Hot Flashes, Part 1

When I felt my first hot flash, I decided I wouldn’t be one of these weak women who needed chemicals to feel good about their changing selves. I gave birth to six children without epidurals, and, after my marriage fell apart, I raised them by myself for eight years. Just because I finally found the perfect guy and re-married didn’t mean I wasn’t a strong woman who was in control.

Verna, my mother-in-law in her late 70's

 

However, the unwelcome flashy guests became more and more insistent. I talked to my mother-in-law, who was then 82. “Do the hot flashes ever go away?” I asked her. 

“Don’t bank on it,” Mother Towne said. “I still get them occasionally, in spite of my age.” 

Oh yeah. That won’t ever happen to me. My mother, also in her 80s, still lives in Germany and walks five kilometers every day. She’s never had a single hot flash in her life. 

 My mother in her 70's

I said a polite “Oh my goodness,” to Mother Towne, and went my way, even more determined to wait out these pesky flashes, and become tough and enduring like my mother. 

A few years went by. One night I woke, a hot flash straddling my racing heart. All kinds of terrible images invaded my sleepy mind. I catapulted up, convinced that my youngest daughter, who was still with us at 17, wasn’t home yet and had been in some terrible accident. 

I woke my sleepy husband, who mumbled, “Whatsamatter?” 

“Meagan,” I almost yelled. “Is Meagan home?” 

“Simmer down,” Ken said. “Meagan came home before you went to bed. Remember?” 

“Oh.” Yes. Then I remembered. She came in just as I turned off the TV. 

I sank back into the blankets. The hot flash must have gotten tired of the havoc it had created and took the midnight train my racing heart had tried to catch. I lay in bed, trying to figure out what had just happened while Ken rolled over and resumed his soft snores. This sudden panic had come upon me unexpectedly and without warning, shutting down my reasoning facilities of which I was so proud. Shamefacedly, I told myself this was just a momentary lapse. With renewed determination not to let menopause win, I went back to sleep. 

During the next year, I had many more anxiety attacks, but proudly talked myself out of them every time. I could win this fight if I just stuck with it.