Death and rebirth in midlife

I feel her dying—my younger self.

As I navigate this gnarly juncture of midlife, I feel myself shedding layer upon layer of who I used to be.

The most obvious, perhaps, is the physical—forty years spent riding the waves of a monthly cycle that’s winding down to completion. Youthful, dewy skin and chestnut hair being replaced by deep lines and shades of silver. The forgiving, flexible body that could hold yoga shapes with ease, now aching and creaking as the practice that used to fit like a glove begins to feel alien and awkward.

And there are the deeper layers of shedding. The layers of societal expectations I have taken on and subsumed as part of my identity. Expectations of who I am and how I show up in the world. The striving to be ‘cool’, the performing, the efforts to be likeable and accepted. To be feminine, pretty, desirable, nice. Successful, but not too successful, in case anyone feels threatened.

The version of me who’s dying is worn out. She’s exhausted. She has lived her life with so much fear. Fear of getting things wrong, being rejected, failing, making mistakes. But the engine that drove all that hypervigilance is running out of fuel. It’s in its death throes.

Death is liberating, and death is painful. The body aches and complains. The tiredness is bone deep. Some days, the brain cells don’t fire.

Midlife feels like a deep cocoon. Like the caterpillar turning into goo before emerging into the next phase. Everything breaking down and being reconstructed. My brain has certainly felt like goo in moments. Like when I reach for a thought, and it’s no longer there, or when I crashed my car because my mind was absent. The emotional world has been turbulent too. So many tears, so much grief, spiked with moments of sharpness, anger and irritation that have more jagged edges than before. Energy that tumbles out before I can censor it. Before I can paste on my appeasing face.

There’s no funeral for my younger self. No friends gathering to share memories of youthful misadventure—hearts broken, mistakes made, lessons learned the hard way. Perhaps there should be. Perhaps we should gather and sing and watch a photo reel—the highlights of youth. Perhaps we should light a funeral pyre and burn the trappings of the past—the clothing that was never comfortable, the alcohol that propped up low self-confidence, the cigarettes inhaled because everyone else was trying them. I’d throw in high heels and push-up bras. Late nights and seedy clubs. The letters from ex-lovers who didn’t deserve their place in my bed. I’d burn everything that never truly fit. The years spent trying to squeeze my introvert self into an extrovert mould.

With loss and letting go comes grief, and grief demands a healthy respect. Demands a period of quiet mourning and turning inwards before a new chapter can emerge. There’s a strong need to observe life from the sidelines, to step back from view for a time, to allow the deep work to take place.

But life doesn’t fully support this. At least the way we have structured our Western lives. Mortgages and bills must be paid. Responsibilities to others must be upheld. I don’t think our physiology was ever designed for working through this life stage. Biology and intuition are demanding something quite different.

This life stage asks for surrender to the unknown, descent into the underworld, and trust that something useful will re-emerge.

How to resolve this conflict? Do we patch ourselves up with HRT and carry on? Or do we respect the deep alchemy and transformation that is taking place?

This is a life stage when everything unresolved in our psyche comes to the surface. Where the tension of trying to hold it all together will break apart and reveal to us in stark relief all that is not working in our lives. We fight this, we resist it. Change is confronting, and it comes with loss built in. But sometimes things need to fall apart in order to come back together in a new configuration. There is power in facing into what needs to be addressed. It’s a potent time for healing work.

Beneath the layers of loss, something deeper is stirring. There’s a rebirth wanting to take place.

Some days, I feel glimmers of her. A wiser, steadier version of myself beginning to emerge. She has a broader lens on some of the struggles I used to become so tangled with. She’s been through the fire. She’s seen enough pain to recognise the arc, the learning, the impermanence. She’s softer and stronger, humbler, and more outspoken. She’s less afraid. She’s learning, she’s growing. Watching and waiting. Finding her ground. On a quiet day, I can hear her whispering to me from the foothills of elderhood. I want to lean into her open arms, her quiet wisdom, her gentle care.

She demands a simplification. Not as loss but as gain. In the sloughing off of things that no longer serve me, I get clearer about where I want to expend my precious energy, my limited time.

Mortality comes into sharper focus. Suddenly, death is everywhere, and it’s visiting my peers. Whilst I continue to fear it, I am also deeply curious, drawn towards the mystery of our fate, trusting there is more than a decaying corpse to show for the work we do in this lifetime.

Transition is murky territory. We humans like to hold on to clarity, certainty, stability. This is anything but. On a good day, it feels like transformation, on a bad day, it feels like the end.

I know there is no going back. I know I will not emerge from this transition the same person who entered. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Thank you for reading. Tell me, how are you navigating intense periods of transition, whether at midlife or elsewhere on life’s journey? I always love to hear from you. Your comments and responses are my favourite part of writing this newsletter.

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Disclaimer - Content is intended for educational and entertainment purposes only and is not a substitute for individualised mental health treatment or advice.