There is a woman I keep thinking about. She is probably someone you know. In fact, she might be you. She wakes up tired, despite having been in bed for eight hours, and before she’s even properly awake, her phone is already pinging with emails, WhatsApp messages and reminders of everything she needs to do. The summer holidays are happening, the children need entertaining, somebody needs something from the shops, there’s a PE kit that needs packing and she’s trying to remember what is happening tomorrow. Somewhere amongst all of this, she’s also trying to run a business, manage a career or be the CEO sitting confidently in the boardroom.
Except she doesn’t feel quite so confident anymore. She has delivered that presentation countless times before, but this time she is questioning herself. The words don’t come quite as easily. She has forgotten something she would normally remember. She’s more anxious, more short- tempered and more emotional than she used to be. She’s exhausted, she’s not sleeping properly and she’s putting on weight despite feeling as though she hasn’t really changed what she’s doing. Eventually, she starts asking herself what the hell is happening to her. Is it stress? Is it burnout? Is it menopause?
And perhaps the answer is that we’re looking at this all wrong, because it doesn’t necessarily have to be one or the other.
Thank goodness menopause is finally being talked about. For years, women were expected to simply get on with it. Hot flushes were menopause, periods changing were menopause, and everything else was put down to being stressed, getting older, having children, having too much on or simply not looking after yourself properly. But the conversation has changed, and we’re finally recognising that hormonal change can affect far more than our menstrual cycle. Brain fog, anxiety, low mood, sleep problems, changes in concentration and memory, changes in body composition and a whole host of other symptoms can occur during the menopausal transition. The World Health Organization is now also looking specifically at the relationship between menopause, cognition and mental health, which tells us just how much the conversation around the brain and menopause is evolving.
But menopause doesn’t happen in isolation from the rest of a woman’s life. That is the bit I think we need to talk about much more.
Because a woman doesn’t suddenly stop being a mother, a business owner, a partner, a daughter, a friend, an employee, a boss or the person everybody else relies on just because her hormones are changing. She could be juggling the summer holidays while trying to start a new business. She could be trying to be the CEO in the boardroom while remembering the school run, packing the PE kit and trying to remember what is happening tomorrow. She could be dealing with a marriage that isn’t what it used to be, a relationship that is declining, or the reality of being alone. She could be worrying about job security because of AI technology, rising food costs, fuel costs, mortgages and whether her business is going to survive. Then add the relentless emails, the WhatsApp groups, the constant notifications and that feeling that everybody else seems to be keeping up with the Joneses while you’re desperately trying to keep your own life together.
So when a woman says she is exhausted, what are we actually talking about? Is it menopause? Is it stress? Is it burnout? Is it poor sleep? Is it everything that has happened over the last twenty, thirty or forty years catching up with her? Maybe it is all of it.
For years, our bodies have been adapting to everything we throw at them. The late nights, the stress, the rubbish food, the lack of movement, the children, the work, the relationships, the emotional stuff and the pressure to keep going. Then our hormones begin to fluctuate and eventually deplete. The buffers we may have had for years are changing, and perhaps the things we have previously been able to tolerate suddenly become much harder to tolerate.
The stresses from yesteryear that haven’t been dealt with are still there. The unexpressed emotions are still there. The things we never said, the grief, the resentment, the relationships that hurt us, the years of putting everybody else first and the constant feeling that we simply have to keep going don’t magically disappear because we have reached menopause. And then we add everything that is happening right now on top of it. Sometimes it feels as though the body has been saying, I’ve got this, I’ve got this, I’ve got this, for years, until eventually it says, actually, I haven’t got this anymore. Or, quite simply, just stop working.
Now, before anybody thinks I’m about to go down the anti-HRT route, I’m not. HRT absolutely has its place, and for many women it can make a huge difference. It is an important option within menopause care and something women should be able to discuss properly with an appropriate healthcare professional. But I personally prefer a more holistic approach as well, because I like to get to the root of the symptom rather than simply asking how we can make it disappear.
While hormones are changing, we can also look at how we are nourishing the body. We can include phytoestrogen- rich foods as part of a varied diet, make sure we’re getting the nutrients we need, consider supplements where there is a genuine need, look at magnesium, reduce things that contribute to inflammation, move our bodies in ways that support us, build muscle and preserve bone health, and change the way we eat and move as our bodies change. Expecting our bodies to respond exactly as they did when we were twenty- five doesn’t make sense when our physiology is no longer the same.
But it isn’t just about what we’re putting into our bodies. It is also about what we are carrying.
What about the stresses from yesteryear that haven’t been dealt with? What about the unexpressed emotions that have never had anywhere to go? What about the things we pushed down because there simply wasn’t time to deal with them? You couldn’t stop everything because you were struggling emotionally. The school run still needed doing. Dinner still needed making. The emails still needed answering. The business still needed running. Everybody else still needed you. So you kept going.
And this is why I believe we need some kind of basic underlying self- preservation ritual that we do consistently. I’m not talking about adding another twenty things to an already overflowing to- do list, and I’m certainly not saying you need to spend an hour in the gym every day. I’m talking about consistently doing the things that support the body and the mind: moving, nourishing yourself, sleeping, recovering, getting outside, making space for yourself and dealing with the things you know you need to deal with.
Because if we can’t look after ourselves, what hope have we really got of looking after everybody else?
We’ve all heard that you can’t pour from an empty cup, but I actually think there is another part to this. Sometimes your cup isn’t empty. It’s overflowing. Before you can start filling it with something new, you have to empty some of the things that are already in there. You have to empty the guilt, the resentment, the pressure, the things you no longer want, the expectations, the commitments that drain you and the constant need to please everybody. You can’t keep pouring into a full cup.
And whatever is in that cup doesn’t just stay with you. It spills into everything. The stress spills into your relationships. The anxiety spills onto your children. The exhaustion spills into your work. The short temper spills onto the people you love. Everything that cup touches gets a little bit of what’s going on inside your world.
But the beautiful thing is that it works the other way too. When you start putting contentment into that cup, peace, joy, connection, self- respect, movement and nourishment, that spills over as well. You start giving the people around you a different version of yourself. Not a perfect version, because I’m not interested in pretending life is perfect. But a version of you that is more present, more grounded and more able to deal with whatever life throws at you.
And this is where I think we can sometimes get the whole wellness conversation wrong. I’m not saying we should put on the happy Pollyanna dance and do the happy Pollyanna clap. I’m not saying we should pretend everything is wonderful when it isn’t. Sometimes life is so bloody hard. We have stresses. Things happen that we cannot control. People get sick. Relationships fail. Businesses struggle. Children have difficulties. People disappoint us. Life will always happen.
There is no point worrying or stressing about the things we can’t control, and there is no point moaning about them endlessly either. What we can work on is our response. For me, that’s the bounce- back factor. How quickly do we come back? How quickly do we find our feet again? How quickly can we return to ourselves? That, to me, is a true testament of a successful life. Not how much money we have in the bank, not how successful we look from the outside and not whether everybody thinks we’ve got our shit together, but how well we can navigate what life throws at us.
And this has become particularly real for me recently.
My ex partner and parent to our daughter is currently fighting for their life in hospital after open- heart surgery at just 43, having already had a stroke in their thirties. When someone you care about is fighting for their life, it changes your perspective. Suddenly the things we spend so much time worrying about don’t seem quite as important. We spend so much time building the career, building the business, building the house, building the bank account and building the future, but what are we building underneath all of that?
Because money means absolutely nothing if we haven’t got the health to accompany it.
And I’m not saying people somehow cause their own illnesses or that every health problem is the result of somebody not exercising enough or eating the wrong food. Life is far more complicated than that. There are things we cannot control, there are genetic factors, there are illnesses that appear without warning and there are circumstances that nobody could have predicted. But there are also things we can influence, and surely it makes sense to do what we can with the body we’ve been given.
Nourish it in a way that can sustain us rather than constantly putting things into it that make us feel worse. Move it. Strengthen it. Support our bones and muscles. Look after our cardiovascular health. Pay attention to the warning signs. Stop treating our bodies as though they are the enemy.
Because we should know by now that the endless cycle of dieting ourselves into misery doesn’t work. We put weight on, don’t like how we feel, go on a diet, restrict, lose some weight, can’t sustain it, eat normally again, put the weight back on and then start the cycle of self- loathing, stress and anxiety all over again. We need to stop asking how little we can eat and start asking how well we can nourish ourselves.
I don’t want women simply to live longer. I want women to live well for longer.
The UK has one of the highest life expectancies in the world, and women can expect to live into their eighties, but healthy life expectancy is considerably shorter. That difference matters. Because what is the point of having years ahead of us if we spend those years restricted by pain, poor health and things we can no longer do?
I don’t want to spend the last part of my life thinking, I wish I had. I want to travel. I want to dream. I want to move. I want to dance. I want to be able to lift my suitcase. I want to have adventures. I want to build things. I want to fall in love. I want to live.
And I want women to realise that at 50, you’ve not got one foot in the grave. You’ve got a bloody lot of life left to live.
It is never too late to start, and it is never too young to start either.
Show your children what self- love looks like. Let them see you move your body. Let them do it with you. Let them see you nourish yourself. Let them see you rest. Let them see you say no. Let them see you put yourself first.
Because putting yourself first isn’t selfish. It’s selfless.
You’re showing your children what it looks like to have a healthy body and a healthy life. You’re showing them that looking after yourself isn’t something you do when everything else is finally sorted, because everything else will never be finally sorted. There will always be another email, another school run, another bill, another problem and another reason to put yourself last.
So don’t.
There is no “Someday” Island. There isn’t some magical future day when everything will finally be sorted and you’ll suddenly have permission to start living. There is only now.
So don’t wait until you’re broken. Don’t wait until your body forces you to stop. Don’t wait until tomorrow. Nourish your body. Move it. Strengthen it. Rest it. Feel the feelings. Deal with the things you’ve been carrying. Ask for help. Set the boundary. Take the holiday. Start the business. Call the friend. Go for the walk. Lift the weights. Eat the food that makes you feel good.
And enjoy your life.
Because a healthy life starts with you.
Maybe the question isn’t whether it’s stress, burnout or menopause.
Maybe the real question is what your whole body, mind and life are trying to tell you —, and what you’re going to do about it.
Because your hormones matter. Your brain matters. Your physiology matters. Your psychology matters. Your physical body matters. Your emotional body matters. Your past matters. Your present matters. And the life you’re asking your body to carry matters.
Maybe menopause isn’t your body failing you.
Maybe it’s your body asking you to finally listen.
With love,
Zoë x
Women’s Transformation Architect
Creator of The HER Method™
