The joy of being an over-40 female

I feel like I owe the entire world an apology for the last month or so. It just occurred to me today that I have been behaving rather oddly – not enough that I think anyone really noticed too much but I certainly have.

There are little signs that I was ignoring – feeling anxious and pent-up, which I attributed to starting filming; obsessing on one particular thing (hmmm, wonder what/who that could be) with no real coherent thoughts; playing spin the wheel of emotion on an hourly basis; over-thinking, over-reacting, over-everything-ing to everything. Then there’s the depression. I usually deal with that quite a bit so I’m used to it. But after the black darkness of a couple of weeks ago, then I woke up this morning and literally could not get myself out of bed, I thought, hmmm, I think there’s something wrong. Coupled with the fact that I exhausted so much of the time.

I realized this morning that all of those little signs mean one thing – I’m in my 40’s, I’m dealing with the wonders of mid-40’s hormones, and I have stopped taking these little wonder pills that got me through the last couple of years. I have been feeling really good and in control probably since I moved into this apartment and just gradually stopped taking these soy supplements that help even out moods, prevent other mid-40’s types of symptoms that most women go through but that I haven’t hit yet. Since I was feeling good, I stopped taking them.

Apparently, my hormones have enjoyed their hiatus but are now throwing a chaos party in my brain. My thoughts have been muddy, my reactions slow and my emotions on 11.

When I looked back at my lunch with Zadra on Friday and my incessant obsessing on OOMA and only OOMA, over-analyzing recent events, feeling so wildly out of control with my emotions, reading stupid things into everything he did and said and didn’t say, just rambling on and on more than usual, I thought that maybe there was something going on. Then last night it really hit me – I have been out of control for a while now. This morning brought it home with another blackness descending.

I went out tonight and picked up a big box o’ soy supplements and started back on them tonight. It’ll probably take a week for them to really kick in but hopefully I’ll be back to whatever passes as normal for me quickly.

I feel like I should apologize to all of you, because I think I have probably managed to do something that was odd or annoying or hurtful. Patty, Monica, Tiffany and Zadra have been particularly patient with my craziness and neuroses, tolerating my ramblings and listening and dispensing advice when, really, nothing they could say would actually help me. And Chairman who, by just proximity due to the film and our schedules, etc., bore the brunt of a lot of my whacked out emotional state but hasn’t yet run screaming for the hills. I think it’s easier for women to understand and relate to a crazy emotional woman but for men, sometimes, it’s not that easy. I feel like I owe him the biggest apology because he has been nothing but his usual sweet, giving, generous self and I feel like I have disrespected that. And there are a few others on the periphery who also got kind of bitch-slapped and should not have and I am sorry.

As for the OOMA, finally realizing why my emotions are strung tight and my feelings are so heightened, I also realized that my feelings for him may have been over-exaggerated due to the rampant hormone chaos within me. I still adore him and I still wouldn’t mind should he show up at my door and demand to sweep me off my feet and carry me away, but I realize that most of the feelings of need and want for him are not exactly real. They’re a combination of loneliness, of his generally charming personality, and of my whacked-out hormones. I am glad I haven’t managed to chase him off and hope that he sticks around for the sane me to return. I guess, in some ways, he’ll always be an OOMA, but not in the zany, out of control way I have been thinking of him, but in a sweet, cherished way that will always be there, no matter what the nature of our relationship.

So those of you females out there approaching that magic age of 40, do some research into the wonder drug that is Estroven, ask your doctor about it, start taking it as soon as you realize that you are no longer in control of your thoughts. It’s sneaky and these feelings will come up without you realizing it. But if your friends start looking at you funny or your best friend says, “Hey, is everything okay with you? You seem kinda weird lately,” take a good hard look at what you’re doing and how you’re behaving. Then check out these wonder pills and see what happens. I wish I had realized it sooner both the first time I went through this and my most recent voyage on the Good Ship Emotion. Hopefully, no irreparable damage has been done.