What I Would Tell My 42-Year-Old Self if I Could Travel Back in Time

Hey, 42-year-old me,

It’s me. You. Us. From the future. I know you’re busy teaching Zumba and playing bass guitar at church like a boss, but we need to talk.

You’re about to enter a season you weren’t warned about—because no one’s talking about it yet. Doctors don’t understand it, your girlfriends aren’t there yet, and you have no idea what’s about to hit.

Let me help.

First things first:

You’re going to be okay. I know you're scared, confused, and feeling a little betrayed by your own body.

But trust me—this isn’t the end. It’s just a twist in the storyline.

Your doctor is a butt. Yes, I said it. I mean it with all due respect (kind of). When he tells you, “You're too fit and eat too clean to have high blood pressure,”  and follows that up with, “It’s just hereditary. You’ll be on meds for life,”  I want you to channel your inner Maury Povich because: That was a lie.

It’s not just genetics. It’s your extreme hormone fluctuations lighting your nervous system on fire. Your blood pressure is climbing because of perimenopause, not because your family didn't exercise and were addicted to fried chicken and every inch of a pig that they could cook (from the roota to the toota).

So what am I telling you?

• The fatigue? Normal.

• The sweating that hits like a heat bomb at noon? Also normal.

• That feeling like you're unraveling but also expected to make dinner? Yup. Perimenopause.

  
  

You don’t know it yet, but this is the reason for so much of what you're experiencing. It's not on your radar yet—and it's definitely not on your doctor’s. But you’ll figure it out. You'll research, read, ask hard questions, and start piecing it all together.

You’re going to become the woman other women come to when they’re falling apart at 45 and wondering what’s wrong with them. And you’ll tell them: “Nothing’s wrong with you, sis. You’re just changing. And it’s okay.”

Oh, and that guy? The one who makes you laugh and scares you a little because he sees you so clearly? Yeah. You’re gonna marry him.

In Hawaii.

Try not to faint.

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So if I could whisper one thing to that woman in her early 40s—still dancing, still learning, still wondering what’s next—it would be this:

You’re going to be okay. And more than that—you’re going to thrive. Not because it’s easy, but because you’ll learn to listen to your body, trust your instincts, and stop apologizing for what you need.

Keep going. You’ve got this. And when you don’t? Future-you will be right here, cheering you on.

Until the next hot flash…

 💋 LB