A Mind -- It's a Terrible Thing To Lose

I grew up with a mother who was very pretty in her younger years and  with a sister for whom the word cute was invented to describe. So it was probably natural for me to ask my mother at a young age if I was pretty.  I have never forgotten her response: You're smart.  That's better than pretty.  Pretty fades and smart doesn't.  

I have come to the conclusion that Mama was wrong in her assessment of the endurance of intelligence.  It started out a few years ago as just small lapses in memory and cognitive skills.  It would take me a moment or two to retrieve the exact word I was looking for or to remember details of an event.  I could come up with the information eventually, it just took some time.  I told my kids that all the data was still there, my processor was just really slow. 

That was before menopause hit full force.  That seemed to have caused a disc boot failure and some of the information might not be retrievable at all.  I went from being someone who could keep all the plates spinning and effortlessly remember all the details to resorting to looking at my email signature block to find my zip code. (And yet, I can still remember the words to the Gilligan's Island theme song.  Maybe there's just no room for more data?) 

My conversation with my doctor on the subject was a little disconcerting.  Thanks to a medical procedure, she went through early menopause a few years ago and has first-hand knowledge of the challenges.  When I mentioned the mental lapses and suggested that I might have some sort  neurological problem, she was quick to assure me that it was far more likely that this was age-related and could be helped but not completely resolved through hormone replacement therapy (HRT). She  shared with me that she had definitely lost some intellectual capacity.  So was I supposed to be reassured that she really understood what I was going through or concerned that my doctor was not as smart as she used to be?  (I decided to be reassured. ) She then told me that while HRT could help, it wouldn't fully restore what I had lost.  In other words, at best HRT could give me back only 1/2 of the step I had lost.

HRT has given me back that half step and I am grateful but I can't help feeling a bit cheated.  After all, I was told that while being pretty might be preferable when you are young, being smart would be  enduring.  Now not only have I never been the prettiest, I'm not even the smartest anymore.  

Obviously there is no do-over coming my way from The Universe.  But do I have to accept the current state of affairs?  If Mama's words did not turn out to be entirely accurate, maybe a favorite saying of Daddy's will be:  It's not that winners don't get knocked down.  It just that winners get up one more time than they've been knocked down.  So I am getting back up and on the horse (I know I have a bit of a mixed metaphor going here but work with me on this).  I have signed up for a continuing education course on Coursera and so far at least am holding my own.  I have downloaded several organization and planning aps to help me stay on track and have also started working more mind-challenging puzzles.  Will I get back the 1/2 step I am still missing?  Probably not but that doesn't mean I am going to stop trying.