Esther McCarthy: Grumpy old men — trying to horn in on menopausal womens' gig

Esther McCarthy. Picture: Emily Quinn

I read an article recently written by Anna-Louise Dearden for The Telegraph. 

In it, she discusses how her last three relationships failed because of so-called ‘miserable man syndrome’. It gets me pondering, do men get crankier as they get older?

Well, “duh”, I say aloud, to myself, and the dog.

That gets me thinking, and I start doing a little research; I ask friends, and I read some more articles, and I think of the men I know, in different stages of their lives.

This also, handily enough, presents me with a topic for this week’s column, which I’m very much aware I’m way past the deadline for. ( Well, duh. — Ed.)

Which brings me to the andropause. (I refuse to call it the manopause, we’re better than that, OK?)

The more I start asking around, and the more I learn about this phenomenon, the more I have to open myself up to the possibility that men are going through their own version of the menopause.

And I’m furious. Grr! Can we not have ANYTHING for ourselves?

Just when it’s becoming culturally acceptable for us women to (try to) own our peri/menopause, without shame or fear. 

Just when we are finally figuring out how to raise our voices and declare: ‘Yes, we are hormonally unhinged, now give us our blasted HRT or so help us, we will mess you up.’

Here come the testosterone-deficient men, trying to horn in on our gig. Tsk. That’s so typical.

Listen lads, we were all perfectly happy when we could blame your mawkish moods and moobs on a good old-fashioned midlife crisis.

We enjoyed our delicious scorn as we watched ye squeezing yer arses into Lycra, like Clonakilty sausages into a particularly colourful casing, and cycling to the back arse of nowhere every Sunday afternoon on bikes that cost more than your first (and possibly current) car.

We were FINE with it, honestly.

Granted, we weren’t keen on the other iterations of the mid-life crisis, with some men tending towards the cliches of desperately trying to relive their youth by hopping up on a motorcycle, or another woman, or both.

But look it, it allowed us to do our bottomless brunches in peace, popping ashwagandha supplements like maniacs, and swapping collagen cream recommendations and patches to make our décolletage appear less crepey.

At least this way, the men were to be ridiculed, whilst the women were championed and revered for battling through this stage of life; united together in brain fogs and an obsession with growing our own polytunnel herbs.

Now, it appears the cranky men are realising they’re missing a trick and getting in on the whole hormonal hellscape deal.

According to our very own HSE, the male menopause means men develop physical and emotional symptoms when they reach their late 40s to early 50s and the conditions that go along with it are delights like mood swings, irritability, unwanted fat redistribution, loss of sex drive and muscle mass, insomnia, poor concentration, and a general lack of enthusiasm or energy.

Eh, sound familiar, ladies? The thieving, copycatting bastards.

The thing is though, I can’t help wonder ... should we feel sorry for them, even just a teeny bit? 

I mean, there’s no male celebrity putting their wrinkly hand up to be the face and balls of andropause, is there? I can’t see David Beckham doing a Davina McCall and bravely busting the myths around the male menopause.

I can’t imagine summits selling out across the land, where professional men share stories about how a gradual drop in testosterone — that hormone that they’ve been conditioned to associate with the very essence of their manly maleness — made them forget how to drive the car today, and they had to ring a friend to come and get them.

So... should we share the empathy stage? NAH. Before the boyos start trading tales about sobbing in the middle of the dairy aisle of Dunnes because they have the wrong kind of cheese,  I reckon the lads of a certain age should go back to hiding in their sheds, muttering about immersions, and blithely ignoring those brittle bones and existential angst, and just deal with it by having themselves another good shout at the kids.

Or why not just repress your fear at the idea of losing the very essence of yourself by passively aggressively shutting your partner out, slowly choking any remaining feelings by withholding affection and picking apart your once joyful union? It’s the Irish way. 

And sure it didn’t do your fathers any harm. Cough.

Suck it up, male Gen Xers. Sod off and buy another pair of padded cycling shorts to cushion your soon-to-be useless testicles, and don’t you dare ask your cycling buddies if they too are experiencing this scary sense of losing your mind, body, and soul.

Don’t you even think about banding together to get through it together.

That’s OUR shtick.