A Few Things I Won’t Be Writing About
How the 20 something nurse assistant looked down at her clipboard during my appointment and asked me if I was sexually active. And the way I said no – with no qualifiers – no comments about the dating pool for women in their 60’s, or a joke about hormones, how I wouldn’t know one if I slammed into one. It was the simple way I said no, and how I wondered what it meant and whether I should do something about it. Had I crossed over into a new world, a one way passage into a nether nether land from which I wouldn’t return? And after a lifetime where being seen and desired by men had defined so much of my worth, what would this mean?
It’s my duty as a writer, as a person who pays attention, to recognize that moment, to part the veil, to sacrifice my facade on all the ways I’d rather be seen; smart, vibrant, strong and desirable – and to see it as a portal – a way to shine a light on all the ways I’m changing.
It’s not easy to write about this, but wasn’t that me who told the writers in class today that if there’s something you’re not writing about it will clog the channel, make all other writing nearly impossible, sometimes even making you sick? Aren’t I the one whose favorite jump off line is: A few things I won’t be writing about.
1. The post menopausal weight gain, the fogginess, the exhaustion, and how it reveals so many things I never wanted to experience or show; those shadowy parts of myself that I neatly tucked away because I felt that I needed to be fit, energetic, busy and productive.
2. How much I used to use the term bullet proof to describe my ideal self, and what a master I was at bucking up when I was sad or uncomfortable.
3. How content I was on Valentine’s Day when I was alone in a hotel in the mountains of Utah, surrounded by couples in a fancy bar with music and energy and laughter, and me, sitting alone in the corner with a scotch and some trout, eating slowly, content, not self conscious, but resting in my own company, even relieved not to be have to pay attention to anyone, or take care of them.
4. To remember the day last week when I drove to the gym, got out of my car, walked to the front door, then turned around and left because I didn’t want to work out, and how in all my life, I’ve never asked myself whether I wanted to workout or not. I just did it. For years and years and years.
It’s my job to report how after a lifetime of restrictive eating – lists of what I could or could not eat – it’s oddly easy to reach for what I’m actually hungry for – a scone, a sandwich – pie for dinner – food that I had to deserve before, but no longer.
It’s not a lack of willpower – it’s that I’ve come to the end of the road when it comes to rules. I’m just too tired to uphold them, and I’m actually noticing that when I say yes to what I want, I’m building trust with myself.
I’m reminded of that thing Gary, my old therapist, said a long time ago when I told him that I was falling apart. “No, no,” he said, “the parts of yourself that you don’t need anymore are falling away.”
I’m on a mission to notice the things that are falling away, and it’s not been entirely comfortable.
My ambition. My capacity. My get up and go. And much of what defined my identity for the past many years.
And how, since I was a kid I realized that the way other people saw you became who you appeared to be, and that being productive, busy and accomplished made you shiny, or at least hard to catch. And while much of what went into that busy life was beautiful, imaginative and helpful to others, it also compensated for all the things I worried I wasn’t – smart, vibrant, strong and desirable.
And so as these parts begin to fall away, I’m more in touch with what was also there, waiting patiently for me to not be so damn busy.
Some sadness. A shake up of identity – the way I knew myself. And also a sense that all of this may be right on time for me – an evolution, an opportunity to see what else is there.
How last weekend I finally had the courage to open up the manuscripts from the last couple of years, pour myself a cup of coffee and sit down and read them. It would be a lie to tell you that I loved what I read, that I got excited, that I knew exactly where to jump back in, but I didn’t, in fact I could hardly relate to any of it – like it was written by a different person, from a different life, a landscape of family and relationships and drama that all felt behind me now.
I’m not sure what to make of that. Was I naval gazing all that time? Working something out? Or is there something there, and I just can’t see it? Who am I if all those years of writing don’t become a book?
Today my life includes slow morning, waking up when my body is ready, and how good that feels, like an accordion that has been stretched to capacity for years, and is only now surrendering to its natural shape. My days include feeding the cat, picking up palm fronds that flew from the palm tree into the yard, texting one daughter to see if she got the job, texting the other child to find out what the doctor said, scouting for poetry, writing with students, thinking about workshops, taking a walk, then a bath, face timing my mother, and trying not to forget the line that kept playing in my head on the cranial sacral table last week, “you don’t have to do anything, you don’t have to do anything.”
My job is to tell you that after a life of so much striving to be special and lovable, I’m just not that person anymore. It’s scary, and requires a lot of compassion which is also starting to feel like love.
I remember the conversation with my friend, Kim, who had pulled back from a very big life. “What will you do next?” I asked. And she said, “that’s just it, I’m not asking myself that question.” What a revolutionary thing to say in a life that had been so full of lists and plans and accomplishment. How brave that was.
Listen to Laurie read this piece:
Yes. Yes to what yo said so eloquently, to every word, feeling, question, sensation and all of it,YES.
I add my Yes to yours about everything that the writer wrote above.
Awesome piece, Laurie. Thank you for all of your honest and beautiful years of writing. This is a gift to so many readers and writers.
Jaune
Your words deeply resonate with me. Thank you for sharing – vulnerability helps the next person (like me) feel brave enough to speak their truth too.
Her words resonate so deeply for me too, Leah! and my gratitude for reading them to validate my own…
I experienced these feelings and ideas that you wrote in this response about 3 years ago , but not in response to Covid. So keep writing. You are a pool into which I look and appreciate all the ripples.
Thank you.
I love, “You don’t have to do anything. You don’t have to do anything.” I’m 77, and not having to do anything has been on my to do list for the last three years.
haha, Ruth! I’m right there with you!
This is IT!! This. ❤️❤️
❤️❤️❤️
So like I feel after 8 years of retirement after 43 years of teaching. And having ghost written 1700 radio shows long ago. Who I am is nebulous. Thank you for the not need 3D part. Less scary.
As you so often say to us: “we already love you”.
Right back at you, Laurie.
Love this so much!
Beautiful, Laurie!! I love your writing about this! I love that you are exactly where you are!
Xoxoxo, Ali 😘😘😘
Me too!!!
Thank you so much. This expresses a lot of this phase of becoming. Great writing can evoke such feelings of connection.
One week from my 69th birthday, I can say this is what my last year has been all about, in a nutshell. Thanks for expressing it so clearly.
Ah Laurie, You’ve touched on so many things that have been crossing my mind even this morning. Thank You! Thank You! Thank You!!
Me too. I am embarking on un-planning, un-doing, and letting go of guilt and rush. This makes it all easier, thank you.
Oh Laurie — if I relate any more to this, I’d have written it. Thank you thank you ……!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
What a radical thing to be a post menopausal woman so free of wanting…in a capitalist world that needs us to want.
No wonder they burnt us at the stake.
THIS. Yes and yes and yes. Thank you Laurie!
thanks for being so honest Laurie…love that last line: I’m not even asking the question.
“Being busy… made you shiny, or at least hard to catch.” A statement profound and appropriately disturbing. What’s chasing us, literally, from the inside out.
You said it. Such an important and, in our culture, radical conversation.. Ok to share it on Facebook?
Thank you Kim for sharing on Facebook. Thank you Laurie, I love the way you are paying attention to what is dropping off and what it brings, the new buds, alien to the before and forever grateful I might add.
So rich, Laurie! And honest. “It’s scary, and requires a lot of compassion which is also starting to feel like love” hits home for me. A bit of wilderness wandering. Thanks for what you’re not writing about.
OMG… precisely! Precisely how I’ve felt for the past several years. And imagine, in our culture, we call it “brave” to say, “I don’t know what I’m going to do. I’m going to feel into it, I’m going to let go of the necessary work-like ‘doing’ and just be”… doing what your heart and body tell you to. Bravo! Brave! Brilliant! And I’m so happy to have taken a moment to actually read one of the Wild posts today (It’s what my heart told me to do). P.S. Your photo conveys your writing, everything is in balance!
Love this so much, Laurie. I’m wandering in that wilderness, too. There’s nothing like waking up whenever your body wants to. And after a few years of wondering what’s next–now wondering if that’s the wrong question.
I love this. This is what I am thinking about most recently . The letting go the busyness. It left my wondering Am I depressed? Since the tell for that is not liking to do the things you used to do. No, i tell myself it is just a new phase and I am figuring out what it is i truely want to do now, not what I tell myself I should do.
Thanks for sharing these feelings.
Hmmmm…i found myself humming and nodding my head as I read your words, Laurie. I’m right there with you and all the women whose menopausal, middle lives are changing/have changed into an unfamiliar and unrecognizable self that is of such beauty, it’s hard at times to welcome and accept her. I don’t want to be bright and shiny anymore. I am content (for the most part) being a warm night light now.
I’ve been a “What’s Next?” kind of woman for most of my life and it always brought me a thrill to anticipate the next best thing. I find most of my future-tripping these days just exhausts me. I’m doing my best to ask myself “What’s Here?” instead and I’m slowly discovering it’s a more supportive and kind question to ask myself.
💙
Laurie, I keep saying “ditto” to what others have related above – but I will speak for myself now – everything you wrote is exactly what I have been needing to hear for some time now! Who else has written so well and so completely what I myself have not til now put together in words or thoughts so clearly! Have known and loved your writing for just a couple years or so, but it has always been so right on for me like no one else’s – the honesty, in depth and feelings! Thank you a million times for being you to us out here in no-women’s land…bless you…
I love you, and I mean it. Thank you for your brave and generous heart.
WONDERFUL!!! 🌸🌿🌈
Yeah, Baby. The post-menopausal years are the best. Thank you for your candor.
Thank you, thank you for this jaw dropping honesty. If any of those manuscripts have anything close to this this piece or specifically this gem – “made you shiny, or at least hard to catch” – there’s gold there.
“My job is to tell you that after a life of so much striving to be special and lovable, I’m just not that person anymore. It’s scary, and requires a lot of compassion which is also starting to feel like love.”
YES ! Good on ya!
This feels like my life every single day. And what did I do before now? And did it matter? Did I fail? How lucky am I also… that I get to decide to do or not to do. And why do I have to try so hard. Love this Laurie. Love. This.
Terrific, beautiful, YES.
So beautiful, thank you.
I loved this so much, Laurie. Noticing how calm and spacious I felt by the end of reading it. Your words are like medicine for the soul.
Wow, Laurie! This is spectacularly powerful and timely. I love that you are taking your own great advice about writing what’s true. Just like that.
I love this kind of thinking…looking forward to taking your next class beginning on the 25th! Ditto many of the comments above…thinking of Billie Eilish having such a great hit song that asks the question what was I made for? What is my purpose now that this phase of my life is “over” is another way of putting it? I’ve struggled with that question off and on since retirement and maybe the real deal is to go with the flow of the day, experience the joy of the moment without all the “lists” of to dos, changing plans in an instant just because you can without taking on all of the angst of the Universe presenting itself through the reporters overly sensationalized lenses. I say turn off the constant buzzing of the news, turn inward cleaning up any remnants of karmic clutter from your closets and go on your adventures through the doors opening before you. Find what brings you joy and do that, write about that, during this phase of our evolution…do that and you’ll meet yourself there. Wishing all peace, joy and balance.Thanks Laurie!
i am laughing so hard because i am all dressed for “my run”- the have to work out and suddenly find myself lying on my couch reading your beautiful words with coat, hat, sneakers, right up on the cushions, and the biggest smile because i just cannot do it anymore. you, me, and all these other women in this thread – one voice – all voices. deep bow and deep thanks. xo
How beautiful. And true. And painful. The first thing I saw when I opened your email today was the picture of you in my beautiful, beloved San Miguel de Allende. My home for 18 years, and I miss it so damn much that even a photograph can choke me up.
So I was vulnerable even before I started reading the piece. You wrote me, except I’m not sure I have even begun to come to terms with any of it. At 78 years old and 9 months after my last cancer treatment (and an All Clear) I seem to have lost my way. This morning, someone on twitter asked the question: “What is the title of the chapter of your life you are in right now? ” And I thought…and I thought. And then I thought…nothing. That’s it, that’s the title of the chapter. Nothing. And every page of the chapter is blank.
I too spent a life feeling strong, fit, and desirable. Now I can barely walk around the block. I have one breast that is huge and falls to my waist and one that looks like a small pile of lumpy mashed potatoes with a jagged scar across it. I no longer know who I am.
So I urge this new season to come into focus, to show me where to begin to rebuild a new and different person. One who knows how to be content.
Thank you for writing this and for sharing it.
Oh my, this is all me!! This spoke to me on so many levels!! Thank you for sharing.
Wow! Buddy! Love this and love you. I get you and am seeing you so much these days. You’re opening, being vulnerable, so real and because of this, I feel the closeness and connection with you. XO
To sit and be, rather than run and strive, was a concept so alien to me until an horrific life event forced me to become stilled. As the stilling came upon me I finally allowed for myself a sense of peace. I was becalmed. And as days moved into weeks I recognised I could hold myself in this new way of being without any shame or guilt or that inner voice saying it was lazy or indulgent of me to sit and write poems all day.
I haven’t always managed to retain this sense of peace over the last four years, but having tasted it, I know what it’s like and I can imagine myself back there almost without fail and at any time a “crisis” arises.
Thank you Laurie for naming oh so many things we striving women need to hear and reconfirming that we are each good enough however we decide to spend or time today, tomorrow and for all the days to come.
This is so powerful. And Donna’s comment – so courageously vulnerable in sharing a bit of her story. And saying that the title of the next chapter is… Nothing. This stung my heart. So I started to think of alternative titles for the next chapter. Perhaps…
Vulnerable Connection
We let go of the façade. We let go of the external lens. We gently shift our attention to what is buried deep within. We bring those deeply buried treasures – desires, fears, our true essence, the beautiful, the not so beautiful – into the light. And we share them openly. We finally allow the world to see them. We let down our guard and find ourselves being vulnerable without the angst of earlier years. And through our vulnerability we create connection in the world – connection with nature, with others, with our spirit, with ourselves – that we’ve been craving our entire lives. Connection that was previously elusive. Finally. Here we are.
Laurie,
I have missed listening to your voice!! I’ve stepped away from writing (the practice, that is) I’ve sorta been hovering in the sidelines trying to gauge when it was ok to tune back in. Mostly worried and afraid of what that would unveil. This piece is so beautiful and brave! It reminds me as you said, that the things I’m not writing about are blocking the channel. I especially appreciated your honesty with respect to restrictive eating and things not falling apart, but pieces unneeded falling away. About having more compassion towards what feels like an unpeeled version of myself. I love that reminder. Thank you, your voice and tenderness is much loved over in this little corner 🥰
thank you for validating and liberating my 58 year old self – here’s to things falling away, like leaves in autumn, and hidden roots and stretching branches
There’s so much strength in being soft and surrendered. Yielding to the whisper of simple desires. Instead of asking, “Should I, how can I, when will I?”, we ask, “Do I want to?” And, then, responding so kindly to ourselves by meeting our innermost wants and needs.
“My job is to tell you that after a life of so much striving to be special and lovable, I’m just not that person anymore. It’s scary, and requires a lot of compassion which is also starting to feel like love.”
Ohhhhh, yessss.
And now I practice living in a way that knows I’m special and lovable. Striving is no longer required to be special and lovable.
I am loved deeply.
I finally know it.
I finally remember. Yet,I still forget. But I never completely forget, not anymore.
Love you, Laurie. You are the best!
How weird that we spend most of our life trying to be something when we already are!
xo
Laurie, so powerful!
– not take care of anyone (just self)
– building trust with self
– parts not needed falling away
– you don’t have to do anything
“Since I was a kid I realized that the way other people saw you became who you appeared to be, and that being productive, busy and accomplished made you shiny, or at least hard to catch.”
I feel this so much. Letting go of that is scary and hard and, I have to believe, worth it.
This is really beautiful.