r/GenXWomen

Is anyone else freaked out at the thought of giving your personal health concerns or questions to Amazon? The commercial about breastfeeding questions has my skin crawling.

My chiropractor recently told me I should stop relying on pills for every little flare up because at our age it’s probably better not to constantly take stuff unless you really have to. He suggested trying topical pain relief instead and honestly I kinda brushed it off at first.

I ended up searching around and got a pain gel from ketro skin. He didn’t recommend that specific one, it just seemed like one of the better options that kept coming up and the price felt more reasonable than some of the super overpriced ones.

Been using it on my neck and lower back after gardening or sitting too long and I do like that I’m not automatically reaching for Advil all the time now. Now I’m wondering if I should just avoid pills altogether for everyday aches if the topical stuff is doing the job?

Edit: Of course I also talked to my doctor about it (forgot to mention that part). He told me to use it when I feel muscle soreness or stiffness.

1. I supervise customer service aides on a call center. One of my staff told me that a caller called her racist and misogynistic slurs. All I want to do is call the guy and tell him what I think of him, but despite the fact that I hate my job right now (see item 2), I do want to stay employed.

2. One of my bosses is a micromanager, staff regularly try to gaslight their supervisors, and after reporting an employee for using ethnic slurs a month ago, nothing has happened. I don’t think the employee got any more than a reprimand.

3. One of my housemates had a mental health crisis on Friday. Her boyfriend (who also lives with me) is trying to get her to seek mental health treatment or leave but I have the feeling that professionals are going to have to be involved sooner rather than later.

4. The less said about the cluster that’s happening in D.C. and my state capital, the better. And all that politicians can manage to do is send half-ass petitions and ask for money.

I’m on psych meds and HRT, I see my therapist next week, I walk my dogs a minimum of 45 minutes a day, I have a consultation with a personal trainer next week, and I’m sober, but I’m full of rage. I can’t focus on work and all I want to do is eat stuff that’s not good for me (I’m trying to lose weight yet again).

Any suggestions?

Okay ladies… I think it’s finally time. I turned 50 this year and I’m seriously considering breaking up with birth control after what feels like a 30+ year situationship 😂

I’ve had a male doctor for the last 15 years and no offense to him, but I need a woman who understands the hormonal shifts. I’m weirdly nervous to stop the pill because right now I have zero perimenopause symptoms. No hot flashes, no mood swings, no night sweats… honestly my birth control has me out here living in a false sense of hormonal security.

The ONLY thing I love is knowing the exact day my period is going to arrive like an annoying but reliable houseguest. But considering I haven’t been in a relationship in almost 3 years, the odds of an “oops baby” at 50 seem pretty slim unless it’s an immaculate conception because absolutely not 😂 (Also: never been pregnant, never wanted to be.)

Now I’m reading all the horror stories about hormone shifts, weight gain, mood swings, hot flashes, HRT, and suddenly I’m spiraling wondering if the second I stop the pill I’m going to wake up drenched in sweat, emotionally unstable, and arguing with my oatmeal at breakfast.

So tell me your stories:

- What was it like getting off birth control at this age?

- Did menopause symptoms hit you like a truck or was it no big deal?

- Did anyone regret stopping?

- Did HRT help?

And most importantly…am I going to gain 12 pounds just LOOKING at carbs? 😭

Please reassure/enlighten me before I panic-renew this prescription for another decade!

My feminine archetype is NUNYA BIZNISS! Y'all know that those are just more data collection BS right? Maiden my ass. No I am not worse off not knowing, thank you. Now, get out of my feed.

I really need to increase my physical activity, but I feel like I'm doomed. My job is very sedentary, and escaping for walks is not often possible.

I've never been a sports person. I'm not good at any, and I really don't enjoy them. I'm at a work pickleball team event right now and, oof, that was embarrassing. I'm short, slow, and not competitive.

I'm NOT a morning person, so getting up and moving is a non-starter.

Gyms are horrible.

Once I get home from work in the evening, I'm exhausted and want to cry at the thought of expending energy.

My go-to activities have been apps and youtube for yoga, rowing, and weights. But, they BORE ME!

I need something I look forward to, has a low barrier to entry, is fun, not "team", doesn't have a bunch of people watching, and gets my cardio and strength done.

I hate it! I hate everything, and I want to scream!

This feels very vulnerable to me, and it is perhaps something that not many women would admit, so I am hoping for your understanding and advice.

I am a 40-year-old woman. The past years has been quite brutal for me. I've edited this text and will only focus on my relationship part here. But I want to go back in time a little bit more. From age 26 to 36, I was living with a man in a civil partnership. I have always wanted a family and kids. I come from a big family and have good relationships with my extended family, and to be honest, this is what I expected for myself too. I pictured a family with at least two kids by my current age, living in my own house with a loved one. I've always loved children and was incredibly good with them. I thought that would be the case, but unfortunately, the man I was in a relationship with was dishonest with me about his family plans. Being an empathetic partner, I always agreed to wait longer and longer because it was never a good time for him. We both moved countries for his job, we were working on a house, and he was starting his business. There were very good and busy times, and then there were bad times. However, it was never a good time for a family. After I turned 34, I started pressuring him to be brutally honest with me because I had been receiving mixed signals from him for years and never truly understood whether he wanted kids or not. When I was 36, he finally admitted that he might want kids "on paper" but did not feel ready for them and did not know when he would be. We separated. It was a very painful breakup because I felt like I had been used the entire time and he had been very dishonest with me from the beginning. It took me three full years to heal. No matter how much I wanted a family, I could not even look at men without remembering what he did to me.

In the beginning of 2025, at 39, I met another man by accident. I was very excited about him, although cautious at the same time. We started dating, and we seemed to be on the same page regarding what we wanted from life. Unfortunately, we broke up last October. Strangely, I initiated it because I never felt like he truly loved me, as he was quite emotionally unavailable. So I ended up being very hurt in October 2025 again, because I was all-in (not in a toxic way, but in a secure way) and hopeful that perhaps with this person I could have a happy home with everything it involves.

On days like today, I feel very sad and find myself crying. A younger version of myself thought I would be in a different life chapter at this time: sharing a home with a loved one and being a mother. I have nothing of the above at the moment. I feel like a loser, and it is really hard to regain hope on some days. My self-confidence is shrinking. I avoid seeing friends. Most of my friends are happily married with kids running around. It breaks my heart every time I see that. I am not jealous. I am happy for them, but I am just so sad that I am not where they are. I do not know if I ever will be.

Some time ago, a good friend of mine invited me for coffee. She was telling me about her new home renovation, I saw her growing 2-year-old running around, and she told me about a promotion. I was crying inside, but later outside as well, because I am nowhere near that. I get up, go for walks, journal, do some gardening, attend pilates classes, attend dancing classes, and cook nice meals. Those things keep me stable, but I am not fulfilled.

I would like to hear your perspective, your experiences. How did you cope with darker periods in life? How did you overcome them? Do you have any positive examples?

I am also thinking of freezing my eggs because chances are I will never be able to have kids naturally, even if I meet the right person. What do you think of that? Have you had similar experiences? Generally, if you were in my shoes, what would you recommend I do next? What is the way forward?

Thank you for your understanding and for any kind advice. It means the world to me 🤍

I hit a wall today scrolling through my feed. saw yet another 24-year-old "expert" trying to sell a 15-step nighttime routine to reverse menopause skin and I just felt so incredibly tired. the beauty industry is constantly screaming at us to fix every single microscopic flaw and honestly it's just exhausting

we survived our teens burning our faces off with sea breeze and st ives apricot scrubs. when did washing your face turn into needing a chemistry degree and a spare $500? I looked at my bathroom counter this morning and realized half these fancy glass bottles do absolutely nothing except drain my wallet and take up space

Im officially done playing the game. I tossed the expired serums and decided my entire routine is just going to be washing my face and pulling a Lululun sheet out of the box. just slapping on a basic anti aging face mask while I sit on the couch in my sweatpants watching murder docs is literally all the effort I can muster now

no more layering seven different acids that just make my skin red anyway. aging is going to happen whether I spend my evenings doing a complicated ritual or not, so I might as well be comfortable. anybody else just aggressively downsizing their bathroom cabinets lately or is it just me hitting my breaking point?

I'm 52. I have about $30,000 in retirement savings, and that was a struggle to put away. It's not enough and I know it. And with the economy in the shitter, I don't have a lot to put away right now to keep building a nest egg.

I sit here every day, wondering how I'm going to work until I die. Because it's not even a question of whether I'll need to do it at this point. I think it's pretty obvious that unless I become a multi-millionaire by hitting the lottery, I'm never going to be able to retire. We don't even know if we'll have the social security we paid into all these years since the government keeps "borrowing" money from it.

*sigh*

What grinds your gears? Rant away

I don’t want to write the 50 paragraphs that I could write, but basically where my life has ended up today is frustrating (but still pretty damn great so I have no right to be frustrated 🫤).

I make a top tenth percentile individual income. I have a home on my own. My kids are not disasters. I have some friends and family that I can count on.

But at the same time, anyone who is in a corporate (or any?) job, knows about the enshittification of work. I really never wanted to be doing what I’m doing, but here I am. I had a similar lower level role 10 years ago and this would have been fine then. The red tape today is impossible. My grand boss holds meetings with my boss and I and says things like “we just need to be smarter about quality than anyone else [in our division].” “We need to figure X out and really drive it.” Blah. But I have no time to be strategic or improve processes or implement AI or outsourcing. We are all eaten up with time to track down all the approvals we need to send out a tiny contract. I think my boss is equally frustrated but he is set up with a wife and bigger income, so he has a little more mental bandwidth.

I have little time for hobbies or my own social life, or even to maintain my house. My dad was a truck driver and worked 70 hrs a week, but when he was home he was home. He knew exactly what his schedule was. I have so little time to DO work and then get things from my bosses that are always last minute, due immediately and have no staff available to support. People on the interwebs are like “put your foot down.” Unfortunately that is the job. You have no control.

This girl wanted to write funny greeting cards as a child. I ended up in corporate engineering. Sigh. Now I just want to have little adventures on the trails in the woods before my body completely betrays me. But it’s the last thing I get to do after everything else and I still owe too much and am stuck in my familial duties to not hold a job like this anymore and just go live my life.

Thanks for letting me vent here.

I was thinking today about these times when I was in 6th grade in 1981 and was almost kidnapped from the same Park two separate times. One time it was Memorial Day and I was roller skating home from 7-Eleven past the park with a snack or something and some dude pulled up in front of me, rolled down his automatic window, looked across the seat at me over his sunglasses, fanned out a huge handful of $100 bills and told me to get in the car if I wanted to make some money. I don't think the wheels on my roller skates ever moved faster than when I hauled ass away from that car.

Same park a couple months later and I was wandering around the Rose garden. I was a dreamy little kid. Some old dude walked up to me and started talking to me about the flowers and at first I thought he was really nice and then I got a vibe. I started to walk home and he kept circling the blocks that I was on over and over again all the way until I got home. He parked outside of my house until I called the cops and they made him leave.

I was 11 years old in 6th grade. It wasn't until I was older that I realized that this was just a sampling and that men were going to treat me like that for years. This wasn't a big scary Park in an urban area. This was in a town of 50,000 people. Just men out there prowling for victims. Did you ladies have similar experiences? I've thought many times how lucky I am because I came so close so many times to not being lucky.

Edited a typo

So. I have been losing weight ever since I got my hormones, PCOS, and Hashimoto's under control. I feel so much better but I have a small issue, it's my fupa. My formerly full fupa is a bit floppy now and it's giving me a new body shape that I am not used to dressing. I'm not a fan of foundation garments, but does anyone know of a brand or place where I can buy something that can keep you comfortably compressed? I think I would be more into legging or bike short type things rather than undies because I can't tolerate a wedgie. I also have a bubble butt that I would like to not mash flat because then it just looks flat and wide.

I've always had trouble fitting this region of my body because of this butt, and I feel like I'm looking for a miracle garment, anyone have any ideas? Thank you!!

Reaching out to this wonderful community because looking in the mirror lately has been a bit of a struggle i would say, seeing these wiry silver hairs is starting to feel a little overwhelming as i reach my old age. Being in my mid-fifties means wanting to embrace this next chapter with grace and hope, but still wanting to find a natural looking hair color for those days.

I've tried cheap drugstore boxes and even some natural rinses from specialty stores in the past and it didn't go well. Would really love to know if you don't mind.

Background: My Mom and I do not see our "relationship" the same way. My Mom sided with my childhood abuser. She's consistently used me as a verbal punching bag. She constantly punches down on me. She's pretty furious that I refuse to take her advice on my current slow burn relationship.

Fast forward to today: Mom has been out of work for several years. Multiple work place injuries (2 in 2 years) have left her under medical treatment and she's also subject to ageism when applying for jobs (she's 79 today).

She's absolute struggling financially. She's had to take out 35k in house loans/mortgaging to resolve some serious plumbing and house renovations as the result of the plumbing issue. With her out of work, she can no longer pay the bills. Additionally, the company that funded the initial amount as part of a homeowner's warranty has reviewed the loan and determined the loan should not have been approved and is suing her in court.

She's had to borrow $50 from me to pay her electric bill.

She's on food boxes for groceries.

She receives social security but it's obviously not enough to cover enough.

She's way overextended and it appears she's been living off credit.

Earlier this week, she blew up at me about what's going on.

My brother lives with her and his wife has decided, after 32 years of marriage and 2.5 year separation, that she wants a divorce.

My mother is furious my sister-in-law won't contact her about things like a car where she's listed on the registration because my Mom needs her off the registration so she can a registration loan on THAT car (she has one on hers already).

Additionally, my sister-in-law filed a restraining order against my brother. Her evidence of imminent danger/potential violence was so strong, her address was protected by the Court.

Furthering it, he lost HIS income this week so there's legitimately no income coming in.

She has called me to learn how to pawn things only to have me have to tell her that nothing she owns can be pawned.

The mortgage company has been clear that if she didn't pay by X date, they would start foreclosure proceedings on the house she's lived in since 1969.

She does not have a place to go. She's indicated she wants to be roommates. Not only does she NOT respect boundaries, but I will lose the privacy of my time with a developing romance that I would really like to see go further. My ex-fiancee and I wound up falling apart as we were living with her to take over the house from her. He and I broke up. He and I both moved out. He told me later that she just bad-mouthed me to him all the time.

I am considering blocking her at this time because I just can't deal with her crazy. She's unmedicated bipolar and she's in crisis right now. I just take days to recover from interactions with her.

I can't help her financially and I genuinely don't want my role to be a verbal punching bag.

To me, this is an abusive relationship and I called it that to someone this week.

I guess I need confirmation that blocking her is the best course of action right now. Maybe some advice if I don't?

ETA: I appreciate all of the strong women in this sub who helped me find my own inner strength today to block her. It’s been done. I thank you all for the additional support and encouragement to freeze my credit, seek a special therapist to work on the grief/loss to process the action, and just genuinely letting me know that my thoughts and feelings weren’t wrong.

I (53) heard Betty Davis Eyes yesterday. As I’m jamming, I’m smiling thinking about my two best friends in second grade. Every recess we’d sing this song at the top of our lungs. We thought we were so cool!!! Then I realized they were both gone. One died in a car accident in high school and the other died a few years ago because of poor health. I cried. Right there at work in the middle of the day. I know aging is a blessing, but that sure doesn’t make it easy. Have a fabulous weekend, my loves 😘 I hope all of our wishes come true!

“How old are you- 50?”

Last year folks said I looked late 30’s/early 40’s. I‘m 47.

I just watched Send Help with Rachel McAdams and it was excellent and gruesome and funny and definitely had a very satisfying ending.