THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 26, 1994 TAG: 9406280516
SECTION: HAMPTON ROADS WOMAN PAGE: 06 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DEBRA GORDON, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: 940626 LENGTH: Long
- Anthropologist Margaret Mead
{REST} \ \ It's something our mothers never talked about. Something secret. Hidden. Shameful.
To them, it meant the end. Of childbearing. Youth. Beauty. Creativity.
But with 20 million baby boomer women on the cusp of menopause, the ``change'' is emerging as something to be celebrated, honored and embraced.
``We're really the generation of women that's opening it up,'' says Carol Maxwell, 42, who abruptly went through early menopause three years ago. ``Society has a lot of mixed feelings about it; there's a feeling of coming out of the closet.''
Technically, the word ``menopause'' means ``cessation of menses.'' It's a time in a woman's life when her body stops producing estrogen, when her monthly menstruations slow and finally stop. The process can take years.
But the word could just as easily be defined in another way - as a time to pause, to reflect.
``When I was young I would think about who I was and why am I here,'' muses Bonnie Finnell, 49, of Chesapeake. ``For a while I forgot those questions when I was so busy with my family and making a living. Menopause provides that opportunity for these questions to resurface; to evaluate the first half of your life and see what you want to change and do differently in the second half.''
And so she's turned away from the strict work ethic of her youth, becoming more aware of the need for a balance between work and play. She's rejected the message that she could always do better, do more. ``I'm tired of that perspective on life. I feel I'm worth enough just because I am, and I will do good things and be a good person because that's the nature of my life.
``I don't know how much it has to do with the biological aspect of menopause, but it's where the emotional, psychological and spiritual part of that process comes into play.
``I think when you hit 40 it's like an eye-opener; a red light that causes you to stop and think differently about life.''
Menopause is a time of transition, notes Linda Rose, 46, who, along with Maxwell, is preparing to teach a course called ``Taking Menopause Out of the Closet: A Holistic Look at Age, Wisdom and Power.''
``The pause in menarche signifies more than just bodily changes,'' she says. `It invites us to acknowledge our losses, shed old ways and create new life once more.''
Unlike many seminars on menopause offered locally, their course will not focus solely on the physical aspects of this passage - the hot flashes, night sweats, arthritic aches and fatigue often associated with this life stage.
Instead, by incorporating music, rituals, journaling and movement with discussion and lecture, the course will encourage women to look deep within themselves for their unique direction and purpose.
``The theme of the course is consciousness,'' says Rose, who is just beginning menopause. ``Be aware of what's happening.''
The course was born when Rose, an alternative therapist who specializes in music therapy, and Maxwell, a nursing instructor, began talking about the changes in their own bodies.
The Virginia Beach women soon realized that most women didn't understand the dynamics of the process of menopause, and many were loathe to talk openly about it.
Even Rose and Maxwell, who talk honestly about their own lives with hundreds of women, flinched a bit when they realized interviewing for this article meant telling the world they were in menopause.
``It's scary thinking about how people look at it,'' says Rose.
``We're worried about the stereotype,'' Maxwell says. ``Of menopausal women being hysterical and nonsexual.
``We think, `Will they box me into that?' ''
She describes one woman she knows who, married to a younger man, hid from him her own symptoms as she began menopause.
``She viewed it as a demarcation, a time of aging, and she didn't want him to know she's getting older. But not to tell the family is overwhelming because the process can be so overwhelming they have to know.''
``There's something about the lack of honoring the passage,'' adds Rose. ``It's like trying to hide your pregnancy from your husband.
``And there's so much to celebrate; we have to take it out of the closet.''
It is happening. Bookshelves - which five years ago sported just a handful of books on the topic - are crammed with titles like Germaine Greer's ``The Change'' and Gail Sheehy's ``The Silent Passage.''
Magazines debate the pros and cons of hormone replacement therapy; hospitals sponsor seminars to spotlight their gynecologists and attract this valuable market. Even advertisers are recognizing the potential and promoting products such as a vaginal moisturizer for menopausal women.
``Women come to me and they're anxious to talk about it; they're coming out in droves to talk about it,'' says Norfolk gynecologist Theresa W. Whibley. ``Any time I give a seminar about menopause it's the best attended; when I give a seminar about anything else, I get questions about menopause.
``This is the baby boomers; we've been aggressive about every other aspect of our health care. This is one new area to be aggressive about.''
In ancient cultures, women's monthly bleedings were associated with power and spirituality; when they ceased, women were considered to be ``withholding the blood,'' and so retaining her wisdom within herself.
``It was a part of her life when she wasn't giving away and taking care of others; there was the opportunity to flower with our own wisdom,'' Rose says.
These ``wise women'' passed on their knowledge to younger women, preparing them for this next life passage, which follows menstruation and childbearing.
But today's women don't have those role models. They're more apt to learn about menopause through the media, even more than through their doctors.
And so they often pick up some of the myths associated with this passage and incorporate them into their own experience.
Remember, for instance, the first woman character on television to undergo menopause? It was the repressed Edith Bunker, and we knew she was going through a major change when she told her bigoted husband, Archie, to ``stifle.''
That episode was entitled, ``Edith's Problem.''
That's exactly the kind of stereotype women like Joan Hecht, 47, of Norfolk, want to smash.
``It's always been my intention to make this phase as graceful and beautiful as I can,'' says Hecht, an adjunct faculty member at Old Dominion University.
``There's no reason why women, as they get older, can't flourish. I would love to be a wise woman some day.''
Hecht began preparing for her own journey two years ago, before she ever had the first hot flash.
She read every book she could find, attended every seminar, made an appointment with the menopause experts at the Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine at the Eastern Virginia Medical School.
``You honor menopause by accepting your age and who you are; by seeing the physical changes, not liking them all the time, but accepting them,'' Hecht says. ``It's a wonderful time of life to experience things like spirituality and a much more peaceful time.
``Life begins at 40; it's true. It's the best years of your life.''
Since turning 40, Hecht has divorced and finished her doctorate in urban education. She's preparing to marry soon and talks of a new relationship she's forged with her 12-year-old son.
``There's so little I know, and so much more I want to know. You take different risks; become more mindful in terms of clarity and clearness. Menopause is a wonderful excuse to look at your life and the changes you physically go through that allow me to keep on growing.'' by CNB