Reflections Inspired by My Husband’s Face
My husband and I are the same age. Well… almost. I’m about six months older.
For the longest time, I sincerely believed I looked great—until a tiny, unexpected moment shattered that illusion. A friend of mine, right around the time my husband officially became “a full year younger” than me on paper, casually asked how old he was.
When she heard the answer, she nodded and said she’d guessed as much—that he seemed younger. Aaaand just like that, I spent the next week in a mild depression.
I mean… seriously? I had been so sure no one would guess I was even forty, and suddenly I’m the one who looks older than my (at the time) forty-one-year-old husband?
I was baffled. What was giving me away? It wasn’t wrinkles—I don’t have the ones he does (and there are plenty!). My jawline is far more defined than his. He is already significantly gray; I don’t even color my hair because I genuinely like my natural shade.
So clearly it wasn’t about wrinkles.
It had to be something else.
But what?
I couldn’t figure it out then. But my rose-colored glasses fell off, and for the first time I really saw myself without filters. That moment kicked off my whole journey into natural rejuvenation methods.
I tried different systems, got really into exercises, and started believing in their results—especially after my daughter passed along a comment from her boyfriend:
“Your mom looks so young. It’s insane!”
(That one carried me for weeks.)
Then came the ultimate compliment—from my chronically oblivious husband. One evening, over a glass of wine as we celebrated our 22nd wedding anniversary, he unexpectedly said he’d noticed my face changing lately… in a very good way.
And yet… he does no exercises at all.
He puts in exactly zero effort, and still, people sometimes awkwardly avert their eyes when they see him with our daughter—and then genuinely look shocked to find out she is not his secret younger girlfriend. He just doesn’t look his age.
Only now am I starting to understand why. I think the secret lies in how he relates to life—and to aging.
My husband just doesn’t care that he’s “already in his…” whatever. Meanwhile, my own constant concern practically writes itself right onto my forehead.
He lives by the rule “do it and forget it.” I, on the other hand, can stress myself out just trying to decide where to even begin with the mountain of tasks in front of me.
He doesn’t lecture the kids, doesn’t obsess about whether everyone has eaten, or whether someone might leave the house hungry. His attitude is always, “We’ll grab something later.”
He approaches life lightly and deals with problems as they arrive—not by pre-planning all possible scenarios the way I do. That’s why his face is always relaxed, always ready to smile… while I only look like that after a sauna or a round of exercises.
Honestly, if you could mix his personality with my dedication to daily practice, we’d probably both look twenty. But as it stands—he skips the exercises, and I stress myself into a frown over absolutely anything.
Well… identifying the problem is already half the solution. I’ll keep working on myself. And who knows—maybe one day my husband will join me. Maybe someone will casually tell him how unbelievably young his wife looks…
The original Russian version of this article was published on July 30, 2019.
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