I went to the doctor for my annual physical yesterday.  If you’re like me, you dread the first few minutes of that appointment more than any other (okay, ladies, not quite ANY other, but it’s a close second) when the nurse first takes you back and has you step on the scale.  It feels to me like one of my success meters for the year – if my weight is the same or less, then it has been a successful year.  If I have gained a few pounds, then I haven’t been quite as successful.

When the doctor comes in, one of her regular questions is how regularly I exercise.  Truth be told, I go in spurts.  I have never been a gym rat, but I try to get in 2-3 workouts a week.  As I answered her question this year, the thought went through my mind “I have a girlish figure to maintain.”  In all honestly, my figure is far from what it was when I was a girl, or even from when I got married– I have a few more curves here and there and gravity has started its low, downward pull in all the typical places.

When I look in the mirror, I feel like I should still be about 29 (and at 29 I thought I should still look like I did at 18).  But the reality is, in a few short weeks I will turn 41.  I am no longer a girl and haven’t been one for a long time.  My husband and I were having dinner a few months ago with a couple who are in their mid-50’s and the husband made some comment to my husband about being middle aged (talking about both them and us).  I wasn’t involved directly in their conversation, but my ears perked up at his comment about being middle-aged, to which I replied that I refused to be middle-aged yet.  The husband turned to my husband and asked “she’s having a little difficulty with that, huh?”

I am finally choosing to give myself permission to no longer have to be the girl I was at 18.  If I truly wanted to be like I was at 18, I would not have the benefit of all the life experiences and lessons that I have learned over the past 23 years.  That, and I don’t have the dedication that is required to spend the amount of time in the gym necessary to be 98 pounds again.  Wisdom has always felt like a weighty word to me, so perhaps some of that translates physically (at least for most of us) as we get a little older.

For now, I’m going to tell myself that I’m “girl-ish,” which will allow me to be a woman with some girlish tendencies.  Who wouldn’t still like to be somewhat girlish in their 50’s, 60’s, 80’s?  Those types of ladies seem to keep their light and joy well into their golden years.  Maybe that will help me from taking myself too seriously and give myself some grace with each transition in life.  I’m still not ready to consider myself “middle-aged.”  Ask me again in another 10 years or so.