What Does a Midlife Crisis Really Feel Like? | Teri M. Brown

Mind Over Body Limits

I think our minds can do more than our bodies believe they can do. And so when you're pushing yourself to what you believe is your physical limit, and then you surpass that, your brain has taken over. You know, it's it's your mind, it's your emotions, it's whatever that have taken over and said, watch me. You know, and I think there's something really valuable to that, to that pushing yourself to these limits and seeing what happens.

Welcome And Guest Setup

Welcome to the Midlife Rebel Podcast. It's time to rewrite the midlife story for women who refuse to be put in a box. Because maybe midlife isn't a crisis. Maybe it's an awakening. I think we've got a lot to talk about. Well, Scream is a good thing. I think we probably do. Screaming is only one part of it, but obviously I mentioned your book. And um, as I was going through, like I'd listened to the a podcast that you're on, and um you're an author, so I'd love to know about your journey to becoming an author because I feel like that was probably part of a midlife journey. Very much. And so that in itself is like a conversation. But should we I've read your book. Um yeah, I read Peg Unhinged. Thank you for sharing it with me. Um I don't know how I would ever get through 12 books in a month. Oh my god. I gave myself a fast reader. Yeah, you have to be. Um, but should we where should we start?

I've got all wherever you want to start.

Honestly, wherever you want to start works fine for me. Okay, well, let's start where we got introduced, because that was the book, right? You contacted me and and um you're an author. Um, shall we? Oh god, I don't know whether to go with like, no, let's go with your midlife reinvention, becoming an author. We could start there too. Let's go there.

We could literally wherever whatever question you ask me, I will answer and we will just go from there. I'm I'm so easy. Interconnected.

If they are, everything is, yes, everything is because Peg Unhinged is about midlife and about this woman's um midlife journey in all of its chaos. Um but also you you know you started writing as part of well, I'm I'm assuming this just based on like how old I know you are from listening to things that you've written, uh your podcast. And you know, when you started writing, I'm kind of like doing the maths. Oh, that was exactly in midlife. Yeah. Like the early 50s or early 50s, right? I was just mid-50s. So let's go there. Shall we go there? What happened? That's perfect. Are are we recording already? We're recording, yeah. I just okay. I just wanted to be sure because I didn't hear that a lot of times it it's yeah, we're on.

Okay. I just wanted to make sure because it was like, oh my gosh, I would hate for us to do this in the recording.

Divorce, Abuse And Finding Freedom

No, no, we're yeah, so you kind of have to go back a little to know how I got to the to the midlife, you know, crisis point. I got I got married, I had four beautiful children. My husband and I were the most two most unsuited people to be married that you have ever met. I am an A plus plus personality. I I have lists for my lists, I I know where I'm going to be at all times. I get things done, a lot of things done. It's just who I am. And he was like a B minus kind of personality where he would just sit and wait for I don't know what, but forever. And we couldn't find a happy medium. We were both very miserable. Um, so I got divorced. Then I remarried, and that was the biggest mistake of my life. The biggest mistake. He was emotionally abusive. And I stayed in that relationship for 14 years because I did not want to be divorced twice. Like I've already been divorced once. I don't want to prove that I'm no good at this. And in 2017, I got out of that relationship. In the most of that relationship, I was writing, but for small businesses. I was doing website content, pamphlets, things like that, which really worked for me. It was it was good work, it gave me something to do. But I wanted to write, I wanted to make characters, but I didn't have a good place to be because when you put your soul out to the world with a character and someone doesn't like it, it hurts. And then if you the only person you have to talk to about it is someone who, you know, consistently says mean and terrible things to you. There was no way. But I got out of that relationship in 2017 and words started falling out of me. Like I wrote manuscript after manuscript. They weren't very good, but I was I was learning, I was, I was writing. I met Bruce. He became my third husband. I was never, ever, ever getting married again, ever. But he told people that he chased me until I caught him. So I think I think what that means is he just hung around until I finally got used to him and recognized he really was who he said he was. I think that's the thing is I didn't believe in my ability to choose anymore because I I didn't choose well twice. And it was like, I don't know what I'm doing, I don't know what I need. Um so he said he chose me, and that's why it worked, and everything was

The Cross-Country Tandem Bike Ride

fine. Um, while we were dating, he told me that he had always wanted to ride across the United States on a bicycle. So I had been wanting to do a big adventure. I wanted to do something big and bold, something that would prove to the world that I still had value because I didn't think I did anymore. You know, I was in my mid-50s, I was, I thought, I thought my life was over. There was nothing else to come. I was done. I had had two failed marriages, I had no real career, I was done. And I wanted to do something big and bold. Well, when he said ride across the United States on a bicycle, I thought, well, that would be big and bold, especially for someone like me. I hadn't been on a bicycle in 40 years. And I was not, I'm not athletic. And I was overweight. I weighed at least 60 pounds more than I do right now. Wow. I mean, I was, I was not, this was not a, hey, Terry's just gonna go to Terry. And I asked him, Are you gonna talk about it forever? Are you going to do it? He said, No, I really want to do it. I said, Count me in. Now I had no intention of marrying him at that point. I was just gonna go on this adventure. We ended up getting married, and then we left on the adventure in the spring, was we meant to leave in the spring of 2020. You remember COVID? Yes, I do. Um, and so we didn't think we were going to get to go. And we ended up finally being able to really make the decision to go in June of 2020. And we rode 3,102 miles from the coast of Oregon to Washington, D.C. And at the end of that trip, as we're coming to the end, we were stopping at the Marine Corps Memorial. My husband was a 25-year veteran, and we were raising money for Toys for Tots, which is a Marine Corps uh charity. And so he said, Do you see that flag? I said, Yes. He said, That's it. That's where we're stopping. And I started to laugh and cry at the same time. I mean, I was just a mess. And then I had like my life-changing, altering thought, which was, I can do anything. Wow. I just rode across the United States on a tandem bicycle. I can do anything. It is not a question of can I, but what? What do I want to do? And I said, I want to be an author. And 14 months later, my first book came out. So my first book came out in January of 22. My next book came out in January of 23, my next one in January of 24, my next one in February of 25, and the most recent one in April of 26. Uh, in the meantime, I also wrote a children's book and I had three short stories published in three different anthologies. So I just it changed, and I began to believe in myself again. A lot of people have said to me, So the ride changed you. And I said, Nope, the ride reminded me who I was because the world had changed me, you know, dumped all kinds of stuff on top where you don't remember who you are anymore, and you don't believe in yourself anymore, and you don't think you're good enough, and you don't believe that you're capable, and all of those things, and that ride all of that away, and all of a sudden it was like, there I am, and it surprises me that Bruce saw me underneath all of that because he was not surprised at what came out. I was surprised, I could hardly remember that that woman existed, and he told me no, I always knew she was there. Oh, you know, so that's kind of the that was the big thing is I got out of that bad relationship and then did this huge journey, this huge adventure. And when I got outside of my comfort zone, and it wasn't easy, I cried a lot, I cried a lot. I kept a blog the whole way across the United States. And if you read the blog from the day we left until the day we got back, you will notice there's a lot of crying because I was very honest in my blog, and I would say I stood and cried today, but it was I I just had all of this emotional junk, and the ride healed, I would say, 95% of it. Like I was able just to, and then the other five percent probably always live with it, but now I know what to do with it. It comes up, I recognize it for what it is. It's like, oh, that's old stuff, it doesn't belong here anymore. You know, that's not useful in in my world today, and you can, you know, put it off to the side and move on. And like I said, from that point on, I started writing, real writing.

That's so cool. I'm really curious about that idea because I've been um just thinking about like I have a background in um personal training. So in the last 20 plus years, I've worked with my husband as a personal trainer and we've had for gym. And it I've come to realize like that physical that like fortifying myself physically and pushing my limits physically is part of a process of fortifying myself emotionally.

Yes, I think our minds can do more than our bodies believe they can do. And so when you're pushing yourself to what you believe is your physical limit, and then you surpass that, your brain has taken over. You know, it's it's your mind, it's your emotions, it's whatever that have taken over and said, watch me, you know, and I think there's something really valuable to that, to that pushing yourself to these limits and seeing what happens. Because when you succeed, and you will if you just if you want to, I've had so many people say to me, I could never ride across the United States on a bicycle. And my answer is yes, you could, because I did it. Yeah, you know, I I'm not I am not an athletic woman, I was overweight, I hadn't been on a bicycle in 40 years when he and I first started training for this. This was not easy for me, but I wanted it, and and that's the thing is if you want something, you really want it, you will find a way around all the obstacles. Yeah, and you know, you may have to take a detour, you may have to do something different than what was in your mind, but you're going to make it work because you want it. But if you don't want to do it, anything can stop you. Up the sun rose this morning, I'm done. You know, you know, like I don't want to do this, right? And so the answer is, and then I've had people say, Well, I bet you could run a marathon. And I said, You're right, I could, but I have zero desire to do it. I'm not going to, but you're right. I could, and it's and I really believe that now. If that was something I set my mind to, I have no doubts that I could do that. I have zero desire, but I know I could. And that ride did that for me. Yeah. It let me know if I want it, then I can make it happen.

Yeah, that's a very good lesson. Yeah. I often say the same to clients in the gym. It's like they go, Oh, I could never do that. It's like, well, do you actually want to? You know, for example, just a chin-up, a woman, you know, women doing chin-ups. Um, because if you really want to, you'll do what you need to do to get there, whether that's losing weight, whether that's training more often, whether that's practicing more regularly, you'll do it if it's worth something. But if you couldn't care less whether you do a chin-up or not, you'll never be able to do a chin-up.

You'll never be able to do a chin-up because it's not worth it to you to because to do a chin-up, if you can't do one, to do one takes a lot of work. Right. And so, do you want to put in the work? Yeah, it's it's pretty simple. And it's the way it felt with the being an author. When I made that decision, the answer was is it is what I want, it's what I've wanted for a long time, but have been too afraid to do, and I'm going to do it. And by golly, I did it. Yeah, and I'm still doing it.

Yeah. How how has that worked for you? So, like, there's one thing to write a book or a short story, but then you've got to find a publisher or self-publish, I suppose you can do more often these days. You've got to sell the book. Marketing is a whole thing. That's probably a a thing in itself, isn't it? Like it's one thing it is. One thing to say, I'm gonna be a writer, but you actually want people to read what you've written.

Right. So this is funny. My first book came out in January of 22, and on the day that it launched, you know, it's up on Amazon. I kind of sat in front of the computer. There were no sales. I didn't understand why were there no sales. I've written a good book, and within about two or three weeks, I realized there's a lot more to this writing than just writing the book. And then I started figuring out the marketing thing. So I kind of went about it wrong. I should have figured out the marketing, but it's okay. I figured I have since I'm still learning.

Learning Marketing The Hard Way

I don't get me wrong, there's still a lot I don't know, but I've figured out a lot of the marketing. You know, four years ago, I had a newsletter that had two people on it, my mother and my daughter. And I now have over 1,400 people on my newsletter. So, you know, that's a big change. And and and you start learning what works for you, what doesn't podcasts work for me. Yeah. Because I like to talk. So people ask me questions and then they have to tell me, shh, shh, I need to ask another question, right? But it's good for me because it allows me to get out in front of people and say, hey, I've got this book, Pega Ninja, you should read it, you know, and it and it works for me.

Yeah, yeah. I can't remember what my question was with that.

But I think that you were just what you had said was is there was a lot more. Yes, yes, to there was just a lot more to being an author than writing. And there is, you have to like there's a there's a ton of hats that you have to put on, and they're not all creative. No, do you know when you go in to talk to a bookstore owner? You're not being creative at that point. You have to be left-brained, business-minded at that point, and and it is hard.

If you'd done it the other way around, potentially you might have gone too hard, not interesting, boring, don't want to do it.

Yes, and like never got the you know, I always I always look at it as you know, in a perfect scenario, I would have known to have marketing in place and I would have been ready. World is rare very rarely perfect, you know. You you go and you do life and you do it to the best of your ability. And in the end, I learned a lot, and I learned a lot very quickly because I had to, you know, like I've got this book out and it's not going anywhere. And like you said, you don't write a book so that it languishes somewhere and no one ever reads it. The point is, is you want people to read it, and so I then had a really good reason to be doing all of that marketing. Whereas if I didn't have the book yet, I might have looked at it and said, this isn't very fun. Because I don't really like it. I mean, I like this part of it, yes, but in terms of oh, make sure you have your social media done and you know, yeah, let's you need to create an ad for Facebook, you know, none of that's very fun, you know. But you have to do what you have to do if being an author is what you want to be. You know, once again, it goes back to, yeah, you'll do what you have to do to make it work if if it's what you want.

Yeah. What about like I'm just as we were talking about, like you write you write a book so that people read it? How does that feel? Like, what is that? Like, there's obviously a creative process where you've got all of this, all of these stories and and this passion inside you, but wanting someone else to read it, like what would you say your sort of intentional purpose is as a writer? Is it to give someone else joy? Is it to educate?

You know, I think there's so many things. I want a good story. I'm a reader, I love to read. When I read a book, I want a good story with strong characters, and I want to be able to become at least one of the characters while I'm reading. That's how I read a book. I I'm fully invested and I climb into the character and off we go on the adventure. So I want my books to do that for people. I want them to climb in and become the character at least

Why She Writes What Readers Get

while they're reading the book, that they feel that connected. I also am a big moral of the story kind of person, you know, where I like to have some other. If you only are reading it for just a good story, well, you've got that. But if you'd like a little more, I like to try to offer a little bit more. Um, especially like in my earlier books, in my historical fiction books, there are a lot of things I talk a lot about, like racism and sexism and uh xenophobia and things like that. And people can read those kinds of things in a historical fiction without getting all uptight. Right. If you put something like that in a contemporary book, people start to get uptight because they feel like maybe you're pushing buttons on them or you're you're making assumptions about them or whatever. And in a in a historical setting, people are more open to seeing and hearing it. So my hope is that in my historical books that people will see those things and and maybe briefly think about where they stand and what they would do and how they might act. And does that pertain to today in any way kind of thing? My Pegan Hinge is just it's a very funny book. It's it's a woman going through menopause. She's just she's falling apart at the seams. And if that's what you want to get from the book, then that's what you will get from the book. But I also see it as a woman who finally recognizes her value and her worth, and that maybe she's kind of been going about things all wrong. She's been letting other people tell her what is success and what that looks like. And she's been having other people tell her that she needs to be perfect and that everything has to follow along this perfect, pretty path. And if it doesn't, there's something fundamentally wrong with her. And in the end, she kind of like debunks that for herself, where she realizes life is messy and life is for living and it's for joy. And let's do that. So yeah, I I have two things. So I'm always I'm always hoping for a good story that make people laugh or cry or whatever it is they need at the moment. And then always a little something else, you know, a little a little peek into something else. This book also, you know, it we visit a a shelter where women have been abused. And you know, that's a big thing for me because I spent 14 years in this emotionally abusive relationship. And I I want women to know a you don't have to stay, and that there's something better on the other side, you know, and I don't I don't know that I actually said that in Peg Unhinged, but I I definitely was showing that these women have gotten out of this bad situation and they're figuring out life again, you know, and that's so I yeah, I I always have extra things because that's just who I am. Yeah, I like to get on my soapbox, so yeah, it's good.

And I have to admit, when I first um you sent me the manuscript, and is that what you call it? Good job. Um, and so I was reading it and I haven't read um a novel um for ages because often the the books that I get sent from other guests um are um like office. Memoirs. Yeah, or self-development, you know, personal development sort of stuff, so a bit more factual. And so I was like, oh, I don't know if I'm gonna get into it because I go through phases when I'm reading, and at the moment I am I've just been studying astrology in the last 12 months, and so I all my books are astrology books, and I can't get enough of them, but I have gone through phases where I'm just like novel after novel after novel, and I can't get enough of them. So I was in an astrology phase, and so I was like, I don't know if I'm gonna get into it, but I couldn't put it down. I was reading it on my computer, so right, but I was like every day like wanting to know what was happening with Peg, and I have to admit, I was cringing quite a lot.

You were supposed to. I mean, that was kind of the point, right? Yeah, um, I I wanted, I kind of want to talk about menopause because people people don't, yeah, you know, it's it's getting a little better, yeah, but still, you know, you go to a doctor and you tell them you're having menopause symptoms, and they say, Yeah, and well now they're not doing anything about it, yeah. You know, and I think it it slowly is getting a little better, but for so many years, women just suffered with all of these crazy things that were going

Menopause Truths And Medical Brush-Offs

on, no idea what they could do to help it. And doctors pretty much say, Yeah, well, it's normal. And you're like, There's nothing normal about putting my phone in the refrigerator, you know, like there's nothing normal about being so angry out of nowhere that you are actively thinking about killing someone, and I don't mean that in a oh, I want to kill someone, but I mean like you're considering it as an actual way to move forward in life. And I think the other thing that really you're gonna get me on a soapbox again, but that really gets me distraught is that if this were happening to men, it would have been fixed. They would already have they would have whole protocols of things that you could do and ways to help. And with women, they just kind of pat you on the head and say, Oh, you know, hormones. Yes, yes, and it's like, um, hello, you know, we're half the population, and our hormones change so dramatically significantly, yeah. You know, compared to men's. Once men get through adolescence, they they stay radically.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, they they start losing testosterone over time, but it it's it's gradual and it doesn't women. I mean, you figure during our menstrual cycles, our hormones are jumping all over the place. Then as as menopause comes in, it's like doing adolescence again, but just in reverse. And it's all these hormones that are flying everywhere, and and everyone's just like, no, just act normal, just keep acting normal. So yeah, I don't know. I just wanted I wanted to show people, and you're supposed to cringe, right? You're supposed to look at her and go, oh my gosh, Peg, get it together, honey.

Right?

But through all of that, I think most women who've been through menopause or are going through menopause see themselves somewhere in her. Maybe they're not doing all of it, maybe they're not having the hot flashes, or maybe they're not angry, but maybe they're having the brain fog, or maybe they're, you know, reevaluating their life a little and looking around, going, I don't know, is this really all there is to it? Because I want more than this. I mean, whatever it is, and so you have to give her kind of this big broad, you know, it's smacking her hard. Yes, and and right, and so you really see it, and then you throw in other things like her husband has decided that he's kind of done with the marriage, and you know, when in actuality she should have been done with the marriage years ago, but she was perfect, and so she she made it work, you know, and all of those things kind of like come together all at once. She's becoming an emptiness mom, her husband has decided that he's kind of done with the marriage. Um, her career or he's her career is that up, is yeah, she messes that up, and then she's got these hormonal fluxes that are just like wreaking havoc with her. And but in the end, even though she's still going through menopause and she's still dealing with things, she's starting to come to terms with who she is and what she wants out of life, yeah. And she's taking more control of it, you know, which there are so many, there are so many ways that you can take control in in midlife. You know, it could be medication, maybe you need some, I don't know. It could be exercise, right? It could be therapy, it could be, it could be yoga or meditation, or it could so many things that we actually have a lot of ways that we can make what could be a really bad situation into something a little better, but we often don't feel like we can. We feel like we're like peg in the beginning that she was at the mercy of her body, and there was nothing she could do. You know, and the only thing that she chose to do was drink wine because she thought that that was the thing that was going to make it all better, and you know, in actuality, it doesn't fix anything, makes it worse. Right. But I think that's you know, that's another little lesson that's in the book is that idea of we have more control than we believe that we do. Right? We have some we have some agency in there where we can say, I this is what I want from my life, and now I'm going to work to get it. You know, but you have to come to that point, you have to come to that realization.

So and I guess the biggest the bigger sort of overriding story of the book is that is that we are in this messy middle bit, but like great your the example of you uh you know riding across America and then change, you know, actually going, I can do something completely different.

That's right, and and not a lot change, yeah, not a lot really changed in terms of I I still struggle with my weight, I'm still not an athletic person, I'm still there's still all of the same things. I still lived had lived in this emotionally abusive relationship. I mean, that didn't go away, and yet I changed the way I thought about all of that, yeah. Yeah, you know, like what matters to me, and then how am I going to make that the central thing in my life? What am I going to do to, you know, and I I loved doing that for Peg. And no, she didn't go across the United States on a tandem bicycle, but she still had that journey.

Yeah.

Yeah.

When you said um a couple minutes ago, if men had menopause, then they'd find something to fix it. I don't, I don't feel like we need to be fixed, but I feel like that is the message that we can get, is that they something with us.

I think what I meant by that though is you know, they're learning, for instance, that there are uh natural hormone replacement therapies that can reduce the number of difficult symptoms. Yes, you know, that can help women not have these hot flashes. And I think some people assume, well, it's a hot flash, use a fan. And it's like, no, it's like internal combustion, and you feel like you're you feel like your your mood is going to be. Yes, you know, and it's and it's not it's not something as simple as, oh, I'm a little hot. It's and it's internal, it's it's it's crazy and it rises, doesn't it? Yes, yes, and it and it's unpredictable and inevitably it happens in the worst possible moments because I think that stress and you know, a little bit of anxiety and stuff helps to kind of move it along. And so you find yourself in a situation where you're worried already that, oh, what if I have a hot flash? And the hot flesh says, Oh, you want a hot flash, you know, and and off it comes. Or, you know, there are things that that we can do to help support um to support our emotional well-being. So I don't mean fix it as much as I mean like support, yeah, support what's happening because we are going through a hormonal flux that is large. It's very, very significant. It changes the way your body metabolizes food, it changes, it changes a lot of things. Yeah, you know, there are women who've had clear skin since they were 13 that start getting, you know, zits and and right, and all of those things. And so it's not fix was probably the wrong word, but if men were going through this, it would have been a lot of time ago. Oh, the support systems in place would have happened instantaneously.

That would be a prescribed um two years off work, probably.

Serious, I mean, they would they would have they would have supports in place, and for women, we're pretty much told, suck it up, buttercup, it's the way it is. You know, I I'm at the stage now, I don't even like I'm trying to find a new primary care doctor because the one that I go to, and it's a woman, which just really irritates me, no matter what I'm having a problem with. It's one of three things. I'm overweight, I'm old, or I'm stressed. Okay. And I'm tired of those three answers. Yeah.

Yeah.

You know, and it's like, it's like, am I overweight? A little, I'm better now than I'm 60 pounds less than I was, you know, 10 years ago. So like I'm doing like I'm doing well, right? And and am I older? Yes, and I hope to get even older. So I don't want that to be the reason that we don't try to help me, right? And then stress. Well, I live life just like everyone else, and there are stressors. Okay, so what are we gonna do about it? You know, and and so I'm just told things like she actually told me one time, well, you know, I think you just need a vacation. And I and I said, Well, I'd actually like to feel better before I went on my vacation so that I could enjoy it because I actually hurt right now, and I was hoping that we could get this worked out. So it's it's those kinds of conversations that I find to be very irritating.

Yes, yeah, you just feel like you've been brushed off. It's like you're not actually listening to what I what I'm telling you. Yeah.

Yes, it's like, you know, if you weren't, if you weren't so heavy, okay, great, thank you for that. And then usually it's coming from someone who's as heavy or heavier than I am, you know, and and in my mind, I am saying, and I don't say it out loud, and in which case I always feel like I deserve like a big prize, but I'm saying, you know, pot, kettle, pot, kettle. You're calling, you know, pot shouldn't call the kettle black, right? I mean, it just oh, yeah, it flies all over me. So a lot of that also came out in the book.

Good.

Um, do you feel like in your own, well, did you go through some of those whole obviously you've been through some hormonal changes, like we all do. But did you have some of those extreme experiences?

I didn't have like where you wanted to kill somebody. I actually have had that one though. Did you? I didn't I haven't had any rage. I got I got rage. I had a lot of rage. I had a few hot flashes, not very many. When they happened, they were significant, but they were not often. I did have some night sweats, which were miserable because you wake up and the bed is wet, soaked from this all of a sudden, and now you're cold. You know, there you were laying there sweating, but now you're cold and the bed's wet, and you have to wake your husband so that you can get the shape to change. I mean, it's yeah, yeah, it's so I had that, and I did have a lot of rage, a lot of just rage. Now, I was also living in an emotionally abusive situation as I was going through it. So the rage may have been as much related to that. I don't know, but I've talked with other women who have a lot of rage where they say they feel fine, and some small thing, their husband will do something very small, like to their apple with their mouth not fully closed, and she wants to reach over and pull all his teeth out, you know, and I know it is and it's I had someone say to me the other day, because I said it's a humorous book about menopause, and they said, Well, menopause isn't funny. I said, It is when it's not happening to you. Yeah, right, and we can laugh at the fact that you know a woman wants to kill her husband because he's chewing too loudly. Yeah, we can, you know, we got we understand we can we can laugh at that, but those things do happen, and some of that is hormonal. I remember being a teenager before my period started and getting, I'd get very angry. I was more right. So I think it's this, yeah. And so I think that it's the same kind of thing, you know, you've got all of these hormones that are just flying around, and my body says, Oh, I know what to do with that. We're gonna get angry and want to kill people, you know. This sounds good, you know. So I just tried to look at what I saw women going through and then collectively gave Peg a lot of it.

Yeah. So Peg isn't necessarily like what every woman's gonna go through. Because I feel like, and I've I think I've read something that you wrote or heard you say it on um the other podcast about like this story that we're told about how life should be or what we're to expect. So the same, the same thing with menopause, right? We're expected that oh, it's all downhill from here, you're gonna put on weight, you're gonna get hot flushes, you're gonna get brain fog, you're gonna have this list of things which Peg has pretty much all of them. Right. But but it's a there's also this um it's a story, isn't it, of like what to expect rather than actually being allowed to go through our own experience of it.

Right. And I think that's something that we need to understand is you know, Peg is a fictional character. Yeah, this is not this is not a a real person. This is a person that I said, what can I do to really get the idea that menopause can be difficult and that we need to learn to kind of take control of our bodies and our lives in this in this period of time. What can I do that this can be a funny story? And so I gave her a lot of things, but yeah, I know I know women who never put on a pound during menopause, not a pound. I don't like them, but I you know, because I have no problems putting on pounds. I tell people I can walk through the grocery store, walk through the bread aisle and gain three pounds before and I haven't tasted a thing. I just I was there, it it saw me, you know, I saw it, that was the end. There's three pounds. Um, and so there are different things that happen to different people, but I think too being aware of the things that can happen so that if you see it happening, you can stop and say, Oh, you know, this may be something I wonder what I might be able to do that could help support my body during this time. Um, you know, some women are always tired and just sleep a lot. Other women can't sleep, they're exhausted, but they lay in bed at night and and there's no sleeping. Well, there are things that you can do to help insomnia, yeah, other than just take it up. I mean, there are things that you can do that help support sleep. And so I don't know, I just think that we need to kind of learn that we have more control than we believe we do, and that yes, there's not a whole lot we can do about the fact that our body is flipping out and doing hormonal things, but there are things we can do to support our bodies while all of this is happening, and that you do come out the other side and go on to write several novels. I mean, you can, you know, like there is life on the other side of this kind of messy piece.

Yeah, yeah. And I think also it can be if you're if you are getting extreme symptoms, like it's your body saying, I need support. Help. Yeah, I need help. I need to and like what are the things that I'm doing that might not be supporting me? Um, yeah, but we've been taught to to ignore the body. Yes. Take a pill.

Well, and we're so well, yeah, take a pill, take a body hormones, right, right. And we're we're told to kind of suck it up and go about life anyway. Yeah when maybe what you need is to relax more, or or maybe what you need is you know, a little bit of self-awareness. Yeah, you know, maybe you need to sit and meditate for 15 minutes. I'm not a good one to talk, I'm bad at meditation, but like maybe these are the things, and and instead we say, Well, I'm gonna gut my way through it. Well, that makes it worse. Yeah, you know, I'm gonna gut my way through it. Well, if you're feeling angry and you're gutting your way through it, you're not getting less angry.

No, no, it's gonna create a cycle, isn't it?

Because now you're frustrated on top of all of that, and then anybody who comes up and says anything to you, you're ready to just like jump out of your skin at them because you've been gutting through it all day, and now your husband's chewing with his mouth open. How dare he?

Not to mention feeling bad about yourself because you've yes, because you can't control yourself, right?

The number of times that I would I would rage, I would rage out loud and be just angry at whoever was near me, usually family. And then I would go to my room and cry because I was such a miserable, horrible person. Yeah, you know, and it's hormones, you know, and so I probably should have sought some help. You know, I I feel like killing people. This isn't good. This is something that we shouldn't just try to, you know, stuff under the rug. I probably should have gone and talked with someone and said, what can I do to help support myself through this period of time? And I suspect there would have been things like some alone time, uh, you know, meditation, yoga, um, you know, a morning walk out in the sunshine, uh, maybe a little less sugar. Let's try to get a little more protein in that body, you know, those kinds of things. But nobody talks about that.

No, no. Apart from it, yeah, it is getting. It's getting more widely talked about, which is great. Yes. But I was like in my I had my kids late, so I was 40, 42 when I had my two children. I'm 52 now. Uh it wasn't really until my 40s, when probably after I had kids, that I realized how much of a difference, you know, just changing hormones throughout a month when you're in a regular cycle can affect your mood, can affect your strength, can affect your hunger patterns. Yes. Yeah. Like I learned very late in the piece. And thankfully, now that we do know more about those things, we can teach younger generations. So that they don't necessarily have to go through some of the things.

So that they so that they know, so that they recognize, you know, let's teach them young that they have a lot more control over their bodies. Yeah. And that there are people out there who can help them. And that if they go to someone who says something stupid like suck it up, that they go find someone else.

Someone else.

You know, that you don't have to, you don't have to put up with that. That there are people out there that are supportive and find them. And then and then you don't, you know, and and that's not to say that it's easy or that, you know, for people who have really bad symptoms, it might still be difficult. But when you feel more in control of the difficulty, the difficulty isn't doesn't feel the same way. When you feel like I have some control of this, I know things that I can do to help myself, it makes everything feel a little better.

Yeah.

I mean, I'm sure you see that in your, you know, working out with women. You know, you said you're a trainer, and so you see them and they start to do more, be a little more physical. They probably are sleeping better at night, become more self-confident. Yes, their hunger gets kind of more in control. Yes, yeah. All of those things, and now they feel better. Did it make menopause go away? No, it did not, right? But it it's supporting them in that, you know, so it's kind of learning what do you need to do for yourself? And unfortunately, it's not the same for every person.

No, it's not.

You know, just because your friend does yoga and that fixed everything for her doesn't necessarily mean that will do it for you.

You might need something totally different, and so it's it's really very much up to the person to find out what try to find out, right? Yeah, yeah, I agree. Um, we're coming to a close, like we're getting close to the end of our hour, but I would love to get receive some wisdom from you because you well, we've received lots of wisdom. More, more wisdom. We've been receiving wisdom for the last hour. But um, I know that you obviously you had your you know writing career started in 2017, so it was your like a midlife I can do this moment. And you love coaching others.

Self-Worth, Imposter Syndrome, Small Steps

Um, and I'd love to hear a little bit more about that because I feel like for so many women, they are coming to this point in their lives beyond the hormones and you know whatever else life might throw at us, empty nesting. Well, not for me, unfortunately, not unfortunately, not for what you're saying. You know, there's so there's lots of lots of things that are happening, changing. But there can, and and there can be that feeling, and I certainly have it, of um there's something more, yeah, and and you want to make a change, but like you have trouble with self-worth or with imposter syndrome, like what what can we do in those moments to help sort of get us across the line?

You know, I think I think the first thing you need to do is remember who you are. You know, you are you are beautifully made, and you have so much capability and so much ability to do whatever it is that you really want to do. You have to remember that because you don't if you don't remember that, nothing else that you do is really going to work. It's like it's like throwing band-aids on top of a gunshot wound. It's you know, it's not going to stop it, right? So you have to remember, and the other thing is to realize that you are enough already, you don't have to be more, you don't have to like what you need is in you, it's already there. So look for it. And if you're having trouble finding it, and sometimes we do have trouble finding it, the world is really good about burying us up under all of this stuff. There are so many resources available. There are there's you know, pastors, there are um therapists, there are friends, there are books. If you're not someone who wants to like run out and talk to someone, there are books about people who have gone through a midlife thing and and found their way on the other side. And then I think the other thing is to remember that whatever you're going through right now, it really is a stage. Very rarely does something last forever, you know, like things change, things move. And so maybe this particular stage doesn't feel very good, but there's going to be something better, you know. So when you're feeling, and I tell that especially to women who find themselves maybe in a bad relationship, is there is light on the other side, you know, it may not feel like it, you may not be able to see it from where you're standing, but there is there is more on the other side, you know, and so I don't know, do hard things, take that first step, you know. Think about what do you want? So what you said that sometimes you know you're thinking that ask yourself, what do you want? And then be honest. What do you want? And then take one thing, do one thing today to move you in that direction. And it doesn't even have to be big, just something, you know, like we decided we were riding across the United States on a tandem bicycle. We did not leave that day.

Yeah.

Okay, it took us almost a year and a half to leave to go on that trip because there was a lot of steps that had to happen to get from think we should ride across the United States on a tandem bicycle to actually doing that. But throughout that year and a half, we were constantly making steps forward. And sometimes they were very large steps, and sometimes they were tiny little, you know, oh, I found a blog today that talks about someone who did that, and I read a couple of their entries, whatever that is, whatever that looks like to you. So I think that's the biggest thing is figure out what it is that you want. What does that look like to you? And then today, right now, when you hear this, decide what you're doing today to move yourself in that direction. Yeah, and it can be tiny, it doesn't have to be so noteworthy that people are gonna go, look at what Terry just did today. I mean, it can be it can be very small, but all those small steps add up. And eventually you're riding across the United States on a tandem bicycle.

Love it, yeah.

Or whatever it is that you decided you wanted to do, right?

Any clues? Did you have any clues? Like, you know, you said that all of your experiences and conditioning sort of covered up who it is that you wanted to be, and if that who you wanted to be was Terry, the writer. But did you have any inklings? Like, was it a something that you had when you were young? And that you when I was young, I wanted to be a writer.

Okay, so it's I did want to be a writer, but I was I was told that people don't make money writers. Yeah, no, that's like being a a waitress. Yeah, like if you're you might as well just say you're gonna be a waitress, and so I never really thought about it again until later in life when I started writing for small businesses, and it was like, okay, so I am writing and I am making money. It's not the kind of writing I want to be doing, but I am actually writing and making money doing it. I'm not a waitress, I am actually writing. So there was that. Um, yeah, and I had imposter syndrome so badly that I did not believe there was any way that I could write. Like there was there was no way that I could write. And so I would write manuscripts and then never show them to anyone. So I started writing in 2017 and I wasn't published until 22. And I have five years worth of things that I wrote that no one saw because I'm not a writer, you know. So yeah, I I think I knew. I think I knew, but I wasn't willing to. I was too afraid. I was too afraid to say, I am an author. And now I tell people, yeah, I'm an author, I write good books, you should read them. That's great. I love it. I mean, you know, and that's what you have to be able to do. You just and and the difference is I now believe in myself.

Yeah.

Is my book for everyone? No, it is not. I can tell you all kinds of people that won't like the book, and that's okay, but it is for some people, you know, and those are the people that I want to have read my book. Those that that don't want to read it, don't you know? The book's not for you. Um, so yeah, I think I think it just it's just a lot of you have to believe in yourself. Yeah, you have to put all of that doubt and realize this is just some little piece of you that was told at some point in your life that you weren't good enough, or you weren't pretty enough, or you weren't smart enough, or you weren't capable enough, or you know, I tell people all the time, I'm not athletic, I'm not athletic. My husband told me, Yes, you are. You rode 3,102 miles across the United States. People who aren't athletic can't do that, and so I've I've learned, I was told I wasn't athletic.

Yeah.

And I still don't feel athletic. I also don't feel like a cyclist. People will say, Oh, you're a cyclist. And it's like, oh no, I'm not a cyclist. Across the United States on a bicycle. I think that qualifies as a cyclist.

Yeah.

Right? But so we have to learn to take those doubts and say, that's that's an old paradigm that is doing me no good. It is, it is not helping me move to where I want to be.

Yeah.

And that's hard to get rid of. You don't get rid of that in an afternoon because you decide you're going to. You got to work at that.

You got to take those daily steps. Yep. I've got one more thing that came up. Is that all right? Absolutely. I was just wondering about this, the whole midlife thing. And like I've spoken to quite a few guests who have been who are currently in midlife, and they're like, I just don't care anymore. Like, I haven't reached that yet. And so I'm kind of figuring that it probably doesn't happen exactly the same point in midlife for everyone.

But is it gonna happen? Has it happened? You know, I don't know. I still

The Good Side Of Not Caring

care. Okay, I do care. Yeah, um, I think maybe at some point you do. I don't care quite as much if that like there are certain people that I care, but I don't care so much about what the general populace thinks. I do care about what people I care about think. Okay, I've given up caring about what the whole world thinks, yeah. You know, the the neighbor four doors down that I can't remember her name. It doesn't matter what she thinks, right? It's not going to affect me. So if I walk out and I'm I'm weeding in the front yard and I'm wearing something that is not doesn't look that good on me, but I'm out in my yard weeding. I used to really worry about what my neighbor would think about the pants that I had on. And now I think, you don't like my pants? Don't look.

Yeah.

Right. So there is a little bit of I don't care anymore. Um, I think I think part of it though is especially with women, we get to a particular age and we say, I am tired of having to live up to all of these expectations, these beauty standards, these stuff my feet into the shoes that hurt standards, the, you know, I'm always supposed to be happy and perky and happy and helpful. And I don't feel any of those things right now. And I think that's some of it. When they say I don't care anymore, what they're really saying is I am tired of the world telling me what is okay and what is not okay. And I think you can get to a point where you say, No, I am me. And this is how I'm doing life, and I'm not going to purposely come over there and stand on your toes. On the other hand, if you don't like what you see, don't look.

Yeah.

You know, you don't you don't want to you don't want to see the fact that I walk on the beach and post 300 pictures of the ocean every day. Scroll on by. You know, I I do have that feeling now of just scroll by. You don't want to see it, don't look. So there is a little bit. Yeah. But it isn't, it isn't, I don't care because I do care. I care very deeply about very many things. I just don't care about some of the things I was told to care about growing up. Yeah.

I'm looking forward to it.

You know, whether or not whether or not I have the perfect manicure on my toenails is not something that matters to me anymore.

That's good to know. I'm looking forward to that point. I've heard it from so many from so many other women. But I think that that is yeah, that's the key, I reckon, is that it's the expectations, like not trying to live up to other people's expectations of what you should be doing or how you should be doing it, but actually that key word authenticity that that we hear a lot of the time, like just being who you truly are.

I suspect why you feel like it hasn't happened to you yet is based on what you said, you have a 10-year-old and a 12-year-old. Yeah, so you are still very, very heavy into a situation where most women are still very, very, very concerned about those things. Yeah, so even if you would naturally be coming out of that, you're in a situation with other women who are in their 30s when right, and so there's some of that going on for you. You know, I have a 10-year-old and a 12-year-old, and I'm supposed to be doing this, and I'm supposed to be doing that, and so you have you have a little more of that. I suspect once your children get to the age where they're far more independent of you, you'll all of a sudden go, What am I doing? Why does it matter? Right, yeah, because that's about when it hits. I've noticed for most people when their baby gets to be about high school age, is when they say, This is baloney. You know, what am I doing? Or they say, There's got to be more than this. And and part of that is is they're about to go empty nest. And they look around and they go, Oh. Because when you have small children, you're busy. You're busy with them, you forget yourself a lot. You and it's natural, and I wouldn't give that up. I'm glad I was a mother of four. It was fabulous. I'm so glad I did it. And when I was done doing it, it was like, whoo, that was a lot, you know, and so because it is you you you give up a lot of yourself in order to help, you know, your children, and you don't prioritize yourself, right? And you come to a point then where you say, Okay, I'm done with that. You know, me first, and I'm not putting my feet in those shoes anymore.

Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah. You know, yeah, I'd never thought of it from that perspective before. So thank you.

I'm gonna I'm gonna start, I'm still gonna start wearing crops to church, you know. That's just I'm not, you know, I'm not, I'm not wearing. I think that's that's what it comes to, is you just start saying, This is ridiculous.

Yeah, where did I get this idea that well, I got I've had it a few years ago with like housework. Like, yeah, why is being having a tidy house is that my value? Or is that something that I just drummed into me all through my life?

Yes, it's something you and and more than likely it's something you had drummed into you. I like I like being able to find my things and I like my kitchen to be clean. I don't, I don't like I don't like smells of yucky food. Yeah, so I like my kitchen to be, I don't mean spotless, but I mean sanitary. You know, like I want to, I don't, I don't want people to walk in and go, oh, I wonder what that fungal thing is throwing in my sink, right? I don't want to do that, but yeah, you do kind of just start saying, why do I feel the need to get down on my hands and knees and scrub the baseboards every week? Yeah. Like comes into your house with a white glove to test that. No one even notices except you. Right. Right. And it's causing, you know, so yeah, it's the same thing. It's with the house, it's with it's with how you dress. Um, it's and sometimes that comes from children. Like I love, I love crazy pants. I like to have like floral and and and stuff. And I have one child in particular, grown adult now, and so everything's fine, but who would always say to me, Oh, I cannot believe you're wearing those, right? And so I got to the point that I kind of didn't. Well, now I'm 62. You can wear the bright pants. I can tell you, I can tell you that I wear a lot of bright pants, things with swirls and stripes and flowers, because if you don't like to see me in them, don't look. No one is forcing you to look at me in these pants.

I do also wonder like why the people closest to us feel like they're entitled to tell us exactly what we think.

Teenagers, you have to give them a little bit of leeway because they're they're still developing and and and they they they feel like everyone's looking at them. Yeah, and if you're near them, then then you're making everyone look at them, right? They don't want anything, you know. So so I I try to remember that she was a teenager when she did that, but still I held on to that for a long time. Even now, every now and then I'll put on a pair of pants and I'll think, oh, are these too wild? And it's like, no, two, two, things too wild, you know. Come on, if you like them, wear them. Love it. I mean, somebody made them. It's not like I I went out and bought material and created, they were on a shelf somewhere, right? And yes, I'm going to wear them. So you'll get there. I promise.

Okay, I'm looking forward to it. I feel like this conversation could go on for longer.

On and on and on and on.

Um, yeah, because there's so many things that we could talk about, but um, it's your bedtime. And um, I won't hold you up any longer. I really appreciate your time. It's been such a cool conversation. And yeah, we'll encourage everyone to get hold of the book, Peg Unhinged. Highly recommend. Um I was Thank you so much. Yeah, I I really enjoyed it and I've really enjoyed this time together. Thank you. Hey there, Rebel. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Midlife Rebel Podcast. If you'd like to support the show, you can buy me a coffee by going to Buy MeACoffee forward slash Midlife Rebel Podcast. Thanks for listening.