Continued Exploration of Grief (and Joy) in Midlife + Menopause
For me personally, I’ve been feeling the internal, gut level feeling of transformation. It’s not so pretty or easy to sit with. The grief I’ve talked about in the past has been sitting under the surface of my skin. I haven’t really been able to vocalize it. For some reason, as I sit and write to you all (and, I am so grateful for you reading my words), some of it wanted to be shared. Maybe because I know it might resonate with you.
I’ve been experiencing memories from across my 20s to be processed: details and stories too long to go into here of past loves, past almost-loves, past friendships, even old acquaintances. My first job as a pharmacy technician, my love of pharmacy when I began school. Before that, my lack of bravery coming out of undergrad to pursue my dreams. All the freshness, energy, and possibility of youth. The feeling that I don’t exactly know who I am right now and who I’m becoming.
What's more joyful then doing crow on the beach at sunset?? My cousin and I crowing it up a couple weeks ago at Anna Maria Island, FL.
I have very few regrets in my life. Everything that I’ve done has taught me lessons, and it has all culminated in being where I am now, and I am grateful. I believe this processing to be part of the midlife moving into the powerful years beyond menopause. And I know that even with menopause, there will be more grief, because it is a part of aging. However, it does seem like this middle time, this transition, has a special layer to it. A rawness.
Until this moment, I haven’t even been able to sit long enough to journal about these things. I’m not a big journaler these days (you’d think I would be), because I often get caught up in my analytical mind when I journal to myself, and so I tend to talk it out with people instead. But this feels like a conversation I need to have with myself with pen and paper.
Here’s the thing: I told my partner the other day that I’ve been feeling sad. I didn’t tell him for days (maybe longer?) of feeling this way. First, because I didn’t recognize it for a while, the emotion that kept coming up and coming up; and second because I knew he would ask me why. I don’t know why.
And that’s okay– this is where I want YOU to have permission to feel sad about whatever you’re grieving right now in midlife. You’re likely now about as far away from your 20s as you are from your 60s. Isn’t that wild?
The flip side of grief is joy. So remember this. Moving through and being with grief helps us have a fuller experience of joy. I’ll bet some of the worst times of your life held within them some of the best times of your life.