Who the hell is that?

This is not a unique human experience, but it was new to me. Completely engrossed in a podcast about a serial killer or a book about a serial killer, I approached the glass entrance doors of Whole Foods and saw the reflection of a chubby middle-aged woman starring right at me. I gave that reflection a friendly smile, almost a wave too. She smiled back.

Fading out of the world of serial killers and coming into consciousness in the middle of the drive aisle in the Whole Foods parking lot, "Who the hell IS that?"

You know where this is going. I had just smiled at my own damn reflection, because I hadn't recognized myself.

Two seconds ago I was going about the business of profiling the Delphi murderer on the inside of my head, while displaying friendliness to my fellow shoppers on the outside of my head, excited to restock my supply of The Chronic coffee. Now, the sound in my earbuds is white noise and everyone can f*ck off, because to my horror, I'm a chubby middle-aged woman.

I've never been a woman. A chick, a broad, a female. Yes. Never a woman. I'm not grown up enough to be a woman.

I can't be middle-aged. I'm too ridiculous, too liberal, too quirky to be middle-aged. Middle age is for cranky white men.

Yes, I have gray hair, but it's not graaaaay hair. My face is just lightly wrinkled, maybe?

I've never been slender, but I'm not chubby. That is not a muffin top reflected in the glass.

I'm a mountain biker, a mountain climber, a motorcycle rider, a fun seeker, a see what I can see'er, a do it for the adventure of it'er. I am an adrenaline junkie for shit sake. My body is meant to move and sweat and breathe hard and get me from here to there and endure the pain. THIS is who I am.

Sigh. Welcome to my loss of identity.

I'll tell you the truth. A combination of physical malformations and a lot of physical activity has left me plagued by injuries for several years, and dealing with them has been a losing game of whack-a-mole. For every injury, it started with denial of the injury, gradually leading to partial acceptance of the injury and treatment with ice, heat, ibuprofen, massage, vascular flushing, stretching, cupping, needling, acupuncture, chiropractor, yoga, physical therapy, injections. When none of these things worked, I was lead to full acceptance of the injury and the surgery for the injury, which turned out was the only thing that was ever going to "fix" the injury to begin with. Finally, recovery.

Oh, but wait! Here comes another injury...

Along the road to chubby middle-aged womanhood, I have to admit that I have not been kind to my body. I have smashed it into the ground repeatedly. I have made it carry and lift very, very heavy weight over the span of years and years. I have made my heart nearly pound itself to death. I have never given my body enough rest. I don't feed it enough vegetables.

Although I've identified as an athletic, sporty, outdoorsy person, I also have to admit that I'm not genetically gifted for most of it.

I am naturally strong, but while all of the lifting of heavy weights (because I can!) might have been just good and fine for my muscles, it was not so great for my tendons and ligaments and other such delicate matter inside my body. For instance, with my freakishly strong triceps, I could lift "500" all day long, but guess what?* The ligament capsule in my right shoulder could not. (Shoulder surgery #3.)

I have an extra set of ribs (cervical ribs) and malformed collar bones, which are sort of flattened, all of which created a condition called Thoracic Outlet Syndrome (bi-lateral). In short, the brachial plexus (a bundle of nerves that comes out of the cervical spine and travels through the shoulders and down the arms) on both sides of my body have been compressed and choked due to a lack of space in the thoracic outlet and scar tissue, causing horrible stabbing, burning nerve pain in my back, shoulders, arms, and hands. Many days, I wanted to live no longer - no living = no pain. In 2019, I had two rib resection/nerve decompression surgeries, which have provided me complete relief on my left side and partial relief on my right side. The amount of weight I can lift to the ability to grip to the amount of typing I can do (which is vital to my livelihood) are all limited.

I also have malformed hip joints, which have lead to a torn labrum and other issues in my left hip. My femurs are abnormally rotated, so that my knees sorta collapse inward, putting strain on the ligaments and tendons associated with my knees, quads, and hamstrings. My calves bow out, and I have super skinny ankles. I can't participate in any sport that requires wearing a boot without experiencing burning pain on the bottom of my feet.

Enough already!

The point is that somewhere in the haze of injury/surgery/recovery/repeat, I have transformed into a figure I do not even recognize in reflection. For decades, I pushed my body to its physical limits and loved every bit of it. I now acknowledge my limitations like a prayer. I don't want to settle into chubby middle-aged womanhood; it's not for me.

So, what am I going to do about it?

I'm going on an adventure...

*Lifting "500" is an inside joke with my weight lifting friends Ginger and Debbie. When people see their big muscles, inevitably someone asks, "So, how much can you lift?" The answer is: 500.