Entering a Bikini Competition: Is it a Midlife Crisis?
When I Google the meaning of a mid-life crisis I get this response:
- an emotional crisis of identity and self-confidence that can occur in early middle age.
Googling the term “midlife” isn’t any better:
I’ve always thought that a mid-life crisis was when a 50 something year old guy went out and bought a fancy sports car or divorced his wife of 23 years and got a fancy new girlfriend. But here I am, approaching 50, and while I don’t feel like I am in crisis, I am planning to enter a Body Building Competition. Does this mean I am in a mid life crisis?
I’m not the Body Building type — I’m not even the athletic type. I’m also the kind of person that cuts corners, and doesn’t like to finish things. But a few years ago, I got the Body Building bug.
It may have been an Instagram post that stirred it, or maybe it was a powerlifting friend of mine that piqued my interest. I’m not sure where it all got started, but what I can tell you is that I was fully aware of all of the aging going around me. My parents aging, people I knew from high school aging, most importantly — me aging.
It always bothered me when people I knew would resign themselves to getting older.
I remember the Over the Hill birthday cards and party supplies I would see around the house as my parents attended 40 year (and older) birthday parties. I remember the “old fart” jokes and my mom’s incessant comments about getting older.
I didn’t want to be “old.” I didn’t want to get weak, slow, overweight, in pain, and all of the things we identify with old people. I can Botox myself every three months, but that won’t stop the fact that I am nearing 50 — fifty! So maybe I am in crisis.
I’m a divorced mom to three kids — all whom are over 18 now, and while the youngest two are still in college, they are not little anymore. So now what do I do with my life?
So here I am. A not very athletic middle-aged mom, who hasn’t walked in heels in a good 20 some years, getting ready to prep for a bikini competition. I’ve been lifting weights for the last four years, albeit on and off for the first two and more consistent in the last two. I found an online coach who specializes in plant-based nutrition and body building.
This is my journey.