold the space for this truly transformative time. Here, I hope to reach out and raise the profile of our experience, through my own trials and tribulations. I offer you a glimmer, a tiny spark of light that will hopefully ignite and grow, so that your way becomes clearer; less dark and more celebrated. We have space to fill, we need to reclaim this void, because without drawing up a sufficient emotional route map to help us navigate, it could well swallow us up. I know this.

From this point, I want us to press the reset button, to wipe all unhelpful and oppressive glitches from our hardware and so allow for an upload, a fresh perspective to help the emergence of improved and positive assertions that can be realised and applied to life. I am not a doctor, a celebrity or influencer, but a 51-year-old woman from Derbyshire, who in the last 2 years, has thrown her entire life up in the air to find where I’d gone underneath it all. I have moved from the home of my blended family, left a twenty-plus career in teaching English and retrained as a yoga and Pilates instructor. Just like you, I do my best to get through the day, often pulled in a hundred different directions, whilst at the same time, trying to figure out my life from here on in. And so here are simply my thoughts about where we may be going, and how best we get to meet our newly formed selves. I do this in the hope that my fuckups, and joyous discoveries about what has helped, (and hindered) will somehow resonate, make you smile, and perhaps soothe your somewhat battered soul, as you move forward into a new phase of being.

It is deepest Winter of 2023. So little contact, so little light. However, to me, the relative isolation has been somewhat of a blessing, a relief as well as a curse.

It is around 3am, and I am awake, again, mopping myself down with a T-shirt from the bedroom floor, as a warm, river runs down my chest. I have always liked my tits in Winter, the contrast of the cold air makes them appear perter. I admire them, the aesthetic value pleases me. I feel like I smell.

I see the sky through the Velux; it is icy quiet. I place a towel, (now reserved for night sweats) on the mattress, ready for my return to bed, and then walk, hot and naked, down to the bathroom. My hair is wet where it meets the nape of my neck, and I perch on the corner of the bath to cool down. The moon is bright above; its iridescent light illuminates my form. I sit quiet, drained from these nightly fevers.

Suddenly, my eyes are drawn to the sink in front of me, a smear of something…toothpaste? I rub at it with my assigned sweat rag. I follow my line of vision and go a step further, wiping around the inside of the sink, whilst I’m at it. Better. Cleaner. The taps aren’t looking too good, bit of a wipe, now shiny. I then do the bath taps as well, (why not?) this leads to cleaning under the shampoo bottles to the right of them, I clean down the bottles, now satisfied by their streak free exteriors. My attention flits to the tiles behind them; I dampen my cloth with some water. I wipe and wipe, quickening my pace. The clear light catches on smears of soap scum above me, with these now accentuated, I begin to clean more avidly. I hoist myself up, and with my right foot, I stand on the edge of the bath and straddle its width with my other leg. I lean over to reach further, scrubbing, my eyes dart between the shower tiles, scrubbing at them in uncontrolled abandon. I whip back the shower curtain, now in my way, now noticing the blotches of dark water mould that are dotted across the along the bottom of its hem. Fuck this, it needs a wash! I start to unhook the water repellent fabric from the shower hooks …. I am lost in motion.

Click.

The light comes on. I catch sight of myself in the mirror to the right, toes gripping the edge of the bath in contorted balance, naked and cleaning and draped in said curtain.

“What are you doing?” Says J

What am I doing?

I am lost in motion. I am lost in the motion.

It is only now that I see this instance as a very real analogy for my lack of ease with my life as it was, and who I had become. There was a huge hole, a lack understanding as to what was taking place within the recesses of my psyche. My perpetual movement was not only a learnt behaviour, a symptom of my social conditioning, - a multi-tasking mistress of spinning plates (with so few of them truly my own), but I was sadly, and inextricably bound, to constant distraction. You see, it had become easier than sitting with myself. There was a deep seated irritably within my body, the feeling that I was not quite at home in my skin anymore, as if I was constricted, restricted, whilst at the same time continually contorting myself to fit into the gaps of other people’s lives. I felt merely a facilitator, with no real agency other than directing various streams of traffic; our family, work (mine and his) and domestic necessity. Where the fuck was I in all of this? I’d become so bloody good at it all, ninja reflexes to boot! With a tribe of teens that was our blended family, my peppy persona began to buckle under the strain; keeping track of who was in, out, battling mess, noise sensitivity, the effort was insurmountable; I craved, something….

All I could really touch on, was an inexplicable need to open, to stretch out, but I had no idea into what…? Where could I go? I barely had the energy to apply thought to the next day, let alone where to channel any ideas of who I wanted to become! Familiar rhythms and routines of daily life felt crushing, as of course they can, but this was different. There was something more, as if I was caught in a riptide, where a contra-flow of current was not only unpredictable, but imperceptible, fathomless: I was treading water, badly.

I found my interactions laboured, hard, draining even. Since first we’d met, the chemistry between J and I had been instantaneous. Like. Nothing. Else. A beautiful, fluid and continuous conversation that had started, and never stopped. But now, for the first time ever, this required a level of effort. I found myself having to work hard at communication, with a man who could instinctively read me at a hundred paces. Our very choice of vocab had always held deep, shared secrets, coded with love and histrionic humour, but on these difficult days, I would watch him scan me, as if he were presented with a sheer rock face, a climber desperately staring up, looking for a foothold; nothing. I was clouded summit, unable to throw him a line. Our sex, which had always been an essential connection point, found with ease and a shared sense of need, now took on a more infrequent, sporadic quality. Nevertheless, this, sometimes urgent and wet, or careful and considered, still unified us, it always would.

It took all my resolve to function, play the role of partner, as by the end of the day, I had very little left to give. My days somehow felt performative, by the time I returned home, all that was left was a husk. What was more, the Literature I was teaching at college, now failed to touch me, well, in any way that was in line with the syllabus. Words, phrases, emerging themes all seemed to point me instead towards a darker knowing of my disposition, I started to feel quite desperate. Names of characters and quotes historically etched in my mind, became suddenly elusive, mid flow. Brain-fog descended and deadened my delivery. Ordinarily, I would have a class in the palm of my hand, lit from within on perhaps the genius of Iago’s Machiavel, now I’d stumble through Shakespeare, scrambling to inspire or catch my breath.

Regular social interactions now made me acutely aware of how disconnected I felt, joy was difficult to locate, numb was slowly becoming my new normal. Don’t get me wrong, I looked like I was functioning well, the lights were still on. I’d zip up my long boots for work, stride out, but my swag was waning, my natural rhythm with life felt out of kilter.

And so, it was then that I started to search. Oestrogen patches, progesterone and testosterone aside, eventually I could get no lasting relief, in any form. Physical maladies were fixable over time, I knew this, I’d done the reading, heard the podcasts, but none addressed what I was experiencing in any other way than with the platitude of ‘low mood’. What a piss-take! This was not depression, nor was it feeling blue, what troubled me most was not being addressed, anywhere. Citalopram had been slung at me years ago when symptoms had first begun, and so that was hanging in amongst the mix of hormones et al, but seemingly to no avail. If I heard any more about self-care I’d scream! A feckin’ magnesium bath and breathwork can only do so much, c’mon! We were all doing the work, all of us. You could hear a constant chatter about cutting down the booze, witness the exercise; herds of middle-aged women seeking solace and escape on Sunday trail runs. Despite this, the relief, a temporary dopamine hit, followed by sustained exhaustion. However, the collective banner of ‘I’m fine’ flew steady and high, with only a small, select few, daring to explore the deep dissatisfaction that wrestled within their chests, in hushed, conspiratorial tones. Admission meant a certain kind of defeat, and defeat meant they were unhappy; that ‘aint sexy, that ‘aint winning.

No, I needed to work out what was actually happening to me, this seismic shift was asking me for its full attention. Now approaching 50, the mid-life crisis label was not only crude, but reductive, insulting even. I couldn’t go on like this. If I was to live fully, and well, and in my truth, I had to strip myself bare, peel back the skin, and dig in the guts – get down and dirty with myself, for the first time ever. No distractions, no excuses, not anymore. With blood under the fingernails was the only way to emerge through whatever this was, renewed, clean and clear of a new way forward.

Clearing away books after class one night, I lingered to stare out at the city skyline, a rising, orange, glow began to surround the crisp silhouettes of buildings as the sun went down. I flicked through some old notes, a bit of prose, some poetry. As I scooped the pages up, my gaze fell to a particular line. I traced the words as tears, thickly welled in my eyes, and I held on to the corner of a desk - ‘I am out with lanterns, looking for myself’- Emily Dickinson.

I caught hold of a large, deeply rooted sob, only just.

I really had no idea where this whole line of enquiry into self would lead me. I would wince as, as a Gen-Xer, my upbringing sat, solid on my shoulder, levying ideas about self-indulgence and naval gazing. My mother’s mantra of ‘buck up’ resonated about me, but what else could I do? Whatever my initial reservations were, I could never have imagined this journey but just knew something had to give. Namely, I had to give back to me.

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