Say Hello to Her: Our Cover for The Real Girls Guide to Midlife Is Here!

The midlife book I couldn’t find… so I wrote it myself!

I first had the idea for this book at 35.

Back then, everything was shifting–my body, my face, my sex life–my very sense of who I was and who I was becoming. It felt like someone had quietly swapped out my life and left me with no manual, no map, no warning label. I was married, juggling motherhood, building a career, and white‑knuckling my way through a season I didn’t even know how to name. I didn’t talk about it. I just powered through it the way so many of us do: silently, stubbornly, and completely overwhelmed.

Even in the chaos, I could feel something coming undone. The original book idea, “The Real Girls Guide to Over 35,” started in a red folder filled with outlines, half-written essays, Post-it note rants, beauty gripes, sex questions, and what-if reflections on my career and identity. It was a brain dump, yes… but also the beginning of something I was trying to shape. Something that might help me make sense of what I was feeling.

And maybe, just maybe, I wasn’t the only one struggling.

I didn’t know what it would become, only that I needed it. It was something to cling to while I was quietly unraveling - marriage, motherhood, caregiving, work, and every other role I was supposed to hold together. Then, like so many parts of me, the folder got buried.

And now, decades later, after I retired, I found that folder again.

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It Turns Out Midlife Isn’t a Moment, It’s a Whole Damn Mood

I opened that folder thinking maybe I’d get a laugh or two. What I got instead felt like a gut punch: I was just as lost now as I was back then. Only this time, it wasn’t about becoming a wife or a mother, it was about becoming myself… again.

Spoiler: I still had no manual.

Midlife isn’t one-size-fits-all. It’s not some clean line we all cross at 50 where everything suddenly clicks or collapses. It’s messy. It’s wide. And it shows up in waves.

For some of us, it starts in our 30s and 40s, with subtle shifts and quiet reckonings. For others, it crashes in post-menopause, after loss, after divorce, after everyone finally stops needing you. Sometimes it’s the changes you were craving. Sometimes it’s the ones you never saw coming.

This book - the Real Girls Guide to Midlife - is for all of it. For the women in the middle of the storm. For the ones still holding the umbrella. And for the ones who already made it through but are still asking, What now?

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So What Exactly is This Book?

Well, it’s my first book. And I didn’t write it as an expert… I wrote it as a woman who needed it.

It’s not a manual. Not a blueprint. And definitely not some glossy memoir with a tidy little bow.

The Real Girls Guide to Midlife is a battle cry in book form: a bold, funny, emotionally honest companion for every woman who’s done shrinking, second-guessing, or playing small.

It’s part love letter, part survival kit, part roadmap… and a full-throttle reframe of all the fears, myths, and WTAF-is-happening-now moments no one prepared us for.

Inside you’ll find:

• Personal essays that name the mess

• Expert insights that don’t patronize

• Real stories from real women… told with grit, wit, and zero shame

• Reframe prompts, permission slips, and a few middle-finger moments to help you rewrite the tired, wrong stories we’ve been handed

It’s not about fixing yourself. It’s about remembering who you are.

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What Makes it a “Real Girls Guide?”

This Real Girls Guide was never about doing midlife perfectly. This book’s about reclaiming what we were told to shrink–our stories, our space, and our right to feel it all (rage, joy, grief, and reinvention).

And this blog? It became a lifeline. Not because I had the answers, but because I wasn’t the only one asking the questions. It was my first real writing experiment, born from the need to say the things I didn’t hear anywhere else. And to name the things I was feeling and experiencing.

It was never just content, it was connection. And most importantly, it was never meant to be mine alone. It’s ours, built from real stories, real messes, and real women.

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The Book is the Companion, RGG55 is the Conversation

The Real Girls Guide to Midlife is the deeper dive. The reckoning. The reframe. It’s the book you dog-ear, cry on, write in, and pass to your best friend.

RGG55 is our home base. Our group chat with no filter, no script, just the real shit!

It’s the rough-draft beauty hacks, the hormone meltdowns, the whispered questions, and the rooftop-screamed truths. Why? Because none of us have it all figured out. And maybe that’s exactly the point. This is where we say the quiet parts out loud. Where what’s falling apart meets what’s finally clicking.

It’s not just a blog. It’s OUR community. The conversation. The real-time, no-filter, seat-at-the-table space we’ve made for each other.

The book is where we name what’s been missing. This? This is where we live it, together.

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YOU Made This Real!

This book wouldn’t exist without you.

To every woman who shared her story, every expert who offered wisdom, every RGG reader who messaged me mid-hot flash to say, “Same.”

Thank you. You carried me through this process with your honesty, your humor, and your real, unfiltered truth.

To the RGG55 crew: You are the reason this book doesn’t feel like a solo project. You’re the ones behind the check-ins, the polls, the inbox therapy, the belly laughs, the reminders that we don’t have to go through this alone.

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What’s Next

It’s hard to believe our cover is live: the REAL GIRLS GUIDE TO MIDLIFE is officially out in the world.

We’ve got lots of good things coming soon: giveaways, sneak peeks, RGG extras, and plenty of raw, messy, real life in the mix.

But more than anything, I hope this book and our blog reminds you—you’re not alone, you’re not behind, you’re not done.

And this? This is only the beginning.

We’ve earned every wrinkle. Might as well make more laugh lines together.
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