The One with the Teenage Revival

For those of you 'lucky' enough to be caught up in the wild tsunami of perimenopause or menopause, here's a question for you. Have you, at any point during this torrent of symptoms, felt you've been catapulted back to your teenage years?

And no, I'm not talking about the resurgence of baggy cargos and paisley bandanas, but the heavy weight of insecurity, self-doubt and rejection-sensitivity. Unlike the recently revamped fashion trends, these things are significantly less of a good look - especially when sported on a mid-life woman who is supposed to have her shit together by now.

Not too scared to wear the latest fashions and instead wearing a baggy t-shirt and jeans combo from Topman AT ALL

Thanks to copious amounts of HRT and Insta-research, I'm coming out of that pseudo-teenaged haze enough now to see what was happening. And yeah, it had all the hallmarks of adolescence but, thankfully, with significantly less acne.

I've had enough therapy in my time to know that my childhood was pretty damn good. If there's a problem anywhere on my relatively privileged white, hetero, cis-gendered, working-class timeline, it's from the ages of 13 - 20.

Let's see what was going on around those years. Well, aside from the momentous hormonal and physiological shifts going on for any teenaged girl, it was also the nineties. Heroin chic touted in every magazine, misogyny flowing like Lemon Hooch, sexualisation of young girls being the lens of choice and perfection assumed as standard issue. The pressure was on and, as an autistic, ADHD first-born daughter, I took all of these things as my own personal benchmarks for life. Fun times.

And on that - I didn't even know I was neurodivergent. I mean, it was the nineties so obviously it was only 'naughty boys' who needed, got or deserved any kind of recognition on that level. Mine would come a mere thirty-three years later (thanks, Patriarchy).

When I think back on my teenaged years, I shrink a bit. Those were the most difficult years to speak of during my therapy sessions. And, predictably, those were the years I was most pressed to talk about by my therapist. In fact, we worked out together, that whenever I'm feeling under threat or out of my comfort zone - it's teenaged Abi who rushes in, completely ineptly, to save the day.

Bless me and my gravity-defying fringe. At least my dad still loved me

So I guess then, it makes sense that perimenopause flung me right back there. This, and the fact that adolescence and menopause are big, clunky bookends of our reproductive life. What with the rollercoaster of emotions, inexplicable rage, body-hating monologue, information overload, unpredictable sleep patterns and brain fog that you could lose a tractor in, it's only been my wrinkles separating mid-life Abi from teenager Abi.

This got me thinking about how I coped back then. There was a LOT of furious and self-hating diary-writing but there were other things too. Things that I remember lighting me up and suggesting, in a subtle but powerful way, that there might be more to life than this awkward battle against myself:

• Occasional one-to-one, out-of-earshot conversations with friends that went DEEP (I remember thinking, 'Oh, this is what connection feels like')

• Books that dared to go to darker places (Have you read 'Sati' by Christopher Pike? That novel taught me it was ok to question things and exciting to philosophise)

• Movies that portrayed girls and women as something other than submissive, pretty little sidelines (Terminator 2, Silence of the Lambs, Thelma & Louise)

• Watching TV that rocked not just me but, seemingly, the world (enter the absurd terror and comedy of Twin Peaks. What a time to be alive)

• Signing up to be in school shows where immersion in make-believe was not just helpful but crucial (who knew a bit-part in Oliver! could be so personality-defining?)

• Music. I mean, need I say more? Twas the time of Alanis, Gwen, Courtney, Skin, Dolores and ALL the spices

My bit-part was overshadowed by my little brother playing the Artful Dodger

These survival mechanisms - along with others I've learned over the decades - are still held close to my beating heart. Yes, I'm all for going within and my enduring mindfulness practice has taught me that all the answers I have are inside of me. But it's important to CONNECT too, right?

So on that last one, music, I've upped my game. As if platforms like Spotify aren't enough of an upgrade from the mix-tapes of the nineties, I have been searching for other ways to get my fix of organised sequences of sound waves. Because if oestrogen is randomly going off on illicit jaunts whenever it feels like it, then I'm filling the gap. And dopamine seems like a decent replacement. Very decent.

You know what that means, don't you? That's right. Live gigs.

Some of these gigs have been close to home - local pubs and clubs. Bands that are hot in Torbaydos, where I live, or even across the South West. I've got to mention Still Life and the Queens Arms in Brixham here - it seems a better band / pub combo does not exist. Real ales and real rock a mere 10 minute walk from my door? Yes please and thank you.

Just another night at the Queen's Arms, Brixham

Other than that, there has been an alarming amount of throwing caution to the wind, utilisation of overdrafts and blind belief that logistics will work themselves out whilst booking - against any better judgement I may claim to have - tickets a plenty.

And let's not forget, these aren't just tickets to a music gig. These are tickets to energy, tickets to healing, tickets to self-love. Yes, I may get a late-night, impulsive ADHD shopping hit from hitting the buy button, but ultimately what I'm getting is a ticket to joy. And surely, you can't put a price on that?

So, what does this look like in real terms? Well, yes, a bit of scrabbling around for ticket money, organising time off work, prepping the family for my absence, gathering funds for travel fares and sometimes even cheapo hotel stays. But mostly it's teen / mid-life Abi gaining a bit of excitement in her life and maintaining who she actually is.

Because that's important.

So far, the big artists who have helped me to do that this year are Yungblud (because teenage Abi would have DEVOURED him), Skunk Anansie and the legend that is Alanis Morissette.

See? Tickets to absolute joy

I may be an author, a gatherer of words, but I'm having an atrociously hard time finding a way to explain how much it meant to me to scream out the lyrics to 'You Oughta Know' with the actual woman who wrote it mere yards away from me, accompanied by a glorious Exeter sunset and 25,000 other people. First year university me had a revival that only I can appreciate so I won't even try to take you there. But if you've ever listened to Jagged Little Pill in the wake of an epic break-up, I don't need to tell you anyway.

You oughta know.

Next on the cards is Mika at the Eden Project (beauty in a musical nutshell) and - would you believe it - Pulp in Manchester. I don't know if Jarvis is prepared for the potentially explosive comeback of teenaged Abi but it's pretty much guaranteed. So, fair warning and all that.

And perhaps most important of all, is the music that seems to be from the fruit of my very own loins. My now terrifyingly aged 18 year old son is all about the music. Protecting his musical passions with a ferocity I've seen only in my own perimenopausal rage-fits, he is on a tremendously exciting path. Off to learn more about performance and songwriting at university in September, he also has a band, Full Disclosure, that gigs regularly and - rather conveniently - providing a cathartic outlet for his mother. There's nothing quite like seeing your baby boy belt out Break Stuff by Limp Bizkit before he crowd-surfs into a mosh pit.

That's my boy

It's like it's meant to be.

So that's it really - I just wanted to write a post about music and how much it's helping me through this weird phase of life. Disclaimer: if you have concerns about your health, always go see your doctor (even if you have to advocate on behalf of yourself and the rest of female-kind whilst you're there) but remember that music is there too - just waiting for you to re-claim and re-love not just your former adolescent self, but who you are today.

In the words of Alanis:

"And what it all comes down to, is that everything's gonna be fine, fine, fine."

Fine indeed

Go well,

Abi

xxx

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