Much has changed in me since Mother Nature visited me with my “monthlies” for the first time in 7th grade. Well, much has changed, and much has remained the same. Cases in point:
I was a well informed teenager – my mother saw to that. I read all the brochures she collected at the doctor’s office about women’s bodies. I read Our Bodies, Our Selves cover to cover. In puberty and in adulthood, I have read the little folded-up, info sheet in 6-point type with which Tampax graces its boxes – many, many times. Life has brought on its share of pregnancy scares and real pregnancies. And most women know that those last two tend to change the whole game and re-define educating yourself on menstruation.
I have been one of the lucky ones. I have never really suffered from cramps. I never really experienced PMS. It seems I have always been on a pretty regular schedule, but I have never really bothered to keep track. On several occasions, I have unexpectedly tuned in to my regularly scheduled programming when I have been focused on my own long running reality show and lost track of things. I have hysterical stories of “crisis moments” in both public and private bathrooms, where the MacGyver side of my mind never fails to step in and fabricate a feminine hygiene contraption from whatever’s available. But that’s a whole nuther blog….
But this past Saturday, I think my luck in avoiding PMS finally ran out, as it visited me for the first time, at 44 years of age, in a dressing room at a boutique. You see, I had waited too long to purchase an outfit for a semi-formal dinner that was to start in less than four hours. I found myself near panic from the lack of clothing options in my closet. So I got in the car and headed to one of my local clothing salvation spots – one that has seen me through most of my adult clothing crises.
Alas, every single thing I took into that tiny, poorly-lit room was ugly, and I suddenly realized that the woman standing there trying them on just didn’t seem very attractive. I looked her dead in the eye, and I picked her apart. She wasn’t tall enough for the one jacket. She was too wide for the one pair of pants. She was too pale for the cream sweater. And overall, as a supermodel, she was left wanting. I told her this silently, of course, and I never pushed so far as to reduce her to tears.
I left the store with one shirt. I paid in full with a smile on my face. The lovely women that had helped me were a wee bit shocked, I think, as I had told them when I walked in the door that I had limited options at home and was at their mercy. They had left me to roam and choose; they are good to me that way, and they know I really don’t like too much help. And to think that, after all that, I arrived at the finish line with just one item.
As I was driving back home, my mind was racing as to what was really clean in the closet, what was really at the dry cleaners, and what should have been taken to the cleaners a week before. I realized – for the first time in my life – that I had been a victim of self-hate in that cathedral of all women’s nightmares: a dressing room.
I blamed it on my period, and I still do.
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THEN: Most problems like these were the end of the world and were the catalysts for full-fledged hissy fits in the solitude of my room.
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NOW: I skipped the fit, gave myself a talking to about procrastination in the quiet of my car, and got on with my night.
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I told my 12-year-old self – when the money failed to roll in – that I would never do that again. I asked myself, “How could you be so stupid?”
I can only speak of the young man I’m living with right now. Well, I can only speak of all three of him.
