THE MENOPAUSE AND THE THROWING THINGS OFF TREND

I’m not usually much of a fashionista, but today I am sporting one of the trendiest looks around, I’m wearing earrings that don’t match! How radical is that?

Even though I have slipped seamlessly into middle-age via my elasticated waist jeans and orthopaedic insoles for my plantar fasciitis (chronic foot pain), there’s still a hint of the rebel about me.

Wearing un-matching earrings is part of the new TTO fashion, this stands for Throwing Things Off as championed by Kate Moss.

The supermodel started this trend when she admitted in an interview with a newspaper, that she likes to wear something like a skinny scarf with a shirt because it ‘throws it off a bit’, meaning it made her outfit look a bit less expected and more spontaneous looking.

The odd earrings trend is a perfect example of the Throwing Things Off trend and some fashionable shops are even stocking mix and match earrings. I know I sound terribly fashion informed but actually, the whole being trendy thing was a mistake. I had my menopausal head on which induces brain fog, combine that with my failing eyesight and I put the odd earrings in by mistake!

If you want to follow the TTO trend, I can assure you, there is nothing that Throws Things Off like the menopause! I thought it would be just a matter of a few hot flushes and not much more. I certainly wasn’t prepared for the confusion, memory loss, aches, pains and constant frustration of losing my thread in mid-conversation that has beset me. Not being able to match a pair of earrings has been the least of my worries.

I seem to bumble my way through the day doing the silliest of things.

My son has a what-are-you-going-to-do-next expectation of me, for him, I’m a constant source of amusement.

He found it hilarious that I recently had to be cut out of a coat because I got the zipper stuck on the surrounding material. He cried with laughter, when I brought the entire library to a standstill after asking to use their lavatory. Whilst in the loo, I accidently pulled the disabled cord alarm mistaking it for the toilet chain. People in the library thought it was a fire or a possible terrorist attack. I had to sheepishly exit the toilet and explain myself to the gathered, anxious, crowd.

This alarming incident is my current all-time great on my list of menopausal head mishaps so far.

I feel a bit like Worzel Gummidge with his interchangeable heads, once the menopausal one slips on out of the blue, it instantly throws things off mentally!

Most women reach menopause between the ages of 45 and 55, though some can have early onset in their 30s and early 40s. It brings with it an array of symptoms which differ for each individual.

I watched a little boy at my son’s school crawl beneath a bench today. He curled up into the foetal position and simply lay there on the rain-soaked ground watching the world go by.

That describes perfectly how menopause makes me feel. I wanted to join him beneath the bench and simply hide, as exhaustion and low mood overtook me.

Actress Kim Cattrall said the menopause was like having the rug pulled out beneath her.

Whoopi Goldberg complained that it hit her hard and artist Tracy Emin lamented; ‘it makes you feel slightly dead’.

Patsy Kensit, who took full blown early menopause after having an emergency hysterectomy, admits that it has been her toughest ordeal yet. She became so slurred, confused and kept forgetting what she was talking about in a TV interview during her worse time with her menopause, that viewers suggested she was drunk! Oprah Winfrey has explored menopause numerous times on her show.

She thinks it’s a time for women to reinvent themselves after spending a lifetime looking after others. Oprah suggests menopause is in need of a sexy poster girl to bust the myth of the old crone.

Perhaps we could look to Kate Moss. At the age of 42 maybe Kate’s new fashion invention of the Throwing Things Off trend is a diversion for her own brain fog.

When really the ‘unexpected outfit’ and odd earrings are the result of perimenopausal confusion when throwing things on. If so, clever girl, I like her deflective style!