Image source: pixabay.com/RobinHiggins
This article is for women who realise that they have less and less patience with their surroundings. Women who suddenly no longer feel like being cute: for women in creative hormonal states, be it PMS, menopause or the slow slide into menopause. Because the difficulty that these conditions bring with them is this: We stop being low-maintenance.
Yes, everything can be explained logically. Hormonal changes, biochemistry, chemical processes. But aren't we a bit more than what we can grasp? What if these processes serve to allow women who are focussed on bonding and relationships to create some space for themselves?
The world in a nutshell
A woman's emotional world is incredibly complicated. For years, even decades, we still manage to squeeze her into a tiny nutshell in order to take the needs of those around us into consideration. While most men are well able to pursue their life plans with a matter-of-factness that seems unimaginable and often enough hurtful to us, for us an important criterion of our happiness is the harmony around us. We are prepared to put our needs on hold for this. Whatever this harmony may consist of for the individual woman - the happiness of our children, the satisfaction of our partner, boss or our family of origin. During a hormonal change, this nutshell bursts open and the emotions that pour out shake our little universe. Suddenly we become difficult.
What happens is often the same as what you have observed in your partner over the years. He acts according to his mood and needs, his opinion is the most important compass for his actions. The hormonal change is a wise device of nature. It sends you into such a hormonal frenzy that you start to create space for yourself with little explosions. If those around you were used to fitting your needs into a nutshell, this seems pretty outrageous at first. You don't understand yourself. Where has the kind, caring, self-sacrificing creature you used to be disappeared to? Say goodbye to him and allow yourself to be a normal person with the full range of emotions and needs. Are you difficult? What normal human being isn't?
OMG, I'm not cute!
Release yourself from the obligation to be low-maintenance. Don't let anyone tell you that you're difficult just because you've stopped being predictable. Because you're suddenly no longer able to play peace, joy and pancakes. Who says THAT is your job? Welcome to emotional chaos. Feelings are wonderful, even if they are unsettling feelings. They make you come alive. Nature has reached out to you and pulled you out of the swamp of your existence as an egg-laying wool-milk sow. Welcome to life.
What do you spontaneously think of the following picture?
Image source: 123rf.com/bowie15
On the page where I downloaded it, this picture is labelled "crazy woman screaming". So a woman who screams is considered crazy. As if we have no right to feelings like anger. But anger is an appropriate reaction of a person whose needs and boundaries are not respected. We are entitled to it. However - between us - we ourselves have often ensured that others do not recognise our boundaries. We have not recognised them ourselves. Under hormonal attack, we suddenly feel them.
Have you ever said something in this state that you've been holding back for ages? Very good! Suppressed dissatisfaction is of course not so explosive, no, friendly and polite, it just quietly gnaws away at relationships until feelings of emptiness, alienation and distance set in. These hormonal explosions sometimes ensure that difficult words come more easily to your lips. That doesn't have to be pleasant. But perhaps being true and real instead of pleasant sometimes does more good.
What can you do if you find this time stressful and don't know what to do with yourself? These 3 steps can help you get a sense of direction. Because I can't shake the feeling that something real and suppressed is trying to burrow its way to the surface from the depths during these times when we are so out of round. It might be worth listening.
1. give yourself the right to change.
Even if you meet with little understanding in your relationships, now it's about you. You are not obliged to remain what others have become accustomed to. If you try to hold back change, you will pay for it with your vitality. Change is unsettling. But those who shy away from risk take the biggest risk. Don't put yourself under pressure to always be the way you've always been and the way others know you.
2. ask yourself "Who could I be?"
Your head is full of images of what you should be, while your soul is drawn somewhere else. Give your head and your imagination some freedom. Suppose you were not obliged to continue your old life - who could you be? What other kind of woman could you be if you weren't who you've always been? Every person has countless qualities that lie dormant within them. Some we allow to grow stronger, others we hold back. What else is slumbering inside you? Maybe it needs to come out?
3. accept your needs, even if you don't understand them
The challenge of this time is to find out what you need for your well-being. During this time, unknown sides of you will come forward, so they will not necessarily be needs that you are familiar with. Or they may be rather childish needs that alienate you and that you may even be ashamed of. No censorship, please. Everything is allowed. What could you do to fulfil this need?
Yes, yes, I know. Sometimes the greatest need during this time is to shed our own skin and slip into another one. We don't feel the way we want to feel and our bodies don't exactly look the way they should. Treat yourself to this witchy time. You don't always have to be a doll. I sometimes wonder whether these conditions would also exist if we were allowed to live out our feminine power. If we lived in a society where the word "crazy" didn't come to mind. In which capable, ambitious women wouldn't have to listen to a bunch of reproaches. In which our willingness to be there for others would be valued and not taken for granted. Then perhaps our souls wouldn't have to rebel so strongly.
Image source: 123rf.com/nexusplexus
But only maybe. What do I know? I'll be nice again and try to look as harmless as possible...
Dear Christina
I have now read all your posts. Super! Thank you very much for all the input.
I wanted to sign up for the detox week straight away, but had to realise that a week like this with you two is unfortunately not affordable this year 🙁 but it's a super brilliant idea! This by the way.
So, the picture above made me think of "power". And I read the article with interest, as I'm currently facing exactly the same dilemma: I was too open, too direct and too clear and now I feel like I'm being shunned because of it. And by several people at once. I'm surprised myself because I'm suddenly "so different" :-D. Your post is now helping me to relax a little about the change 😉
Best regards
Eva
Dear Eva,
"Relaxing into the change" hits the nail on the head! 🙂
Thank you for your kind feedback and much love!
Christina
Dear Christina,
That's so brilliant, your perspective on the menopause, I've never read or heard that anywhere before! It helps me much more than the purely medical-technical view of what happens to the hormones and what the physical symptoms look like. I am now 50 and am slowly slipping into these "creative hormone states" and so far have only perceived this as a problem everywhere. Especially when talking to other women, the positive aspect is totally missing! It's so nice and liberating to read your article, now I'm looking forward to what awaits me!
As a result of my corona illness in February, I had a hormone rush that lasted for several months and suddenly put me in the spotlight. It was an exciting time! Unfortunately, the effects of the hormones have now worn off, but the focus has remained, so I treated myself to your course today.
I wish you all the best from the bottom of my heart!
Kind regards
Simone
Dear Simone,
Thank you for your kind words ???? I wish you all the best! ????
Christina