The best way to tell if someone is going through a midlife crisis is to wait and see if she reverts to the person you thought she was before she began to “act strange.” Then keep waiting and checking in every few years—or let it go already and accept that permanent changes have occurred.
Maybe her blinders finally came off and she saw the truth about everything one day. Maybe she finally figured out who she is and decided to stop listening to other people force-feed her a negative self-image. Perhaps she found faith, and you don’t understand it because you really don’t believe in it.
Or hell, maybe you’re 100 percent right, and she is having a decade-long midlife crisis. So what?
You can’t control another person or beat her into her former self or your idea of her former self. You just can’t. You can try with everything you have in you, but you will only push her farther away than she already is.
What is a midlife crisis anyway other than a term someone made up to explain why some people do things differently when they grow older? Or maybe “midlife crisis” is a term used to insult someone who has changed, and it’s similar to calling someone crazy or mentally ill when she stops kissing behinds and jumping through hoops. Either way, it’s subjective. It’s one of those things you can choose to believe about another human being if want, but that doesn’t make it true.
Some people are comfortable staying stagnant emotionally, environmentally, and psychologically. Other people go ahead and take that huge risk to head toward health and happiness, no matter how rough the road is. Don’t be one of the crabs in the bucket trying to pull down the one trying to climb out. You can stay in the bucket forever if you like, but leave the other crab alone and let her go.
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