I've been playing tag with my weight again, and once again, I'm "it." Yes, sometime in the last few months, the five pounds I regularly do battle with for possession of my thighs has proclaimed yet another victory, and the scale and the fit of my shorts prove it.

At my age, I admit to being a little battle-weary in my Battle of the Bulge though, since we've been at war for 30 years now. I find myself wondering sometimes if there's any acceptable age (before one is actually dead) where letting oneself go to seed -- just a little bit -- is OK. You know, a slightly less defined waistline, or a pleasantly plumper face? Of course for women, going to seed is about much, much more than just our weight.

The dilemmas women face as they grow older are numerous. Do we allow our hair to go gray, and if so, when? Do we refuse interventions such as Botox or cosmetic surgery for our sagging faces? Can we manage to not feel bad about ourselves when we can't buy something cute we found in the Junior section of the clothing store because we realize it's just "too young" for us?

I know men have it tough as well. There is an increasingly rigid standard for fitness for all but the eldest of males in our society, and many men I know feel the confusion of being caught between the desire for physical fitness, versus the age-related problems that make fitness activities difficult.

My husband for example, has problems with heel spurs/plantar fascitis, which can make walking or running extremely painful. But his doctor tells him exercise is the best way to maintain cardiac fitness, lower cholesterol, and keep weight off.

Truly, we've never been more pressured to "play through the pain," even to the point of having surgery and replacing joints or other body parts when they resist cooperating with our personal fitness crusade. It's relentless, it's tough, and we're warned if we don't stay on the treadmill -- literally -- we'll pay with our lives, or at the very least, our health.

It's something I wrestle with. For the last couple of years, I've been power walking, three miles a day, four times a week. But within the last year, I began having pain from two old injuries, which kept getting re-kindled in those power-walking sessions.

The knee I injured in high school became swollen and developed a benign tumor on it. The hip I dislocated in my 20s became so painful that going from sitting to standing was agony, and even sleeping was uncomfortable. But I was fit. My B.M.I (Body Mass Index) was good, and the scale was where I wanted it to be.

My painful workout only changed once I saw not my own doctor, but my dog's veterinarian. She recommended my dog lose some weight, so I changed my workout in order to take her for a walk every day -- at her slower, more reasonable pace. I figured I'd do it until her weight stabilized.

The results? Good and bad. My dog lost weight, which was good. Both my knee and hip ceased being painful, which was really great. But the five pounds I'd been keeping at bay showed up once again, and now there's another five which are constantly trying to creep on, too. So my scale-watching days are far from over, if I want to continue fitting into my clothes. Bad, bad, bad.

And as I play another round of tag with the pounds, I wonder if there's ever going to be an acceptable age to stop fighting this slower-metabolism/aging process, and just relax and let myself glide into it, low-impact style.

It's a personal decision, to be sure. At some point, we all have to give in and "kiss the hag," even when that hag is the self we find in the mirror. Decay and aging are things we all spend the second half of our lives journeying into, and I'm not sure if resisting it like the plague makes those lives any better. Are we healthier if we fight it? Maybe. Are we happier? I doubt it.

There's no question that in some ways, our youth is hard to let go of. It's hard to give up the image we have of our younger physical selves, back when we could eat whatever we wanted, sleep soundly, and mold our bodies by pounding them into submission in the gym or on the running track without them complaining so much.

And while maintaining a weight and general fitness level that is good for our health is a wise thing, maybe the journey that begins in middle age, that of "going to seed," is a necessary and, one might argue, an inevitable one.

It's a journey we're all in the process of taking, and perhaps with a little moderation and gentleness (and even lower standards), we might make the voyage into old age a journey of self-acceptance and peace, rather than as grudging participants in a war with the very nature of life itself.

Diane Sayre is a freelance writer living in Hanford. Her column appears weekly in the Sentinel. Readers can write to her at The Hanford Sentinel, P.O. Box 9, Hanford, CA 93232.

(July 7, 2008)