midlife Roar
Rage, grief, jiggly tits and other midlife initiations that are actually trying to save you.
Imagine this: you’re a woman who’s played by all (ok most) of the rules since forever. Married the guy. Worked your arse off either in your career or gave it up for the world’s most thankless job - mothering, or possibly juggled both simultaneously. You’ve invested time, energy and money in “maintaining” your feminine attractiveness for a reason you’re not quite able to put your finger on, but that damn loose neck skin is starting to give you away even if your forehead doesn’t move.
Suddenly, maybe violently, it’s like you’ve woken from a forced sedation. You might describe it as if you’re moving through the motions of a life that feels… separate to you. To the actual you that remembers joy and creativity and play and all the orgasms, but that you can’t locate for more than a minute these days. It’s as if your life doesn’t feel entirely like your own. Like you’re watching it unfold, wanting the characters to make different decisions, say no instead of yes and go rest occasionally, but you can’t seem to edit the storyline.
Each day presents you with a lucky dip between righteous rage and deep sadness. You scroll to escape, but the black hole of social media makes you feel like the most worthless woman on the planet and your confusion escalates. Who am I and what the hell do I want? An icy freeze begins to spread through your veins. The despair is too much. Not only at the crumbling, apocalyptic state of the world, but at the terrible suspicion you’ve been giving your own power away for so long that you’re not sure where to find it anymore.
You’re seeing the therapist - geez maybe you are a therapist. You’re reading all the books - is it avoidant attachment or is he just a cunt? You’re making it to your Thursday night yoga when the kids get to sleep before 8pm - fuck that one time you even scored an unexpected nap.
Oh and there was that Burlesque class you did for a while to feel empowered (‘cos that’s what it said on the flyer). You took the stage in heels for the final concert terrified at the very real possibility of pissing your lycra hotpants in the jump kick section of the choreo, but at least all the heckling hubby’s got to wolf whistle 28 sequinned gyrating pelvises in unison to Ariana Grande’s Dangerous Woman without fear of a face slap.
It did feel kinda cool dancing with a feather fan. Jiggling your tits around with a group of women was a laugh, but also… there was something manufactured about it. It definitely scratched an itch, but it wasn’t exactly you up there in that slick back pony with flicky-outy eye liner and caked concealer. It was that sexy caricature you’d been performing since you could remember. The same one that makes an appearance after 2 drinks to help you loosen up. She’s a fun time gal, but dissociating and numbing out when things feel too intense is her real (private) skill. Is that still empowerment? You’re unsure.
It’s this kind of rumination that keeps you up at night.
Is it perimenopause? Am I depressed? Am I gay? Should I do another degree? All very valid questions that churn through your mind on repeat while you keep on keeping on, survival mode intact, autopilot on max. Because… What's the alternative?
Well as audacious as it might seem, this is the conversation I want to have. Not in a preachy “I used to be a fucking mess, but now after 17 sound healings and an ayahuasca trip in Byron Bay I’ve healed my Mother Wound and raised my frequency” kinda way, but in a let’s see what happens when we subvert the narrative, welcome our full humanness and experiment with what makes us genuinely come alive kinda way.
In short, I’m making some stuff for you that you might like and could help you navigate whatever brain-melting midlife initiation is begging for your attention.
My qualifications include: 12 years and counting of thankless mothering, increasingly loose neck skin (and a fully mobile forehead - thanks to that one time I tried botox 5 years ago and missed my expressive face SO bad), a long history of giving my power away, an ex-husband, an endless supply of rage and grief, as well as a passion for jiggling my tits around at any opportunity.
Oh and I have a number of actual credentials that make my offerings somewhat rigorous, plus a decade of experience supporting other women to find the kind of embodied agency and liberation that took me much longer to accomplish myself. Hurrah!
Some of my humble gifts will be this substack, a podcast, and lots of actual opportunities for you to practice being your whole, wonderful, interesting, erotically expressed midlife self, with an emphasis on establishing nervous system safety and powerful self-agency after a loooong time feeling the opposite. Stay tuned.
If you haven’t closed this window or shut down your laptop in a wildly offended huff by now, then yay! Let’s hang out. If these words speak to you - even some of them - even a smidge, then please know that this Substack is my love letter to you. ‘Cos you’re pretty fucking wonderful exactly as you are.
