Looking good as a full-time job?

An old friend of mine has a very busy life. She works full time, and has a small business of her own, teaching art to kids. I admire her a lot. I keep thinking how on earth does she actually have time for all that, and getting old? Because, as I am thinking these days, getting old for a woman who wants to continue looking decent, is a full time job.

Of course, there is always an easy option of just letting yourself go. It is very tempting. Not only is it easy, and cheap…It also gets approval from other middle-aged ladies. They will never openly admit that they are just loving the fact that someone looks worse than them, they will just say’ Oh, I admire how little attention Sarah pays to her looks! Sarah is not vain at all! She has more important things in life to worry about!' Yeah, yeah....that's just great. 

In the meantime, Sarah looks like this:

My grandmother used to say in Azeri, while applying lipstick on her way out to a food market, Dost var, dushman da var. There are friends, and there are enemies out there. A woman should always try to look her best.

The problem is…if I wanted to look my best right now, there would be endless things to get, apply and/or do that would basically, take all my time. And all my money. 

I am not exaggerating. Let’s just look at this.

Body.

There are of course, obvious things, like trying to stay slim and working out. Trying to stay slim does not only mean hours of exercise, but of course balanced diet which means looking into what you cook, what you eat, which for some of us can take a while. It is calculating your fats, protein and carbs...Drink water! 

And back to the exercises...It is not simple. The best idea, really, is to do weight training AS WELL as cardio. Great! No problem. But, don’t forget you have to stretch. So, chuck in a couple of hours of yoga or pilates in your weekly routine.

You start loosing weight, great. But then...omg, your face! 

Face.

The more weight you loose, the worse it looks on your aging face. So, you either need to invest in fillers, threads and botox or do some facial workouts. There are plenty of videos on Youtube, most claim to transform your sagging double chin and other problem areas in as little as 15 minutes per day. That’s nothing, right?

Don’t forget about the skin. As you age, facemasks and facials are a must. Feed the skin often. 

Drink water! 

Your hair will need more attention, too. You will probably need to have regular colour treatment. As you kill the hair roots with chemicals, balance it out with keratin or argan oil hair masks and treatments to keep it healthy.

Then, I read somewhere recently that, after childbirth, doing your regular pelvic floor exercises might not be enough if you want to tone up, you know, down below. Right, I thought. Tight muscles everywhere- wouldn’t that be nice? A special machine can be purchased, as I discovered, with various programs, depending on your desired goal. Each program is about 20 to 40 minutes and in order to achieve noticeable results (to feel like a virgin again!) you need to stick to your program daily for 12!!! Weeks. 12 weeks of spending 40 minutes every day doing this bizarre exercise I am not even going to describe here. Thereafter, you could just do it every now and again. 

Drink more water.

OK, so let’s summarize. Hours of working out. Stretch. Some tummy flattening exercises, like vacuum.... Pelvic floor exercise. Some facial exercises. That’s it, right? Right? 

Then I see this.

 7 Super Effective Yoga Poses for Beautiful Breasts

Mother ffff….OK, I should try and do them! Maybe, to use my time in a more efficient manner, I could combine the beautiful breast exercises with the stretching for overall body’s benefit yoga time I already have allocated above.

I hear you scream "enough already!' and cover your ears, but no, of course we have not finished yet. You must not forget about the brain! Last but not the least. The brain, as we get older, needs exercising just like any other muscle of our older body. It needs a program too. Like Lumosity. Probably another 30 minutes a day. Then, as we taken care of all the muscles- facial, vaginal, body and brain, it is time to think about the rest of it, deep inside. We need to take supplements. A lot of various supplements! Vitamin D3. Fish oil. Probiotics. Protein shakes, and CLA for weight loss.

Now, unless I am forgetting something-due to lack of brain exercise, which I simply don't have the time for- we are finally done. 

Oh, yes and drink more water.