Flower Power Mom Blog

One of the most ironic criticisms I have heard about mothers having children after forty is that they are selfish.

That description may potentially apply to mothers as rich as the wife of Croesus—a lady who could afford a domestic retinue, I’m sure. For the rest of us, the definition of “selfish” is to abscond with our hard-earned coin to some exotic destination for a last hurrah before the encroachment of our twilight years and the  inevitable descent into prunehood.

When it comes to parenting in general, the whole experience of “self” is necessarily subjugated to “servant”.  Ergo, I’m so busy running after my children with a mop in one hand, a platter of snack food in the other, and a pen and school paperwork  jammed between my teeth,  that I wouldn’t know my “self” if I ran bang smack into a mirror.

Ironically (again), the most apt description of parenting I’ve heard came from a young father who was just a part-timer taking his kids out every Sunday. He said he coped by just accepting that he was “their slave for the day”.

Yes, ma’am, slave for a whole day—imagine that! When it comes to being a mom, you’re a slave– 24/7 and for life!

And when it happens at our age, we are simultaneously enslaved to an inner hormonal cataclysm I like to call the Midlife Momotov Cocktail (after the Russian “Molotov” incendiary bomb which originated in the Spanish Civil war). It is an experience that inspired me to research and write a dedicated “tips” page for menopausal midlife moms.

Every day can feel like a ride on the roller coaster of patience-testing your children subject you to, while sandwiched between hot flashes and mood swings—the whole far out experience sending you on an LSD-style flashback that makes your brain feel like a fried nut cutlet. “Turn on, tune in, and fall apart”, is midlife mom’s take on Timothy Leary’s 60’s Acid Trip mantra.

I was talking to my cousin in Detroit who works in a corporate environment, has two children in their teens and is a few years younger than me. On the subject of the November 16^th article on Flower Power Mom in the Detroit Free Press, she laughed breathlessly and said “I remember what it was like with young kids” in a better-you-than-me voice, “and I don’t even want to imagine what it would be like at my age!”

Flower Power Mom subscriber, Leonora, doesn’t need to imagine it—she knows what it’s like to “ride the ride”.  Leonora, who was 41 when she had her second child, began to get perimenopausal symptoms like weeping and constant headaches when she was 46.

“It was like having PMS three weeks out of every month” says Leonora.

She said her gynecologist would not prescribe HRT medications because her menstrual cycle was still regular. Instead, she was put on the pill, which later resulted in heart palpitations.

In the end, she sought refuge in alternative therapies with the help of a Chiropractor who was also a Clinical Nutritionist and Neurologist.  Through a program of food concentrates to cleanse and heal, as well as herbal supplements, Leonara gained a new lease on midlife motherhood.

Melissa Carr, a Doctor of Traditional Chinese Medicine, treats perimenopausal and menopausal patients often. She says they are usually in their mid-to-late 40s, but (in some cases) as young as late 30s.

According to Dr. Carr, Traditional Chinese Medicine refers to menopause as the “second spring”—a natural transition, rather than something to endure or avoid. She treats her patients through Chinese herbal and food cures, western nutrition, acupressure and massage.

For perimenopausal midlife moms, she acknowledges that the proverbial heat is turned up in the kitchen.

“Raising young children is such an enormous task and time management would generally be a huge challenge—I offer ways to de-stress without stressing over how to fit in another thing to do.”

When Leonara remembers the days of tears and headaches, about her daughter she says “Before I starting on the healing program, I had no patience with her because I felt constantly sick.”

You don’t’ have to be an MD to know that, when it comes to having your children after 40, menopause and midlife parenting are going put you at the centre of an evil tug of war between hormones and high demands of child rearing.

I’m willing to wager that too many of us feel the social pressure that—because we’ve made our midlife mothering bed—we must lie upon our thorny resting place and suffer the consequences in silence, lest some overexcited anti-midlife-childbearing zealot point the accusing finger at us and rasp “Selfish!”

The truth is, we deserve help, healing and support upon our journey. Since our children need us to be the best we can be, we’d be selfish not to.