My new OBGYN starts every sentence with the phrase “at your age.” She says, “At your age, you should be doing [everything differently].” In response to every question I ask, she replies, “Well at your age you might want to try [something for old people].”
This flies in the face of all the “Forty Is the New Thirty” hoopla I keep reading in overhyped media stories about celebrity bodies and the wisdom one achieves in her forties. I suspect this flimflam editorializing is the work of propagandist Generation Xers who have all turned forty recently. None of the pop psychology pseudo-science referred to in these publicity stunt blog posts is getting through to my doctor or to my uterus.
I think that’s because my doctor is twelve years old. Sorry, that’s unfair. She’s fourteen. She and Doogie Howser could be pals, except she’s not old enough to remember Doogie Howser, M.D.. Okay, okay, now I’m just doing the bitter reverse ageism thing. My best guess is that she has probably reached the ripe age of thirty-two, which according to Wikipedia, puts her squarely in between Generation X and Generation Y. Dear Universe, please don’t let her be a Millennial. She was my only way into the specialized women’s health practice that handles my um, special circumstances.
Her “At your age” commentary grates on me like fingernails on a chalkboard. She talks about my uterus in dog years. My body may be forty, but my ovaries are sixty-five. I’m ready to enjoy the financial stability of my mid-career earning years. But my eggs—the ones that haven’t been flushed like goldfish—are moving to Boca Raton, and they ain’t comin’ back. My fallopian tubes? Fuggedaboutit.
And here’s the punchline: it’s all true. The Lady Parts don’t age like the Gentleman’s Parts. They don’t even age like the rest of our body ages. They just go verkakte at some point. The awful truth is that Lili von Shtupp was right, “Everything below the waist is kaput!”
Honestly, I really like my doctor. This “At your age” verbal tick is less insulting than the doctor who informed me when I was thirty-four, “You’ll never be as young as you are today.” She is smart and cheerful and has the wisdom and compassion to communicate bad news well. And that’s why I comfort myself with the knowledge that she’ll grow out of it. Then she’ll be sorry. Because one day she’ll be forty too.
Visualizing Shakespeare 