Should I Bring Her Back or Reinvent Myself?

I didn’t ease into menopause like most women.
I didn’t get the gentle warning signs or the slow transition.
I went into menopause after my first chemo infusion — suddenly, violently, without permission.

One day I was still me.
The next, my body had crossed a line I didn’t see coming.

But here’s the thing — unlike most women, I didn’t want to go back to who I was before.
Because before cancer, before chemo, before all of this… I was already living in quiet pain.

I was surviving, not living.
Smiling, but disconnected.
Going through the motions of a life that looked fine from the outside — but inside, I was numb.

Sometimes I think maybe my body whispered what my soul had been screaming for years:
Something has to change.
Maybe cancer was the storm that forced me to rebuild from the ground up — to stop settling for a life that was slowly dimming my light.

WHY I’M WRITING THIS

I wanted to write about menopause because so many of us — especially in my community — are walking through this stage of life.
Some of us are easing into it.
Some of us are resisting it.
And a few of us, like me, were thrown into it overnight.

But I didn’t want this blog to be about my diagnosis, or my treatment, or even my cancer story.
That’s not what this is about.
This is about us.

The women standing in the middle of change — trying to make sense of who we were, who we’ve become, and who we’re still becoming.

Because no matter how we arrive at this season, every woman deserves to feel seen, supported, and powerful in her becoming.

THE WOMAN I USED TO BE

I used to think I needed to “get her back.”
The one before everything fell apart.
But now I realize… she wasn’t happy. She was holding her breath, living on autopilot, pretending everything was okay.

So why would I bring her back, when I’ve worked so hard to wake up?

This new woman — the one who went through chemo, who lost her cycle, her hair, her certainty — she’s not broken. She’s becoming.
And maybe that’s what menopause really is: not an ending, but an initiation into the version of you who no longer apologizes for existing.

WHEN LIFE TAKES AWAY WHAT YOU THOUGHT DEFINED YOU

The old rhythms are gone.
Your body feels different.
Your reflection, too.
But in the middle of all that change is a whisper:

“You’re free now.”

Free from chasing who you were.
Free from proving, performing, or pretending.
Free to finally choose yourself.

THE REINVENTION

So no — I don’t want her back.
I want to honor her for getting me here.
And then I want to keep walking forward — toward peace, toward presence, toward the woman I was always meant to become.

Menopause didn’t take something from me.
It gave me permission to start again — awake, honest, and alive.

If you’re standing in the in-between — wondering if you should fight for your “old self” or let her go — maybe the answer isn’t either/or.
Maybe it’s both.

Thank her for surviving.
And then, let yourself become.

Because the woman you’re becoming…
she’s the reason everything had to change.