Midlife

Menopause for men and women

Menopause is a developmental milestone — like puberty in reverse — and it’s different for every one. Once you reach menopause, life can get simpler. If you learn from it.

The secret no one tells you in this youth obesessed society is that midlife can be the most radiant, passionate years of your life. Self-knowledge and self-confidence are the true gifts of menopause — they create an inner glow that more than cancels out other physical changes. One once described it as finally owning her skin after years of struggling to pay rent.

You may be asking: what about aging, wrinkles and weight gain? What about becoming metaphorically invisible? Surely there must be something backing up those dried-up menopause clichés. After all, if menopause is so great how come there’s so much bad press? Well, it’s a fact that everyone gets older every day and this comes with some inevitable physical changes — it’s a price we all pay for getting to stick around. Gravity does exert its pull — but menopause is not the wicked witch. She does not drain any vital function nor turn you old, weak, crotchety, or unattractive with a wave of her wand. We do that to ourselves by buying into a prepackaged idea of what being older (and younger) means. It’s time to retire that tired old stereotype of the post-menopausal and take a good look at the realpeople who are living it.

Stamping out the stigma of menopause Lauren Bacall once said during midlife “I am not a has-been, I’m a will-be.”

Cat note: A plus: I struggled all my life with a few extra pounds, never losing them...I'm kind of a full figured gal. Going through the menopause I actually am losing weight. A friend of one of my beautiful daughters theorizes that because our body is changing it stands to reason that weight gain or loss could be part of the phsyical changing depending on how your hormonal/physical make up was before menopause.

I know men do not techncally go through menopause. Its a condition called andropause due to the decline in male hormones. Men definitely go through a change a midlife as well, however.