Shedding light, adding sparkle and celebrating life with fairy lights
I live in Cape Town, the spectacular city at the southernmost tip of Africa, where I have spent half of my life. It is home for decades and is where I have endeavoured to live in a Christ-centric way.
The Mother City
South Africans have been dubbed the rainbow nation and the Mother City as Cape Town is known, is home to a diverse cross section of people. Depending on where you fix your gaze, it is breathtakingly beautiful but our city is also plagued by a number of problems. In addition to the usual suspects of crime and rampant poverty, we have also had to endure incessant load-shedding of late.
Extreme wealth and abject poverty co-exist here. Some neighbourhoods are havens of tranquility, while in others gang-related activities and gunshots abound. Being streetwise with a great dose of discernment is required to live here in the shadows of the world-renowned Table Mountain. BUT, we are a pretty resilient bunch and humour gets us through when impatience and frustration seem to want to drive us over the edge.
Now that I have set the backdrop, I would like to tell you what inspired me to host this blog. And like the city I live in, the answer is multifaceted. I have battled to maintain the balance in various spheres of my life and the search for how to achieve this has been decades long. But just as I seemed to have gained confidence and some real traction, along came the biggest challenge to the balance I sought: hormonal fluctuations.
Ridiculously unprepared
The physical changes and symptoms accompanying one’s 40s wrought havoc on life as I knew it and somehow, I was ridiculously unprepared. I was completely ignorant of the changes I could expect to happen. Hindsight is 20/20 as they say, but I never really sat down and considered the inevitable changes that needed to occur to transition one from a young person in peachy health to a wrinkled elderly individual.
Perhaps, due to the circumstances of my life, I was in denial. But the changes showed me in no uncertain way that midlife was well and truly upon me and I better accept it. Well, I could resist, but where would that have taken me? In the light of this, I hope to elucidate how things got out of whack and my travails to get things back on track.
Add my voice
Indeed, I am, unfortunately, not a board certified anything … but I have had to dig deep when confronted with completely unexpected aspects of ageing. For that reason, I would like to add my voice to those who feel we have to do more to inform, or is it warn, other women. Perhaps they, too, can approach it differently or make alternative choices when they are younger.
So that when they feel alone, we can reassure them that they are not, or when they feel that they are going crazy, we can bellow through that brain fog, no, you are not, you are going to be okay. We can help you.
It is not that help and resources are not readily available; it is simply just that this season of life often comes upon one like a ton of bricks without warning, or so it seems. The symptoms could be linked to and/or mimic a number of other conditions, some terrifying. Often the idea that it may be hormones is, ironically, never even considered by the individuals involved.
More medical advice required
This is where things get tricky. Women around the world have expressed that just because they are of a certain age, hormonal changes should not be assumed. This is for fear that other serious conditions will be missed due to such a diagnosis. While for others, it may be that it is the last avenue investigated. This is the conundrum and solutions require discernment and knowledge with medical professionals at hand.
And this all happens at a time when the world at large seems eager to elevate and value the young, the upcoming, and the dynamic, often to the detriment of older folk. It can be very daunting to find yourself feeling so lost and uncertain during this time, especially when things you did without any qualms now seem hard to do.
It is so relatable and will share some anecdotes and reassurances as well as facts and stats relevant to this rather treacherous part of our collective journey. I do so in the hope of making this season a little less jarring for you and the ones you love.
I believe that with the right attitude and equipped with the requisite knowledge, this could be a really wonderful time in life. A phase of life when we all can really revel in the lives we have built, the family and friends we cherish, the work we love and so much more.
A change of course
It brings me back to why I chose this medium to engage with you all. My qualification is in Communication and I have been privileged to have worked at various publishers over the last decade or so.
I love the English language and really enjoyed writing, editing, researching and proofreading. However, during Covid-19, the creative and visual part of me came to the fore. All those videos I was consuming really challenged my creative inertia and this is my foray into something different.
Covid-19 was also the reason why I found myself amid a restructuring process to streamline the number of staff at the organisation I worked for. After much contemplation and prayer, I chose to venture out on a new path voluntarily and take the plunge of what newness would bring. And here I am doing something I did not foresee even a scant few months ago.
Melding of passions and interests
So yes, doing this seemed the right thing to do. As a melding of my passions and interests, yes, but also the overarching reason, the fuel of my fire and crusade if you would like, is that I simply want women to understand how these fluctuations in our hormones – the imbalance that often makes us feel unhinged – are affecting our lives. Hopefully, that will go some way to help some to be prepared and ready to tackle it when it comes. Yes, so we can be ignorant no more.
In my small way, I hope to give younger listeners some helpful tips that could save some money. For the 40-somethings, some insights to prevent unnecessary stress and anxiety coupled with suggestions of how to manage a supremely manageable condition with aplomb.
This season of choppy hormones may not facilitate smooth sailing but being equipped with the right knowledge will help us all to make informed choices. Then we should be able to focus on what is truly important. What is that for you? A fulfilling family life, career, developing new skills, growing in faith, travelling, etc?
“I will live deep and suck out all the marrow of life and not, when I come to die, discover I have not lived.”
Henry David Thoreau
By God’s grace, may we find the sparkles of light, love and joy that have generously been sprinkled over our lives and celebrate it all, with stunningly beautiful and the brightest of fairy lights.
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