The Irony of Being Middle Aged and Female

Being a woman really sucks ass sometimes. Being a woman in her 40’s sucks ass all the time.

I don’t know about you but I’m finding that the maintainance of my appearance has become even more onerous and more expensive than ever. Gone are the days when I could wash my face with whatever soap was in the soap dish, lather my hair with the generic family shampoo, skip the conditioner (we didn’t have any anyways), finger comb the curls and run out the door.

Not only has the soap been replaced with the 4-step facial cleansing system, I carefully rotate through at least three different types of shampoo and conditioner depending upon the current state of my tresses.

So that my aging dermis doesn’t begin to look like alligator skin, I must slather on a moisturizer that is chock full of heavy duty ingredients designed to restore my skin to it’s youthful glow…speaking of which, said moisturizer must have a good dose of self-tanner to best camoflague those pesky spider veins.

I can’t forget the face creams, one for day and another for night, each costing a week’s worth of groceries for my family of six. Retinol, peptides, amino acids, vitamins C and E, helioplex, glycolic acid…the list is endless but mandatory if you want to keep that face wrinkle and age spot free.

And that’s just the morning routine. What about the ‘little extras’. I don’t know about you but no one ever told me that I would be growing my own mustache that could rival my husband’s. Let’s not even mention that one course hair that sprouts just under the chin and seems to grow in minutes after plucking. (My BFF and I have a pact that we will pluck each other’s chin hairs in the nursing home).

I’d never waxed my face before but I am frankly too cheap to pay someone to do it. I bought that green goo that you heat up in the jar, slather on your face, and then rip the sucker off after it dries.  Since I’m a know-it-all, I did not read the directions first. How hard could it be?

Memo, check temperature of wax before slopping on face.

My face is now completely mustache and chin hair free but it’s hard to tell due to the series of tiny red pustulent blisters that now adorn my cheeks on both sides of my mouth. Let’s not even talk about the chunk of upper lip I pulled off with the wax that is now a bright red, scaley scab outlining the top edge of my lip.

Add to that, a nice cluster of pimples have decided to join the party, and are now pulsating en masse all over my chin.

All that time and money to try and ‘hold back those hands of time’ just a little bit more.

Sadly ironic isn’t it?