By Sukie de la Croix

It’s March and this week Mid-Life Crisis celebrates Women’s History Month by taking a look at some of the women I’ve admired and been influenced by over the years. Here’s my list of the Top Ten Most Influential Women In My Own Personal Herstory, what they taught me and how they’ve been a catalyst for change in my life:

No. 1) Ruth Handler, the creator of the Barbie Doll, gave me a body shape that I could aspire to and work towards—a dream, if you will. She also steered me towards a pink glittery lifestyle and Ken, a gay boyfriend with a winning smile and no genitals whatsoever, thus cutting down on my chances of contracting herpes, etc. Sad to say my dream turned into a nightmare when I failed to cinch my waist to half an inch and I suffered from guilt-ridden bouts of bulimia, anorexia, and attempted suicides, until I discovered…

No. 2) Ruth Wakefield who, in 1930, created the recipe for Choc-Chip Cookies, the delicious comestible that comforted me through the many lonely nights I spent trying, but failing, to live up to the Barbie dream.

No. 3) The great Susie Orbach, author of “Fat is a Feminist Issue,” a book that taught me that I don’t have to conform to the Barbie ideal of beauty and that it’s OK if I look in the mirror and see a fat bloated walrus looking back at me. …Goo goo g’ joob. I learned how to love my gross morbidly obese self.

No. 4) Brownie Wise for inventing the Tupperware Party. Wise taught me that I don’t have to leave the house to go shopping for rubberized containers, giving me more time to stay home all day lying on the sofa pigging-out on White Chocolate Kit Kats and reading about anorexic celebrities in magazines.

No. 5) Josephine Cochran invented the dishwasher just for me—I used to wash all my dishes by hand but thanks to Ms. Cochran I now have more time to lie on the sofa shoveling down Hershey’s Kissables and Dark Chocolate M&M’s while watching Oprah shows with titles like “Inside Every Fat Person There’s a Thin Person Eating a Bag of Cheetos.”

No. 6) Marion Donovan made my life a whole lot easier when she designed the disposable diaper which enables me to lie on the sofa all day pigging-out and soiling myself without having the bother of dragging my corpulent carcass into the bathroom.

No. 7) Julie Newmar was not only Catwoman but also an inventor, as she patented her own design for ultra-sheer, ultra-snug pantyhose, which I wear with Ms. Donovan’s diaper as I pose seductively on the sofa like a pissing and pooping hippopotamus perched on a pincushion.

No. 8) New York socialite Mary Phelps Jacob invented the first modern brassiere to receive a patent, which I wear to complete my sofa ensemble with Ms. Donovan’s diaper and Ms. Newmar’s ultra-snug pantyhose.

No. 9) Catherine Deiner invented the rolling pin so that I would have something to beat over the head of any motherfucker who says I’m not pretty, or that I’m “too fat,” or that I’ve “let myself go.”

No. 10) The wonderful Lizzie Borden taught me you can get away with murder if you’ve got a pretty face. Which goes some way toward explaining why all my exes are packed into oil drums and buried in the Mojave Desert.

Email Sukie de la Croix at delacroix@chicagofreepress.com.