Fifty, Unfiltered: An Interview

I turned fifty yesterday.

I have spent this entire week writing about the versions of me who got here, which sounds very reflective and evolved until you realize I still lose my phone while I’m talking on it and apparently cannot remember to eat lunch if I’m working on something interesting.

So instead of another essay about what fifty means, I decided to interview the woman who actually made it here.

Thirty questions. No polished answers. Some serious. Some ridiculous. A little sex. A little God. A chupacabra. Seven children. One boob-job confession. And apparently a limited number of fucks remaining.

Here we go.

1. What about 50-year-old you would absolutely scandalize 20-year-old you?

Seven children.

Holy shit.

Twenty-year-old me was perfectly fine with the one child I already had and the second one who was coming. Seven? Absolutely not. She would have been horrified.

There are probably several other things I’ve done that would horrify her too, but we’ll save those for another story.

2. What would 16-year-old René think was incredibly cool about you, and what would disappoint her?

She would think it was incredibly cool that I actually became a writer. She’d love that I’ve written books, been on Lifetime television, built the kind of work I have and created this life.

She would be severely disappointed that I still don’t own a ranch.

Sixteen-year-old me had plans involving Montana, preferably somewhere around Seeley Lake or Missoula, a big piece of land and horses.

She’s still waiting.

3. What version of yourself do you sometimes miss?

Single René in her thirties was pretty fucking fun.

I don’t want the eleven boyfriends back. Dear God, no. I don’t want the drama, schedule or emotional circus either.

I miss some of her carefreeness. She went to concerts, plays, symphonies and art events constantly. She had adventures. I’m still deeply artsy, and I haven’t given that part of myself nearly enough attention lately.

4. What did you spend years trying to fix that you’ve realized may not need fixing?

My boobs.

There. I said it.

I spent years wanting a boob job because I thought they were too small. I don’t believe in unnecessary surgery or putting fake shit in my body, though, so apparently we’re all staying together. They’re also not saggy, so there’s that.

The real answer is my personality.

I’ve spent years adjusting myself to environments and people, trying to become whatever version of me would be understood, supported, liked or loved. The truth is, I’m a whole bag of tricks. I love wildly different things and see the world through multiple lenses. My personality reflects that.

Maybe I’m not supposed to be easier to categorize.

5. Which version of yourself deserves your biggest apology?

The woman who went through my darkest two years.

I was losing my mother. My children were going through difficult things. Trauma had piled onto trauma. I entered what I can only describe as a dark night of the soul.

Most people probably didn’t know how bad it was because I hid it well.

I also hid myself.

I hated that woman. I felt shame and disgust toward her. I punished her for struggling until my body started carrying what my mind and heart couldn’t anymore.

I would apologize for the cruelty.

She needed tenderness from me. I gave her judgment.

6. What’s a decision you defended before admitting it was a terrible fucking idea?

A relationship.

Specifically, my second domestic union.

There were opportunities to leave earlier, and I didn’t take them. I defended that relationship to my children because I couldn’t yet see what they could see.

I should have gotten out much sooner.

7. What’s something you once called love that you wouldn’t today?

Love bombing.

This one gets complicated because I’ve taught love languages for years, and I still think they’re useful.

I also know they can gaslight the shit out of you.

A manipulative person can learn exactly how you receive love and use that information beautifully. Flowers aren’t character. Words of affirmation aren’t integrity. Gifts aren’t trustworthiness. Physical affection isn’t emotional safety.

Learning someone’s love language is beautiful.

Who is speaking it matters.

8. Who do you miss even though you don’t want them back?

Nobody.

That probably sounds cold, but I’ve never been particularly good at missing people.

I miss moments. A feeling. An experience. I’ll remember something and think, God, that was good.

There are people I once missed desperately whom I don’t miss anymore. Some relationships ended painfully. Others simply completed themselves as our lives moved apart.

I’m grateful they existed.

I don’t need them returned.

9. What apology did you deserve that you finally accepted may never come?

An apology from the father of my youngest two children for the physical violence that shattered my world and my body eight years ago.

I don’t believe I’ll ever receive it.

For a long time, some part of my healing remained entangled with wanting him to acknowledge what happened. This year I’ve worked intentionally on forgiveness without requiring someone else to own their shit first.

I’m probably 65 or 70 percent there.

I’ll take it.

Something has shifted. I react differently. The triggers don’t own as much territory. Our children benefit from that too.

Maybe forgiveness isn’t saying what happened was okay.

Maybe sometimes it’s deciding I no longer need the person who hurt me to participate in setting me free.

10. What do you know about sex at fifty that you wish women knew at twenty?

First: it’s your sex too.

Your pleasure matters. You don’t have to perform for him. You don’t have to fake anything.

I also wish we’d stop confusing sexual self-abandonment with female empowerment. Having sex you don’t actually want, giving access to your body because you need validation, or collecting partners while calling yourself liberated isn’t automatically empowerment. Sometimes trauma learns feminist vocabulary.

And sex is supposed to be fun.

It’s adult play. It’s sensual, ridiculous, intimate and pleasurable. It’s also one of the closest ways we ever encounter another human being.

I don’t want something that intimate treated like fast food.

11. What’s sexier at fifty? What’s less sexy?

Slow sex.

Kissing. Touching. Sensuality. Anticipation. Taking your fucking time.

I’ve always liked those things. Now I value them even more.

What’s incredibly unsexy? A partner who can’t be bothered with foreplay or doesn’t care whether the other person’s body, emotions and nervous system have actually arrived at sex with them.

12. After marriage, divorce, nonmonogamy, multiple partners and monogamous love, what makes a relationship last?

Alignment.

Your values need to work together. Your lives have to be blendable. Sexual compatibility matters. Emotional safety is mandatory. Money needs honest conversations. You have to remain deeply intimate beyond surface-level communication.

Never stop courting each other.

Go on dates. Travel. Buy the flowers. Bring home the stupid little thing because it reminded you of them. Play together. Laugh. Be ridiculous.

Polarity matters to me too. I value masculine leadership that protects and covers without controlling or dominating, and a relationship where a woman has enough safety to soften without disappearing.

Most importantly, love is a choice we keep making.

Staying together while being miserable isn’t my definition of a successful relationship.

13. What does Craig give you that younger René didn’t know she needed?

Leadership.

14. What have your children had to forgive you for?

Being a young, dumb mom with anxiety, fear and childhood trauma I didn’t even have language for yet.

They’ve each had to forgive my mistakes in their own ways.

And there were plenty.

15. What do you hope your children someday understand about you?

How strong my faith actually is.

They each have their own interpretation of Mom’s faith, and understandably so. Mine doesn’t fit particularly neatly into anybody’s box.

I hope they eventually understand how deeply I trust God.

I also don’t know if they’ll ever fully comprehend how deeply I love them. Maybe no child completely can.

16. If your seven children were the only evidence you existed, what would you hope they said?

Mom was there.

She was our cheerleader, support and refuge. She told us the truth even when it wasn’t what we wanted to hear. She was trustworthy. She had our backs.

She loved people.

We didn’t always understand the way she saw the world, and we certainly didn’t always agree with her.

But we knew she loved us.

17. What have you been angriest with God about?

My grandson’s heart.

He needed a heart transplant when he was two.

People talk about transplants as though they’re a fix. They’re not. They’re another chance, accompanied by uncertainty that never completely leaves.

I see what my daughter carries. I see what my son-in-law carries. I see my grandson and his little sister, and there is still a place inside me that asks God why my daughter has to live with that kind of courage required of her every single day.

I’m still working on that one.

18. Weirdest spiritual experience?

Oh, Jesus.

Around ten years ago, at about two in the morning, I was driving down a dark road when my headlights landed on something crossing in front of me.

Catlike black body. Roughly mountain-lion size. Very short hair. Bobcat-ish tail.

Doglike head.

It stopped in front of my car and looked directly at me.

I stopped too.

My highly spiritual response was:

What the fuck is that?

Then it casually crossed the other lane, stepped onto the sidewalk and disappeared into the woods.

Every curious cell in my body wanted to follow it.

Fortunately, my 138 IQ apparently clocked in for work that evening, and I remained inside the car.

Later I started researching strange creatures, including the chupacabra, and found images disturbingly similar to what I saw.

Was it an animal? Something spiritual? My imagination? Something that wandered in from another realm?

No fucking clue.

I do know the following decade contained enough bizarre darkness that I’m perfectly comfortable leaving the question open.

I also have ghost stories.

Those are going in future books.

19. If God would answer ONE question tonight, what would you ask?

Are we really in the end times?

And are some of the dreams and visions I’ve had about them true?

Yes, technically that’s two questions.

I’m fifty. Let me have this.

20. What does your mother know now that you wish she could tell you?

I imagine my mother, wherever she is within the great divine consciousness of God, looking at me and saying:

Stop worrying.

Just stop.

God is good. Life is good. Quit letting fear convince you otherwise.

And that means something coming from the woman I imagine saying it.

My mother lived through war, concentration camps, being bombed out as a little girl, rape, violence, abusive relationships, scarcity and terrible anxiety.

I think from wherever she sees life now, she’d tell me we’re all spending far too much time being terrified.

21. Would you take your 25-year-old body back if your 25-year-old mind came with it?

Hell no.

I’m not that damn far from my 25-year-old body anyway.

I’ve got some pounds I’d like gone and a baby pooch we’re currently negotiating with.

But take my twenty-five-year-old mind too?

Absolutely fucking not.

I worked too hard for what I know now.

22. If your body filed a complaint against you, what would allegation number one be?

She forgets about us.

I’ll sacrifice sleep. Forget to eat. Skip sunshine. Work too long. Put off fun.

Then I’ll put on lipstick, perfume, shave my legs and somehow convince myself that counts as self-care.

My body would have a case.

23. What’s the stupidest thing you believed about wealth?

That money would make me happy.

I’ve had seasons of significant financial security. I’ve made money. Lost money. Built things.

Money is a tool.

It can create choices, solve real problems and allow enormous generosity. I like money. I intend to make more of it.

I just stopped asking it to do a job it can’t do.

Happiness lives much closer to God, purpose, ourselves and the people we love.

24. What work would you continue doing if you never made another dollar?

Writing.

I have to write.

I also have to serve people somehow. There have been seasons when I’ve worked with fewer people, but the need to contribute never disappears.

I genuinely love my work.

25. What do you do that would annoy the shit out of you if Craig did it?

I don’t know.

Which probably means Craig should answer this question.

That could get dangerous.

26. What’s the warning label on 50-year-old René?

LOVE, LIGHT & A LIMITED NUMBER OF FUCKS LEFT.

USE WISELY.

Perfect.

No edits.

27. When were you loneliest while technically not alone?

Thirty.

I had a husband, five children and extended family around me.

I was deeply depressed, incredibly lost and profoundly lonely.

You can have a house full of people and still feel like no one can find you.

28. What are you surprised you still haven’t figured out?

Myself.

After all this work.

After all these books.

After all these years studying humans.

Still me.

Apparently this project has no estimated completion date.

29. If you knew you’d live to 100, what would you stop rushing?

I don’t know that I’d stop much more.

I’ve already spent the last few years deliberately building systems that let me rush less.

But I’d travel more.

Always travel more.

Travel is a love language for me. Actually, it’s probably a soul language. It fixes a surprising amount of shit.

And I’d stay longer. Less rushing through places. More actually living inside them for a while.

30. After everything you’ve lived, lost, loved, fucked up, survived, built, questioned, forgiven and become… are you happy to be René?

Extremely.

I’m happy to be this René, and I’m grateful for every season of her that came before.

Some were beautiful. Some were fucking disasters. Every one brought something with her — growth, lessons, blessings, scars, people, stories, wisdom, questions.

Without those women, this woman doesn’t exist.

I don’t need to go backward and retrieve any of them. I don’t need to hate them either.

They got me here.

And after fifty years of getting to know this woman, losing her, finding her, questioning her, fighting with her, forgiving her and finally learning how to love her, I can say something I don’t know that every version of me could have said:

I am really fucking happy to be René.

And I cannot wait to see who she becomes next.

I’ve got fifty more years in mind.

I think I’ll dance through these.

→Thirty questions. Thirty very unfiltered answers.

Some made me laugh. Some surprised me. A few took me places I wasn’t expecting to go at all.

So now I want to turn it back to you:

Pick ONE question from this interview and answer it in the comments.

Don’t overthink it. Don’t make it pretty. Give me the answer you’d actually say if we were sitting across from each other with a drink and no audience.

And if you’re somewhere near 50 — or already on the other side of it — I’d especially love to know:

Are you happy to be the person you’ve become?

As always loving and praying for you and our world,

Rene Schooler

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This post was previously published on medium.com.