Milestones: Celebrating the Death of Aunt Flo
It’s official! After contributing six beautiful individuals to the human genome pool, I have been given an executive pardon and handed my get-out-of-jail-free card. Goodbye! O daabo! Sayonara! I am usually squeamish when it comes to saying goodbye but this is one time that I am happy, giddy even at the prospect.
Okay, so two of those six individuals are more like spiritual contributions than physical, still I feel the need to celebrate the end of a union that I did not see coming and had no say about how and when I entered into it.
She barged into my life when I was ten years old. A little too early, some would say, but that’s my story and I am sticking to it. I was away from home for the first time and at first sight of her, I was sure I had been poisoned. A tentative introduction by an older cousin clarified her true identity and purpose. So with no official invitation and the sinking realization that she had come to stay, it was with a sense of trepidation that I became saddled with her. How rude! Worse still, how inconsiderate. I was just learning to be responsible for myself, how could I be expected to handle more responsibilities?
I did the best I could but this house guest was very controlling. For years she determined if I went out, where I went, how long I stayed out. I loved sports but whenever she was around, I had to stay out of the swimming pool and I dared not wear certain ones of my favorite clothes because simply put, she would embarrass me! Just when I thought I had begun to get the hang of this aspect of our relationship, things got more intense and I took to counting every single day that she was away in anxious anticipation of her equally dreaded yet welcome return. Coping mechanisms available for dealing with the upheaval her presence in my life caused, ranged from popping pills every single day, buying endless supplies of consumables or undergoing some out-patient procedure or the other. I opted for the procedure, all the while hating this persistent intrusion into my life. The procedure helped with the consumables but did not fix the pain. She was always hanging around and her absences were usually marked with anxiety about if and when she would return. I only recall four times that she was gone for any length of time in the entire thirty-seven years that I knew her. For the forty- odd weeks she was away each of those times, I had a wonderful little bundle of joy to distract me and I absolutely hated her return every single time. Did I mention that when she turns up, I get the most excruciating mood swings, stomach and headaches? That’s a sign of how exhilarating I found her company to be.
So it is with no sense of shame whatsoever that I embrace the end of this relationship. Some say it’s too soon but with my get out of jail free card, I finally have a water tight excuse for my husband’s world-domination-by-population-explosion plans and come to the end of a pill-popping, pharmacy-surfing, life-restricting and pain-inducing relationship. I did not feel like celebrating her arrival but I am sure going to celebrate her final departure: dust-to-dust and ashes-to-ashes, Aunt Flo. If I ever see you again, someone’s going to be in serious trouble!! Now, what do you think I should I write on the Cake?
