"Midlife finds so many ways to diminish us, to challenge the sense we have of ourselves. It messes with our vision and our hearing, it knocks us down and keeps us up all night. It makes us dizzy and angry and scared and causes us to question everything from our hair to our sanity. Nothing is sacred, it’s death by a thousand cuts."
I am really feeling this shit. Plus I go through moments of "anything is possible/I can re-invent myself!" for like a sec & then 'why bother'. Also apparently I now track how I feel by the weather outside. I keep complaining about the humidity & I'm dripping sweat like I have the plague and my husband likes to tell me it's not humid, quotes the actual dew point & says it's me.
Hi Lisa, I share your love for driving and have driven all over the place, in all sorts of vehicles (we had a Renault LeCar that my step-father bought in a pawn shop, which we had to pop the clutch on), in all manner of weathers. Thank you for reminding me about Toyota Celica's and four on the floors. While anxiety (and sometimes panic) have been my companions for as long as I can remember, they have not manifest in the car until recently. Oddly, this doesn't happen when I'm driving - it happens when my husband is driving. My husband has always driven like an 80 year old man, which makes me crazy, but now it makes me anxious too. It's gotten so bad that most of the time I just drive so that we don't get in a fight because I'm busy making comments and telling him where to turn, to speed up, and asking, "why are you doing that?"
I wish you well in your return to the road and wheel!
I cannot be the only one who is now curious who the famous author was from, "I once read a profile of a famous author, a brilliant figure on the international literary scene whose work takes my breath away. It mentioned that her quiet backstage husband is also her agent." 😁
I can so relate to the feeling of losing oneself and wondering if this is now the new self or if the old self will one day re-emerge and tell me she was just on leave. I'm in my mid forties and I used to love the navigator seat! But my husband's driving has me questioning and telling him he can speed up. When he's tired he drives as slow as his fatigue sometimes 10 under the limit and hugs the middle line and I just need to drive. But I absolutely hate driving at night, add in rain and forget it. I might as well move to the back seat and just close my eyes. Soon my son will be driving and then who knows. Driving Miss Daisey. Lol
Feeling perimenopause so hard these days, ladies. Losing myself and sanity is not an easy road for my perfectionistic personality. We need to start a club for "The Lost Ladies".
I so relate to this... Right as I entered perimenopause, at age 41, I was simultaneously diagnosed with a severe seizure disorder and my license was immediately revoked... I was a single mother of two young children living in Los Angeles... a city that all but required driving. I had to completely reinvent our lives. I was so lucky to have girlfriends who stepped up to help, but it was one of the most difficult pieces to navigate after having been a grown-a*s driving lady for so many years! It took years to decode my brain and stop my seizures, but eventually I gained my license back, but I still experience a palpable flicker of anxiety every time I drive.
I laughed when you took to the couch like a silent movie star, and relate to your longing for the old fearless you. I haven't driven in years, because I was never that good at it and have lived in a city for so long, it's not necessary. But your essay made me remember driving to the Jersey shore in my baby blue VW Bug, open windows and a cigarette between my lips. To be that cool again (sans cigarette - sigh) seems inconceivable at times, but I want to believe there's more driving - and drive - in most of us than we may know. Here's to you, in your mother's Camaro, or as a woman who has a driver - either way, I think you're great.
That’s a badass piece of writing. Brava. A bizarre suggestion you may freely discard or hate me for - get yourself a sexy bike? You may be amazed at the autonomy and reclaimed power it affords.
I so relate, Lisa; this happened to me on a motorway in a soaring heatwave here that we rarely get in Ireland back in 2021. Driving along, out of nowhere, sheer panic set in, the heart racing, and then the legs were like gelatinous. Wobbles. And a traffic jam to contend with, and me all hot, bothered, and like a wibbly wobbly wonder, considering frantically at what minute I was going to die there in my car in a traffic jam.
I managed to get off the motorway and through the traffic chaos (just about), and it took months of internal chaos and anxiety to come through it and then six months on menopause. Indeed, this was my first taste of perimenopause. I had an early enough one too, at 45, as I had a partial womb removal. But I am out the other side of it now within reason, thank you HRT, but that shiver down my spine does still show up on occasion when I sit back into the driver's seat. But I am accepting that it will always be there now, just as there will always be traffic and more to deal with on the roads with post-pandemic rage. Take care, and thanks for sharing.
"Midlife finds so many ways to diminish us, to challenge the sense we have of ourselves. It messes with our vision and our hearing, it knocks us down and keeps us up all night. It makes us dizzy and angry and scared and causes us to question everything from our hair to our sanity. Nothing is sacred, it’s death by a thousand cuts."
I am really feeling this shit. Plus I go through moments of "anything is possible/I can re-invent myself!" for like a sec & then 'why bother'. Also apparently I now track how I feel by the weather outside. I keep complaining about the humidity & I'm dripping sweat like I have the plague and my husband likes to tell me it's not humid, quotes the actual dew point & says it's me.
Hi Lisa, I share your love for driving and have driven all over the place, in all sorts of vehicles (we had a Renault LeCar that my step-father bought in a pawn shop, which we had to pop the clutch on), in all manner of weathers. Thank you for reminding me about Toyota Celica's and four on the floors. While anxiety (and sometimes panic) have been my companions for as long as I can remember, they have not manifest in the car until recently. Oddly, this doesn't happen when I'm driving - it happens when my husband is driving. My husband has always driven like an 80 year old man, which makes me crazy, but now it makes me anxious too. It's gotten so bad that most of the time I just drive so that we don't get in a fight because I'm busy making comments and telling him where to turn, to speed up, and asking, "why are you doing that?"
I wish you well in your return to the road and wheel!
I cannot be the only one who is now curious who the famous author was from, "I once read a profile of a famous author, a brilliant figure on the international literary scene whose work takes my breath away. It mentioned that her quiet backstage husband is also her agent." 😁
I can so relate to the feeling of losing oneself and wondering if this is now the new self or if the old self will one day re-emerge and tell me she was just on leave. I'm in my mid forties and I used to love the navigator seat! But my husband's driving has me questioning and telling him he can speed up. When he's tired he drives as slow as his fatigue sometimes 10 under the limit and hugs the middle line and I just need to drive. But I absolutely hate driving at night, add in rain and forget it. I might as well move to the back seat and just close my eyes. Soon my son will be driving and then who knows. Driving Miss Daisey. Lol
Feeling perimenopause so hard these days, ladies. Losing myself and sanity is not an easy road for my perfectionistic personality. We need to start a club for "The Lost Ladies".
I so relate to this... Right as I entered perimenopause, at age 41, I was simultaneously diagnosed with a severe seizure disorder and my license was immediately revoked... I was a single mother of two young children living in Los Angeles... a city that all but required driving. I had to completely reinvent our lives. I was so lucky to have girlfriends who stepped up to help, but it was one of the most difficult pieces to navigate after having been a grown-a*s driving lady for so many years! It took years to decode my brain and stop my seizures, but eventually I gained my license back, but I still experience a palpable flicker of anxiety every time I drive.
I laughed when you took to the couch like a silent movie star, and relate to your longing for the old fearless you. I haven't driven in years, because I was never that good at it and have lived in a city for so long, it's not necessary. But your essay made me remember driving to the Jersey shore in my baby blue VW Bug, open windows and a cigarette between my lips. To be that cool again (sans cigarette - sigh) seems inconceivable at times, but I want to believe there's more driving - and drive - in most of us than we may know. Here's to you, in your mother's Camaro, or as a woman who has a driver - either way, I think you're great.
That’s a badass piece of writing. Brava. A bizarre suggestion you may freely discard or hate me for - get yourself a sexy bike? You may be amazed at the autonomy and reclaimed power it affords.
I so relate, Lisa; this happened to me on a motorway in a soaring heatwave here that we rarely get in Ireland back in 2021. Driving along, out of nowhere, sheer panic set in, the heart racing, and then the legs were like gelatinous. Wobbles. And a traffic jam to contend with, and me all hot, bothered, and like a wibbly wobbly wonder, considering frantically at what minute I was going to die there in my car in a traffic jam.
I managed to get off the motorway and through the traffic chaos (just about), and it took months of internal chaos and anxiety to come through it and then six months on menopause. Indeed, this was my first taste of perimenopause. I had an early enough one too, at 45, as I had a partial womb removal. But I am out the other side of it now within reason, thank you HRT, but that shiver down my spine does still show up on occasion when I sit back into the driver's seat. But I am accepting that it will always be there now, just as there will always be traffic and more to deal with on the roads with post-pandemic rage. Take care, and thanks for sharing.