Thank You Mirror Trainers!

Jakob asked me earlier this week when in my life I had reached the point where I liked working out. He has jumped back on the fitness wagon and is not spurred on by a desire to work out. Instead, he is driven by a “need.” He feels he needs to lose weight and that doesn’t happen just by wishing it would happen. So he started a four-week routine this week and each morning he goes downstairs to work out before he gets ready for school.

I was honest with Jakob about my attitude towards working out. It was only four years ago that I fell in love with working out. I have been an active person my whole life and I have been fortunate that my weight has never been a concern for me. I haven’t always liked the way I felt or looked in my clothes (or out of them, for that matter) but I have never had to worry about being overweight. I spent my teen and college years working out as part of team athletics and staying conditioned for those teams. As an adult I have worked out 3-4 days a week and I made that work for me. And then Ed gifted me a Mirror for Christmas 2019. The Pandemic began three months later, and it was a perfect storm of opportunity.

I can honestly say that I now love working out! It is as much a part of my daily schedule as my mug of coffee, and as important to my overall health routine as brushing and flossing. I so some sort of workout or movement class seven days a week. I am a nicer, more patient mother and wife when I have worked out. I work out to release stress and anxiety, and I work out to gain focus. Yes, I love working out!

As I continue to mourn the loss of the #MirrorLiveCrew, I am grateful for the progress that I have made in the last four years. My fitness journey has been one marked by change throughout my varied attempts at body transformation. And the one thing I know is this:  learning to embrace a fitness routine takes time, patience and an understanding of your own body. Most importantly, it takes acceptance. Accept that movement and strength training are necessary for the body as we age. Accept that it will get harder the older we get. And accept that the same things don’t always work. Muscle memory leads to plateaus and plateaus lead to boredom and frustration. Accepting that workouts need to be changed up periodically goes a long way in keeping one on the fitness treadmill. (Pun intended.)

In addition to the strength, cardio, barre, Pilates, and boxing classes I started taking on the Mirror, I also found yoga and dance and added them to my weekly repertoire. Last year I added a 15-minute stretch class to the end of every workout. Four years ago, I could not do a standing figure four to put my socks on without severe lower back pain. It usually ended up with me losing my balance and tipping over. Sitting down to put my socks on was a safer way to go. Today, I can not only do a standing figure four with excellent balance, but I can also lift my leg up onto the bathroom counter, in a near standing pigeon pose. It didn’t happen overnight. It took time. It took patience.

Where I once worked out to transform my body, I now work out largely to maintain. I no longer workout in an unrealistic attempt to regain my body of yesteryear. I work out for the benefit of future me. The transformations I am after are now the subtle ones that I believe are more of a test of my longevity. As I watch the Seniors around me struggle with the challenges of age, I am committed to not end up in a hospital bed with a broken hip, ready to die. At my age and moving forward, flexibility is more important than whether I can bench press any amount of weight.

So, although I may not see new classes being added to the library of my Lululemon Studio app anymore, I am happy to still be discovering the benefits of all that I have found there and continue to find there. (As long as Peloton doesn’t decide to completely get rid of us Mirror/Lululemon subscribers as they did with our trainers.) And I am grateful to those trainers that helped get me here.

Thank you:

@lanceaparker – You made me actually LIKE stretching!

@ gerrenliles – for the philosophy that will keep me going:  (paraphrase) It takes a lot longer to notice progress in your stretch routine than it will to notice progress in your strength routine.

@theamandabaxter – “If we don’t bend, we break.”

@alexsilverfagan – “Take care of your hips and you take care of everything else.”

If you don’t stretch on a regular basis, start. TODAY. Future you will thank you.

Why I Listen @ 1.5+

My husband, Ed, has a Type A personality. He is not a procrastinator; he is a planner. He is not a fly by the seat of his pants kind of guy and he is not the guy that’s going to tell you that he hasn’t considered the inevitable, the probable or the fantastical, because he’s considered it all. His To Do List is created each night before he goes to bed and edited and rearranged each morning that he sits down at his desk or outside by the fire pit with his coffee to start his day. He is currently running his second automotive dealer development company, maintains all of the exterior maintenance of our home, cooks gourmet meals several times a month for our family, including the shopping for the ingredients, and he takes his responsibility for planning date night two times a month seriously. He is present and available for all four of his children when they need him. He recently started a new business venture in real estate and can now add “Landlord” to his many titles and accomplishments. Ed gets shit done.

My friend Michele also has a Type A personality. She has at least three full time jobs at any given time, devoting her attention to school systems in need, covering ground from Sturbridge to the Bronx and back, and then out to Great Barrington and back again. She somehow manages to also get her youngest son to hockey practice and games in Connecticut, a “short” forty-minute drive to UCONN, and until just this past August was driving her middle son to and from work at two different jobs, as well as his sports commitments. None of those responsibilities includes the time she spends parenting a new college student away down south and being a wife and companion to her husband and many friend groups. Michele gets shit done.

I have two part-time jobs. One of those jobs is seasonal and I am only “on the payroll” from May to October each year. I usually work one day per weekend, from six to nine hours per shift. My other job has me glued to my desk, work laptop and large monitor two to four days per week, usually for two to three hours each day. Sometimes it’s more. Sometimes it’s a lot less. Scattered around these responsibilities I clean my house, shop online for my groceries from Shaw’s and household necessities from Walmart. I paid for the yearly “Shaw’s for You” program, so I get my groceries delivered on many days. The other days I am pulling up to the “Drive Up and Go” spaces and someone else is putting my preordered groceries into the back of my car. Pick up at Walmart is the same, with me simply punching in my space number and the color of my vehicle before someone brings my items out to me in a tiny blue open hand-truck type of cart. This is my idea of getting shit done.

During the pandemic I reconnected with a cousin that I hadn’t been in contact with since I was in my early twenties. As we developed a relationship through Instagram, we shared many things about ourselves that we hadn’t known from living on opposite sides of the country and only getting together during mini family reunions fashioned as a result of another cousin getting married. We shared our mutual joy over finally getting over the personal stigma of listening to books on audio. As an avid reader my whole life, and a “struggling” author in the making, I resisted switching over to audio and listening to books. It felt like cheating. It didn’t seem fair to call it “reading.” And I worried most that it meant that I was lazy.

But the first time I finished an audio book and realized that it allowed me to finally take in a story that had been a daunting task in print, I was sold on the benefits of audio books. Add in that I listened to this book while cleaning the kitchen after dinner, doing the dishes, folding many loads of laundry, and vacuuming, there was really no reason not to love audio books! I was still getting shit done and I was “reading”?! It really was a win-win-win-win-win all around.

So, when my cousin asked me if I thought it was cheating further, or some kind of ridiculous execution by Type A’s to be more Type A by listening to podcasts and books on anything greater than 1.0, I had to take pause and really consider the “why.”

Michele listens to audio books on 2.0 and I have always laughed at her and figured it was just her Type A in overdrive and that she was trying to prove something to herself, or to book club. I wasn’t sure which demographic was her intended audience.

When I am not sure what I should be thinking about a particular subject, I do what most people do:  I Google it. (When in doubt, Google. When you’ve considered both sides of an issue and still don’t know what side to stand on? Google.)

And what I discovered was a video that questioned the very benefits, stereotypes and judgments that were boggled up in my mind about listening to books and podcasts at any speed faster than 1.0.

What I remembered is that I love to read. What I acknowledged is that I often fall asleep while reading. What I connected to was that I have always been a fast talker. (When I was a kid, my grandfather lovingly called me “Shotgun” and would instruct me to slow down so he could take in my story better.) What I realized is that we all want to get shit done. What resonated is that most of us feel short on time to get any of it done, let alone all of it. Even the leisurely stuff; the fun stuff; the relaxing, recharging rejuvenating stuff – it all takes time and usually gets shoved to the bottom of the To Do List and finally off the list altogether, being replaced by things we prioritize at the moment.

I believe that most of us know instinctively that the little things in life, the small pleasures, are what we hold most dear and what really should stay at the top of the To Do List. Perhaps they are most treasured because they are the relished joys that are dismissed because we view jobs, money, status and outward success as the ultimate reward. At the end of our days, most of us will admit that our interpersonal relationships and the acts outside of work and what we do for the world held more importance and should have had more of our time. Yet we still prioritize the extrinsic acknowledgments and achievements over our personal successes and internal acceptance.

I am not a Type A personality. I have dreams and goals and I am also a true procrastinator. I am the dog distracted by the squirrel. I reorganize a drawer in my kitchen while putting away a pen and lose an hour on a day that I swore I had no wiggle room to mess with. My To Do List never gets shorter. It gets longer as I cross one thing off and add three more that popped up while I was chastising myself about deviating from the list when I rearranged the drawer. I get shit done. It’s just not always the shit that I thought I was going to get done.

So, I currently listen to my stories on Audible at 1.5. I toggle back and forth on my podcasts from 1.5 to 1.75. It took me much longer to elevate the podcast listening speed that high, than it did for the reading speed. I am not sure why it was harder to listen to conversational talk at a faster pace than to listen to a story told at a faster pace, but I challenged myself until I could listen to both at an enjoyable 1.5. It feels painfully slow and sounds weird when I roll the speed down to 1.0 when there is the occasional statement that doesn’t make sense and I have to listen to it slower to understand it. It does amaze me that the faster speed has become a normal sound for me, and not an insane hyped-up, cocaine-addicted voice yelling in my ear.

I listen at 1.5 because it lets me take in more of what I love and what helps me get through the day. I listen at 1.5 because there are so many stories in the world, and I want to enjoy as many of them as possible. I listen at 1.5 because when I find a podcast I really enjoy I want to take it in and keep it with me. “Dear Sugars” and “We Can Do Hard Things” have gotten me through the housework week after week, walking the dog in the rain, pulling weeds, shoveling snow and making spaghetti. (I can’t listen to a story or a podcast while I follow a recipe because that requires too many brain cells to pay attention to very different things, but I can multi-task during a rote activity like boiling pasta and making a meat sauce.) I listen at 1.5 because I want to pack as much of what I like doing into my day as I can, and on some days, the only thing that makes it onto the joy list is listening while I get a chore done.

Listening at 1.5 is my way of having a Type A personality.

Passport

My new passport came in the mail yesterday. The picture that I decided to submit was not the first photo that was taken. It was the second from a second retailer. I wasn’t happy with the photo that Staples took so I went to CVS. When I got home and compared the two pictures, I actually liked the way I looked in the Staples photo, but it was too dark. So, I went with the brighter light of the CVS photo, even though my mouth has a smile that belongs on a Muppet.

I hate this passport.

Despite the challenges of my photo submission, the picture is not the reason for my dissatisfaction with my United States passport.

I am horribly offended.

Other than me, there are no women depicted on any of the twenty-six pages, nor on the inside front or back cover. The images that have humans all display men – white men. The drawings and representations are probably supposed to characterize our history and our origin, our beginning. There is a prominent bald eagle, mountain ranges, steamboats and steam ships, and a glimpse of the top of the page of the Declaration of Independence. There are a colonial ship, buffalo and cattle, and men working the land.

When does anything “new” ever make it onto a government document? How about anything from the last 100 years? Mount Rushmore was completed in 1941, less than 100 years ago, but:  MORE MEN. This country honestly was built upon – and sustained – by more than that. We have a total of twenty-eight pages of old American images showcasing a pathetic and insulting reality:  the United States government still does not want to reflect upon, nor give credence nor validation to the other people that have helped build this country.

History has its place in the manuscript of our certificates, buildings and monuments. We gain insight into where we need to go by remembering where we came from. The past was not just a step towards the current time, it was the blueprint for moving forward, and more importantly, it was the lesson of what not to do again. Our story has come a long way. The pages of a book that afford us the freedom to enter a new land rich with its own history, and then return home to our present roots, should represent more than just the beginnings of our growth.

The story this passport tells excludes women. It negates all people of color, whether they were forced to come here or decided to arrive of their own volition. The current passport story blatantly and disgustingly ignores the native people of this country from whom the land was stolen, stripped, and marginally reallocated, before dismissing them once again as unworthy humans. Most of the people that toiled and taught, created and invented, or envisioned and prophesied are not represented in these pages. The book is not a document that reflects all or some. Instead, it focuses on the most of our culture and heritage and those that are clearly still in power.

From the plains to the mountains, the United States is also home to beautiful cities ripe with culture. From saguaro to palm tree the land bears greenery, flora, and fruit. Our National Parks preserve and showcase caverns, canyons, rivers, lakes, and wildlife, far more than just the bison. Over three and half million square miles of earth is claimed as the United States of America. Within that expanse is the equal number of images, milestones, constructions, progressions, and peoples, from which to choose defining symbols of our life as Americans. The Statue of Liberty can stay. The Liberty Bell can stay. The Declaration of Independence can remain. The saguaros, the palm trees, one mountain range, and the last image from space can stay. Everything else needs to go.

Men brought their families here and women worked hard alongside them. People of all colors have poured their souls, as well as their literal blood, sweat and tears, into the folds of the American batter. A mixture of old and new, the past blended into the present, should grace the pages of a legal document designed to take you home again. That home should be adequately represented for the person entitled to bear it.

What Do I Know? Part II

When I started my blog over 12 and half years ago, I didn’t even understand what a blog was. My friend Erin kept telling me I needed a blog. Like Glennon Doyle’s response when her sister Amanda told her the same thing, I was forced to Google the word blog…multiple times. It finally started to sink in…but not really. I took a huge leap of technology faith and prayed that I was doing it right. I put all my x’s and o’s into Google’s BlogSpot platform and hit publish.

It was exhilarating! I was literally sweating, nervous about having my words out there on the web. At the time I did not have any social media. I was not, and still am not, on Facebook. I hadn’t even signed up for Instagram yet. And today I have only added Twitter to that forum of interaction. (I almost never check it, so it kind of doesn’t count.) For me, that day was a jump into the shallow end of the pool of reality. Only, picture me carefully stepping onto the first step, s-l-o-w-l-y. It was one small step for mankind and one giant leap for Heather.

What I knew then and what I know now are drastically different or exactly the same, depending upon the subject matter. I first shared some of those thoughts almost exactly twelve years ago, on September 16, 2011. I still show up to share what is on my mind and what makes me grab my journal and pen. This is where I tell you what I know.

I know that the world changed three years ago when the 2019 Novel Coronavirus began sweeping across the world. How to treat it, stay protected from it, and whether to fear it, is all largely dependent upon what political party you align yourself with. The treatment of the virus was handled publicly as a political issue and remains to be viewed as such.

I know that my marriage is not a stable, secure environment for love and trust. It is a foundation in our lives that has been shaken with a severe magnitude of pain, dishonesty, blame and denial.

I know that I have tried everything possible to save my marriage. Whether Ed ever wants to admit it or not, I will always know that we have lasted this long because I refused to give up, because I asked for another chance every single time Ed brought up divorce, and because I kept looking for ways to bring faith in each other back to our marriage.

I know that even though I have already had to do one of the hardest things in my life - say goodbye to Jakob when he went off to college at St. John’s - I will not know how to deal with the pain of saying goodbye to Miranda when she moves into the New England Institute of Technology on September 29, 2023.

I didn’t know that I could enjoy a 7:05AM goodbye hug from Kendra as she leaves for her senior year of high school on her own. I knew that the autonomy she would have after getting her driver’s license would also afford me some independence, but I never imagined it would give me a feeling of relaxation and freedom as I start my day. I never realized how anxious I was in the morning to have to get up and get dressed and drive her to school.

I didn’t know that I could go five months without therapy and not feel like I was losing my mind. I didn’t know that I could be 100% willing and ready to say “goodbye” to Cynthia. For now.

I know that I have acquiesced to my husband’s desire – and need – to give his children the best of everything that he could provide. I know that it is time for me to gently remind him that just because he can, does not mean that he always should. (Thank you, Michele.)

I know that I am discovering a part of me that is an introvert. The me that used to hate being home alone, now looks forward to it and embraces it. I know I am still largely an extrovert, gaining my energy and reboots from time spent with people, my people. I also know that I now find joy in being alone and doing things for me.

What I know now will remain the same and evolve from this day forward. What I know will be able to be stamped in stone and what I know will need to be reevaluated, erased, and washed away. What I know fills a shot glass and what I know overflows the riverbanks of my life. What I know is I am changing, still growing up a little every day, and becoming the person I was meant to be. I am afraid, I am resilient, I am willing.

This much, I know.

Buckle Up

Today was Kendra’s first day of school back after summer vacation. It was her last first, and the first of many lasts that will be ticked off over the next 180 days.

Today was the first day of Kendra’s senior year in high school.

She came to me at 6am to tell me she was leaving at 6:30am to meet up with her friends so that they could get a “good parking space.” If I had known that getting good parking was motivation enough to get her to leave the house fifty minutes earlier than I dragged her out of the house last year, I would have pushed her harder to get her learner’s permit and license.

In 2014, Jakob decided he wanted to transfer out of Tantasqua Regional High School and attend Worcester Academy, a private school in Worcester, MA. He reclassed to get all four years of high school on one transcript and assure that he completed important foundational classes that WA required of all freshmen. We literally bought ourselves another year with Jakob.

Kendra was sixteen in January 2022 and if she had completed all requirements on a strict timeline, she could have earned her license in July 2022. Therefore, she could have driven herself to school for her entire junior year. For some reason, Kendra showed no serious interest in getting her permit. She took the test once, and like many teenagers, she didn’t pass it the first time. She would put off re-applying and re-taking the test for over a year. She never seemed unhappy about not having her license when many of her friends were driving into the lane of independence around her.

When Kendra was four years old, Ed used a bunch of his American Express points to buy her a navy blue, battery-operated Jeep. She mastered driving that Jeep in the vein of Vin Diesel in any one of the Fast and Furious movies. She circled the cul-de-sac in front of our old house, doing her best to keep up with her brother and sister and some of the neighborhood kids who were on bikes. The day I saw her slam on the brakes and let the Jeep fishtail to a stop, before slamming it into reverse, I knew that she was going to command being behind the wheel of a real car. Even as a tiny preschooler, she was confident in her skills. She looked over shoulder and turned the wheel of the Jeep, put it back in forward and resumed her chase. Kendra could drive!

As a baby and toddler, I carried Kendra around the house a lot, and held her on my hip every day at the bus stop when Jakob and Miranda headed off to elementary school and then came home in the afternoon. I like to believe that Kendra purposely procrastinated herself into another year of being carted around. There was no rush to gain too much independence. She would be ready when she was ready.

I have often tried not to look in the rearview mirror of my life and be sad about the world I have left behind. I was all too eager to leave diapers and tiny baby food jars on the side of the road. Through most of my children’s development I was perfectly satisfied to move on to the next stage. When Jakob got his license, I was ecstatic. I didn’t see my little boy driving away from me down the road. I saw a responsible driver who could pick his sisters up from practice and run to MickNuck’s for a last-minute dinner ingredient. So, I am trying to look at Kendra’s senior year as something other than, “How did I get here?!”

Rather, it is the Surreal Senior Year!

My baby girl is a baby no more. I am proud and overjoyed at the amazingly smart, and beautiful young lady she is today.

I may no longer be driving Miss Daisy, because now she’s driving, and not making me crazy.

She is growing and going…going to school, going places, and going towards her goals.

It will assuredly kill me a little bit each day with each Last that senior year has to offer. She is my youngest and represents the onset of the empty nest, regardless of whether her older siblings are still at home. With that comes sadness. I may not languish in the loss of my children’s childhoods, but I am also not devoid of feelings and deep connections with them, either. This year, I hope that I can keep my reflection and bittersweet joy for this phase in her life contained at a level that doesn’t make her feel bad for the steps she’s taking to move on and away.

This senior year, Kendra will be killing it!

Feeding My Soul

I didn’t write yesterday. I had a 9-day streak that I hadn’t rivaled since last November. I am happy with the progress I have made lately, so I forgave myself when I didn’t have the energy to sit down here and get some words on the page.

I can honestly say the biggest reason I have been able to get “arse in chair, words on page” in the last nine days was because Ed was cooking dinner. He prepared a new home-cooked meal every night for eight days straight. No takeout, no repeaters, no sandwiches. It was real food, and there was a variety:  chicken, steak, fish, pasta. We had it all! He was proud to say that he used all the major appliances, as well:  oven, stove, microwave, air fryer, Insta-Pot, and slow cooker. The man was on a roll! This run as head chef has never happened in our twenty-five plus years together.

Everyone knows I hate cooking. I have not kept it a secret, faked it or denied it. For years I longed for Ed to find the time to take the lead in the kitchen and prepare the evening meals. He is, after all, a lot better at it than I am. He is more creative in the kitchen, as well as more daring. He is willing to try new things and if it doesn’t come out the way he hoped, then he orders take-out and commits to making appropriate changes for the next attempt. We approach cooking in two completely different ways. I address it the same way that a Black Ops team approaches an extraction:  move in, clean sweep, accomplish the objective and get out. Ed arrives in the kitchen with the spirit of Jula Child on his shoulder and the bravissimo of Emeril in everything he touches. “Bam!” Yes, he just did that.

Not having to cook gave me HOURS back into my day. Even on the nights I cleaned up after dinner, I was still able to get more done than I have achieved in the last six months of evenings. Jake jumped in on Monday and prepared the entire meal for the family and I had yet another night of personal accomplishments. Not having to prepare dinner is the heftiest task off my To Do List, and it rarely actually makes its way onto the list because it’s usually just a given. For the last nine days I had mental clarity, focus for me, and an opportunity to feel less burdened by what I needed to provide for other people. That doesn’t mean that I didn’t take care of my family. Instead, I managed to clean the entire house, order groceries, and continue to take Miranda to work and pick her back up. Jax and I got our outside time, I got my work done for Matt and I got my writing done. The mental anguish of what to prepare each night is enough time out of my day that it interferes with the rest of the housework I must finish. Cooking dinner on a nightly basis really has been the bane of my existence.

In the last few years, I have stopped beating myself up for not liking to cook, and for not being able to do it seven nights a week. I was much better when the kids were little, but as they got older and everyone’s schedules shifted away from the family unit because of sports and jobs, I found satisfaction and a sense of accomplishment in cooking four nights a week. One night was leftovers, one night was take out, and one night was “You’re on your own. Figure it out for yourselves.” It wasn’t a perfect system, but it worked for me. I hoped it worked for my family.

So, I didn’t write last night. Why? Because I cooked dinner and I cleaned up the kitchen afterwards by myself, like I’ve done most nights of the last two decades. This was after doing the housework and work for Matt. After picking Miranda up from work. It’s that simple. I cannot do it all. Something’s always gotta give.

That is why it is 10:15AM and I am sitting here to get the thoughts in my head out now. It’s about priorities. I wish that Ed would cook dinner for the rest of our lives, but I am not sure that he has that long of a run in him. I am delirious with appreciation over the last nine days! I will keep my fingers crossed and hope for more. But in case the duty does fall primarily back to me, I will have already gotten my writing in for the day. It just means that maybe the dusting doesn’t get done today.

Hot In Here

 

“It’s getting hot in here, so take off all your clothes!”

-Nelly:  “Hot in Here”

Anxiety Sweat and Hot Flashes:  Why I always stand with my hands on my hips.

The Secret brand deodorant commercial references the difference between anxiety sweat and regular sweat. Anxiety sweat is wetter and quicker to flow than the sweat of a hot day, a Tabata workout or great sex. Fortunately, anxiety sweat doesn’t smell like the rest of them, at least not initially. The body, heated up by physical exertion and performing manual labor, produces sweat that exudes from the pores and combines with the air, the atmosphere, and the fibers of our clothes to create a scent that is usually not very appealing. Anxiety sweat on the other hand is 80% water and 20% fat and proteins, forced through the pores of our skin in a rush of “Holy shit! This sucks! I must get out of here!” Sweat is literally escaping our bodies like the body and the mind would like to do in an anxious situation. Anxiety sweat leaves your shirt – and underwear – full of sweat. The sweat itself is largely odorless. The smell arrives when the sweat meets bacteria. Anxiety sweat, because of those fats and proteins, is thicker than regular sweat, so it takes longer to evaporate, giving it more time to mingle with any local bacteria.

I suffered through so many anxiety sweats in my life I could never attempt to catalog them, chronologically or alphabetically. They appeared when I presented oral reports in class and again when I interviewed for prospective jobs. I was sweating on my wedding day in a sleeveless gown on a bright, January afternoon the day after an ice storm, with snow on the ground. Anxiety and its salty shadow forced me to wear a long sleeve shirt with cotton sweat catchers in the armpits when I attended my first in-person writing group, and any home-sales parties hosted by a neighbor.

I don’t remember when anxiety sweat became a thing for me. I have had anxiety my entire life, so I presume that sweat was a part of that life, as well. I know that I have never been an overly smelly person, so that has been a saving grace. My older sister Candice had to deal with heavy sweats as frequently as my younger sister Kelli had to deal with heavy periods. I was fortunate enough to have four and a half day periods before children, and three and a half day periods post child-rearing. In my later years, I finally traded an easy menstrual cycle for the hot and heavy drenching of profuse sweating.

I remember being at a book club meeting one night in the early fall and had to ask my hostess for a clean t-shirt to replace the shirt I was wearing. She asked me if I was having hot flashes. I was in my early forties, so I replied, “No, they’re not hot flashes. I just get sweaty, very quickly.”

With a firm and honest tone, she replied, “Honey, that’s a hot flash.”

It took me a few more years to admit that I was having hot flashes. I suppose that is a pattern with me. It took me several years to admit that I had anxiety. Imagine that…it took me a long reflection to admit to the two different things that left me feeling hot, flushed, tired and wanting to run away from whatever I was encountering in the current moment.

Like understanding that I fall asleep easily in a moving car, or recognizing that patience is not my virtue, I finally accepted sweating as a fact of everyday life. Menopause has elevated not only the frequency, but the annoyance of sweat in my everyday life. If hot flashes are the result of hormonal changes in our bodies, and we don’t take hormone replacements, then it would stand to reason that the hot flashes are here to stay with me. At least until the hormones decide to stop dancing about in my system with abandon.

A few years ago, my therapist recommended that I adopt a “stance” for when Ed and I get into uncomfortable conversations. She explained that if I had a go-to stance, I could relax into it, despite the challenging environment, and find comfort in the stance, as well as not appearing antagonistic to Ed. At first, I thought the casual “hands-held-loosely, clasped behind the back” was the most inobtrusive, yet assertive. One casual disagreement and I found myself having to change my shirt because clasping my hands behind my back kept my arms close to my body. That meant no air to the pits. The same happened when I clasped my hands down low in front of my body. For obvious aggressive-appearing reasons as well, crossing my arms across my chest was not an option.

I settled on standing with my feet just a little wider than hips-width, with my hands on my hips. I felt it offered an air or confidence, but not superiority; casual, but not unconcerned. And yes, it gave my body air. BINGO! I had my stance!

The irony that a hand on the hip is also the best way to avoid looking like you have a side of beef for an arm in a photograph, makes this stance my go-to in just about any situation. I have prided myself on the tone and firmness of my biceps and triceps for most of my adult life. What I lack in height and boobs I make up for in arms and shoulders. But the older I get, the harder it is to keep them looking muscular and lean, not just big. When the camera clicks, a breezy hand on the hip camouflages the breadth of the muscles.

So, if you see me standing with my hands on my hips, you can discern where I am emotionally and psychologically with just a subtle distinction. Both hands on my hips? I’m probably feeling anxious, and you might want to keep your distance until the moment passes. Once hand on my hip and I’m ready for some pictures. No hands on my hips but I look like I’m ready to pass out? Then please hand me one of my pink fans. Sometimes it gets too hot in here too quickly, and no one really wants me to take off all my clothes.