I know the Best Menopause Story Contest has ended, but I can’t help but submit my story anyways. My story is not fictional. At times, it may be slightly embellished, but believe me-Most of it is probably understated! I will point out any exaggerations so you will know fact from fiction. (Eh, you’ll probably know…)

I call my story, “The longest, hardest journey from the deepest realms of Hell to a sweet little spot in Heaven.”

It is tough to know where to begin, but I will start with my first summer in my current condo-about 6 years ago. Was it my imagination, or was I experiencing what a chicken feels like when it is being roasted in a 400 degree oven come July? Sometimes in the evening, if we are lucky, it cools off outside. Unfortunately, my bed is not outside, nor my desk, or anything else I need 90% of the time! I couldn’t get that coolness INTO my house! In came the suggestions: Get some fans! Yeah, let’s make it more like a convection oven and blow the hot air around! “Come to my house, I have air-conditioning!” Well, when can I move in with you? I mean, really? Can you rub that in a little bit harder please?

You see, my HOA does not allow “window air conditioners.” You know, because they look so much worse aesthetically than an air conditioner sticking  out a wall right next to the window. Things that make you go, “hmmmm!!” I learned in my Environmental” class at school that apparently, my condo is situated in a geographical direction that does not allow for the natural flow of wind or breezes of any kind. No, those would be blowing in the direction in which there are no windows to open to let them in. Home buyers avoid these types of homes. We settled for black-out curtains in the kitchen and livingroom, which makes for a real cheery atmosphere when you are feeling depressed already.

What am I getting at here that has to do with menopause? Well, we all know the number one symptom of menopause– HOT FLASHES FROM HELL! What a perfect complement to living in a kiln! What else goes well with hot flashes while hanging out in a large kiln? Here are a list of symptoms in which I associate with almost daily, amped up about 100 degrees more in the summer heat in my residential kiln:

·         Menstrual flooding that comes on suddenly and makes you feel like you may hemorrhage to death.

·          Headaches, Migraines, especially before, during or after bleeding to near-death which debilitates and radically interferes with normal functioning. That would mean pretty much all the time.

·         Decreased motor coordination or clumsiness - an experience that makes me feel spastic,  certainly less than graceful. Especially after cursing like a sailor after stubbing my toe for the 10^th time on the desk chair base or tripping over the cat who suddenly stops when she is walking right under my feet.

·          Physical exhaustion – a crushing-crashing fatigue that comes on so suddenly, it grips you into feeling like you will collapse-and you usually do.

·         Exacerbation of autoimmune issues which are now co-existing with my declining hormones, as well as an Essure birth control implant which has a black-box warning now. It has co-conspired to cause as much inflammation throughout my body at all times.

·         Muscle cramps and low back pain.  Gall bladder pain, spasms and discomfort felt in the right upper abdominal quadrant under the ribs which is accompanied with belching, bloating, and intolerance to certain foods that increase the liver load with declining hormones. 

·         Dark circles under eyes that no amount of sleep will eliminate. 

·          Increased facial hair, especially under chin or along jaw line. Oh, and the extremely course mustache which must be dealt with about every other day. Yeah, I’m a man now who so enjoys this comment at the threading place: “Would you like to just do your whole face?” Me: “Why, do I need it?” Answer: grimace…nodding yes….then adding, “Well, maybe next time…” nervous laugh…

·         Abdominal bloating making it visibly evident that, yep – I’m pregnant-all the time…and I’m 52-there’s just no baby in there!

·         Palpitations or heart racing that comes out of nowhere - no warning or provocation- like, is this a heart attack? Asthma? Anxiety attack? Agoraphobia?

·         RASHES! When the heat hits, it’s rash time – 24-7! As time has gone by, I am now resistant to certain antibiotics, and now it seems that steroids aren’t even helping. Big welts on my ass from sweating all the time. Angry rashes on my face….aggravated by sticky sweat…I want to kill someone now!

·         And my all-time favorite, the hot flashes!

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·         By the time I notice, it is too late because my brain is fried, dyed and laid to the side. I am delirious, depressed, angry, and my last episode had me jumping up to scream at my son – “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!” To which he just stopped what he was doing-draining his personal portable AC while he looked at me and shook his head in disbelief, followed by me doing the same thing because I had no idea where that came from or why I asked or WTF…? Then I just go on talking to myself or to my cat, bitching about how I just need to COOL OFF…

·         I tried for 3-4 years to get approval for free weatherization services, hoping somehow that would bring relief. It finally happened. Got a new fridge, microwave, a couple other freebies, but it is still hotter than the deepest layer of Hell in my condo.

·         For one brief summer I had a portable AC that a very generous friend gave me. It was old and huge and consumed a lot of power. It tripped the breaker one too many times and never came back on. Out of desperation, I asked my sis for the lovely new-looking portable AC that was in her backyard. She said it didn’t blow cold air and it was on its way to the dumpster. I said, “Whoaaa-let me have it, I’ll figure it out and fix it!” Now, after HOURS OF sweating profusely over it and taking it apart, etc., I now have two heaps of shit-ass garbage-heavy garbage-in my livingroom. Finally someone on Craigslist wants to take a torturous stab at repairing them and hauls them off.

·         I then went to the next level down in total and complete desperation this week. After finally getting a good raise at work, I had to wait a month and a half to actually see it in my check. Unfortunately, I had to use the entire check to pay past-due bills and wait about 3 and ½ weeks for my next monthly check. Finally thought I was going to enjoy some of that hard earned money, when a former friend who was down and out had stayed here for about 3 months, and then she bailed a day before all the bills were due and she got her paycheck. Needless to say, she didn’t pay a dime – FREELOADER! Then, at the same time, my son and his girlfriend who should have paid me collectively around $400 towards bills, took off on a trip to Portland, making themselves too broke to give me anything but around $190 between the two of them. My whole check gone on day 3, and another month to go without a dime. As I said, in total desperation –I asked him – wait, first let me give you a quick rundown of my state of mind and body at that time:

·         It’s about 1200 degrees in my house and about 110 degrees outside. I’m having hot flashes from Hell-cramps like I am about to give birth – f-ing tired! – Rashes all over me, sweating profusely for too many hours -  can’t think or get anything done – depressed – anxious – in pain – broke – fucking hot! I ask my son if he would be willing to get a payday cash advance in which I would fully pay back when it became due, in order to borrow enough to get a goddamned portable AC from Craigslist. His answer, while throwing cash in my face (while taking a nap in his cool AC’d bedroom): “Here, just take it all! Now I can’t even eat!” Visualize my response to that….you could never! Or, maybe you could…I’m sure snakes were coming out of my hair, my tongue became instantly forked, horns on head, there was a faint sound of a T-Rex echoing from my soul as I exited the room, and I possibly made blood flow from the inside of the walls. I left the money on the floor and I went to my computer and proceeded to post every last item that I had in my home – FOR SALE! If I had to sit on my condo floor with nothing else in my condo but me and a portable AC, then that is what was about to happen….(more sounds of angry T-Rex shrieking while surrounded by screeching banchees  eminating from my soul, as my head is spinning round and round on my shoulders, Freddy Krueger blades coming out of each finger…PHT, PHT, PHTT!!

·         My phone went crazy with text messages, about 100 of them. I arranged to sell my washing machine, my kitchen table and chairs, 2 boogie boards, and with that being done, I had enough money to buy my FUCKING AC. And I did! And I got lost on the way home in Yorba Linda hills, but I had my AC in my back seat, so … it was sort of almost okay, I found my way home. I stopped at Stater Brothers and got me some rum and coke and a big bacon, cheese hamburger patty. I got home – I hooked up my fucking AC, cooked my burger, and sat down in my room. I turned on that AC and then I threw myself down in front of it while it spewed cold air and I worshipped it like a God that it is! Finally! I have arrived in a small part of heaven! What a fucking long, arduous journey! I’m going to go get my rum and coke now, FUCK YES I AM! Dude! I’m fucking cold right now, what? That’s right, I’m cold – and I am HAPPY now. THANK YOU UNIVERSE!

·         I just want to say that it was a razor-thin line that I was walking for the past week between losing the last part of my mind over this and everything else. Thank God I decided to just do what I do when I have had enough and I do what I have to do to keep going…one more time. Just another chapter in my book yet to be written…