Jan King - When Youre Hot, Youre Hot: How I Laughed My Way Through Menopause

Also by Jan King

Hormones from Hell
Its a Mom Thing
Its a Girl Thing

To my wonderful girlfriends who courageously fought
and won their battles with cancer:

Carlynn Donosky, Jane West, Kathy Buckley, Elizabeth Jackson,
Marilyn Taylor, and Margaret Larmon

and

In memory of my beloved friend who lost hers,
Linda Wexler

When Youre Hot, Youre Hot copyright 2002 by Jan King. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of reprints in the context of reviews.

Andrews McMeel Publishing, LLC
an Andrews McMeel Universal company
1130 Walnut Street, Kansas City, Missouri 64106

www.andrewsmcmeel.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

King, Jan.

When youre hot youre hot : how I laughed my way through menopause / Jan King.

p. cm.

1. MenopauseHumor. 2. Middle aged womenHealth and hygieneHumor. I. Title.

RG186 .K54 2002

612.6'65dc21

2001056180

Book design by Holly Camerlinck
Cover photograph by Charles William Bush
Hair by Carolyn Carroll
Makeup by Jus Judy
Nails by Marla Burgess

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Contents

Acknowledgments

T o my husband, Mark, thank you always for your love and your continued support in sickness and in health.

To my editor, Kelly Gilbert, whose insight and understanding of this field, especially for a young gal, constantly amaze me. Even though I am old enough to be your older sister, I wont hold that against you.

To my friend Jon Anderson, thank you so much for your guidance and friendship. I think you are truly one of the brightest men in this business.

To my mom and dad, to Karen and Bob, Paul and Ginny, Michael and Whitney, and Philip, youll never know how much your love and support mean to me. You were all instrumental in helping me make a complete recovery.

To my doctors, Sharon Winer, Philomena McAndrew, Gary Tearston, Herbert Stein, Joseph Lebovic, and Mitchell Karlan, you made all the difference in my successful treatment and recovery. Thank you for giving me back my life, which is, now, better than ever.

Introduction

W ell, girls, a lot of estrogen has passed under the bridges of Menopause County since I wrote Hormones from Hell . Since then, I have had a big change of lifein more ways than one. I am happy to announce that I have successfully gone through menopause. Yep, thats right. Im officially out of the egg business.

You can count on me to give you the real scoop about the metamorphosis your middle-aged body will be going through. And trust me, you wont be getting a sugarcoated placebo. Ill deliver the real thing

Actually, its quite a chic time to be going through menopause, for youre in the company of such luminaries as Cybill Shepherd, Bette Midler, Lauren Hutton, and Suzanne Somers. I dont think Cher has gone through menopause, though. In fact, I dont think shell ever go through it. The only thing shell go through is another surgery. She looks like shes still thirty. Maybe a little waxy, but definitely sexy. But youve got to hand it to her. After all that singing about turning back time, she actually did it.

When Youre Hot Youre Hot will answer some hard-hitting, James Carvilletype questions like: Is there life after menopause? Can we learn to cope with sagging skin, irritable bladder syndrome, and sleepless nights? Can we make some sort of attractive centerpiece out of all those unused tampons sitting in our bathroom closets?

Well, if you are getting seriously depressed about all of this female stuffdont. Just throw back an Ensure shooter with a Pepto-Bismol chaser while you read my book. In no time, youll be laughing and feeling much better.

When youre finished, I promise youll feel good enough to come busting out of your menopausal closet. And speaking of closets, you can get a lot of straightening done in yours... while youre up all night... between bathroom runs.

But Seriously...

A Womans Worst Nightmare

Its sometimes hard for me, as a humorist, to tell just the truth.The truth is, I had a tough time, as youll learn throughout thisbook, dealing with the onset of my menopause and developingand fighting breast cancer. But I survived, more or lessintact, with a healthy body, a good firm grip on reality, and,thank God, my sense of humor.

So this book is a bit of a departure from my others. Dontworry, I havent stopped telling jokes, but through these ButSeriously... sidebars, I am also going to pass on a lot ofthe knowledge I gained from surviving this difficult period.Hopefully, youll learn some valuable things from my experience,and that knowledge will make a difference in your lives.

1

POWER SURGES:

Sweatin with the Oldies

C all me nuts. Ive heard it before. The fact is that I am probably the only woman in the world who enjoyed going through menopause. Yep. You heard me right. Why? Because menopause is the only time in life when a woman can get away with all kinds of rude behaviorincluding murder. Not long ago, I read about a case where a woman killed her husband, then pleaded not guilty because of temporary insanity brought on by menopause. And she won the case. Crazy? Yeah, like a fox.

Wow! Just think of the possibilities this opens up to us, considering that menopause lasts roughly 1.4 centuries. Okay. I exaggerated. 1.2 centuries. But heres the thing. Before menopause, I was always the calm decision maker, the peace broker, the voice of reasonyou know, traditional woman stuff. But once it got startedand I embraced the possibilitiesI found that I had a huge window of time to complain, carry on, and act like a total bitch. I could make everybody around me as miserable as I was feeling. And heres the best part. Nobody blamed me. They just shook their heads and said, Go easy on her. The poor woman is going through the change, you know.

Crimes of Hormones

Perp	The Crime	The Time
Lorena Bobbitt	Cut off husbands penis and threw it in a field	$25 fine for littering
Betty Broderick	Stalked and shot ex-husband and new wife	$100 fine for hunting out of season
Patrizia Reggiani	Ordered Mob hit on cheating husband, Maurizio Gucci	Six months of anger-management classes
Christine English	Ramming boyfriend into utility pole with her car