Alive! Alive-O!

A story is necessary to bring about the appropriate emotion...

When I was in my early 40s, I decided I needed to run a big race. Not so much a long race, but a big one, with crowds and a chip on my shoe and a finish line and a medal. A real race. At the time I was pretty heavy, but working on getting leaner, and putting a big race out in front of me seemed a good goal. Something to look forward to, and a kind of capstone to all the hard work of losing weight and getting fit.

As it happened, the perfect race would be run in Dublin at a time when I planned to be in Ireland anyway, riding in my husband’s bags as he went there to teach for one lovely month of May.

This race is an annual 8K, dubbed a mini-marathon, run entirely by women, and doubles as one of the biggest fund-raising events in Ireland every year. That day 40,000 women gathered in the center of the city to await the starting gun. Tradition dictates that  all these women together sing the first verse of the old Irish folk song, Molly Malone, just before the race starts...

This makes absolutely every woman in the field begin their run with tears streaming down their faces, and feeling the ghost of Molly in their hearts, and feeling very much alive. I haven’t quite felt so glad and proud to be alive and kicking as I was that day.

Until today. Because tomorrow, MiddlesexMD.com goes live. We’re all thrilled and a little terrified, waiting here, at the starting line. This blog has been a bit quiet for the past month as we’ve all been hurling ourselves into our final wind-sprints. This is an amazing group of experienced, wise, and funny midlife women who have worked hard for a year now to pull off Dr. Barb DePree’s dream of a smart, informative, trustworthy place for women in menopause to explore and sustain their sexuality for life.

And it has been a dream project. Important. Fascinating. We have learned so much, and look forward to learning so much more. Learning from you, for you, and making all the necessary connections that women our age need to keep feeling Alive! Alive-O!

Please take the time to take a peek soon, and tell us what you think!