Are Millennial Women OK?!
[Bonus issue!] Relinquishing limitlessness; facing our fears; discovering the power of settling in
Every woman I know is talking about All Fours by Miranda July. Imagine the audacity July must have, in this world we inhabit, to write a whole novel about hormones. To the women reading it, the narrative feels urgent and overdue. We have been silent about hormones for too long. Crucially, the story picks up the life of an artist at age 45, just when our culture would prefer to cast her aside.
Through a series of events surrounding a cross-country road trip, or lack thereof, we learn July’s main character has entered perimenopause, the period leading up to menopause which sees the female body and its hormonal patterns go through significant change. As a result she has mood swings, increased anxiety, building depression, and shifts in desire. In the grip of this transformation, the character’s art, marriage, and wellbeing all suffer.
Though most millennials are not even 40 yet, our lives are progressing, which means that perhaps for the first time, we can sense that change is coming. These are transformations that arrive for all women, eventually, but until this particular cultural moment, they have been addressed largely in silence, almost as if they should be ignored. In other words, major, life-altering hormonal shifts will happen—are happening, have always happened!—and women are conditioned to act like everything is normal. We continue life as usual, barely acknowledging the secret struggle of our bodies and minds, even with our closest friends.
In All Fours, July does what our society will not: She takes hormonal change seriously. She writes about how difficult it can be and acknowledges that sometimes the stress it conjures causes relationships and long-term marriages to end. She sheds light on the high-chaos, diminishing-fertility chapter that arrives for every birthing person. Most importantly, July has people actually talking about hormones, opening up about their fears and experiences, and exploring what support might be available beyond the typical gynecological approach of regular periods? okay, that’s all.
All Fours is the story women needed—to capture the struggle of hormonal ups-and-downs throughout the uterus-bearing life. As millennial birthing people become more aware of approaching change—perhaps sensing some shifts, even if perimenopause itself is five, ten, or fifteen years away—we understand the transformation that is coming will have effects that are not just physical or emotional. As women the internal status of our bodies shapes the very way we are seen and valued in the world. Or not, as the case may be.
As women the internal status of our bodies shapes the very way we are seen and valued in the world. Or not, as the case may be.
In our systems, women and birthing people are most useful to capitalism, and most revered and feared by those in power when they can, indeed, birth people. New little humans are necessary to fuel the production and profit-worshipping machine. Once women move past the potential of creating those workers, we are deemed uninteresting and less valuable, especially in America. We are no longer glamorized. Notably, the state stops trying to control our bodies.
For the first time, millennials are beginning to sense this unavoidable trajectory, the chapter in which our bodies will dictate a perceived change in value and a real change in our visibility, like so many women have experienced before us. But the difference is this: We want to talk about it.
But the difference is this: We want to talk about it.
If our internal status will soon effect our commoditized value in the world, our external status has already begun that process. As we start to show signs of having lived more life for more years, laughed at more jokes, worried about more recessions and shooting sprees and pandemics, and encountered more of the sun’s rays, we are acutely aware that physical change for American women means reduced visibility. As a result, aging is scorned by many of us, even denied, and caught at the intersection of our fears and consumerist addictions, we are sold all manner of cosmetic intervention.
Regardless of where you prefer to be on that playground of anti-aging interventions available to those with resources in the twenty-first century, in a country that most values youth, beauty, and fertility in women, noticing the physical signs of a fully-lived life can be difficult. Even as millennials dabble in sun protection, engage our friends in debates about plastics and filler, and marvel at how little faces actually move on television these days, we are inevitably forced to reckon with a deeper truth: No amount of serums, injectables, or hockey-inspired red-light masks will ultimately erase the reality of our bodies’ ongoing collision with the passage of time.
Though physical changes are difficult for women, especially in the harsh American cultural matrix, I suspect fine lines are not what most of us truly mourn as time goes on.
Though physical changes are difficult for women, especially in the harsh American cultural matrix, I suspect fine lines are not what most of us truly mourn as time goes on. Perhaps the gradual loss of fertility that Miranda July put in the spotlight this summer mirrors what women perceive as a loss of broader potential in our lives. When the possibility of motherhood fades, we sense other forms of possibility waning. As time passes, the open-ended and formerly limitless nature of our prospects seems to take solid form. Every thirty-something woman in my life is currently buried in questions relating to this feeling that her potential might be disappearing.
Each of us fears that loss of potential in different ways. Some are worried about finding love, or partnering through marriage, while others are anxious about starting a family. Many are concerned about their careers, wondering whether success can arrive as a later bloom, and some—like me—can hardly stomach the loss of time itself, so alluring and nostalgic and bittersweet is the glow of the rearview mirror.
My personal relationship to passing time has never been more amplified than it is right now, because in my degree program I gained friends in every chapter of life, including many who are younger than me. Some of them are still firmly planted in the open-ended, all-is-possible era, which was my favorite pillar of life as a twenty-something. I adore them and their perspective, though occasionally I find myself envying their freedom, the way they can still spend years trying out whatever seems right, choosing where they want to live and how they want to orient their days.
As time churns, in contrast to the limitlessness many feel in their twenties, I find myself wondering if I have indeed spent my own time wisely or if there might have been a better way. In certain lights my path now feels too solid, too fixed, too inhibited by choices that were made for boring yet unavoidable reasons like living in a lackluster city because it was the only place I could find a post-recession job. At a certain point, our lives are what we have made them to be, and solidification becomes apparent.
Paired with the hormonal changes we know our bodies will bring in the next decade or two, I wonder if women and birthing people feel this loss of possibility more than our masculinized counterparts. After all, men can count on a steady stream of testosterone, as July points out in her novel, for the rest of their days. Their bodies do not seem to come with as many brain-shaping side effects and surprises. Running parallel to this internal steadiness, the men in my life do not seem to yearn for transformation and evolution in the same way as my female friends.
This bittersweetness of life transforming into more solid forms is inevitable as we move through time. But since I have a unique talent for noticing loss, and the emotions associated with it, I must counter my melancholic center by asking a question. On behalf of millennial birthing people, as we enter our forthcoming era of hormonal surprises, I wonder: If limitlessness is lost as time passes, and our potential seems to wane, what, alongside that, do we gain?
If limitlessness is lost as time passes, and our potential seems to wane, what, alongside that, do we gain?
Thanks to our bodies it is clear what will be lost on this journey. Collagen, egg production, and flexibility are all evidently on the list. And as we make more commitments, we relinquish potential—at least of a certain kind. But with every loss comes a gain. So what gifts are arriving as our lives progress towards change?
I do not know about you but I am starting to feel, occasionally, the weight of my experience. Sometimes after connecting with a friend in a different, greener chapter I am reminded of the lives I have lived. At this point I have been an emotionally lonely child, a kid who could not put down her books, an overachieving student, an opera singer, a corporate tech communicator, an essayist, and a stressed-out graduate student, twice. I have been a newlywed, a world traveler, a bookseller, a yoga teacher, a sporty spice, a maternal beating heart, and evolving wife to a devoted man. At twenty-five I had not been half of these things. At this point, the pieces have coalesced to make me the person who knows what I know and wants what I want.
It is no small thing, in this world, to understand who I want to be and what I have to offer. It takes time and real effort, in many cases, to draw closer to yourself. Amidst the noise, amidst the expectations, amidst the constant fluctuation of our bodies and minds, amidst the pressures of patriarchal, market-driven exploitation, it can be hard to understand yourself at all. But as time grows I draw ever-closer to the unmovable parts of my soul, the threads that function like a north star and guide me onward. Getting older, it turns out, only makes them more clear. My roots are growing deeper and wider and I am just getting started.
My roots are growing deeper and wider and I am just getting started.
As I look towards the coming decade, or two or three or four, and envision all I want to do, the idea that my potential could be waning feels absurd. As women gain experience, we develop bone-level wisdom and by that I mean clarity. We become less susceptible to being used as anyone’s pawn. As the female body begins to move toward change, only one form of maternal potential is lost. The rest remain with us, ready to be nurtured.
Nurturing our potential, in this stage, might feel different than it did when we were twenty. And thank god for that. The scrambling, grasping energy I had then has no place in my life now, and any remnants of internalized misogyny must be cast aside. What I want is something more spacious and sustainable and wise.
Speaking of sustainable and wise, in recent months I have been fascinated with Anne Hathaway’s resurgence in our cultural consciousness. After early success she experienced a wave of internet animosity so strong it was nicknamed “Hathahate” and faded from the spotlight. But at 42, she is back and more appealing than ever. Intrigued, I watched her in The Idea of You, another story that centers a sexy, evolving 40-something this summer,1read Anne Helen Petersen’s analysis of what Anne Hathaway is trying to tell us, looked at her stunning images in V Magazine, and listened to her talk to David Marchese on The Interview.
On the podcast, which asserts that “Anne Hathaway is done trying to please,” the actor was candid about her boundaries and why they exist. She was unapologetic about who she is or what she needs, which made the interview a masterclass for self-critical, success-oriented women who want to become truer and kinder to themselves. One thing she said really stood out.
When asked what helped her transform, Hathaway said she hesitates to use this word because it is often used negatively and frequently misunderstood. But she used it anyway, and I am glad she did. Anne Hathaway said she has finally settled. She said that settling transcends the negative and becomes beautiful when it centers a feeling of surrender. For her, it is shaped by gratitude. Hathaway said that as an ambitious person who wants to achieve things, she found real power in settling into herself and understanding that if everything were to end today, she would have lived a gorgeous life.2
I, too, am an ambitious person who wants to achieve things. Look, for women, ambition can be demolishing. We are hated for wanting more while men are celebrated. Hathaway noted that to drive ourselves towards success in our culture, we often engage self-criticism and loathing. But settling in—to ourselves, our bodies, the beauty of our lives as they are right now—has a capacious, easygoing quality that I have rarely viewed as the path to success.3
Settling in has a capacious, easygoing quality that I have rarely viewed as the path to success.
Admittedly, I used to think of settling as giving up some essential dream I could not afford to lose. The term seemed to have a quality of giving up everything to live in the suburbs when your city-heart was still on fire. I thought I had to continually push myself past depletion to achieve anything meaningful. Thanks to Hathaway, I now see that settling into my wisdom and grace is precisely what will unlock the fullness of my potential.
Millennial women are on the cusp of a changing trajectory, along with birthing people just ahead of us and a little behind. This rite of passage is unavoidable but confusing, because it arrives at a time when we thought rites of passage were done. Yet this moment is not to be feared. Our lives thus far have been one ever-present evolution, and embracing the female propensity for metamorphosis only makes us richer. Settling means finding the spacious surrender to claim the truth about women and birthing people: We just keep on transforming, and that fluidity makes our potential impossible to contain.
HAPPY SUMMER. I hope you enjoyed this bonus issue! Have you read All Fours? Did you watch The Idea of You? Do you feel a sense of shrinking—or growing—potential as time passes? Please leave a comment, because we need to talk about all of it.
It would mean a LOT if you passed this on to a 30-something or 40-something woman in your life. Changes are coming so let’s be in them together!
20-somethings, 50 and 60 and 70 and 80-somethings, please let us know how you feel about these topics, too! The best way to learn is from those who have already been there.
This week, I am wishing you sweet and gentle rest. <3 LM
WE’RE ALL FRIENDS HERE is written by Lauren Maxwell. Can you help us grow? Send this to a friend and ask them to subscribe. Share it on Instagram and tag @lauren_only. If you enjoy this space, please consider becoming a paid subscriber to support more essays like this one. Thank you so much for being here!
I loved it! Children of ‘90s rom-coms will delight in the light, breezy vibes, which dare to center a 45-year-old woman who is also a mom as a sexy, evolving, career-oriented creature. I hear the book is wonderful, too.
This interview is so great; I recommend the whole thing. The settling and ambition segment arrives at 17:30.
Hathaway also references the idea of your best possible choice in the future turning around to guide you in the present, which I appreciated. It reminded me of Playing Big by Tara Mohr. Part of Mohr’s advice for women in that book is that we can visualize ourselves in the future as an inner mentor who can help provide answers about the next best step.