This morning I tried the Teenage Look filter on TikTok and came face to face with my 14-year-old self, shyly peering at me from my phone. Looking at this eerily accurate baby-faced version of myself, I wanted to tuck that little girl into my pouch like a mama kangaroo. I thought I was such a mature hardass back then, when really I was a baby bird.
My other impression, toggling back and forth between the images of present-me and past-me was: Good lord, I’ve aged.
I’m not going to say youth is wasted on the young. The young have a fucking hard time; let them at least enjoy being bouncy and cute. But for sure my youth was wasted by my young self. I put so much booze, cigarettes and weed through my system, and got away with looking surprisingly fresh-faced well into my forties, which I truly didn’t deserve. All my death-wish shenanigans caught up with me around 48 when, boom: “menopause face” arrived overnight, ironically just as I was getting sober. Party’s over, folks.
I’d quite like to pump the brakes on that slide into decrepitude, but unfortunately it’s actually set to speed up, thanks to the medication I’m on. This is bumming me out. I actually had to have a big old cry about it recently, after discussing the side effects with my oncologist.
Anastrazole is an “aromatase inhibitor”. Its job is to pretty much wipe out all the remaining estrogen in my body. The type of breast cancer I had last year feeds off estrogen, and eliminating it will cut my risk of recurrence from 12% to 6%. Will this make a life-or-death difference in my case? Nobody knows. But I do know it’s kicking me further and faster down the road to old age.
Estrogen is the youth hormone; it’s what makes us juicy peaches. Without it I am shriveling up, and it’s not only my vanity taking a hit. Along with thinning my hair and skin, this drug is making my bones brittle, giving me joint pain, hot flashes, insomnia, brain fog, and all-over muscle ache - it’s supersized menopause. My knees hurt, and when I twist my neck, it crackles and pops like a bowl of Rice Krispies.
I want my estrogen back so bad. I want to tell my endocrine system, I promise to use it for good and not take it for granted! After a lifetime of squandering my life force, I am finally ready to really live. I don’t want to turn into a crone before my time.
I was ruminating on the injustice of it all when I got a text from someone I love very much who was having a hard time. They were tired of feeling bad, and tired of trying so hard to feel better. They didn’t know how much longer they could stick it out on this planet.
I’m not going to say too much about this because it’s not my story to tell, but if you’ve ever talked someone you love off a ledge, you’ll know that it is terrifying, and it is difficult. Depression is a dense and sticky substance.
I can’t say for sure whether I’ve been depressed or not. I don’t have the problem of feeling unable to get out of bed and face the day. I laugh easily. I’m capable of flights of ecstasy over a meal or a movie or a museum. But underneath it, I often feel ambivalent about the project of my human life. Sometimes I suspect my enthusiasm for food and alcohol and sex - and even laughter and beauty and ambition - is really just an effort to squeeze as much hedonic pleasure out of this body as I can, because without it, I barely want to be here. Is that a form of depression?
The cry for help from my friend came on April 16, which happened to be the 46th anniversary of the death of my big sister Henrietta. She was hit by a car in front of our farmhouse at age seven. And with her death I became a more reluctant member of the human race.
Recently I was speaking to someone about Henrietta, and they asked whether I felt guilty, as a child, to have survived when she was dead.
No, I didn’t feel guilty, I told them. Something a bit worse.
I felt jealous.
Henrietta was in heaven, where everything is perfect and you can eat ice cream all day. I was stuck here on earth where parents are sad and distant, kids at school are mean, and our house is too quiet. Sitting on the carpet of a friend’s bedroom, I excitedly explained to this unsuspecting six-year-old why it was actually a good thing to die, and the living are the unlucky ones who must wait for their rewards in the afterlife. Thanks, Catholicism.
I’ve never been tempted to take my own life. But I think I’ve been chasing sensation while secretly biding my time for my expiration date to arrive pretty much since then. If this sounds morbid, that’s not how it feels to me. It’s more like binge-watching movies on a long flight, stimulating and numbing at the same time.
This all started to shift when I quit drinking two and a half years ago through a mix of self-compassion, mindful observation and intentional decision-making. That led to breaking my love addiction to relationship drama. Finally, I brought my essential self out of hiding and let her run free, notably in my writing practice.
Nowadays I feel less driven to chase intensity or seek approval. I am holding my human experience more lightly, letting the journey of growth and healing be the point. Surrendering to subtlety, embracing ease. I don’t have to kill time because, on this side of fifty, I know too well that time is constantly slipping away anyway, without any help from me.
Ambivalence about being alive is not uncommon and it’s nothing to be ashamed of. Maybe we all feel it sometimes, even if we rarely talk about it. Maybe you’ve felt it too. Maybe you’re feeling it right now, or someone close to you is.
We are exhausted by the sheer grind of laundry, Zoom calls, and taxes. We look around at the state of the environment and the politic climate and think: What the fuck is humanity’s problem? We reach out to a friend and maybe they respond in unhelpful ways. We urge ourselves to get out there and socialize, but small talk only makes us feel lonelier and more isolated. Our knees ache. It’s hard to get excited about a new job, a new lover, a new pair of shoes, and we wonder what the point of it all is.
But giving in to despair isn’t the way to find relief.
Perhaps it’s thanks to my chronic, low-key ennui that I’ve amassed a good supply of tools to keep me anchored in my life when the urge to escape it feels irresistible. I shared some of these things with my struggling loved one, and I want to share them with you now, too.
Intentional energy management
For when you’re feeling listless and wrung out.
Life is a constant flow of deposits and expenditures: some things fill us up, and others drain us. That’s inevitable. When we have a good baseline of vitality, we may not notice the fluctuations in our energy. But when we are feeling low, every drop of life force counts.
Make a list of the things that fuel you or lift you up, and a list of things that deplete you or drag you down. Interestingly, this is not the same thing as resting vs working! Notice that some short term pleasures are actually draining, while some things that fill you up require some effort.
If you find yourself indulging in the things that deplete you, don’t scold yourself. Just try consciously and compassionately turning away from them, turning toward what fuels you instead.
What depletes me:
Alcohol
Ruminating on injustices from the past
Beating myself up; blaming and shaming myself
Watching TV
Scrolling social media
Eating junk
Meaningless conversations
What fuels me:
Organizing my space
Completing an overdue chore
Making and eating a nutritious and delicious meal
Moving my body, especially in nature
Sitting with my truth, accepting it, expressing it
Writing something that I’m pleased with
Connecting with a friend I feel I can be myself with
Saying kind and encouraging words to myself
Automate your transitions
For when you keep slipping back into an old rut.
We can be humming along just fine in one part of our day, but when the time comes to switch gears we’re at risk of falling off track.
Building little rituals into the transitional moments in our days can allow us to ease into a new activity on auto-pilot and build momentum before the brain and body have a chance to panic and crash, or we get sucked into a social media rabbit hole.
Consider creating a checklist for your most vulnerable transitional triggers. The most effective and easy to stick to rituals are simple and contain inherently pleasant sensory elements. Here are some examples.
Waking up: Make bed immediately, light a candle and meditate with some hot lemon water. Or go for a ten or 15-minute stroll whatever the weather.
Coming home: Make a cup of herbal tea, put shoes / bags / shopping away, do some stretching while mentally preparing for the next activity.
Finishing a task: Walk out onto the balcony or into the backyard and take some deep breaths while looking at the horizon. If you are a list making person, check your completed task off your list and reevaluate the rest of the list. Do you still want to do the things you’ve planned, or is your body or mind needing something different? Pivoting is just fine, as long as it’s intentional and authentic to your needs!
Winding down: Screens off 90 minutes before bed, take a bath with a podcast on, dim the lights, write in your journal or read a book.
Fill your brain with kind words
For when your inner meanie is loud and relentless; when you don’t 100% believe that you deserve kindness.
We know our inner self-talk is a powerful influencer of our mental health, but kind and encouraging words are hardest to access when we need them most. I write them on Post-it notes and stick them on my wall. (Back when I was very gripped by shame I didn’t let myself do this because I worried that it was a neurotic thing to do. Now I don’t care one bit because it works, and that’s what matters.)
For a supportive statement to be really helpful, it needs to be one that feels true. Hyper-positive affirmations can actually make you feel worse if you know you’re bullshitting yourself. My supportive statements often acknowledge the difficult feeling or belief that I’m grappling with.
Some examples to try:
I did not choose to come here, but I am here, so I might as well make the most of it.
My circumstances are hard, but life is made of moments and this little moment right here is beautiful, or could be made beautiful.
Other people have struggled with similar feelings, even if they don’t often share it openly. We are together even in our aloneness.
Although it sure looks like humanity is headed for a dumpster fire of self-destruction, we don’t know how this is actually going to turn out.
And if this truly is the end times, I’m kind of lucky to witness it. (This one is good for emergency situations when the state of the world seems inescapably bleak.)
For all the despair, hardship, cruelty, wreckage and alienation in this world, love somehow persists as an unstoppable force with transformative powers.
I’m here now, and I won’t always be.
Things can, and do, get better.
A hopeful parting note
I’m glad to report that my dear friend is back on their feet. After working with these tools together, I had a renewed perspective on my aging body and gloomy feelings about my cancer treatment. I realized that if my sister Henrietta were still alive, she’d be going on 54 in September. But she never had the privilege of getting wrinkly and creaky like I am now. And I don’t need to envy her for enjoying heaven’s ice cream; wherever she is, I’ll be joining her there soon enough.
Meanwhile, I am here, on this ride, and I’m here for the whole enchilada. It is scary sometimes, challenging often. There is risk, and there are thrills. Just like every good novel, video game, amusement park ride, or movie. The human experience is all about highs and lows, and my life is blessed with a full share of both.
We all make disastrous mistakes, some of whose consequences cast a shadow over decades of our lives. But what if fucking up royally is actually part of the plan?
We all get kicked around by circumstance, by the people we love, by illness and poverty, by loss and loneliness. But what if the lessons we learn - including the lesson of what to do with our pain - are the point of being here?
You’re not doing it wrong.
The joys are sweeter and the lows are more tolerable when I’m fully present, awake, aware, and willing to live this life. And the fact that you are reading these words is proof to us both that we are not alone.
xo
This is one of the best pieces of writing I’ve had the pleasure of reading in a long time and I read A LOT. I’m sorry about how difficult this loss of estrogen is and how it messes with so much of your world. It’s a real rollercoaster. As I continued to read I thought « oh this is a sister » then I got to the love addiction and it was confirmed. You are a blessing sharing your truth and we need more women like you speaking about topics so many of us deal with but feel isolated. Sending blessings!
Wow what a powerful read. Thank you for this.