Turning 51

A few days ago, I turned 51. It’s the first year I’ve really felt less like celebrating and more like hiding. Maybe not hiding, but definitely not bragging. 

Typically, I’ve enjoyed my birthdays. I’ve never lied about my age. Actually, I’ve always loved my age; I’ve been proud of it, even. 

This year, though, there’s been a noticeable and regrettable shift. 

And I think it’s for these two reasons: My body finally feels its age. And I finally look my age. 

I remember having a conversation with my grandma when she was in her 70s, and I was in my late 20s. She told me that even at her age, she still felt my age on the inside. Wisdom, knowledge, and experience allowed her to handle herself better, more controlled, more sophisticated, but deep down, buried under societal norms and expectations, she was a young woman navigating life day by day. Just like me. She wasn’t omniscient?

That stung me. She could still feel jealous, under-appreciated, insecure, dismissed, fat, ugly… She just knew how to manage those feelings better than I did. 

For some reason, I believed that when you’re a full-grown woman (my 20-something brain assumed that was around 40), all those negative feelings and doubts about yourself and about the world just subsided, and you were automatically full of confidence with an acute understanding of yourself, your life, and the circumstances happening around you and around the globe.

Well, 40 came, but the acute understanding did not. 

Now, at 51, guess what? Still nothing. 

Maybe some of that is due to the pressure to look like a 30-year-old, but act like a full-grown woman, which is now ageless to me, because what does that even mean? Full-grown sounds so black and white: you stop growing, so you’re fully grown. Well, please tell that to my ever-growing hips and belly. But most importantly, try telling that to my mind. My eager and hungry mind that can’t recall the most mundane words or why I’ve gone into the bedroom or the password to my Instagram or my kid’s name. 

What. Is. Happening? 

And then there are all those pesky wrinkles. Not only are they intensifying, but they’re multiplying. So now I’m supposed to buy creams and oils and gels from 30-somethings on my Facebook feed; these products that go on my face, neck, decolletage, cellulite, age spots, sun spots, teeth, nails, eyelashes… Wait? What was I looking up?  

Oh! Wrinkle cream. 

In the meantime, my cart has $8,450 worth of anti-aging stuff in it. Um. Reign it in, Sonny. 

And, of course, there’s Botox and fillers and lasers and peels for the bargain price of your firstborn. 

Speaking of: I had kids late. I was 37 with my first and almost 40 with my second. That makes them 14 and 12 now. I’m really tired. Like, all the time. And that’s my bad. I just didn’t know how emotionally and mentally exhausting kids would be. The physical part, yes, of course. But the stress of it all. And stress causes wrinkles. 

So, basically, what? We’re just screwed? I guess, then, obviously, fine, I’ll give you my firstborn for some face injections. That’s a win-win. 

But at this point, what IS the point? My husband thinks I’m stunning. My kids think I’m beautiful (although they do want me to start dying my hair brown, blonde, red, anything but its natural gray). 

I mean, yes, there’s something to be said for doing these things for myself, to make me feel better about what I see when I look in the mirror. But why do I think I’m supposed to look like I’m 30 when I’m 51? Why do my lips need to be bigger? My nose smaller? My skin tone even-er? Why do I think I’m supposed to look like I have a filter on all the time? 

Who put that in my head? And when? 

Honestly, I don’t know that it even matters because the seed is planted and its roots are secure.

But, I’m not. 

Incidentally, I never use filters which is why no one ever sees any selfies of me, and barely any pictures of me at all because I’m comparing myself to millions of other women out there aged who-knows-what because they could have on a filter or have years' worth of Botox, laser, filler, butt fat, whatever, in their face, so how do I compete with that? 

And now I’m left with 3801 pictures on my phone, but still can’t find one halfway decent image of myself to allow into the foreverness of the WWW to be compared to those un-aged women, so just forget it.

And we can’t blame it all on filters, Botox, and social media. My grandma lived in a time without all that, yet her insecurity remained throughout her life. Is mine worse than hers? What will my daughter’s look like? 

Why do I have digital shopping carts full of beauty products to help me build collagen and elasticity in my skin, but nothing at all to help me build my mind as it slowly becomes more compromised, less agile? 

Believe me, I do know that I’m lucky to be aging at all; the alternative would suck. But I don’t know what the answer to aging gracefully is.

For years, I thought I did, and literally, just one look in the mirror one day, and poof: I’m 51, and I look 51, and my knees and hips and concentration and memory and energy levels, they’re 51. But my negative thoughts, my insecure feelings, the fear of my inadequacies, they’re all 25. How is that fair? How is that possible? 

I’m not saying I haven’t grown as a person and matured and become happier, more fulfilled, and better able to approach the complexities of the world and the lines on my face, but the doubt is always there, and I guess my question is: How much money do I need to spend on the way I look to make it go away?