On How We Turn 40

A COVID birthday, second chances, and what scares us about aging

For the last month I’ve been asking older friends a pertinent question about aging: What did you do to celebrate when you turned forty? The responses are mixed. Some people threw parties or went on trips. But most people I’ve asked seemed to do very little to mark to occasion. The same seems to go for those who turned fifty, sixty, etc…

Asking around didn’t give me any bright ideas for my own birthday. But it did help me consider how we perceive aging.

Expectations

The practice of Life Mapping has definitely taught me who I want to be by the end of my life. As long as I was moving forward on the way from here to there, I didn’t define the middle much. Apparently, that didn’t keep me from making assumptions though.

For example, by age forty I thought I'd...

• Have visited every continent

• Have more energy

• Have less pain

• Not have chronic or mental illness

• Have kids about to graduate, not be starting over with a toddler in tow

• Be caregiving significantly less

• Have much more freedom with my time

• Experienced an easier parenting adventure

• Have had less disappointments and failures

• Wouldn’t have gained weight

• Be consistent in my “career” or “ministry” (or whatever I did with my time)

• Not have had multiple near-death experiences

• Not care much about sex anymore

• Still own a house/yard I could invest in and make beautiful as my own

• Still be in my “sweet spot,” not to have found it only to be swept away

• Be committed to and hold a leadership role at a local church, vs. be practicing my faith with a smattering of believers scattered all over

Most notably, I expected that I would:

• Have it “all together”

• Look younger

• Feel older

Based on my poor research strategy of nonchalantly asking friends and family about their expectations, these later three are the most common assumptions that we collectively hold. It is intriguing to look for the roots of these beliefs.

The gift that keeps on giving

I’m not going to lie, today has been rough. On my fortieth birthday I’ve been at home with my husband and toddler, drinking tea and taking cat naps. We have COVID, which ranks in my top ten least favorite gifts/curses to humankind.

Resigned, I cancelled my birthday plans. So far, I’ve seen parts of Frozen, Moana, Beauty and the Beast, Brave, and Tangled. And the day isn’t over yet.

Trying to make the most of my 40th B-Day, on the couch with sick people

Not even two weeks ago my neurologist exuded enough intensity that he might as well have shaken my shoulders. He was urging me to get the updated flu and COVID vaccinations on the way home from my appointment. He put it this way:

“Besides getting pregnant again, the most likely way for your lupus nephritis to relapse is to get an infection. So don’t get an infection that you don’t have to get.”

I’m grateful I heeded my doctor’s advice. I’m still quite out of it, with a slight headache, swollen/sore throat, and fatigue. But my husband, who hasn’t yet gotten the updated vaccines, has been as sick as a dog. (Whatever that means.) I don’t like being the healthier one of us two adults, either. That means more caregiving is on my shoulders. On my birthday. When I am unwell. But I still prefer this less-than-ideal birthday to us both being extremely ill.

I wonder, was my doctor’s urging a gift from God? Would I be starting to relapse right now, if it weren’t for that booster? Did God know one of us would need to be able to move around? Or is this a curse, that I am dependent on my expensive weekly lupus shots and require regularly updated vaccines? Then there are my dear friends, who view the vaccinations themselves as the curse. Maybe what I do doesn’t matter either way—that it is neither a gift from God or a curse from humankind.

But I choose to be grateful that I’m not as sick as a dog. I don’t want my forties to be defined by sickness, like the second half of my thirties was.

Winifred Turns 29

When I turned thirty, I began writing a book tentatively titled, Winifred Turns 29. The novel commences as Winifred enters a new decade, on her 30th birthday. I’d work on it four hours a week, estimating that if I could keep up that pace, I’d finish it by my mid-thirties. I didn’t. I’m still working on it. It has helped me process a decade of living.

Here is Winifred’s blurb:

Coping with an imperfect marriage and the rigors of motherhood, Winifred pushes into her thirties with more insecurities than her hallucinations can handle. Following an unexpected move across the country, Winifred attempts to remake herself. But when the line into fantasy becomes too blurred, Winifred is forced to reckon with reality. Winifred Turns 29 is a poignant, comedic, and unique coming of age story mirroring the reality of when most women actually come of age.

Recently I’ve been wondering if I should drop it and instead start writing Winifred Turns 39. Or maybe I should wait until I am fifty or sixty, and then write 29, 39, and 49. Surely I’ll have enough material to write a trilogy. Or at least to process a trilogy.

What do you wish for?

My dad sent me a quick text. “We are thinking of your birthday. What is your greatest wish?”

It was a great question. Although I answered him right away, I kept thinking about this question throughout the day. And I didn’t answer it how he meant it:

“For my family to always be at peace, find joy, and laughter together. To be able to speak, coach, and get published without having to do a lot of work to make the opportunities happen. To feel like our housing situations and car situations are non-issues. To feel like I could see you guys on a regular basis with ease. For my kids to be healthy and safe. For Josh and I to flow well together in ministry. To feel like I can navigate Church stuff as it comes up with confidence. To always have the opportunity to be near/in nature. To never have to clean my house again. To have regular massages. To not have to meal plan. To have healthy food that I like and healthy portions put on my plate without any work. For the wrinkles between my eyes on my forehead to get softer…”

Later, I wanted to add, “To be able to give my kids every opportunity. To be able to afford to travel to another country every year or two, there would be a simple way for my kids to be cared for while I was gone. To keep having a better marriage with each year. To respond to conviction, but to never feel shame again. To know God deeper and enjoy creation more. To always believe I am enough and don’t have to prove myself. To never suffer from lupus again, or that anyone else would for that matter. To have a new non-degrading body. For mental illness to heal. For the people of the world to find reconciliation with God. That we may live in wholeness and flourishing. For all strife and war to cease. For good to prevail over evil. For all of us to find the source of life, joy, and delight…”

As my wishes turned to prayers, I could only be grateful that at forty, I still have reason for faith and an anchor for hope.

Back when I was 39

The day before a birthday is its own type of beauty, carrying grief, gratitude, and excitement. Especially on this birthday, as I embark on the year that typically symbolizes the second half of a life. After being so close to death in the first act of life, it is a gift to even consider I might have another forty years (or even more) to go.

Each time it crosses my mind, I marvel. I might be crossing a threshold, but it is a threshold to possibility. It's wild and thrilling to reframe my perspective as being in the middle of my life instead of the end. My imagination has grown wider.

The Mexican Mocha Meg brought me to celebrate my last day in my thirties

What scares us about aging

I will be honest, though. It brothers me that I am not young by Western culture’s standards. I don’t match with gorgeous influencers. I laugh to see things that in my memory are out of style—but I used to wear them when they were—can again make a perfect “fit” after someone’s “glow up.” Not only have I been over crop-tops, Crocs, bucket hats, and jorts for two decades, I can’t keep up with the slang.

My teens have really chiseled me down, like whatever generation in their physical prime is known to do.

It is confusing. There are too many things to follow. I don’t have the mental energy or desire to stay on top of it. I’m officially in the murky decades of life where we all just give each other a lot of grace because at some point, we recognize the effort it took to look decent—not what the person managed to dress up in. After all, everything was in style at some point.

I have friends in their seventies who tell me they still feel young at heart. I think I will too at their age. I am catching a glimpse of the dissonance of their experience. Even now I feel young, but the young don’t see it on me. They see my less-than-cool clothes, my heavy belly, and the lines between my brows.

I think this is one of, if not the hardest, things we grapple with as we age. I am past being judged by my presentation—whether I like the right things, say the right things, wear the right things, do the right things, etc… to fit into some cool cultural norm. I’m in the stage where people either like me for who I am, or they don’t like me.

This should be relieving, but it is scary. Our facades can’t keep up with the demand of the cultural youth. We lack the energy to continue rebranding. Aging exposes us for who we are. And then, we wonder if we will belong.

Gratitude

I’ve reached the moment where I’ve overprocessed and I just need to switch to being grateful. On the onset of a new decade; a new era, here is my gratitude list:

I am thankful that…

• I love and thoroughly enjoy my family

• My kids don’t have any major health issues

• My tubes are tied

• I am less demanding of my sadness and my healing timeline

• I’ve become uninterested in being famous

• All our road trips and the rare and precious international trips I’ve taken

• The middle of my marriage is drastically better than its beginning

• I like my definition of success more than culture’s

• I'm still in love with God, despite the ways my faith has evolved

• I am learning to be gracious to myself in grief

• I have friends and community

• I actually finally published two books

• I have readers, clients, mentees, and friends who trust me

• I am learning to be at rest, practicing presence and staying in my body

• That I live in beautiful San Diego, between the mountains and the sea

• That it isn't too late to learn my body and what she needs

• I have people I feel safe to be authentic with: deep friends, spiritual shepherds, and therapists

• I have enough to subsist on

• That I can explore around where I live and I can meet people outside

• And that there is a grass field with palm trees and sunsets outside my door

• That my kids still talk to me and want to be with me (sometimes)

• I have easy access to food and I don’t have to cook every single meal

• That I can come alongside parents with kids with learning disabilities, autism, ADHD, and anxiety

• For discovering that I like cats and for our new kitten

One thing I’m especially grateful for is the wisdom that comes with experience and growth. I hold the weight of authority that can only come through living, persevering, and overcoming. This is worthy. I won’t lose it. And I might have another forty years to double it.

Introducing Meow/Cinder/Aiko/Judy (her name is still somewhat fluid)

Remaking forty

As today was a less-than-mediocre celebration of my 40th birthday, I’m going have a different celebration.

• The first is that you’re invited to be part of my “sustainable book launch team” (I’ll send another email soon, but in the meantime you can learn how to join me here)

• The second is that I’m going to have a beach bonfire in a couple weeks. If you live anywhere nearby, please join me in celebrating that I’m alive, I’m well, and I made it to my second act!

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Tell me in the comments (or process these in a journal):

1. What did you do or plan to do for your 40th birthday?

2. What is it that you truly wish for?

3. What assumptions did you make about how you expected your life to now be?

4. What feels vulnerable to you about being judged by who you are instead of your presentation of yourself?

5. What’s your definition of success? (I have a free worksheet called Purpose Roadmap to help you with this on AverageAdvocate.com)

6. What are you grateful for overall from the collection of your years?