The Positives of Menopause

The journey through menopause and the empty nest phase isn't just about navigating physical changes—it's an invitation to reconnect with your emotional landscape after decades of putting others first.

Many of us have spent years running on fumes, managing our families and responsibilities while neglecting our own emotional wellbeing. When this season of life arrives with its whirlwind of changes, it often feels overwhelming—like being suddenly thrust from a peaceful stream into rushing rapids. But what if we viewed this transition differently? What if, instead of resisting the current, we learned to float downstream and discover what the river of life wants to show us next?

During this vulnerable exploration, I share the difference between activities that genuinely nurture us versus those that merely numb our discomfort. Whether it's compulsive reading (my personal escape), endless Netflix scrolling, or even excessive cleaning, we all have ways we avoid emotional discomfort. The alternative is finding practices that gently open our emotional doorways—like the Pilates, breathwork, and pelvic floor work that helps center me when anxiety strikes. These practices allow emotions to surface naturally, without forcing or judging what emerges.

Drawing wisdom from Christiane Northrup's pioneering work connecting our body's physical sensations to our emotional patterns, I offer a simple yet profound practice: becoming the compassionate witness to yourself. By placing a hand where tension lives in your body and observing without the pressure to fix anything, you activate your body's innate healing wisdom. This isn't about being your own isolated healer—it's about recognizing you're part of something larger, connected to divine support that flows through your perfectly designed physical form.

What if you're 50 and have 30-40 more vibrant years ahead? That's not just possible—it's probable. While it's natural to grieve what's changing, can you also be present with who you are becoming? The river hasn't ended—it's simply changed course. Float with it awhile and see where it takes you.

We want to hear from you! Reach out to us on socials or at [e-mail] to share how our conversations are landing with you! xo-Melynda and Jennifer

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hey friends, welcome to the Empty Nest class.
Today I, melinda, am here bymyself and as Jennifer and I are
wrapping up this season, withher finishing out the school
year and just you know all thebusyness of the season where
we're, you know, pinging backand forth by ourselves on here

(00:25):
sometimes.
So just bear with us as we getthrough spring.
But today I wanted to talk toy'all.
We've talked so much aboutmenopause lately and a lot of
the physical components and howto address what's going on in
our bodies, and it's soimportant to really honor and

(00:48):
treat our bodies with therespect and the care that we
need and we deserve, because, aswe know or, if you don't know,
because you've been just runningon fumes for so long as a mom
and in all your roles that youwear so well it is so important

(01:10):
for us to honor our bodies, ourspirits, our emotions, our minds
, like it all matters, and so Ijust wanted to give some
attention today to our emotionalhealth and that this.
If you have not had the chanceto give it attention in your
life, now is the time, becauseyou may feel like this feeling

(01:36):
of emptiness or midlife orperimenopause is overwhelming,
because it's inviting so muchchange that it feels like whoa.
This is like you were, you know, kind of floating down a stream
and now you're whooshing overthe rapids, but y'all, it's
really an invitation for us totake the time to do that more

(02:02):
introspective work withourselves, and you don't have to
do a deep dive and go somewherescary to do that.
I think we hear emotions andwe're like whoa.
That sounds overwhelming.
You can approach this so manydifferent ways.
I just want to give you acouple today and keep it short,
but just to get you thinkingabout this is actually an

(02:24):
opportunity.
So if you think about life andit being like a river that is
flowing, that the stream, youknow it just wants to carry us
forward and this is anopportunity for us to rest back
and let the flow of life carryus and work with the flow of
life instead of resisting it somuch and trying to like buy time

(02:47):
we don't have.
You know we've spent so muchtime like busy and running that
it's going to feel strange toslow down.
It's like when you step off thetreadmill and you feel like
you're still moving.
You might have a little seasonwhere it feels like that.
Just give yourself time dothings that feel really

(03:08):
nurturing.
So I know sometimes we numb outand do the things that aren't
nurturing but that just sort ofbuy us time, like maybe we, you
know, get in our bed.
And I mean one of the things Ido is I just I read, and I know
reading can sound reallypositive but I read like
ferociously, like it becomeslike my addiction, like I read

(03:29):
to escape and, um, I know, forsome people it's like Netflix
series.
Uh, you might just do kind ofthe doom scrolling.
It can be so many things.
Maybe you compulsively clean,um, so I don't know what yours
is, but that's not terrible.
But we just need to be awarethat when we do that we might

(03:51):
get in a pattern.
We need to pull ourselves out.
So what are things that areactually nurturing Like for me?
I love to get in here in mystudio.
I've been doing Pilates thismorning, doing some breath work,
doing some pelvic floor work.
I'm finding that that is justreally opening up my energy and
helping like emotions come tothe surface.

(04:11):
So whatever you decide to dothat is nurturing for you will
open up some of these emotionalwalls and soften them.
So this morning nothing felthard or too challenging for me,
if that makes sense.
It just felt good.
It felt like, oh, here I am,just like a little bit more of

(04:32):
me.
Oh, here I am, okay, like Ijust feel more settled, I feel
more centered.
The anxious feelings I hadyesterday are not here right now
, okay, so that's what I'msaying.
Like you can just invite it inwith your intention, with the
leaning in to these littlethings that just feel good.
And the more you come back tothose, the more you'll find

(04:53):
yourself just sort of unwrappingslowly at the pace that your
body wants to go, these, youknow, emotional layers.
You might be at a big precipice.
You might be like Melinda, it'snot going to be that easy for
me.
I feel like the dam's going tobreak.
If you feel like you're readyfor the dam to break, sometimes

(05:13):
we have those moments too.
Sometimes we need the big boommoment, you know.
So if you're in a place and youcan feel that coming, how can
you let it happen so that youfeel safe in that?
Do you need to network and finda counselor?

(05:35):
Do you need to find, maybe, agroup to join, like a women's
circle?
Maybe it's just getting in amore true self-care routine
where you're walking with afriend.
I know one of my friends.

(05:55):
When she got a divorce shejoined a hiking group on, I
believe, facebook and met somany new friends and I think
maybe that's how she met hercurrent husband many new friends
and I think maybe that's howshe met her current husband.
So there are just ways that wecan ease ourselves out there to
support us, whether it is forthis big whoosh that we can feel

(06:17):
coming big emotional change,big, big stir and like kind of
shake up the snow globe feeling,or if it's just subtle and kind
of within the scope of littleday to day.
Does that make sense?
Okay, so I?

(06:38):
Um, there is this really oldbook If you're on YouTube I'm
holding it up it's called thewisdom of menopause.
I mean, I think she publishedthis, I don't know, and I mean
y'all, I read this.
I've started reading ChristianeNorthrup's books when I was in
my 30s.
I was just fascinated by hermind body wisdom.

(06:59):
She originally yeah, it waspublished in 2001.
And then again in 2006, to tellyou just how long she's been
talking about the things thatare now surging all over the
internet.
But one of the things is shetalks about identifying your
emotions in your body, and Ilove this because this whole
chapter is called coming home toyourself and it is really tying

(07:21):
in the chakras, which is likean energy system that I learned
through yoga.
But if you're like I don't likethat word, melinda, that's fine
.
The chakras totally line upwith our endocrine system.
Your endocrine system is yourhormone regulation throughout

(07:41):
your body, which is veryconnected to how our nervous
system is regulated, veryconnected to how our nervous
system is regulated, which givesus all these sensations of
anxiety and, you know,heightened awareness, fight,
flight, freeze, fawn, all thatstuff.
And so our endocrine system isso important and in different

(08:01):
components of it live in thesedifferent like areas of our body
.
So if you think about coming upyour body from base to top,
there are all these differentenergy centers, or you can call
them endocrine centers, and theymove from your root, so from
the base of your trunk, all theway up to the top of your head

(08:25):
and actually, in some traditionsand in some lineages, actually
above our head and below ourroot, to connect us to earth and
then to connect us, you know,to the heavens.
So, but as far as our endocrinesystem goes, we, you know we
have.
You hear people talk about youradrenal gland, your pituitary

(08:45):
gland, your thyroid, your whatelse?
I'm not naming them all, butthey're throughout and they all
send certain information up anddown the system and so, anyway,
so she is using some of thatwisdom, along with her medical

(09:08):
training, to talk aboutidentifying your emotions.
And yeah, I could go on aboutthis forever, but she is
addressing, like, some of thework that I love to do is just
like being the witness toyourself.
So, instead of judging and liketrying to fix and over

(09:28):
complicate, um, like a plan foryou to fix yourself, and if you,
if you start observing thisstuff and you go straight into
what I need to do is, no, no, no, just relax, sit back, like,
think about like when you watcha child play, like, think about
like a mom sitting on a bench onthe playground, just sitting

(09:51):
back and watching, notinterfering, even if, like, a
kid comes and, you know, startstalking to your kid, you don't
need to go figure it out.
You see your kid likestruggling with the monkey bars.
You don't need to go figure itout.
So you're just witnessing andobserving, without all of the

(10:13):
swooping in and messing up theprocess.
But one thing she talks about indoing this is in this mode of
awareness that you can tune intoyour bodily sensations, and
this is so much of my yogatherapy training.
That is about us stoppinggetting into our bodies,

(10:36):
noticing the body sensationswe're having, just being present
to them.
If you always have tightness inyour chest, just sit and
breathe with your hand on yourchest and let your awareness
just really not shine thespotlight like I'm here to watch
you and judge you.
Just let the warmth of the sunlike, imagine like a ray of

(11:01):
light shining on it in a way oflike warming it, like when
you're sitting in the sun, andjust let yourself witness that
part of yourself and you canjust invite the presence of God
at your side, your angels.
Maybe you have a loved onethat's passed and you're like,
oh, I would love to feel younear me right now.

(11:24):
Maybe you just want to sitoutside so you can hear the
birds when you do this, but youknow you just sit and let
yourself be with that part ofyourself.
You can choose just a number ofbreaths.
You can just sit until youstart feeling distracted and you
can just drop your hand andtake a breath and let it go.

(11:47):
But the more we just acknowledgethere's no fixing, there's no
fixing.
Just start to acknowledge andyou may see that like oh gosh,
day after day I have thistension in the same exact spot
and it's always when I startworrying about the bills or I
start worrying about my kids ormoney or whatever it is that's

(12:07):
coming up for you.
And if you just trust and I sayif you just trust that sounds
like oh, so easy.
But if we can relax back andtrust this wisdom that comes
through, we are part of ourhealing.
Some people don't like to hearsomeone say I am my own healer,

(12:31):
because that sounds very, verylike I take care of me.
I am an island, because thatsounds very, very like I take
care of me.
I am an island.
But the sentiment behind thatmost of the time is that we are
truly divinely created.
These bodies we are in are sucha gift.
They are kind of our maincontrol system in this life,

(12:56):
because without this body we donot have this life.
So even when we're trying todial up our emotional
intelligence and maybe getcontrol of or understand more
about our emotional patterns andreactions, it's going to be so
helpful if we can get into ourbodies.
And then, as we get into ourbodies and we start witnessing

(13:17):
and we start noticing how thingsshow up in our bodies, we gain
more access to your angels andyour ancestors and your if you
are comfortable with the wordspirit, guides or guardian

(13:43):
angels.
Like all of the, we're allworking on a small scale.
It is simply just presentawareness, letting your hands on
your heart or your seat on theground connect you into your
body so that you can feel youremotions All right.

(14:04):
So that's it for today, y'all.
I just want to highlight to usthat it is a gift that we are
still here, that we are stillliving and breathing, that we
might have so much life ahead ofus, even though we feel like

(14:27):
we're looking in the rearviewmirror and so much life has
passed us by.
What if?
What if you're 50 years old andyou have 30 or 40 more years
ahead of you?
What if?
That's a long time?
There is so much richness andgoodness ahead, and so maybe it

(14:52):
takes a little time for you togrieve that you're changing,
because with change comes alittle bit of grief that we can
talk about that another time.
But can you also just be presentwith who you are now, the
emotions that are coming up, thesensations that are coming up,
the feelings and the tightplaces in your body that might

(15:13):
be trying to nudge you in thenew direction that the river of
life wants to help you flowtoward?
And sometimes my favorite thingto do to get myself tapped into
this is I truly just close myeyes and do a meditation where I
imagine myself floating onwhatever feels the most fun,

(15:34):
whether it's a giant unicornfloat or just a raft.
Maybe I imagine myself sittingin a little boat, I don't know,
but just let myself floatdownstream and feel the presence
of all that is good, of allthat is good.

(15:56):
And so let me know if you tryany of this, let me know your
resistance to this, yourquestions, your yes, your no.
I want to hear.
Have a great week.