I Have a Cream

"I Have a Cream"
By
Saffi Darsanac


Up until a few months ago, I had thought only sporadically about "the change." Back in 2005, I did print out something called "The 35 Symptoms of Menopause," primarily because the title appealed to the obsessive compulsive side of my personality. Thirty-five sounded hefty. Thirty-five made you believe you could encapsulate the whole thing in a neat package and be on your way to hormonal bliss forever.

Back in 2005, I read the list, earmarked a couple of symptoms, and put it away.

But it seems that I have gone from pre- to peri- in a flash-no, not a hot flash. I don't get those. Yet. But a "cycle, interrupted" recently got me to take out the list from under the clutter on my desk. I work from home, in a third-floor attic transformed into a suite of colors reminiscent of nature in the fall. My office is spacious, bright, and inviting, but today the last thing I feel is serenity.

I start reading.
"Irritability." Check.
"Mood swings, sudden tears." Check.
"Irregular periods." Check.
"Anxiety, feeling ill at ease." Triple check.
"Feelings of dread, apprehension, doom." Damn, I'm checking almost everything on the list.

But wait. Aren't those feelings normal for someone in her late 40's?

At least I have never brushed my teeth with Monistat, as my friend Candy did on vacation in Mexico. It's funny how a vaginal cream meant to relieve itching in your nether regions has the opposite effect in the moist recesses of your mouth. I have never put away my purse in the refrigerator either, as my neighbor Julia once did. And I don't have raging hormones, not like my friend Sandra, anyway. As we were changing into our workout clothes at the gym one day, she blurted out how constantly horny she felt, but because she was on the rag three weeks out of four, her husband's penis had gotten so raw and sore he had to be on medication.

Still. I don't like surprises. And "shorter, longer, heavier, lighter, phantom periods" throw me off. When I am thrown off, I write to Monica, my nutritionist. I have never met her in person, but she helped one of my best friends get over a serious digestive problem, and she has done wonders for my liver condition. In fact, if it weren't for her, I would be a rabid bloated bitch on steroids trying to "treat" the symptoms of auto-immune hepatitis, and not the cause of the disease. Plain and simple, Monica fixed me. And in the process, she converted me to alternative medicine through proper diet and supplements.

She answers my e-mail right away:

"I suggest some progesterone cream. Short cycles are a sign of estrogen dominance, most often because progesterone levels are dropping off. I'll include some cream with your supplement order, along with instructions... Any other symptoms?"

Yes. I have recently become a chocolate addict. I used to be flummoxed by my friends going on chocolate binges, but now I find myself craving the stuff. Being on a gluten-free, dairy-free, and no refined sugar diet only leaves me one option: the semi-sweet chocolate chips that a company named "Enjoy Life" cheerfully puts out for people on a "restricted" diet like me. I started out by eating a handful here and there, but my husband got irritated with the small droppings that he would find all over the house. So I switched to pouring the chips in 3 oz-bathroom plastic cups. I eat the chips the way an Englishman downs a pint of beer: head back, long satisfied gulps. I didn't think anything of it until my nine-year-old daughter looked at me once and said, "Mom, are you really drinking chocolate chips?" But the best way to eat those tiny chips (they are much smaller than Hershey's) is with a cup of Swiss water-process decaf (the only type of decaf I am allowed to consume, black, without cream or sugar). I set a mouthful of chocolate chips on my tongue, take a swig of coffee, and the chips immediately dissolve into bliss.

Monica is aware of my chocolate habit, and lets it go. But there's more she needs to know. "Anxiety attacks," I reply. "About ten days or so before my period, I really feel panicky about things." I add, "It doesn't help that I am starting to plan for a divorce, secretly, and of course it will take a long time, but still, I get overwhelmed by worry." I have hinted at my miserable marriage in the past, but never blurted the D word to her before. (It is a long story, one for another day.)

Her response is immediate: "Well that totally explains WHY your progesterone levels have receded...they are the hormone most affected by emotional stress.  Progesterone is like nature's Valium so it should help the anxiety....and if you need something a little stronger to get you through the next months, let us know!  Good Luck! It will be worth it!" Monica is a calming presence. She has concrete, tangible answers. And she is always there for me whenever I need reassurance. If stress depletes me of Nature's Valium, naturally my obligation is to restore it.

I get the cream in the mail in the next couple of days. "Pro-gest. The original natural progesterone cream. Two ounces of ‘menopause/perimenopause support.'" The package looks vapid, covered in vaguely pastel hues swirling in free-flowing lines and circles. I squint. Those curves actually form the silhouette of a women's body. Why do manufacturers always have to give feminine products a washed-out, insipid look? One side of the package reads like a self-help Oprah-sized mantra. "In 1978, we had a revolutionary idea: that there was not enough real choice when it came to peri/menopause support." The Editor in me stares at the slash between peri and menopause. I hate over-zealous punctuation.

Now that I paid $25 for two ounces of revolution, my immediate concern is downright pragmatic. Where do I put the darn thing? I turn the container in my hand. "Where do I put it? We get that question a lot." Good. I'm not the only confused soul out there. "Just massage a dime-sized dollop of cream into your skin. Try your wrists, arms, thighs, tummy, whatever you like."

I start panicking. What if I apply it to my arms but it works better on the stomach? And do I rub in a thick amount on a little surface, or a thin layer on a large glob of flesh? What if the best spot is one I can't easily reach by myself? Do I need someone's help to put this on?
Asking someone to slather me is a thought I find disgusting. My mind flashes back to one blasted summer in England. I was away at ballet camp, in East Anglia, a bucolic region east of London where the English pretend to be carefree and loose. The family I was staying with had, as my nine-year old daughter would say, "hygiene issues." The bathtub was coated with grime-human or canine in origin, I didn't have the stomach to look long enough and figure it out. We were only allowed to shower twice a week, and I took to running outside every night and using the neighbors' hose to wash myself, leotard and all.

The wife, an Australian woman of impressive girth, walked around the house in a frilly slip, incessantly barking orders. "I can't stand this bloody heat," she would say on a perfect 75 degree day. "It gives me a rash. Would you be a Dear and put some Vaseline on my back?" I reluctantly did as I was asked. I was quite shy, then, and terribly afraid of offending our hosts. I had the urge to wipe my fingers for hours afterwards. To this day, Vaseline remains deeply repugnant to me.

No. I will never ask anyone to apply anything to my skin. So I make a decision. I'll put the cream on my stomach. I go back to reading the box. "Do that twice a day for 21 days, then rest for the next seven, and you're on your way to natural peri/menopausal balance." I was going to start rubbing the stuff when additional instructions fall out of the container. These tell me to start applying the cream right after ovulation. But if your cycle isn't regular, when do you know you're ovulating?

I am floundering. Is this cream really going to make a difference? Just apply it.  Be done already. As I stand suspended in my hesitation, my inner voice suddenly intones, "I have a cream!" Great. Now I am plagiarizing and trivializing a legend. "I have a cream!" It's February, after all, and for those of us firmly ensconced in Obamelot, it's hard not to think in lofty phrases. "I have a cream!" As I squeeze the first drop onto my extended fingers, I smile. I feel a speech coming on.

4/08