This post may seem to contain a lot of selfish concerns and declarations. But they are very real anxieties to me. I cannot just shut them off. I'd love to if I could.
Sure, I can still run long distances like I did in high school. However, my best mile time of 7:42 is long in the past. Since my last 5K (equivalent to 3.1 miles) time was close to 35 minutes, that puts my mile time between 11 and 12 minutes. It's always close to that on the treadmill too.
Then there's another number. The one on the scale. I wanted to turn 40 and be at the same weight I was before Mikelle and soon after I had her (she was the only baby that the weight just melted off afterwards. That makes sense since I was the youngest - a 25 year old spring chicken - when I had her...). I did get there again 9 years ago, but despite getting close a few times since then, 2006 is the last time I saw that magic number. At this point, I'd be happy at within 10 pounds of it (which is where I was a year ago...:sigh:)
Sure there are some things that make turning 40 not that bad. I found a list like this on a couple different articles/sources over the years...I can't remember any of them specifically, so I'm not trying to plagiarize by not linking them.
Sure, these can be good things about 40. But you know what? These things applied for me around 35, so I would certainly be nice to still be a thirty-something with these perks.
Yes, if you haven't figure it out by now, I'm having a big problem with the numbers. No matter who tells me age is just a number, it doesn't change the anxiety attack. Like I said, if I could turn it off, I would.
You become more comfortable with the person you are, but you are not necessarily totally happy with it. Yeah, that's true. I'm happy that I can look back and know I pushed forward to get my degree even though so many other things were stacked against me. My tenacity and stubbornness that is detrimental in other areas, was my saving grace in that instance. In fact, other than still living in Arizona and not having my Masters degree yet, I would say things are pretty good. Our house will completed next month (June).
I will say that if our house wasn't being built, I'd be losing my mind. But that also has to do with the arduous loan process with the bank. Also, we bought the land in October 2010. Alexander was in the oven. It's been a hard road to get from purchasing the land to making the home a reality. I am so happy we are so close.
I do wish I could have traveled so much more of the world by now. To date, the furthest away I have been is Anchorage, Alaska. That's awesome, but eastward travels need to occur as well. If I could have been ascending or descending Mt. Kilamanjaro in Tanzania when the dreaded 4-0 hit, it certainly would have made the transition easier. But that kind of trip is no cheap feat. Instead, we're building a house. No trip to Africa yet. But it's overdue!
You tend not to fret as much about stuff which used to bother you. Anyhow, you don’t have that much time to think about it. Sure, I fret about things that shouldn't bother me. But that comes with the anxiety thing no matter what age I am. But believe me, there is a lot of stuff that doesn't bother me now that would have bothered me in the past. In fact, right now at the house, the master shower is kind of an issue of some frustrations and annoyances. And our contractor was so frustrated when he saw that the shower was dry-walled when it shouldn't have been yet.
He's a generally even-keel kind of guy, so it was kind of a big deal seeing him get as upset as he was when he saw the shower had been dry-walled (because of a deal with the plumbing that has to be solved before the dry-walling). I was like, "dude...chill...we'll get it figured out...." Plus, the following day he was leaving for Hawaii. I told him he needed to get there mentally and then send us a picture of him sitting on the beach with a fruity drink adorned with an umbrella.
Hey, I'm just happy the house is being built and I'll have a shower that I don't have to crutch down into and bend in order to use. I'm just happy that I'll have a shower that isn't in the same room as the bed. That's right. Currently, our shower is in our bedroom. That is kind of fun in this temporary state, but not with the bending and crunching one has to do in order to use it. There's a reason I love going to the gym. Well, aside from stress relief and staying up to date with exercise. I love the showers that I can put my hands up and bow to the high ceiling angels to bless me.
Small things can make you happy – like the sight of an empty dishwasher, folded, clean clothes, or a really good night’s sleep. Oh my gosh, yes! Lol!
You gain confidence, even if you also lose hair. My hair is already thin, so I better not be losing any hair. And my friend Emily who does my hair (and the beyotch is 10 years younger than me) made the mistake a year or so ago of telling me she saw some gray hairs. What happened after that is a blur.
I drove the 100 miles last Saturday to have her cut and color it again (it had been almost 3 months...can you say 'trailer park' roots? bleh...) and I asked her if she saw anymore gray hairs. She said something to the effect of, "I learned not to talk about that with you..." Beyotch.
You don’t care that much what people think about you. Other people’s opinions are just not that important, so you can admit to liking stuff no one else does and even be proud of it. That's right! However, if I died suddenly, I need some friends to erase the music off my ipad. I don't need that kind of postmortem humiliation and revelation about myself. Some of the music is fine, but there are some "????" music on there that just shouldn't be revealed to the rest of the world.
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| Kids, why are you looking so mortified? |
But it is actually freeing not to worry about what other people think and things that would embarrass me do not anymore (to the chagrin of my children who are still concerned about such things).
But I do get overly concerned with embarrassing things that I don't plan on. Such as when I tried to get in to the wrong car the other day and the owner of the car was right behind me and said, "that's my car..." Yeah, I still want to crawl in a hole from those kind of situations.
Another thing that screams "40" is needing to get a mammogram. No, I haven't gotten one yet, but I will say that when I went to the doctor a couple of months ago, she mentioned, "you're too young for a mammogram."
I said, "really? I'm 39..." She looked back at my chart and said, "Oh my gosh, you are. For some reason I thought you were 32. You don't look 39."
So there is that. Haha. I don't know if she was full of crap and lying to me, but that was a perk. But then she hit me with, "I'm 32."
Beyotch.
Still, I'm not looking forward to making it to second base with mammogram machine. I know it's not going to be as enjoyable as actually making it to second- Oh, never mind.
To end this post, this was taken on my 40th birthday. I elected to sub half the day for a social studies teacher at the same middle school I'll be teaching at next year. I wanted to sub at least half of that day so I would have a reason to get up early and commence with the day. Otherwise, I would have sat around the house feeling sorry for myself.
Anyway, a dork 7th grader tried to get my iPad. Before I got it back from him, he snapped this picture. And despite what my friend Dave said, that's not a booger in my nose. It's a piece of skin. But thank you, Dave, for posting that it's a booger and making it look like I posted a picture of myself with a booger in my nose. Thank you for that.
It's not a booger.
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| What 40 looks like...total dork...but my newly re-colored hair looks nice! haha |
My husband is wonderful. I was mad at him, but in a way that I knew it was unreasonable to be mad at him. So it wasn't as if I made him suffer. This 40 thing is tough, so it's hard for him to do the "right thing". I don't think there is a "right thing" unless it's the discovery of the Fountain of Youth.
Stay tuned.
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