On the record, she’s forty-something and that’s all the age information you need.
She’s a mother of a high school senior daughter (Olivia), a wife to husband Dennis for 23 years, and she’s been an educator and marketing specialist for The Linsly School since 2004.
And, as of last week, Stacey Creely’s reinvented blog – Find Yourself After 40 – launched, so now she’s an author and a digital publisher of a website concentrating on the mysteries of womanhood.
“It’s been a work in progress for the last few years, that’s for sure, but it’s coming together and I really like the website now. Plus, I’m always open to new ideas,” Creely explained. “The blog won’t just be about me and my experiences, but once I hit 40, it’s been a daily learning lesson as far as eating and exercising the right ways.
The Creelys - Dennis, Olivia, and Stacey - are very active in the Wheeling community.1“I really want the website to be about me AND other women because I want them to share their stories of success and struggles,” she explained. “A work in progress is definitely what it is, and I can’t wait to see where it goes and what it becomes.”
Creely hopes for interaction with her readers so it adds to the content, and her topics will range from meal preparation to the power of disconnecting.
“I think ladies who want to be the best version of themselves will enjoy the content on the website, and that’s because it’ll be about nutrition while eating healthy as a family, and it’ll be about so much more,” she explained. “Life becomes a rat race and it’s hard to slow down sometimes, so that’s when it becomes even more important to take care of what you’re eating.
“I feel like I can relate to my audience because as women, no matter what we’re interested in or what our passions are, I do believe most women my age are juggling many, many different things and responsibilities,” Creely shared. “We’re juggling work. We’re juggling families. We’re juggling aging parents. We’re juggling extracurricular activities for our kids. We’re juggling wanting to volunteer in the community and be involved in our community or in our church.”
The solution?
“I’ll write about losing time for ourselves and how we can get it back,” she said. “And I’ll help the readers realize it’s never too late to reinvent themselves and try something new.”
The Boxes of Life
Some call it the American Dream.
Education. Love. Prosperity. And then the Golden Years.
But at what cost? There’s the chase, the hard work, and the ups and the downs, but where’s the “Me Time”?
“I think the biggest thing I’ve learned in my 40s is that you get to the point in your life where you stop caring about what others think,” Creely said with a chuckle. “There are those boxes to check – go to high school, go to college, get married and have a family, and earn a career, and I am grateful for all of it. But you kind of lose a piece of yourself along the way.
“When I turned 40, the fact I wasn’t going to get any younger hit me, so I decided I was going to start doing something that I really enjoy and that is writing,” she said. “I love to write, I love fashion and makeup and all of those things, so now I’m going to share my experience and hope people offer theirs, too, so more women can find that confidence.”
But, see, there’s a trick to it. Creely is going to share her experiences on her new blog, sure, but that means she’ll need to continue experiencing her busy life as a wife, mother, and professional. So, that’s why a specific publishing schedule won’t be available anytime soon.
“I don’t have a writing schedule made up for myself, and to be honest, I’m going to be less worried about being perfect in my blogs and more concerned about providing valuable content that the readers will enjoy. So, to begin, I’ll try to have a blog a week,” Creely revealed. “It might be my favorite recipe for that week or maybe a new beauty find. I should warn the readers … I really like Amazon.
“Or it could just be something about aging as a woman because that never stops,” she said. “I’m still a mom and a wife and I have a lot of responsibilities at Linsly, too, so it’s going to be a lot of fun for me to write about all of that when I find the time.”
So far, “Stacey C.” has written about how to eat healthier after splurging on vacation, eyelash strategy, and even about considering friend groups to add support during these changing times.
“I try to pick the topics that most ladies over 40 discuss a lot,” she said. “Hopefully, I can get enough people involved so we can start figuring out some of the mysteries involved with this aging thing.”
