Letters to the Editor
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Good letter - good advice
It's about coming to peace with yourself. There is no manual, no instruction book.
We all get older every day. Your options are:
1.) Die, and you won't have to worry about aging
2.) Live, and deal with aging.
Good luck. I hope you come to peace with yourself.
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Our Bodies Do Not Fail Us
I like to think I have, or at least had, beauty credentials of my own, and at age 47, this letter resonates. For those of you grieving the inevitable onset of age, I recommend a book I just read called "Waking," by Matthew Sanford, who became a paraplegic at age 13 and years later healed himself through the practice of yoga. No, he's never going to walk again, but he became whole in his body, on his terms, contrary to everything his doctors and physical therapists had ever told him was possible. This may seem like a stretch--from grieving one's aging process to the extreme challenges of being unable to walk--but it's an inspirational book for anyone coping with injury, illness, and, yes, aging. Sanford challenges the notion that "our bodies fail us," and points out that the human body is a miraculous instrument that works hard to keep itself healthy, if given the chance.
In our culture we are not given permission to feel good about the way we look. This is especially true for women, and even the most beautiful women are afflicted by this (and at any age). They will always find a flaw or two and magnify the significance. So we have to live by our own rules, because the rules we are told to live by are a recipe for misery. Now when I look at myself in the mirror and see my expanding mid-section, sagging chin, and age spots, I feel compassion for everything my body has been through and all the ways it has served me in my life. Don't buy into the rules, and you might actually be happy.
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age and beauty
As I rapidly approached my 50th birthday, I felt so old, and dreaded reaching that milestone. Then I was diagnosed with breast cancer and stopped worrying about my age altogether. That's not to say that I don't sometimes wonder who the grey-haired woman staring back at me from the mirror is. But when I think about how lucky I am to still be here, cancer free, seven years later, it helps put things in perspective.
My old friend was not so lucky. She was a real knock-out throughout her 30s and 30s. It often seemed like every guy in the rural area we lived in was interested in her. When she was in her early40s, she was diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer and fought it for 10 years. In that time, she struggled with painful treatment, hair loss, etc, but whenever I heard from her, she'd write about the joys of just being alive and the power of friendship and sisterhood. When she died this last summer, I mourned the lost of this friend, who to me seemed as beautiful as ever.
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Wow......
This is definitely a "girl thing".
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I'm in my 50's
& liking it MUCH more than my 20's. Back then, I was full of the ususal insecurities & self doubts, like I suppose alot of us were, & it took a mental & physical toll. Since I was so obsessed with fretting about my looks rather than cultivating a sense of self-awareness or inner beauty, the expenditure of that wasted energy eventually made me feel OLD. At 26, I actually thought I was over the hill. 30 seemed like a death sentence, not to mention 40. I agree with what alot other posters have said, & I don't have much else to add, except for one thing.
To quote an old line from a Bob Dylan tune:
"I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now." SO true. Didn't understand what those words meant way back then, but I do now, & it's pretty liberating. You start to grasp the meaning of acceptance, & once you do that, what else have you got to lose. I may never look or feel as good as I did in my 20's & I may be moving closer to eventual demise, but I'm a hell of alot happier now because I have an inner SPIRITUAL awareness. And when I'm told by the occasional old friend that I'm looking even more physically attractive now than I did then, well, that's just icing on the cake.
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Oh the irony...
I am in my mid-twenties and entering a health care profession. What I wouldn't give for some lines on my face, some gray in my hair, and the experience that goes along with them. The older ladies can go ahead and hate me; but what a blessing it is when they instead are kind enough to share their wisdom with me. My teachers seem to be having a good time, too. Perhaps you could find yourself a mentoring-type role with one of your many skills. Don't keep it all to yourself! You have so much to enrich the world with at this point.
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MLC
It's just your version of a mid-life crisis. It will pass.
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Notice
how much hatred you are throwing my way.
I am merely telling you how many men think. Young women for sex, older women for life experience (and maybe sex too)
Brightstar65, you have had a 'life of grief and begging'. Never had any 'pull'. You would much prefer, of course, the young 18 year old over the better partner of 50, much as Woody Allen tossed aside his partner for her daughter. You so much deserve your life of grief and begging. Hope you're happy, all alone and bitter until you end up in a nursing home.
but you have to twist it like it is some sick thing.
believe me, you women, with your newfound fiduciary freedoms, are exhibiting every similar example of finding young boy toys to entertain you too.
so don't give me that superior female bullshit.
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more attention for you
See...you got all this attention without anyone having seen you. Obviously, this topic hits a nerve with the beautiful, the formerly beautiful, the never beautiful, the bitter, the self-righteous, the wise, the ignorant...and my hot and bitter late grandmother, from her grave. Her sage advice to her 20something granddaughter 20some years ago was "Your ass will fall. Men will no longer want to do things for you. Learn how to do everything yourself".
I can change a tire, and men still enjoy looking at my ass while I do it. And I'm not sure which aspect of that pleases me more. Who cares. My reaction to your dilemma is somewhere between appreciation for the wise, thoughtful responses it has engendered and "Tough Titty, Princess."