BONUS: Gen X Lesbian Menopause: The real talk with Quincy and all the sweat you can handle

Menopause isn't just an ending, it's a turning of the page. In this solo episode, I share and perhaps overshare the humor and heartache of being a Gen X lesbian moving through hot flashes, raising a teen, and still daring to find love. These are the layers of my book called life-messy, radiant, and real-that makes this chapter worth celebrating.

Transcript

Quincy: 0:01

Hello Cocoons. Welcome to Cocoon After Dark. We are going to be talking about Meno Pods tonight, and I think it's an important place to start in the lesbian community because just before I was getting ready to record the solo, I was doing some other research and I decided to take a spin on YouTube. And what I found was. There's nothing on YouTube about lesbians and menopause. There's one extremely short, short of this woman talking about when she was going through a menopausal relationship with another woman who was also going through menopause. Both of them surgically, induced into menopause and that it did not work. The other one is. Bless your heart. Asia Sullivan from Folks Health. She does a super short video, but if you are out in the world and you are from the lesbian. By community androgynous and you are studying menopause and things like that. This is going to be your platform. Like seriously, you need to capitalize on this. You need to do as much research as you can and see how it's different. Because remember when they talk about you cycle with your. The other women that live in your house, you cycle with your best friends. Well, when you're cycling with your wife, your live-in partner of how many ever years, but you're cycling instead of through periods, you're cycling through menopause, which is just as difficult obviously as becoming a woman, becoming a. Less hormonally a woman is also extremely difficult. And now you have two people with multiple layers of their lives,, together. And what does that look like? So anyway, just my little PSA about that. We're gonna start the episode now. So welcome back. It's your grand Pappy, gen X lesbian. Currently sweating through menopause like it's my side hustle, right? When I was younger, I literally thought menopause meant you instantly got wrinkly. The you weren't having sex. And for some reason I thought all menopausal women were smelly. Don't ask me why, but I truly believed also that your teeth fell out. Don't know, but that is seriously what I thought. And of course I thought your vagina just closed up and you lived out your days like in a rocking chair or sitting in your house, in your lazy boy watching tv, spoil alert. Nope. So that's not the story and that's definitely not my story. Tonight we're re rewriting what menopause actually feels like, especially as a single lesbian, me and my little tween age, who's also going through her own hormonal rollercoaster. Right? It's messy, it's funny, it. Sometimes it's heartbreaking. I mean, it is so sad when I see her like going through the freaking cupboards, like she's a mouse on a crack looking for that snack that's gonna satisfy her. But I think I do the same thing, just not when she's here, I am, looking in the fridge, oh, there's a tub of frosting and I take like a spoon fill. Oh, there's some marshmallows. Oh, I have marshmallows. Oh my gosh, I should eat healthy. And I eat 20 pieces of Turkey and a slice of cheese and five little cutie tangerines, you know? Anyway,, definitely it's hot, right? Like she gets hot before she starts her period. She's sweating in her sheets. I'm having night sweats sometimes, and, it's. Not the ending. I definitely thought that I would look like when I got to this point. So let's start at home. My hormones, chaos, my teenager's hormones, pure anarchy. It's like living with two dueling DJs. She's spinning a lavia, Rodrigo heartbreak ballads, and I'm over here sweating to earth, fucking wind and fire, right? I mean like. And this is a new thing for me because I've been coasting through this. I had a surgical menopause situation during COVID and gained 20 pounds the next day. Seriously, that's what it felt like. I've since dropped about 20 of those, and I would like to drop a little bit more because I had inched up in the beginning of menopause. So that's a whole nother story. But picture this, she's slamming her doors, right? Because her crush left her on red. I am standing in front of the fricking open fridge, half naked fanning myself like a Beyonce concert. Hormone heatwave meets teenage heartbreak, right? Together. We're on this household away from being a Netflix drama, right? Like just one household away from a Netflix drama. And sometimes I wish I had cameras everywhere in my house instead of motion detectors and cameras like just captured every funny, crazy moment. And we should sell tickets like front row seats called the hormone circus includes popcorn, and of course the complimentary eye roll. And really, yeah. Yeah, that's my life. So let's sprinkle in some dating here. How do you explain menopause to other non. Menopausal women that you would like to possibly date? How do you explain this? When you go to say, a lesbian event or say you are online, and is it Gen X lesbian with wisdom, wit, and night sweats? Grandma, mom, chaos, swipe right if you own a Dyson fan. Woo. No. I once tried flirting with somebody. Mid hot flash. I looked like I was coming back from a SoulCycle class. Dripping shiny. Not exactly the sultry, thin, fatal. I was going for the upside. Moonlighting is built in. Forget the candles because I am the fucking fire over here. Like get close to me. You don't even need a heating blanket this winter. And people have been saying that for years to me. You sleep so hot. Do I feel great when I do that? No, but trust me, if you are cold, you wanna snuggle up to this hot bo and not hot bod in the sense that we're talking about. Again, remember, I am menopausal. Okay? The upside is that other cultures do this better. In Japan, they actually have something called kki, if I'm pronouncing that right. Please, somebody that is better at Japanese than me, please. Help me out with that. But they consider it a natural, transition, a rite of passage, an indigenous. Parts of the world, women become wisdom keepers and some parts of Africa. Menopause equals freedom. Freedom from being defined by fertility and freedom to step into their full power. And, remember, there are still places in this world where you go to a menstrual hut and if you're bleeding six, seven days outta the month, that is a long time to be sequestered in a room where people don't wanna be around you while you bleed into a hole or in. To Palm Franz. I'm not even sure sometimes what exactly happens.'cause I know for me there were times when. I pretty much lived in the bathroom because not one tampon, not one pad, could keep that blood from gushing out, and that may be too much information, but you guys need to know sometimes that's part of menopause, so I don't obviously wanna scare you, but if you haven't gone through it yet, there are so many different things that go on with being perimenopausal than getting. Through menopause and because mine was surgically induced, she left my ovaries, but took my fallopian tubes, obviously my uterus and my cervix for a long time after I felt broken inside. Like you have this relationship with your uterus when you choose to be a parent, right? You, you get pregnant either naturally or with hormones or whatever, and your uterus is Built this baby, that you bring into this world that you absolutely adore. Sometimes loathe when they're hormonal and everything else, but you love them nonetheless. You fight for them. You're there for them. And when they take that out of your body, it's like they took a part of your kid. Too, because this nourished them, this helped them grow. This made them safe, and it just felt really weird. I didn't think I was gonna feel like that. And I honestly, it was probably all in my head. But for at least six months afterwards, I felt like it was concave down there, it felt. Empathy, and I know it was just my organs, like readjusting and things like that, and sex after that was not very good because your body has to reset that too. You know, there's cervical climaxes, right? Your, your whole labia and your vulva and things like that, pulsate, right? When you, after you have an orgasm and suddenly you're missing part of that whole feeling in there. Good news. It gets way better actually, and I had this conversation with one of my exes recently that once everything resettles in there, the orgasms are even better. So, I mean, I'm not saying rush out and have a fricking hysterectomy, but don't think that you're not ever gonna come back. Just give it some time. Let's just just get there. But anyway, so meanwhile in America, we're only just. Now not whispering that word out loud. Growing up in menopause was like a dirty secret, right? Tucked away with like girdles and cigarette stained Tupperware. Nobody told us we could still be hot and literally be going through menopause at the same time. So here's what's real. Menopause is not the end, right? It's a recalibration. Yes. Your sleep betrays you like something fierce. If you. Have been a great sleeper your whole life, guess what? You're suddenly not going to sleep anymore. And it could be hot flashes, it could just be hormones. It could be just the fact that you have learned and been through so many experiences in your life that you just can't. Shut your mind off at night anymore, and it's part of it's hormones. Part of it's just figuring out a way to get comfortable in your sheets. Buying a new mattress pad cover, getting a new mattress, getting a. A pillow in a pillowcase that doesn't sweat all over your face so that when you wake up in the morning, your hair isn't pasted all over your face. If you guys have are following me on Instagram, you see that I went from short hair to shorter hair to now like basically buzzed on the sides and everyone's like, oh my gosh, your hair looks so great. And I'm like. But you don't understand, this is not to look great. This is to keep me from having to worry about sweaty hair. I know, God, you guys sound so gross. Sometimes your libido wakes back up like a shotgun and espresso. Sometimes you care less about being polite and more about just being honest. And sometimes I feel like becoming braver and bolder and sharper isn't just a gift. It's a miracle. Right, because now I have all this knowledge and I also have a mind of my own. I also have money of my own. I also have a life of my own, and I'm not worried if anyone is going to care what I look like or anything.'cause really it doesn't matter. I made it all of these years without going to federal prison for my hormones. Right. It's amazing to me. So. The brain fog. On the other hand, forget the word microwave and call it food heater. Like how come you can't remember words? Sometimes? I can't remember people's names mostly, and I've always been bad at that, but now it's embarrassing and I hear other women do it, and I catch up to them really quickly and I'm like, no, no, no, it's okay. I do that all the time because I know they're going through the same thing and I don't want them to feel bad. Or incidentally, they always call me by one of my daughter's names. That's cool too, because guess what? They're over 20 and 40 years younger than I am, so if you wanna call me by my kid's name, go right ahead. I am happy to take that. Menopause isn't a decline, right? It's like a remix. And yeah, men go through this too, right? I think they call it andropause. Their testosterone drips. Drips. Yeah, definitely drips. And it dips men. They have, they also have mood swings and fatigue, and they start not being able to build muscle as quickly and as easily. And they lose muscle too, right? Just like we do. We're losing muscle like crazy once we hit 30. And that's why it's really important to keep up with your protein. Keep up with your fiber. We want it. Stave off, you know, colon cancer. We wanna make sure we get to those appointments because even though we're lesbians and we're not having sex necessarily with with men or others, we still have to take care of the inside, right? We still need mammograms, we still need colonoscopies, and we still need to have a. Pap smear every couple of years because there are still things that could crop up. God, I don't know what crops up after you have a freaking hysterectomy. If the only thing left in there is my two ovaries, what could happen? But they need to look for something. So get the Q-tips and the. Salad spoons out and have at it, I guess. Women get hot flashes, men get hot rods. Does that feel right? Like they're out there, they get, I mean, trust me, I've gotten a few tattoos too, but they get tattoos. They get a hot girlfriend. They get hot rods, like they just think they're the shit, you know, they feel their dick kind of shrinking up. Their balls are getting longer. Like one year, and this is years ago now, my brother and I are 17 months apart, but years ago I said, what do you want for Christmas? And he's like, seriously, I want Tommy John underwear. And I'm like, you want underwear for Christmas? And he's like, you have no idea. But my balls are starting to hang down to my knees. I need something to hold them up there. So. Anyway. I mean obviously other than films, I've never seen things like that, and obviously in the film I hope it was a parody because if they're really hanging down to your kneecaps, I say to other women, and I've said this to one of my ex-girlfriends before, was why do all men walk like they have hemorrhoids? Is it because they all have hemorrhoid? Or is it because their balls are hanging so low and their penis has shrunk up so much that they're trying to figure out what's the new gate? You know, I dunno. I'm just making a joke about it'cause I seriously don't have any clue. But PSA, please continue to get your mammograms, your colonoscopies, your um, pelvic exams. See your doctors, see your practitioners, see your PAs, see your holistic health people. Talk to them about what's going on.'cause there are so many things out there that can help you in a couple of, well actually it's not a couple of weeks, it's longer than that. We're actually having someone on that's gonna be talking more about this and I think you guys will be excited to learn a lot of things, but I just wanted to bring it up now. Sort of preface that episode coming up later, probably towards the end of November. And, um, I, that's all. I just love you guys so much. And the thing is, love and menopause is not the cliff I thought it was. It's a doorway. It's messy, it's sweaty, sometimes hilarious, sometimes heartbreaking, but it's also power. If the right woman comes along, she won't run from my chaos. She'll laugh with me through it. She'll fan me during a hot flash. Kiss me after, and maybe even pour me a cold glass of wine while we ride this wave together so that my friends is what makes this chaos magnetic. And while I'm still here, still sultry, still grand Pappy. This alive in the fire. That doesn't sound right, does it? I'm still alive in the fire. Yeah, that sounded better. Anyway, thank God my dad was a firefighter.'cause the next time I see him, I'm gonna say, dad, can you just squirt me off with a fire hose because that's probably the amount of water that I need to feel like I'm not dripping in sweat. Anyway, everyone, have a super great rest of your night. Enjoy your evening, hug your about this and I think you guys will be excited to learn a lot of things, but I just wanted to bring it up now. Sort of preface that episode coming up later, probably towards the end of November. And, um, I, that's all. I just love you guys so much. And the thing is, love and menopause is not the cliff I thought it was. It's a doorway. It's messy, it's sweaty, sometimes hilarious, sometimes heartbreaking, but it's also power. If the right woman comes along, she won't run from my chaos. She'll laugh with me through it. She'll fan me during a hot flash. Kiss me after, and maybe even pour me a cold glass of wine while we ride this wave together so that my friends is what makes this chaos magnetic. And while I'm still here, still sultry, still grand Pappy. This alive in the fire. That doesn't sound right, does it? I'm still alive in the fire. Yeah, that sounded better. Anyway, thank God my dad was a firefighter.'cause the next time I see him, I'm gonna say, dad, can you just squirt me off with a fire hose because that's probably the amount of water that I need to feel like I'm not dripping in sweat. Anyway, everyone, have a super great rest of your night. Enjoy your evening, hug your loved ones, and I'll talk to you soon. Bye.