Jeanne Muchnick
Thanks to menopause, I’ve gone slightly insane. As in full blown freaking out/screaming/crying/ semi-hysterical over the smallest, most innocuous things.
Case in point: Two weeks ago when my husband ate the sushi I had bought for myself. No, I didn’t leave a note on the fridge warning him not to eat it. And no, I never mentioned to him that I had a particular craving for a California roll and under no circumstance was he to touch it. In my crazed state, I just assumed he’d know.
So when I came home after a long, hard day at work and it wasn’t there – this after practically ripping the entire refrigerator apart — I went into full-out hysteria mode as in “WHERE IS MY SUSHI????”
And then – with a glare in my eye straight out of a horror movie: “What do you mean you ate it??? I do everything around this house, you couldn’t have saved me my one little tray of sushi???? What were you thinking???”
The rant went on: “I was been dreaming…DREAMING of eating that all day. ALL DAY!!! Now what will I have? I specifically bought that earlier to enjoy TONIGHT!”
“What about pasta?” asked my normally sensitive hubby. “Or a Trader Joe’s pizza? I can heat the oven up for you.”
“How can I eat something with tomato sauce when I was yearning for sushi?” I bellowed. “YEARNING???? I’m not in a tomato mood. I wanted Asian. That’s why I bought the sushi and left it there. For me. That was MY order. You never go for California rolls.”
“What are you talking about?” he asked. “I eat California rolls.”
“Not a lot, you don’t,” I countered angrily. “Not enough that I’d think to tell you not to eat it.”
And then came the sobs. Real crocodile tears, in fact. Kids are going hungry all over the world, people are losing their mortgages left and right and there I was – 50 years old in my nice Dutch Colonial kitchen — literally crying because I couldn’t think of anything else I wanted to eat and I was hungry. As in blood sugar falling fast hungry. As in hormonal hell-watch-out-because-the-earth-is-falling hungry.
“You need to go out now,” I told him. “NOW! I want the same exact sushi– and I don’t care how many stores you have to go to to find it.”
“Now?” he asked. He was already in his sweats. “Can I run to Stop & Shop?”
“Are you kidding me? The sushi sucks there,” I said. “You’ll need to go the Food Emporium where I was or one of the sushi restaurants on Mamaroneck Avenue,” I said.
“GO!” I said with a push. “I mean it. NOW.” Stiff cold body language. Arms crossed. Insane Asylum glare.
“Jeesh,” he said…a bit scared I think. Even my hair was electric – the better to go with my bugged out eyeballs which screamed “HURRY! I’m in menopausal meltdown!!!”
And that’s just one example of the nutty menopause moments I’ve had of late where I swear my body and mind have become inhabited by aliens. Which brings me to this — my invitation to share your craziest, most embarrassing, most hilarious menopause moments.
Whadda ya say ladies? Don’t be shy. Are you irritable? Feeling out of sorts? Done anything off the wall? You’re not alone. Let’s share. Or do you want me to go into my “Why do you refuse to buy a GPS?” story where we got major league lost in a bad DC neighborhood? My kids STILL refer to this episode as “Remember The Time Mom Went Insane?”