Women Over Fifty—Feather Your Nest
One of the most difficult transitions women face is the double blockbuster hit of going through the hormonal havoc of peri-menopause at the same time their nest is emptying. It seems that at the very stage your children are rebelling and leaving you, both emotionally and physically, your very own body is rebelling and leaving you too. You get the sense that living inside your skin is no longer a familiar place (both emotionally and physically) and it’s an uncomfortable experience indeed.
My friend, Mags, over at The Magnolia Diaries has a great post on some of the very real and distressing symptoms that many women experience. These are by no means easy to endure and peri-menopause can be a time of genuine suffering.
Nevertheless, as someone on the other side of the change, I’m telling you to hang on. Full-fledged menopause is just around the corner and it’s a wonderful period in a woman’s life, if you look at it that way. Menopause brings about emotional and hormonal equilibrium, revitalizes your energies, and gives you the nudge to “go for it”—it’s your time and you’ve earned it.
I was recently on the television talk show View From the Bay with my friend, Maure Quilter, Marriage Family Therapist, discussing this very topic. (The segment is only a couple of minutes and I’d love to have you take a look.)
After menopause, ratios of testosterone to estrogen rise and women experience a merging of their male and female energies. Although nurturing will always be part of our make-up, we have an increasingly insistent drive to express ourselves and leave our unique mark upon the world.
So, go out there and feather your own nest with new interests, take risks and expand your own horizons. Step away from familiar behavior and head for new and exciting directions and goals. This truly IS your time and you HAVE earned it!
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April 27th, 2009 at 7:44 pm
If you ever get the chance, check out Dr. northrup’s Secret Pleasures of Menopause. She brings up the male/female melding aspect as well.
November 18th, 2008 at 1:32 am
It was a double whammy, no tripple whammy, for me when my daughter left home earlier this year. Firstly I’m going through menopause. Haven’t had a period now for about 3 months….hopefully it’s not just stress. My 19 year old daughter left home to work in the snow fields. About a month prior my friend and lover of 5 years died. It was an unexpected accidental death, so unlike my daughter leaving home there was no warning, no expectation, bar a few minutes before his body was found.
Not an easy time, but you know, its funny how both these things happening at the same period of time have somehow distracted me from the momentous aspects of both those things when the going got tough in the earlier days. Sounds weird I know, but when I grieved for Alex I could ring my daughter. When I missed my daughter, I looked on the bright side – I could use the computer whenever I wanted to. The mess at home was mine and I had the time and space to blog and begin to rediscover the woman that became a mother 19 years prior.
All this stress together, has forced me to look at life very differently. Grief is still a constant visitor, but life is a constant, and that is something Alex reminds me of as he gives me strength of spirit almost daily
I can’t focus on the bigger picture any more, so happiness comes from the smallest of things, life is generally lived one day at a time and you what, I quite like it.
November 17th, 2008 at 10:06 am
Great interview and very positive, thanks a lot. It’s necessary to talk about this period of live and even greater to point out that it is a new start. The more we hear from optimistic people like you, the better
November 16th, 2008 at 8:55 pm
Great information, interesting, I was just thinking about how empty my nest is feeling in a post at my Claudia Chronicles blog. And yes, it’s so much better being at the other side of meno, I can’t imagine what it would be like to be going through both at the same time!!
November 16th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
I’ve been working on reinvention for a while now. Not looking forward to the empty nest or menopausal headaches. Right now my daughter is my little buddy. Hard to imagine us at war. Not looking forward to my body attacking me either. LOL
November 16th, 2008 at 1:56 pm
I have moved into the ‘feathering my own nest’ stage. It has been difficult becoming a new person but I love who I am becoming. I am looking forward to a new, fun and exciting life.
November 16th, 2008 at 2:24 am
I think I’ve always been feathering my nest – long before my girls were growing up. I love to explore and try things out but I guess I have even more an excuse now, don’t I?
November 15th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
Since my nest has always been fairly empty – feathered only by my little birds, Tinkerbell and Peter Pan, and accented in fur by Shadow and Pixel. With only my little Pixel left to keep me company my nest is a bit quiet, but I’ve never experienced the actual “empty nest” syndrome and have always keep my horizons expanded. The hot flashes were a big annoyance that just got in my way, lol.
November 15th, 2008 at 10:45 am
The interview was great! “I love the expression to feather your nest with new interests!”
I tell people I am re-creating myself every few years. Thanks for sharing this with your readers!
November 15th, 2008 at 6:54 am
Eileen,
I actually wrote about the relationship between mother and daughter during the menopausal-PMS years. I honestly believe that is the reason for the deterioration of the relationship. Both are going through hormonal changes—rages–and depending on how bad it gets–some relationships never recover.
It truly is a discussion that needs more attention.