Maria Bello Revealed How She Turned Her Midlife Crisis Into a 'Gift'

Maria Bello made a big comeback this year swift her Emmy-nominated role in Netflix’s Beef, but many fans are probably wondering where the heck she the last few years was since she was off the Hollywood radar. It wasn’t COVID-19 that forced her to take a break from acting at the start of the pandemic in 2020, it was menopause. 

The 56-year-old star revealed that her journey with menopause was brutal. “I never meant to take a pause, but the pause took me first,” she explained to People. “I started menopause at the beginning of COVID, and two years into it I felt like I was just going to die.” It was a full-on midlife crisis for her that resulted in her needing to take a step back from everything by pausing her “my social media, traveling, some work” to focus on self-care. She moved with her now-wife, Dominique Crenn, to Paris and reassessed her entire life.

It was the best decision Bello could have ever made for herself in this season of life. “I realized a crisis is actually a gift to us at midlife, to take a step back, to reevaluate,” she added. “So I went back on social media to talk about my findings. I feel more peace than I’ve ever had.” She turned the narrative around on words like “midlife crisis” and “menopause” because she has been taught that “these phrases denoted this horrible time in your life.” 

Bello is now sharing her wisdom with her followers in her return to Instagram with her experiences with “bioidentical hormones” and a brief trial with Ozempic. And she’s also trying to reframe how the beauty industry has marketed their anti-aging products. 

“The sort of running to stop the aging process, to try this and the machines and the cellulite creams and the diets and the this and the that? You suddenly realize wherever you go, there you are. You take yourself with you wherever you go,” she pointed out. “Just because my skin looks a little tighter at that midlife point — when I was really down, disillusioned, and depressed inside — it didn’t help a thing.”

Sharing her journey has given her a newfound sense of “confidence, more humility and more gratitude.” Bello wants to remind everyone who has “crossed over into the second half” of life to know that it’s just as “extraordinary” as the first half. So, soak it all in!

Before you go, click here to see all the celebrity women who have spoken out about ageism.