40s panic: The crazy antics of men facing midlife crisis

A senior manager at a local media house last week set tongues wagging after his nudes leaked on social media.

In the pictures the man, believed to be in his forties, is seen naked in a bathtub with two pretty young girls playing in water and bathing.

The images went viral, sparking debate on midlife crisis, with people, especially women, sharing some of the annoying antics they witness with men who are undergoing midlife crisis.

Turns out the media manager is not alone. A number of prominent Kenyans are undergoing a similar psychological crisis.

The political landscape, for instance, is littered with politicians who suffer this transition of identity and self-confidence, so much so that they have dyed their hairs pitch-black to look youthful.

Some are so desperate to look youthful they have gone heavy on jewellery as other chase small girls and boys for romance.

All these observations were made against the backdrop of a distraught female reader having sent this magazine’s agony aunt a long and detailed mail, asking for advice on the same about her man.

The woman was at a loss on why her 44-year-old husband had all of a sudden began behaving strangely.

First, she wrote, he sold the family car late last year, claiming he wanted to upgrade, only to buy a blue Subaru with a noisy exhaust pipe.

“He is forever on Facebook and Twitter and when asked, he jokes that everyone nowadays is digital and he doesn’t want to be left behind,” her mail read in part.

Social media obsession

She went on to complain about his recent fascination with newspaper obituary pages, drinking and making careless decisions about money, especially on buying latest mobile phones and other electronic gadgets and gambling, particularly on sports.

“While in the house he never puts down his phone,” she wrote.

What’s more, as if to catch up with what slipped past him in his youth, he, she wrote, has a tattoo on his arm and prefers to walk with his vest, showing it off.

He has also become very boyish in as far as his language and behaviour are concerned.

She wrote in part: “How do you understand and explain a man who, all of a sudden, speaks sheng, has now become a gym freak and has increasingly gotten bothered so much by his looks, that he now regularly dyes his hair and trims his moustache and side burns?”

Suspecting that this could be a common problem many men are facing, this writer picked up the matter and discovered there is more to it than meets the eye.

Fascination for small girls

There is a simple explanation as to why your previously faithful-to-a-fault husband has suddenly taken a liking to nubile young college students.

No, it is not your double chin, cellulite and stretch marks that is making him flirt immodestly with women 20 years his junior.

Neither is it your perpetual nagging. In fact, it has absolutely nothing to do with you at all.

If his extramarital relations with pretty young women coincides with his hitting the big four-O, he might be going through a midlife crisis.

A midlife crisis is a period of personal emotional turmoil and coping challenges that some people experience when they reach their forties, accompanied by a desire for change in their lives, brought on by fears and anxieties about growing older.

Experts, however, say it is common, more pronounced and even lasts longer (almost a decade) in men than in women. So ladies, what that means in a nut shell is that your man is likely to wake up one day and realise he is not getting any younger and things like hair loss, retirement and death are a looming reality.

Confronted with this revelation, he convinces himself that jumping into bed with a younger woman will bring back his youthfulness and slow down the aging process.

The 40s jinx

Ken Ouko, a sociologist and lecturer at the University of Nairobi, explains the phenomena:

“Midlife crisis is a stereotypic reference to the rudderless behaviour most men engage in after they hit forty. The new vogue is to refer to it as ‘midlife transition’. Forty has always been a uniquely significant referential number. Jesus Christ spent 40 harrowing days in the desert; a thief supposedly has 40 incidental days before he is busted; Noah built the famed Ark in 40 years just as the Tower of Babel reportedly took 40 days to construct. But most interesting of all, it is said that for men, life begins at 40. It is the transition into the 40s that causes existential panic in most men.”

His penchant for blossoming bombshells is not the only thing you have to worry about either.

A man who is experiencing midlife crisis is apt to make dramatic changes in his personal style or appearance.

In an effort to recapture his dwindling youth, he might start dressing like a teenager.

We are talking about sagging trousers, ripped jeans, t-shirts emblazoned with boyish literature, cap tilted at a rakish angle, singlets perhaps to show off muscles, boots and a snapback bag sloped sideways for maximum effect.

His choice of jewelery will no longer be limited to a watch and his wedding ring. He could start rocking chunky rings and gold chains on his hairy chest.

In addition to that, do not be surprised if he starts spending more time in front of the mirror.

He could become more conscious of his appearance and start using products like hair dyes to tackle those pesky gray hairs. He might also become obsessed with working out.

Another prime symptom of a midlife crisis is an impulse to spend money on extravagant man toys like top of the range motorbikes and sports cars. These actions are indicative of your man’s sudden desire to live life to its fullest. He will become the embodiment of ‘YOLO’ (you only live once).

He will do whatever it takes to make up for all the things he let slip by in his youth. He might make rash decisions like quitting his job, getting a tattoo or going on a vacation to a place he has always dreamed of.

Rather than acting like a middle-aged man with responsibilities, he reverts back to being like a teenager without a care in the world.

Even seemingly accomplished men are not spared from the depressing transition of a midlife crisis. They start to wonder if that is all there is to life.

“In psychology, midlife crisis unfolds when grown men who have now become economically empowered suddenly acquire the feeling that they missed out on some stage of recreational behaviour and hence regress so as to fish out and maximise on the benefits of that stage. This explains those lumbering men who selectively keep the company of teenage beauties considered recreational trophies symbolic of what they may have missed out on in their youthful prime,” Ouko explains.

Handling the transition

There are other men who deal with a midlife crisis by falling into destructive behaviors like alcohol or drug abuse, gambling or porn.

A midlife crisis is not the worst thing in the world. Most women are usually at a loss on what to do when their men start exhibiting signs of a midlife crisis.

While things like affairs and drug and alcohol abuse can be hard to get through, the other stuff can be easily weathered. There is nothing inherently wrong with your man wanting to cut down a few pounds or purchase a new car (as long as he is not running you into debts).

Ouko offers some advice on how to handle this transition. “The women in the lives of men experiencing midlife transition can best support them by simply never prickling their consciences about their newly acquired age status. Women possess the capacity to buoy or deflate men in equal proportion. A sister, a girlfriend or a female colleague all wield the ability to shore up or deconstruct a man’s ego. At their elemental best, such women ought to use their famed early maturity to help these men navigate through the forties,” he says.

You are advised not to overreact. You won’t achieve anything by berating him. Instead try joining him in his new-found passions once in awhile. Go shopping with him.

Ride along on his motorbike and take an impromptu vacation with him. Encourage him take up healthy pursuits like running a marathon or learning a new hobby, it is advised.

It is going to be tough to watch and put up with your husband’s child-like behaviour but the good news is that midlife angst generally doesn’t last more than a decade.