Things I wasn't warned about...

There comes a day when you look in the mirror - and it just seems to happen, it really does - and you have wrinkles. You are not looking at the taut, youthful skin that used to be part of you, but instead stares back - with some disgust, shock, and awe - a woman whose eyes are sagging, skin is sallow (of a sickly, yellowish color) and kind of drooping jowls...yes, I said, jowls (a fold of flesh hanging from the jaw; the meat of the cheek of a hog). This cannot be me. What are the dark, puffy circles under my eyes? Look at all the creases - and that's not just from my pillowcase. Of course, it is like nature has played a cruel joke -just when you've got your "stuff" together - your body falls apart. All of this horror and I haven't even reached my neck. Believe me, I was not warned about this and it only gets worse the further south I travel with my mirror.

For some time now I have had an idea that the breasts would droop like twin swinging pendulums. If they're not harnessed in at night by a bra (how comfortable is that?) then most likely one will be found on my back and the other hanging off the side of the bed near the floor. Wasn't there a song..."Do your boobs hang low, do they wobble to and fro? Can you tie 'em in a knot, can you tie 'em in a bow?" Yeah, I was warned since childhood about the effects of gravity on the breasts. Still, it is an utter horror (ha ha ha ha ha) when for any reason you are bent over without a bra and are vividly reminded of the mama goats down at the dairy farm. Somebody help me please.

Well, I was warned about the layer of fat that develops around the mid-section which is an effort of the female body to "protect the ovaries". Believe me, mine are well protected. However, that said, nobody said I'd develop extra breasts on my back. What is the body trying to protect on that side? I have no idea. The kidneys perhaps? No amount of sit-ups, crunches, or Tae-Bo causes them to cease and desist. I heard there's a bra out there that makes them look diminished - I wonder if there are little cups - like I'm a D up front and nearly a B on back! One friend described her body as "doughy"...great, now I always have that word ever before me as I try to smooth out the bulging belly fat. Doughy. Thanks, Cyndi.

Now as I share about the bottom half, I'll try to be gentle. Certainly no one ever said what I would find down there. When you have no idea that one day you'll find grey hair and those "jowls" aren't just hanging off the cheeks. I swear I am looking at the backside of an elephant. All those sagging, folded layers with bits of grey hair sticking out all over. Yeah. Oh yeah. All of my friends are about ten years older than I am and not a word. Not a word. It looks as bad from the front as from the back - heck, who can tell the difference? I did see a skit once at a women's retreat and they revealed a secret hair dye for "the hair down there"...too bad I was about five years younger and didn't take notes.

Oh, I'm not finished. The thighs. The thighs. Oh, the thighs. I give up already. I'll just ... I'll just ...what? What shall I do? I didn't know saddle bags were an inside and outside phenomenon. What the heck? My body must be trying to protect my vagina. Are there exercises for this? You can shrink it but how do you make it go away? One older friend hinted that one fall she put away her shorts and her legs were normal. The next spring she put on a pair of her shorts and her legs looked like sagging pantyhose. Yes, ladies, that's where I'm at today. Only no amount of tugging pulls the skin back into place...too bad there's not some kind of "spanx-garter" for sagging legs.

Lower still, the ankles. I remember looking at a friend's ankles - checking them out when she was looking the other way - and they were swollen. I wondered what in the world she must have eaten the day before to just have such balloons around her ankles. But they just seemed to stay that way, week after week, and year after year. Remember, all of my friends are about ten years older than I am. For heaven's sake...it has started with my own ankles. I have enjoyed sleek, sexy ankles since I was fourteen years old. Again, what the heck?

Okay, then, this nightmare is not over. The feet. Disgusting. One toe nail is a freak show - literally. Something went wrong a few years ago with a pedicure and it never recovered. Instead, the body is trying to protect itself and it's growing thicker. Imagine that. As for the dry skin on the feet - why? Why, I ask you? Why? If I'm not using that little "ped-egg" nightly, then I'm giving my husband quite a sanding all night long.

Then nobody warned about the all-over-just plain old - feeling. The loss of coordination - last New Year's Eve I fell in a parking lot while wearing 4" "ho-heels"...and I wasn't even drinking. For some reason my eyes cannot adjust to reading books with my contacts or glasses so I have to remove everything just to read. The left eye seems to have visual black holes - like part of the picture is missing. I'm tired, cranky, constipated, short of breath, and thinking on how I want the flowers arranged at my own funeral. When is the right time to buy that plot anyhow?

Did you ever see The Thornbirds? Forget Richard Chamberlain - who knew? But remember Barbara Stanwyck's role. I'll never forget that 80 year old woman lusting for that young priest. She cried loudly that she didn't feel old. She felt like a young woman trapped in an old body. Hello. That's how I feel today. "Let me tell you something about old age...inside this stupid body I am still young, I still feel, I still want, I still dream...because at my age, officially, I'm supposed to be beyond the drives of my body....one mustn't expect miracles." Yes, I have to agree, one mustn't expect miracles but when will the nightmares of discovery end?