I Don't Miss Them

So I'm in a coffee shop yesterday, and the waitress asks me how I'm doing since my surgery? Before I could answer, the woman sitting two seats away says, "Oh, you just had surgery too? I just had a hysterectomy. What kind of surgery did you have?" I said, "the same."

Now mind you, I'm not particularly looking to trade war stories with a stranger. Also, based on listening to people talk, I'm convinced that half of everybody over 40, two-thirds of everybody over 50, and all of everybody over 60 has had this done... So, what up?

But I digress.

The woman two seats away... suddenly she wants to commiserate. She wants to discuss some the nastiest "side effects" she's having. Wants to compare notes. I don't.
To me it's personal and private, and I don't want to talk about this stuff. So, I nod now and then and try to keep my eyes trained on my newspaper.

Then she wants to talk about not being whole anymore, and feeling like less than a woman.

I have to tell you, I totally cannot relate to this.

Perhaps it's because I never had children, never wanted them in the first place. I don't know. But this woman was lamenting the loss of her reproductive organs so woefully, I really didn't know what to say. I mean, she kept asking me to agree with her about how horrible it is to be half a woman, unable to have babies, etc...
I could not. And I told her so.

What I said instead was, "Hey, the way I see it along with my reproductive organs went monthly periods, bloating, and cramping. Not to mention a cancer that was trying to kill me. So no. I don't miss those organs whatsoever."

Blunt, but effective!