30
WHEN I GROW UP
Becca
Once the music has started, I’m glad we came and didn’t just fall into bed as I had wanted.
The lights are dimmed in the room, we’re all wearing our headsets and Peggy has provided us all with glow sticks, which we’ve fashioned into bracelets and necklaces. It’s not quite a rave atmosphere. We’re not sweaty enough to really get that vibe, because thank God Peggy knows what it’s like to be menopausal and has switched on the aircon. But it is a fun vibe. I’m not sure when I ever forgot that having a good old throw around on the dance floor was a brilliant way to boost my dopamine levels, but I’m glad to be experiencing it all the same now.
We’ve been joined, once again, by Deirdre, who is as hyped up as Niamh for what’s to come. I did wonder if Niamh had been at the Grey Goose again – her mood being so improved from this morning – but she smiled and said she was just ‘high on life’.
‘Enjoy it while you can,’ she’d grinned. ‘No doubt the next mood swing is just around the corner!’ She’d then linked arms with Deirdre and the pair of them had rushed to the front of the queue to grab their headsets.
Peggy has put together a couple of playlists – absolute bangers from the eighties, nineties and early 2000s. There’s even a choice of angsty emo teen music from the nineties for the women who were cool enough to follow Pearl Jam, Nirvana andREMback in the day.
I was more of a Backstreet Boys/Spice Girls fan so I’m happy enough to throw some moves around to ‘I Want It That Way’ and ‘Stop’ instead. I do enjoy a minor segue into some of the dance classics from my uni days though, and even though I am so not nineteen any more, I jump around to ‘Set You Free’ by N-Trance as if my pelvic floor has never been pummelled on the inside by twins.
Even though I was sure I was only popping along here for a couple of songs, I’m shocked when the lights come back up and we’re told that’s us until morning – when there will be another sea swim for anyone feeling brave enough, before a session on supporting your menopause from a holistic perspective, whatever that entails.
My feet ache, despite wearing my trainers, but I don’t care. I don’t think I’ve had as much fun in years. Sixteen-year-old Becki would have loved this. She would’ve loved that I was dancing until midnight with our best friends on a weekend away. She would love that I’m going to write about this once I get home. I can almost imagine her giving me a big thumbs up of approval – probably before ruining it all by asking me how our marriage to David Duchovny is going.
‘Thank you so much for letting me be your fourth wheel,’ Deirdre says, her arm linked in Niamh’s as we walk back to the yurts. ‘You’ve no idea how much it means. I was absolutely sick with nerves coming here, but you all have made it so easy for me.’
‘You’re very welcome to be part of our crew any time,’ Laura says. ‘Why so nervous though? I think you’re amazing coming to the retreat on your own. It takes real courage.’
‘Do you really think so?’ Deirdre asks, and of course we all turn around and tell her that of course we bloody do.
She shrugs, but even in the darkness I see that she is smiling. ‘You’re all very kind,’ she says. ‘And maybe you’re right. I just… well, I’m not one of those girls who has bucketloads of friends waiting to hang out with them. My friends from school have all moved on or moved away. We’ve all just drifted apart and no one really warns you how hard it is to make friends when you’re a proper grown-up doing proper grown-up things.’
‘There’s the truth,’ I say, acutely aware that I would be lost without the girls, and especially without Niamh, who has consistently been there for me and with me through my life. Yes, I have a few acquaintances but not a whole lot of people I’d class as ride-or-die friends. My mum always told me it was quality that mattered, not quantity, and I happen to believe she’s right. Sensing that Deirdre may want to talk more, I don’t share my own experiences, wanting to leave room for her to talk.
‘I’ve never had children,’ she says. ‘And my friends did. Their children became the centre of their lives, and I totally get that, but it became difficult for me. I started turning down invitations and then, perhaps not surprisingly, they stopped inviting me.’
‘That sounds difficult,’ I say.
‘Yeah, it wasn’t great. It isn’t great, to be honest. Feeling like I didn’t belong simply because I’m not a mother. It was even more painful because I desperately wanted to be a mum but it just never happened. It was never the right time, or it was never the right man and then by the time I finally met the man I thought would be a great father I just never managed to get pregnant. I imagined it was down to my age.’
‘You don’t know for certain what the problem was?’ Laura asks gently.
Deirdre shakes her head. ‘There’s a whole story there. He didn’t want to get tested. Said if it was meant to be, it would happen. He said we should leave it to fate and sure, hadn’t fate brought us together. Then he said he was scared that if wedidfind out, it might be very difficult for the problematic partner to deal with. And, as he said, age wasn’t in my favour; he was confident the problem would be with me and he didn’t want to put me through that pain.’
I can hardly believe what I’m hearing. What an absolute shedload of fuckery disguised as concern for her wellbeing.
‘Ooof!’ Niamh says. ‘I’m sorry. He sounds like an absolute dick.’
I freeze. We don’t know Deirdre. Not enough to know that she will be comfortable with one of us calling her partner – hopefully her ex-partner – a dick. Even if he is very clearly a ginormous dick. It’s possible Niamh has just said something that will upset her and that’s the last thing I want. Imagine coming away for a weekend on your own, finally being delighted to have met some nice people, only to have one of them insult your partner outright.
‘He is an absolute dick,’ Deirdre says, and I breathe a sigh of relief. ‘Because the absolute plot twist in all of it is that I found out he’d had a vasectomy five years before we met. He just didn’t think he owed it to me to let me know. Thankfully he’s no longermyabsolute dick.’
My jaw drops so far I imagine I look like one of those cartoon characters whose jaws hit the floor.
‘That absolute mother-fudger!’ I say.
‘Becs, you’re among the grown-ups now. You can say the actual word,’ Niamh says.
‘Well then, he’s a fucking big fucker!’ I say with a level of enthusiasm usually reserved for children swearing out of earshot of their parents and getting high on the thrill of speaking the forbidden words.
Deirdre laughs. ‘Yes. Yes, he is a fucking big fucker. But it’s okay. I can laugh about it now. I couldn’t for a long time, but then I realised I could be angry, or continue waiting for the right man, or the right friends, or whatever to come along before I started doing the things I always wanted… or I could just do them anyway. It’s been really freeing actually. I’ve been to concerts by myself. It doesn’t take a fizz out of me to go to the cinema or out to lunch on my own now. I even have a holiday to Italy booked for this summer. Just me. I can’t wait.’
