Why I am Ageless

As of December 2010, the time of this writing, I am 31 years old - but when you look at me, you're inclined to estimate my age to be in the early 20s. This has been true for my entire life. When I was sixteen, I looked like I was ten. When I was in college, I looked like I was 15 or 16. Throughout my twenties, people always estimated my age to be six to eight years younger than I actually was. I have extremely clear, fair skin, with very few visible signs of aging. What is my secret? Some people jokingly say, "Whatever it is you're doing, keep doing it, because it's working!" Sometimes I jokingly tell people that the reason why I look so young is because I've already attained immortality and I am a Taoist immortal and I will never age. I'm only partially joking!The truth is a very intense story about the most traumatic event of my life, the impacts of which will be felt in my body for the rest of my life. At the age of 16, I received oophorectomy surgery in which both of my ovaries were removed - due to the fact that there were malignant tumors in both of my ovaries. Prior to my surgery, at the age of 16, I still looked like I was ten and I had not experienced any of the normal tell tale signs of adolescence. I was sixteen and had never had a period, never had any pubic hair or armpit hair, never a zit, and my breasts had never grown. My endocrinologist surmised that I had 'gonadal disgenesis' - an extremely rare case where my body was genetically pre-disposed to not launch the production of my sexual maturity, due to low or no levels of hormones in my body. The running theory has been that my body was not flooded with the appropriate hormones from my endocrine system - progesterone and estrogen - to begin all the secondary sexual growths, such as periods and breasts. Instead, when I was 16, we did a bone density scan of my body and discovered much to my doctor's and family's horror that my bones had stopped growing when I hit ten years old.The years immediately after, I took premarin, a pharmaceutical estrogen replacement pill for women who have hit menopause.. Because, at the age of 16, I had already hit "menopause" - completely bypassing a life of menstrual cycles. Finally at the age of 17, I began to exhibit all the normal secondary sexual characteristics; breasts, pubic hair, armpit hair, and even finally a zit! Until one day when I was 21, one of my dear friends suggested I look into the background of premarin. Due to her encouragement, I discovered that premarin is a genetically engineered hormone that was extracted from female horse urine, and it contains several other hormones that don't exist for female humans, and that there have been cases of menopausal women getting breast cancer from taking premarin. So, I stopped taking it cold turkey.The rest of the last ten years have been a very intimate and confusing story of trying to figure out how to self-medicate my hormonal levels, and doing a lousy job at it, so that I can have bone density health, vitality and higher levels of sexual energy. I have been working with bio-identical hormone creams, I've been working intermittently with a jade egg practice (http://www.thedesiletsmethod.com), have studied and practiced Tantra, have worked with private trainers and pilates instructors and exercise, and ultimately came to believe in traditional shamanic healing as the answer, combined with a Chinese Medicine / taoist approach. But I am far from having dialed in a disciplined regimen that would balance my endocrine system. And regardless of how much I have changed emotionally and energetically, how much I have changed in terms of location and vocation, how much I have changed in terms of my hair length or my clothes - I remain looking eternally young. And I have to wonder if I will ever, truly age?I am curious to know if I will still look extremely young when I'm 40 and 50 and 60. I have no doubt that I will bypass much of the aging process that most of my friends and peers will undergo. I'm extremely excited to know what I will be like when I'm 80 years old. My ultimate goal in life, in terms of longevity, is to cultivate the proper ability to age well according to the Taoist Immortal Sage techniques; combining herbs, diet, sexual cultivation, qigong, & breathwork, in order to have long life and vitality well into my elder years.Regardless of these potential techniques for longevity and long term vitality, I have reached a point in my life of wanting maturity, of wanting to look more my age, of wanting to age. Most people want to remain looking young forever, and it's a mixed blessing that many feign jealousy of. Yes, while I have no menstrual cycle, and while it is completely impossible for me to get pregnant, I do want to become mature and not remain stuck in youthfulness forever. Mostly because my youthfulness feels almost like I'm stuck in a permanent state of adolescence and not growing up, both physically and in terms of my life path. I feel that attaining maturity is one of the purposes of life; to ripen and bear fruit. Youthfulness is a developmental phase, and maturity to me means that one has evolved to a place of refinement and wisdom - integrated with one's purpose. I have long admired white hair and wrinkles as a sign of the beauty of elders & wisdom, and I do look forward to that time in my life.It has become clear to me that it is the endocrine system, which is governed by hormones, which tell the body's systems and organs what to do, and trigger long term evolution - is what ages us humans. When we reach a certain age, our hormones kick in and we move from being a child to being an adolescent and our bodies transform dramatically. This is completely governed by the endocrine system, which uses hormones to initiate action. To me, this explains why men seem to age more dramatically and more rapidly than most women, because the masculine hormones - such as testosterone - overwork and over-stress the endocrine system and the body more rapidly than the relatively more gentle hormones that women are flooded with. I feel that I am proof that it is hormones that age us humans, for with my diminished hormonal levels, an endocrine system that functions undoubtedly different than for most women, I visually appear nowhere near my age of 31 - and more than likely will continue to look young for many years. Thus, I would jokingly argue that if you want to keep your skin young and look young well into your aging years, have an oophorectomy!There's another interesting level to the endocrine system that intuitively made sense when I first began to study the endocrine system, even on a superficial level - which is that the endocrine glands correspond with the Chakra system. An endocrine gland exists literally in every region that a Chakra is said to exist. The pituitary gland sits in the center of our brain, in front of which sits the pineal gland which is said to be the physical home of the third eye and contains DMT. In our throat is housed the thyroid gland. Behind our ribcage, near our heart, is the thymus gland. The adrenal gland sits on top of the kidneys. And the gonads - our sexual organs - sit both higher and more internally and lower and more externally. Thus it seems ot me that each of the 7 chakras is embodied by an endocrine gland, which to me intuitively means that they are connected - that the endocrine system is the physical interface for each of the chakras - that the spiritual energy body interfaces with the physical body in some kind of meta-physical manner to organize our physical bodies as determined by our Chakras which when in alignment expresses clear life force energy and vitality.So, my realization recently is that endocrine health necessitates the health of the spiritual energy body, which necessitates techniques like Kundalini Yoga, QiGong, Breathwork or Vocal Alchemy for working with that internal energy body cultivation and alignment. But it is important to not get solely stuck on the energy body awakening and cultivation - total spiritual focus of the energy body can lead to being out of balance and wholeness. There also needs to be a manner in which the energetic cultivation practices are brought into balance with other necessary practices, such as Tantric sexuality, creative empowerment, developing family and community, physical exercise, service to others and healthy nourishing food for total holistic health and longevity.Obviously, with such a big and holistic picture for each person's total wholeness, health and balance - every one of us ends up getting lopsided, focused in only one region and slacking off in one or many areas because it's too much work and very overwhelming to try to manage all these aspects. In our culture, and many cultures around the world, the first area of integration to be knocked off the needs for wholeness was sexuality - and that was especially true in cultures where the focus was on enslavement and the workaholic program. But our sexuality is the very basis of our physical bodies, our sexuality sits at the base of our chakra alignment system, and our sexuality is essentially the foundation upon which our entire internal energy body rests. And sexuality is very much a crucial aspect of the endocrine / chakra system, without it we are unable to be fully embodied. And as a young woman robbed of her ovaries, I can honestly say - nothing else has ever been as traumatic to my body and forced permanent healing.So, while it may be lovely to look forever young, and never have to worry about getting pregnant - I tell you that my body is not whole and I am not completely integrated and I'm doing my best to be patient with this life long issue.