Who's a Smelly Nelly, Darling? 😂

An All-New Game You Can Play With Your Bestie! Plus a Fantastic Ode to the Black Experience of Menopause, and Why We Need to Pay Extra Special Attention...

This week's newsletter is brought to you by our friends at Winona, doctor-prescribed menopause care for women, backed by science, and shipped directly to your door.

---

Fellow Empresses,

Happy Juneteenth! How the hell are you?

We have been working so hard on a series of posts to do with sexual well-being and there is SO much to cover, sometimes it takes us a minute to get things just right and in our signature voice… so pardon the delay.

Before we jump into this week’s post, we wanted to mark Juneteenth with this amazing ode to the Black experience of menopause from Empress Erykah Badu on https://blackdoctor.org.

---

“It can be a lonely place if we aren’t careful… let’s talk about the flowering of menopause… Blessed with The time when A QUEEN truly TAKES HER THROWN (throne)… Get your nutrients (mind, body & soul) Share your feelings and thoughts with people who love you.”

---

It is more critical than ever that we pay attention to our mental health during this time because as Ann Marie McQueen pointed out in her post this week, more and more of us are simply choosing not to be here—and that is indeed frightening.

We need you here...

And now this week, we also bring you a bit of sillier fare that gets back to our pragmatic roots—available as well on Scary Mommy. But below, please enjoy the NSFW unabridged version... 😂

I was in the car with my bestie, Merridy, when it hit. Something — someone — absolutely reeked.

I’d just showered. I discreetly sniffed my pits and got a hint of powdery scent. Still, the smell of musky-cheese-poop was enough to melt my glasses right off my face. It was the worst BO I’d ever experienced in my life, and I’d grown up with seriously stinky brothers who, to this day, still reek of filthy jockstraps and overcooked Brussels sprouts. This was much worse.

Merridy would totally tell me I stank if only to spare my dignity. I mean, we were housemates, best friends, divorced single moms, both equally perimenopausal with avalanching hormones and all the symptoms that come with: torrential night sweats, frequent brain fog, wild mood swings, and Chernobyl-like hot flashes. We were Grace & Frankie, minus four decades and all the vibrators.

But it had to be me, I thought. I was usually the smelly one. I did all the cooking. I was knee-deep in garlic half the time. I was always chopping shallots for some kooky marinade. Maybe there were still vestiges of raw meat under my fingernails from the previous night's sausage extravaganza? Merridy turned on the AC, which blasted stale warm air across both our faces, accentuating the BO to an even greater degree. Couldn’t she smell this? Surely she'd say something?

---

And so she had to smell what was going on here. It was a tiny car — the smallest Toyota Prius they made. Good God, I thought, am I getting BO-induced migraine from… myself? 😂

---

She’s British, also a screenwriter like me, with little-to-no filter, a total prerequisite for the job. A divorced mom of two who’d married youngish, the truth always comes out quite unvarnished from Merridy. So much so, that she’d once refused to kiss a Hinge date goodnight because she was pretty sure his lips had seen “more pussy than a toilet seat.” And she told him, so. (Yikes!) I’m the exact same way, with a similar marriage saga.

And so she had to smell what was going on here. It was a tiny car — the smallest Toyota Prius they made. Good God, I thought, am I getting BO-induced migraine from… myself? 😂

But what if wasn’t me? What if it was her?

I shifted in the passenger seat ever so slightly and gave a little sniff, my eyes watering amid the foul stench. You see, I’m the guilty type of person who, if something is wrong, always thinks, “Oh, it's gotta be me! It's gotta be me!” But it wasn’t me.

It was SO her. Lordy, she stank to high heaven. But I knew she used deodorant because we’d been grocery shopping together. So what had changed? I knew hormonal fluctuations, changes in sweat, and BO were totally common symptoms during perimenopause — was that what this WAS? I sat there frozen. Let me tell you, it's really awkward to turn to your bestie in the car and tell them that they are so incredibly stinky and that they have to stop using the totally accepted national brand antiperspirant beloved by so many other sporty role models because somehow their body chemistry just isn't jiving with it any longer.

Oh, God: But what if this was the perimenopausal brain fog, rather than the perimenopausal BO talking?

Never mind that we were on our way to a very public place where people would definitely be able to smell her from more than six feet away. I mean, should we turn the car around? We were halfway there. Should I just not say anything? And pretend that I wasn’t dying over here in the passenger seat? Or should we make an emergency pit (heh) stop at a drug store en route for something “clinical”? My mind reeled!

I knew I had to be a true friend and say something.

“Do you smell that?” I said, quizzically, gently sniffing at the air above me, although I was about to choke and die. (Ahem, hello Oscar?) “Is it me, or is it the car? I smell something terrible...”

We proceeded in the grand theater of smelling ourselves, the car, and each other, at which point I told the truth. But she’d already noticed the smell, it turned out: “Fucking hell, Alisa, here I was, thinking ‘Who’s this blob of poo who’s sludged her way into my vehicle?” And we both guffawed until our eyes watered.

We walked into the drugstore, bought travel samples of several different varieties, and proceeded to test them with each other over the next week, with me as the resident pit sniffer. Every day, she’d apply a new product — we’d both do a super sweaty HIIT workout and then do a sniff test and rate said product on a scale of 1-10 for stink, dryness, and stain. Talk about friendship! Still, when it comes to perimenopause, this is just something that happens to so many women, as we discovered in an absolutely horrifying fashion.

Day after day, it was, “Nope, still smelly!” We finally found one that really actually worked to stop her intense perimenopausal stink: Degree Ultraclear Dry Spray and it didn't stain clothes, white or black, or leave any yellow stains on white clothing afterward. Shockingly this was the least expensive option at $6 and also lasted 72 hours. When they say this, they actually mean it.

The only unfortunate thing is I’m pretty sure you can’t travel with it because it qualifies as a low-level aerosol. Check with your airline. They do make a solid version for $4, but it doesn't seem to work as well as the spray. Just saying.

OK, that’s the skinny on Smelly Nellys.

A reminder… people are loving the Wise AF (and a goddamn delight) T-shirt that Ann Marie and I launched last week. Vivian left this note: “Awesome! I’m ordering now... for me, my daughter & my daughter-in-law!”

Please send pics if you get one. I’m still waiting for mine to arrive!

Again, we will have more EMPRESS goodness in our upcoming series on vaginal & sexual well-being. You won’t want to miss it. There are some fabulous advances to discuss. Until then. Remember… you are wise AF!

Yours in Grandeur,

p.s. If you are so inclined, follow us on IG for flash content & upcoming giveaways. We’re at https://www.instagram.com/the.empress.age/ and we’d love to see you there!

---

*As an Amazon Associate, The Empress may earn from certain purchases, at no cost to you.

---

---