Pro tips for the midlife woman

Welcome, all you young whippersnappers! Thank you for coming to today’s session, Pro Tips for the Midlife Woman! I’m sure you’re wondering just what the hell I’m talking about, as the notice said this session was Fifty Easy Cocktails With FREE Samples!, but that was only to get you in the door. Don’t bother trying to leave, we’ve locked it behind you. Never fear, we’ve taken care of your every need. If you look under your seat, you’ll find a box lunch of room-temperature Lunchables and an single serving box of Malbec, with straw. We be classy, yo.

So what are the Pro Tips, you may be asking each other around a mouthful of soggy cracker and wine? They are nothing more than years of lessons learned the hard way, condensed into a short and understandable format. So sit back, suckle your wine box, and learn.

Pro Tip #1: Earplugs. I cannot say enough good things about earplugs. I sorta accidentally on purpose but kinda not really ordered an enormous box of earplugs on Amazon (hell yeah, that’s an affiliate link, how else do you think I could afford to get the wine for you?). When you have 200 pairs of earplugs at your disposal you keep them everywhere, and you won’t begin to imagine how your life will change. Distracted by the household while you’re trying to concentrate? Pop in the earplugs! Sick of sibling bickering? Turn up the silence! Spouse snore like a chainsaw? A little neon green foam to the rescue! I never knew how distractible I was until I couldn’t hear anything.

Pro Tip #2: Start a new file in your notes app or BuJo. Title it: BRUISE JOURNAL. Include the date, the time, the item you walked into, and what part of your body you smacked. This way, when your spouse stares at the technicolor contusion on your hip (calf, shoulder, thigh) in nauseated horror, you at least have an idea what you did and when. You’re only allowed to claim alien abduction once before no one believes you anymore.

Pro Tip #3: Have several different and entertaining ways to say “back in my day” so you don’t sound like an aging diva. If you come up with some good ones, please share. Evidently I’m an aging diva. Now get off my lawn.

Pro Tip #4: Splurge on the good eyeglass frames. If your eyes are going to fail you, you might as well look sexy while you’re walking into furniture (see #2). Have the frames people show you stuff you wouldn’t usually pick, they’re really good at selecting ones that look good on you. You might be surprised. Skip the long eyeglass chains, this is midlife, not the Golden Girls.

Pro Tip #5: You will learn that patience is like a muscle – the more you exercise it, the stronger it gets. Right now I could patience a Hummer right over my head and into the seats with you. Somebody pass me a wine box, hold the straw. Imma just rip it open with my teeth and slam it. Also, patience does need rest time, again like a muscle. Patience also requires wine, unlike muscles. So when mama says her alone time is for your safety, there is a reason.

Pro Tip #6: Appreciate the hell out of your pelvic floor, because someday that sucker is gonna give way like an elevator in free fall, and unlike an elevator rescue, hot firefighters can do nothing for you other than make you long for a strong pelvic floor. 

Pro Tip #7: Give up being butt hurt about the opinions of others, especially when it comes to things like crafts, home decor, fashion, or pretty much anything on Pinterest. Dudettes, our American healthcare is a fustercluck of epic proportions and needs overhauled. I, for one, have become quite fond of no cost to me yearly mammograms. Can’t say I love having Tit and Tat squashed like matching stress balls, but it’s covered and I’m less likely to postpone it because of that. But I digress. You want more women in leadership positions? You want to be taken seriously? You want to fix the flaming dumpster fire that our kids are inheriting? Quit having online cat fights about birthday party decorations, and focus that energy on helping put out the flaming shitshow. We’re all getting sprayed with poop and no one cares about themed balloons. JFC.

Pro Tip #8: You know that hot body you have right now, with the race car metabolism? Love it while ya got it, because you’re gonna hit 40 and that race car is gonna blow a tire and go spinning into the crowd, exploding into a fiery ball of rage once it realizes it can no longer tolerate certain foods and beverages and of course all of them favorites. Same with skin tone and hair texture. Your décolletage will go from soft and creamy to dry and crepey, your hair will flip you off as it goes from shiny and bouncy to dry and unruly. They’re gonna turn on you and there ain’t nuttin you can do about it.

Pro Tip #9: Once you hit a certain age, and for every woman that age is a different number, you’re going to look around and wonder where your life went. You’ll start marking years by things other than numbers. For example, I am I had feathered hair years old. Or I am I miss Love’s Baby Soft years old. Or, I am I had a large sticker collection and think kids are missing out by not having smelly stickers sorted in binders years old. Or, my personal favorite, I am I ate sushi before it was trendy and everyone thought it was disgusting that I put that in my mouth years old.

Pro Tip #10: You will have VERY STRONG OPINIONS about things you never gave a rat’s ass about. Things like socks. Knee-high compression socks, to be exact. They are hugs for your legs, and the days you wrap your lower limbs in those hugs are the days you realize you don’t wanna go all HULK-SMASH on the world and before you know it you’ll have a large collection of knee-high socks and will stab a bitch for more.

BONUS PRO TIP! There just not enough flonks to go around. Learn now what is worth a flonk. 

Thank you for coming. Or rather, thank you for not storming the stage when we ran out of wine. As you exit, please help yourself to complimentary chocolates which are certainly not laxative samples that you’ll wish later that you had stuffed into your purse.