August 27, 2025 • 53 mins
Bloody hell, perimenopause is a ride. I sat down with Karen Stein, ex-Deloitte partner turned leadership coach and menopause-at-work trailblazer, and we got real about the chaos, confusion, and silence that surrounds this stage of life. We talked about my own messy journey through HRT, testosterone, fatigue, and re-finding my 'sense of self,' and Karen dropped insights on why workplaces need to wake up to what their midlife women are going through. From the 48 symptoms no one talks about, to the Senate inquiry that revealed doctors only get one hour of menopause training, to why men need to be in this conversation too... this chat is equal parts eye-opening, practical, and validating. If you’ve ever thought you were losing your mind, burning out, or just being 'a bitch' for no reason… maybe, just maybe, it’s ya hormones, sister!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
She said, it's now never I got fighting in my blood.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
I'm tiff.
Speaker 3 (00:10):
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(00:33):
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reach out to Mark and the team at www dot
test Artfamilylawyers dot com dot au. Karen Stein, welcome to
(00:53):
Roll with the punches.
Speaker 4 (00:55):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Great to be here, a great to have you, great
to have another fel Hello lassie who has in no
uncertain terms, I'm sure rolled with the punches that I've
recently been rolling with, and fortunately people like you are
helping women figure out how the hell we get through
this turbulent little part of our lives that we call
(01:18):
peri menopause and menopause.
Speaker 5 (01:20):
It's so good to be talking about it because there's
such an absence of understanding for so many that the
more we can talk about it gush, the healthier it
will be for everyone. So thank you glad you bring
up the topic.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
It astounds me. It astounds me as someone who has
access to so many brilliant minds and conversations through this
medium here in podcast, and I've had quite a few
in the past before I stumbled into this blindly into
this phase, I've had a few conversations on menopause and
(01:55):
perimenopause and getting ready for it. But still, I found
myself in a space where by the time I decided,
h I think this is it. I think this is
the situation I'm in, I'd been in it for two
years and that astounds me, and so I'm really open
about sharing about it. And the reason being is the
(02:17):
moment you do, I feel like everyone around me is going, oh,
hell oh, how do you like? They're coming to me
like I'm the expert.
Speaker 4 (02:25):
I'm like, I'm not. I'm not the expert.
Speaker 3 (02:28):
I'm just trying to figure it out, but no one
knows where to turn or how to get good information.
Speaker 5 (02:36):
I think what you said is really interesting because the well, actually,
let me go back a step only about fifty percent
of women and some non binary and transcendent persons have
actually heard of perimenopause. So when you talked about it
took you about two years to work it out, that
doesn't surprise me so much. And also because of the
(02:56):
vast number of symptoms that we can have, So there's
something like auty eight reported symptoms that come along with perimetopause.
What a pleasure that on their own they can feel
just like other health issues. But when you start actually
putting it all together and look at the correlation of
the symptoms and what else is happening, and where I'm
up to in my life, and what's my menstrual cycle
(03:18):
like and all of these different things, then we can
start to work out, well, what's going on for me,
and you know, start to get some other advice around us,
whether it's from general medical practitioners or specialists through otherwise.
So it's interesting you say that I also had a
kind of a long journey through understanding. I didn't know
what perimetopause was until I was in it, and it
was I was, you know, having a vast number of
(03:40):
symptoms and questioning what the hell was going on. So
that's really what started to entertain my mind as to well,
if I'm thinking this, and I coach a large number
of women, and I didn't have a lot of people
talking about it, and I thought this was really strange.
There's a lot of silence, and that started to want, well,
introduce me to me exploring, well, let's find out more
(04:01):
and then we can help others open up the conversation.
So I'm glad you actually raised the time frame, because
it's not like you just go and have one simple
test and you go, yeah, okay, I've been diagnosed and
now I know where I'm at. There's actually quite a
progressive build up of information to help you understand what's happening.
And then what do I do in order to be
(04:22):
of support to me? How do I advocate for support?
Who do I need to turn to, What are the
things I could possibly do in support of my well being?
Speaker 4 (04:30):
Those kind of things.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
He's so bang on with that. And what's interesting is
I a year ago went to have the went and
saw a doctor, specifically, finding one who who had worked
with pair of menopause and menopause, went and saw her
to talk about hormones and explore this because I'd been
(04:53):
am I just burnt out? Is this LONGTI and burnout?
Is this more related burnout? Am I overtraining? Is this cycle?
Is there a psychological element because I'm doing a lot
of work on my psychological well being and I'm bringing
stuff up and I'm working to things. So there was
all these layers, and a year and a bit ago
I went to explore the HRT route and have some
(05:16):
tests and I started and very quickly paused that journey
because I had to have some breast scans and things.
And in the pausing of it, I just went, I'm
just before I jumped straight back into this, I'm just
going to tick a few other boxes. I'm just gonna
get my sleeps or to do some things. Next minute,
I'm a year down the track. I've restarted the HRT.
(05:38):
And then at that point when I went in to
get another prescription, I raised Testosteronecause in the meantime, I've
had a lot of conversations with people on this show
and others about testosterone in women and realizing that a
lot of symptoms that go with loan testosterone were symptoms
I was experiencing and lo and behold, we test I'm low.
(06:01):
But yeah, so there was an additional year of Oh,
this could be it, and then I know, maybe it's not,
and then waiting and then still going. I was perplexed
at why when she initially tested my hormones in relation
to this thing, knowing the symptoms I'd told her I'm experiencing,
she didn't choose to testosterone at that time.
Speaker 5 (06:23):
Yes, and with due respect, the available information through the
medical system is low, and most doctors through their training
we found out through the Senate inquiry in Australia into menopause,
it was confirmed that they only typically have one hour
of training on menopause through their medical degrees, and so
(06:43):
there are a few specialists in menopause, and as much
as they might be approachable and open to it or
maybe not, it's about finding the right person and bringing
more and more information towards them. So there has been
some work that's being done to try and better inform
doctors and nurses and others as to how they can
support women going through this stage. But we've got a
(07:05):
long way to go. And in addition to that, every
woman's experience is unique. So as much as you you know,
referencing other people and finding out where you're at and others.
I think that's the interesting thing about menopause is it's
so unique and we all have different symptoms. In fact, symptomatically,
twenty percent of women will have no symptoms at all,
(07:27):
which is just really fortunate for them. But eighty percent
of women will experience symptoms. And of the eighty percent,
sixty percent will find them bothersome, so you know, they're
not able to thrive through their life. That might be
irksome in terms of their functioning, how they feel, how
they think. And the last twenty percent for them is
really life changing, so they really aren't functioning. They might
(07:48):
find that they're needing hospital treatment, or they're bed ridden
or otherwise. And if we look predominantly at that sixty
percent of women who were in that area of bothersome,
everyone's to have different symptoms, different combinations, different experience, different
environmental cues that are also impacting them. So in the
systems that they form a part, whether it's within their workplace,
(08:10):
or whether it's within their home life or the relationships,
or where they're living, or even from cultural nuances, there's
a whole range of different elements that impact on our
own experience. So it's a really fascinating conversation to have,
and it's not one that you can kind of pick
up and go here, let me reflect back to you
to show you what you're likely to experience because this
was my experience, or even that of your mom. If
(08:32):
you were to speak to your mom, just because your
mom had certain experience doesn't mean that you know it's
going to roll down to be what your experience will be.
When you were mentioning the doctors, just this week, I
had one somebody reach out to me and say she
had some conversations with the doctor, and they were brilliant
(08:53):
because they said, you know what, I'm really new to
this area.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
I don't know a lot. You've given me some good
information to follow. Let's walk through this together. So really
open about their information, which was nice. Just before getting
home half an hour ago, I've got a message from
someone talking about why the hell, Like they've gone to
see a doctor. They'd like to ask about hormonal tests
and setosterone and they've just been completely cut off and said, well,
(09:19):
we don't do that with women. They haven't tested, they
haven't looked into it, but they've just gone that's not
something we do. And I'm like, oh, man, it's so hard, yeah,
because people are going, well, who do I see?
Speaker 5 (09:31):
Yeah, And that's where it's the relationships you have. So
I do a lot of work of managing menopause in
the workplace, so helping organizations to normalize the conversation. And
the reason why the workplace is important is that where
you'll find lots of women and so if you're trying
to get the messages out as to what to do,
the more they then can start to socially connect and
(09:52):
build their sense of relatedness with others by being in conversation,
the more they share information. I do a lot of
group coaching in this space and you'd be surprised how
many women saying, oh, where are you located? You know,
do you have someone who's you said? Your doctor is
really good? What's their name? And so it's kind of
a word of mouth thing as well. And then there's
a number of people who have quite high profiles who
(10:14):
can also help you identify groups of practitioners who are
in different locations across Australian and also through the Australian
Menopause Society, they've got a really good listing which shows
people who have an interest in this area. So if
someone doesn't know where to start, you know, if your
friends can't help you and your colleagues aren't talking about it,
that might be a good place to go to The
Australian Menopause Society's website. Australasian is Australasian. I always confuse myself.
(10:40):
There's my menopause brain like playing up for me.
Speaker 3 (10:44):
I love that that is it's such beneficial information that
the one thing I really encourage people, you know, when
I do share what I share is you know, I'm
just highlighting be as informed as you can. Get an
idea of what you need to ask for, then go
and ask for it, like make your decisions. But like
(11:05):
it's such a mix of fine as best information you
can and then you are just an experiment in yourself
because the information is so sporadic out there that it's
really there's no yes or no answer, and like you
just described my symptoms aren't your symptoms, so we can't
even go off that.
Speaker 5 (11:26):
I love what you said just then about it's the
experiment because I in the background, you'll see a book
that I've written, be your own leadership coach, and in
that it's trying to support people with self coaching so
they can be their best selves and they can have
strategies and practices that they can draw upon. And in
order to self coach, it's necessary to build up your
(11:47):
level of consciousness and awareness of what's happening for you.
So building your self awareness and part of that is
noticing what's happening, identifying what's helping or what's hindering, but
then also conducting some small experiments, just as you said,
and then from that further reflection to see, well did
that take me further or did you know, have I
maintained the status quo or did it actually pull me
(12:07):
back somewhat.
Speaker 4 (12:08):
So experimentation is.
Speaker 5 (12:10):
Really important in a controlled way, and that might be actually,
you know, experimenting with how I work. If I'm incurring
lots of sleepless nights, maybe from night sweats or muscle
aggs or muscle cramps, it can really impact how you
feel and how you function, and so maybe my energy
stores in the morning aren't great, and so maybe to
(12:31):
support myself in the workplace, I might conduct some small
experiments to see, well, do I what energy do I
need to do certain types of work? And how can
I alter what I do, what level of autonomy might
I have in my work to make some choices about
when I do what across the day when I have meetings,
when I might be coaching my team, when I might
(12:52):
be writing you up reports or doing research or whatever
it is, or going through emails, and we all get
plenty of those, SOERA could involve all to support myself
when I'm in quite a fatigue state.
Speaker 4 (13:03):
What could I do? Is there room if I'm working
from home to take.
Speaker 5 (13:06):
A nap for twenty minutes? And that can really make
a difference to you. Because sleep is so fundamental to
our brain health, to our body health. I think we
underplay the importance of sleep, and that can really help
our view of life, our view towards finding solutions to
the problems we have. And if we look at perimenopause
as just being a stage of life and what I
(13:28):
need to make adjustments for, as opposed to I'm doomed
and this is terrible and woe is me. It might
not always be pleasant, but it doesn't mean that we
can't try and find more positive ways to approach it.
And that's where I think that experimentation that you refer
to can be really really helpful because we can socialize
that with people to say, well, what are you doing
about that? Oh, great idea. I might try that myself
(13:50):
for the next two weeks and see how it helps.
So I'm glad you mentioned that.
Speaker 3 (13:54):
Yeah, I was thinking before, and I don't know if
this is a question or an invitation for observain, but
this idea, I don't know the stats. I don't know
if there's I don't know if perimenopause is more prevalent,
more intense now, or it's just more we're more aware
of it. But I think about lifestyle and how you know,
(14:15):
working women, and just independence and stress and active minds,
social media, everything that pulls at our attention slash, our
stress system, our nervous system twenty four to seven now
means that as hormonal shifts occur, perhaps this lifestyle we
live is exacerbating them as well. So I think, you know,
(14:39):
because I think about all the questions that I needed
to tick off personally as an athlete. At that time,
it was like, oh, okay, so I'd had a recent
ADHD diagnosis. I'd spend a little bit of time tinkering
with stimulant medication, understanding how that felt with my nervous system,
then questioning well, is this some of these fatigue and
(15:01):
brain fog? Is it because I've because I've played with
that and put something into my nervous system that's disrupted it?
Speaker 4 (15:08):
Is it?
Speaker 3 (15:08):
Like I said, I had all of these questions about
how I did life, which was fine as a youth,
but as you know, while I'm rocketing into my forties,
the body is like, no, mate, you're not going to
have a full time or sometimes it feels like a
double full time because I just love what I do
that much. I just don't want to stop thinking about it.
So it's like, you can't be switched on twenty four
(15:30):
to seven and be a boxer and you do all
of these things and be forty.
Speaker 5 (15:39):
Well, well, you can, but it comes with choices, right,
and so there'll be certain things that you have to
give away, or there might be certain responses from your body.
And you're quite right, because the hormones are sending messages
through the brain to allow for different actions or reactions
to occur. And so even if we're thinking about if
(16:00):
these things are happening to us and we're not taking
notice of them, it doesn't mean it has to stop
us from doing something, it just might mean we do
it differently. And so I think that awareness, that building
the self awareness of what's happening to me physically, cognitively,
emotionally is very very important. Rather than letting it all
take hold and control of us, I'm one to try
(16:21):
and turn it back and try and understand, well, what
can I take control of and how is this in
service to me in being my best self so I
can thrive and not simply survive through this stage of life.
And what's my mindset towards what I'm experiencing. So if
I go into a mindset of you know, woe is me?
Speaker 4 (16:39):
This is really.
Speaker 5 (16:40):
Awful, or fear and uncertainty and feeling, you know, I'm
pulling back from relations or pulling back from perhaps opportunities
because I'm nervous. My confidence might be dropping because of
some of the symptoms I have. What can I do
to try and build up my level of confidence, of
competency and connectedness. And if we kind of break those down,
(17:00):
it becomes easier to think about, well, where does confidence
come from? And so confidence is looking at beliefs, and
it's looking at the mindset towards certain things. So, how
do I change the beliefs that I currently hold on
the assumptions that I might be holding about myself. Am
I setting a new set of beliefs which are pulling
my confidence down because I'm telling myself I don't have
(17:24):
the capacity to do something because I'm perimenopausal? Or how
do I change or address those sets of beliefs to
enable me to think differently towards things and what supportsmen
I need around me to build that confidence? Is it
feedback loops to try and hear from people what they're
seeing of me? Is it my own feedback loop for
me to be assessing and self reflecting to understand what
(17:46):
feedback is available to me from my perspective and what
supports can I have? If I don't have the answer
to something, how can I seek it from someone else
who might have expertise or experience there? So I think
if we do that, we actually address what's happening to us,
it can be also helpful rather than just moving through
(18:06):
it and kind of working it out along the way.
I think there's a really lovely proactive approach that we
can take to live our best lives and through perimenopause
when all of these changes may be happening to the
greater number of women, and menopause is going to happen
to every single woman. Four million of four billion of US,
I should say, you know, globally one billion are in
(18:27):
the age of perimenopause, and closer to home in Australia
it's about three point five million or.
Speaker 4 (18:32):
Of that age.
Speaker 5 (18:34):
There are people who are in their midlife, not their
old life. We have one hundred year life now, so
we're really in midlife. And they're able to thrive and
have vitality and interests and wisdom and experience and all
of these things, deep relationships, deep understandings of the systems
that they're a part of how things work. Coming back
(18:55):
to some of those earlier premises, it's they can lift
some things not necessarily cure for, but shift how they're
experiencing some of those symptoms by starting with self and
the mindset.
Speaker 4 (19:10):
I love that.
Speaker 3 (19:10):
Where did you watch your was your journey into this?
Did you what were you doing and when did you
turn your attention to or was this as it always
seems like people hit it and then it becomes an interest. Now,
no twenty year olds going you know, I'm really interested
in menopause.
Speaker 5 (19:28):
No, well, quite right, So I had My career was
in professional services. I was a partner of Deloitte for
some twenty four years, and sixteen of those years I
was a tax partner looking at research and development incentives
and grants for organizations. So helping, you know, organizations create
(19:48):
new and interesting things to the benefit of the Australian
economy really purposeful. But I'd always wanted to help individuals.
So when I was on my journey as a tax partner,
I was given a coach towards executive roles and it
was the first time I'd had a coach, and I
fell in love with the process of coaching. I thought,
now I know what I'm supposed to be doing, and
(20:08):
this is what my journey should be. So I did
part time at a Master's of Science in coaching psychology
at Sydney UNI, and just before I finished it, I'd
suggested to the CEO and CEO of Deloitte that I
should leave tax and roll out a coaching program I'd
designed for the women partners, the women leaders of Deloitte
Australia because it would help them have long term sustainable careers.
(20:31):
Be for their benefit to be their best selves and
also for the benefit of the firm, and they agreed.
So in twenty sixteen, I hung up my tax boots,
left tax and moved into an executive development role as
a partner of the firm and rolled this out so
each year I'd coach about eighty to one hundred women
leaders of Deloitte. It was over the years that I
(20:52):
also started to then experience my perimenopause and started to
notice that people weren't really talking about this. And I
had and you know, some who were in their more
fertile years having children, some who are at menopause postmenopause years,
so you know, into their fifties, a range of women.
But it was really quiet around the menopause conversation. And
(21:14):
as I said, I was having different symptoms myself. I
was very teary. I'd find myself all my relationships were solid,
my work relationships, family friends. There was nothing that was
going on in my life that should have created the
emotions I was experiencing, and I'd get in my car
drive into work, the tears would flood and I'd pull
myself together and perform really well and then get back
(21:35):
in the car and the tears would come again, and
I just didn't know what was going on. And I
started to notice that my hair was thinning, which was
causing me anxiety. I was getting flushes, didn't really understand
what that was all about, headaches, muscle cramps, so they
were fun through the night. So the fatigue was building,
which then affects your mood and affects the tears and
(21:57):
all this. So I started to investigate it and I
was fortunate to discover what was going on for me
and learn the term of perimenopause. But I also had
a conversation with our former deputy chair and she had
also started to experience this and was wondering why it
was so quiet. So the two of us came together
and we created a working group within Deloitte to look
(22:17):
at managing menopause within Deloitte, probably going back about a
good three years ago now. And from that we then
started to support the workforce. Our executive and our chair
came on board very quickly. We started to lift the
level of understanding and awareness in the organization, whether it
was through internet resources, webinars, podcasts, all sorts of things.
(22:42):
We ran menopause cafes to bring us the greatest of
relatedness when people come together to talk about it informally.
And I still still today run the group coaching program
which is focused on menopause at deloit or perimenopause, so
a lot has come through from that. And then outside
of Deloitte, I'm no longer partner with Deloitte, but I
still do some work with them, but I work with
(23:03):
other organizations as well. I'm also assisting other organizations with
group coaching to manage menopause awareness sessions, cannote speaking those
kind of things to uplift the conversation so it's no
longer a taboo and there's no longer silence and a
lesser amount of distress or concern in the workplace for
those who are experiencing it. So that's kind of how
(23:24):
I came into it and how I offer my support.
I hope I've answered your question.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
I love, love, love love this. What I love about
it is understanding your background and how fortunate we are
women are that someone like yourself had this existing relationship
and experience inside of a huge organization to be able
to have the trust to roll that out. A question
(23:50):
I'd love to ask is without naming names obviously, but
what has it been like approaching organizations to have this conversation?
And I imagine at a lot of the senior levels
you're dealing with men, what has what has it been
like to introduce this conversation and sell the idea, get
them on board and does it come Tiff, Just ask
(24:14):
one fucking question at a time. I'm going to leave
you with that. This is what I do. I could
just keep a layer seventeen questions on top of one
another and leave you and it is.
Speaker 5 (24:23):
No, that's right because I'll give you so much back
that so between the two of us will work it out.
It's interesting because most of the conversations you have when
you are working with organizations don't necessarily start at the
executive level. You're not around this topic. I might, you know,
I know people at that level of different organizations, but
(24:44):
they're not sitting there waiting for me to give them
a call and say, hey, I want to I was
waiting for you to call me about our menopause policies.
Speaker 4 (24:51):
So typically you're looking at who.
Speaker 5 (24:53):
Am I speaking to in the organization and what level
of attention are they paying to it? And I think
the biggest challenge. There's no well, there is some doubt
in some organizations, but there's an understanding that this affects
fifty one percent of the population. There's an understanding that
there it's the fastest growing demographic in the working world
(25:14):
in terms of women who have perimenopausal age. So and
also there's an understanding that we are now in midlife,
no longer referring to this as old age, so we've
extended the number of years we'll have in the workforce.
We have a longer life expectancy. People will be in
the workforce for a third longer than what it was.
And there's great talent and wisdom, but we find it's
(25:35):
challenging to get the issues solved, mainly because of the
attention of all the other issues that they're also trying
to solve at the same time, and the limited number
of resources and budgets that they might have available or
people internally to try and.
Speaker 4 (25:50):
Solve for this.
Speaker 5 (25:51):
And so I'd say that that's probably the biggest challenges
is how do they understand how powerful this can be
as a stretch magic advantage To help them understand that
if I have to solve for this issue about managing
menopause in the workplace. I'm actually solving for the gender
gap because many women who are going into senior roles
(26:12):
are of the aide of perimenopause or women and if
you kind of put them over each other, it correlates really,
really well. Yet there's this missing link to that conversation
talk about the gender gap. We talk about it in
terms of wage, We talk it about it just in
terms of numbers, But I would be uplifting to say,
and what's happening at that life transition for those women
who we're hoping will stay and take on those leadership roles.
(26:33):
So we want to address the system, but we also
want to address what support we're offering to those women
to be able to take up those opportunities. And there's
an advantage just in that in terms of continuing with
the great insight and wisdom and experience that these women have,
helping the younger women see themselves in those women, so
they are thinking, oh, wow, I'm going to have a
(26:54):
long standing career in this organization because you're helping me
do so through all of my transitions of life. It
can make a considerable difference from a strategic point of
view to be able to maintain your unfair share of
talented women in your workplace who'll bring the richness and
guidance and knowledge to be able to support what you're
(27:16):
doing in your workplace, and who will have deep relationships
to continue with your clients, your customers, your team members
to meet. It's no brainer, but it's helping. It's helping
organizations move it away from what they think might be
a personal issue at first instance.
Speaker 4 (27:31):
To a workplace issue.
Speaker 5 (27:33):
And so when we start to actually explore that perimenopause
is something that affects how you think, how you feel,
and how you function, and that the symptoms of perimenopause
don't stay home when you go to the office. They
don't know working hours, and so they are ratic and
unexpected and unwanted, and they'll appear and affect people in
(27:55):
the workplace so they're not thriving. Well, what can we
do in support of that, and how can we open
up conversations and get some insights from our workplace and
really just understand how we're impacted by it in our
organization to then say, well, that makes sense to do
something about it. So, you know, the more men I
speak to the more they're curious about it, the more
(28:16):
men I'm actually running programs, just starting programs for men
as well, which is separate to what I'm doing with
coaching women through menopause, because men want to have a
safe space to have conversations and not feel they've affronted
anybody by asking some questions which some women might go,
are you kidding me? Like that's what you think? And
(28:36):
so it's giving them also a safe space to open
up and understand what's their awareness and understanding how can
they support colleagues in the workplace, how can they go
home and support their life partners at home? And that's
where they get really interested.
Speaker 4 (28:49):
To say, oh my gosh, back at home.
Speaker 5 (28:53):
Now I realize she doesn't hate me, you know, it's
actually there's something going on there, And now I can
be in support rather than you know, perhaps since there's
a problem with our relationship.
Speaker 4 (29:04):
That's when it.
Speaker 5 (29:05):
Starts to get really interesting, when the men start realizing,
hold on, I could actually help my colleague have a
bigger impact here if we had a chat about it,
and if I could support it. And now I'm learning
how I can have that conversation without worrying I'm going
to be sent to HR or offend my colleague or
whatever it might be.
Speaker 4 (29:23):
So yeah, there's I guess there's.
Speaker 5 (29:24):
Different places in the organization where we'll have the conversations
just to finish.
Speaker 4 (29:29):
Off on that.
Speaker 5 (29:31):
It's really important though, that the executive understands it and
has an awareness of it and role models there under
their interest in supporting that part of the workplace because
any cultural change needs to come top down and if
it's just kind of been spoken at this level, but
when you get up there, they're going, what are you
talking about?
Speaker 1 (29:48):
What?
Speaker 4 (29:48):
We don't want to talk about this in our workplace.
It's you know, chalk and cheese.
Speaker 5 (29:52):
So you need to ensure that the executive have briefing
papers that it's been addressed with them, that they their
awareness and understanding is in But at that level they're
unlikely to be the ones who actually make change in
the organization around this, and so it's then finding out
who have they given the accountability and responsibility to in
the organization to bring this to life.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
It's just so brilliant and you I was quite surprised
the first time a bloke said to me after releasing
an episode talking about Paramam Pause that he listened because
he was around that age, and so a lot of
his friends and people that he's hanging out with or
around that age, and he was interested in understanding it.
(30:36):
And then I've since then, I've I've actually had a
number of guys say a similar thing. They're tuning in
where I'm thinking, well, take a buddy seat for a minute, guys,
I'm just gonna have a few episodes on this topic.
They want to know and I love that. I love
that so much.
Speaker 5 (30:52):
I'm glad and they I mean, I'm going public in
the next couple of weeks with a course offering that
men can join in three parts that they can participate in.
And then there's the corporate piece as well, which is different.
So doing it it's for the public domain, just to
help those who maybe their organization won't want to sponsor
such a program. And then with some organizations, we're putting
(31:14):
programs on for the men as well, so that it
can be discrete programs for men in the organization to
upskill them and help them with their understanding and awareness.
And then bringing the whole workforce together. So, for instance,
if the workforce holds these menopause cafes it's not a
women's cafe, it's for everybody of all gender, So you
get then a cross fertilization of questions and sharing and
(31:37):
information gathering, so people can benefit from that in a
really constructive way.
Speaker 4 (31:44):
You know what else.
Speaker 3 (31:45):
I love about that, Just like with stress itself, you
never know what you're in the middle of, and so
it's actually, when I think of it that way, it's
more important that the people around us stand to the
signs because they may see it before. One of the
most surprising things I felt when I started taking HRT,
(32:11):
So yeah, I started sleeping bout, I started to fill
my energy right, but this unexpected feeling of going I
recognized this. I call it my sense of self. There
was this sense of self that came back that was
like a long lost friend, and I kind of went lovely.
I think I've i'd like been a bit of a
(32:31):
husshole for the last few years, Like I just looked
and not not so much. Maybe two people maybe maybe
everyone's like, yeah, TIP actually went real witch. But in
my head even just that kind of reactive and negative
and just wound up, which you don't like. That wasn't
(32:53):
a symptom I was reporting of like, oh, I just
it was just like I'm just tired and not my
body's not recovering and I'm forgetting stuff. But it you know,
you RECOGNI this person that comes back and it's like, oh,
will that happened?
Speaker 5 (33:04):
Yeah, yep, yeah, I mean it's true. It could be
attitudinally coming across. So it could be just people feeling
your mood. And we know that moods are contagious. So
if you're in a workplace and you've rocked up and
you're feeling flat, you're feeling a bit lower down, less
people are going to want to be coming up to
you and seeking help and support and asking questions or
(33:24):
engaging you to come into an opportunity because it's not
particularly comfortable when people are that. They probably prefer to
be in an environment where there's more positive emotions that
are demonstrated. And it's not to say we always have
to be happy, but if there's a consistent kind of
theme that's coming through, so it's possible that it did
have an impact. The ripple effect can be very strong.
(33:46):
I love that you found your sense of self though,
because what a gift and what a joy, and I'm
so glad that you know that's worked for you, because again,
everyone's journey is different. So for some women HRT has
been awesome. Others use other ways to try and resolve
and work through perimenopause without it. So it's great that
you found what works for you.
Speaker 2 (34:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:07):
Yeah, And I feel fortunate with that. By way of
I've just increased the dose of my gel a little
bit yeap from my doctor. But I haven't gone and gone,
oh this is not working. It's like, oh, I'm feeling yeah,
I think of feeling really good. But also I went
I was fortunate enough to have in recent years, maybe
(34:28):
a few years ago, I'd had a genetic DNA test.
Speaker 4 (34:30):
So I had a lot of data.
Speaker 3 (34:32):
I pulled that out because I knew that I had
variations in my like there's a better word for this,
but I can't remember the letters. So the motherfucker gene,
you know, those detoxification pathways and methylation pathways and things
that related to my ability to process these hormones. So
I revisited that and started taking supplements that would support
(34:54):
these things where I had variation. So it was, like
I said before, it was using what data I had,
And I honestly think that that in conjunction with the
hormone therapy has just helped my body, has just taken
a lot of load off of my body. So but
I do feel so fortunate that I've I seem to
(35:15):
have so far landed on what is working for me.
Speaker 5 (35:18):
Yes, and it's that it's that personal advocacy of finding
out and learning and trialing things, the experimentation until you
get to a place where you can see positive change.
That's what I'd encourage people to adopt.
Speaker 3 (35:32):
Yeah, and I've had to change a lot of things.
I've have to change how I trained, and I've gone
to strength training, and I've had to completely park the
intensity of i haven't boxed for ages. I love boxing,
and now I'm trying to integrate small snippets of it
in appropriate intensities and not over like I'm one of
(35:53):
those if I did if it was awesome today, it'll
be awesome tomorrow. I want to do it again. I
want a little bit, you know. So it's trying to
find I knew normal in how do I best move
and not just go over the top yet feels good,
But if you're not going to recover a brick to
do that every day of the week. Yeah, so there's
been a lot of I mean, there's been a lot
of things that I've So it wasn't just the HRT
(36:15):
was magic bullet. It was in the middle of a
lot of changes, and then I added this to it,
and then I chose to find what other things would
support that, and yeah, patience, which is not my strong
suit by any stretch of the.
Speaker 5 (36:29):
Well, look, if you're not feeling great, you don't have
a lot of patience. We want that resolved and sort
it out. And then I guess people feel a bit
deflated if they're going and seeking support and they're not
getting the right support, or they're dismissed or ignored when
they talk about symptoms, or you know what we have.
It's been reported that we have an over prescription of
(36:49):
antidepressants because a lot of women are showing up and
then said, oh, you just take these and this will
sort you out. So it's working through those kind of things.
I'm not saying there's not a role for that, but
the question is how many perimenopausal women have been prescribed
And there's some research that's been done in Australia around that,
(37:10):
and it's concerning that perhaps it's just been what the
doctor has thought is the right response. But perhaps they
didn't have the information, their training didn't allow them to
be thinking differently, And so now we're trying to help
them think differently through the programs that are being offered
as a result of that Senate inquiry I've spoke of before.
Speaker 3 (37:27):
Yeah, And I think for me and where I was
at with understanding information and how to find it and
who to trust, I'd been exposed to enough information, not
just around this, but around everything I've learned the last
five years, having a ridiculous amount of conversations with everything
that fascinates me on this show. Start to realize that
(37:52):
you can build a case and support it with science
for everything, so you can take one I could have
taken that one set of symptoms. What this might have
been a big part of what made me slow to
pull the trigger on which way to attack this, because
it was like, well, I could go to a GP,
I could go to a bloody sports scientist, I could
(38:15):
go go to so many different places and report what's
happening and have five or six different diagnoses or ways
to resolve yes, And when you know that, it becomes
like you go the ball really is in my court
with this, How do I decide what's the best for
(38:35):
me and who I need to trust? And then when
I decide on the method or the avenue, where how
do I find the person within that that's gonna be
a fit?
Speaker 5 (38:45):
Yep, yeah, yeah, So it can take some time, absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 4 (38:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (38:51):
What what have you learned in the middle of doing
what you do that maybe you didn't expect to.
Speaker 5 (39:01):
I think what I've learned is that the world is
changing rapidly, and so there's many more conversations. Social media,
which typically we'd say is not our friend, I think
is being our friend on this to some degree, because
it's providing us ways of educating people very quickly. It's
opening up conversations, it's normalizing the topic very quickly. So
(39:24):
there's many, many more people who are talking about it
online or who are presenting on it or discussing it
and so on. So I think that's something that's been interesting,
the rise of social media, and also the rise of
the actors across the world who are of my vintage,
who suddenly also have a voice that they feel they
can talk about these things. And I mean it's true
(39:46):
that their story won't match everybody else's story, and we
want to be mindful that some of their stories are
going to be a little bit dramatic because their background
and training tells them that's part of what holds people's attention.
So we just need to work out, well, was that
an interesting story that I've learned from, or even if
my experience is different, it's great that it's being shared
(40:06):
because the more I'm seeing people share stories, the easier
it is for us to normalize these conversations. So I
think it's just been this probably in the last couple
of years, there's been this rapid change in the quantity
of information being shared in this space, which is making
it much more helpful, and everyone's open. When typically when
I tell people what I do, everyone's got a story,
(40:27):
everyone wants to talk about their experience. It's almost a
sense of relief that, oh, you know, like the TV show,
thank God you're here, we can open it up and start,
you know, you open the door and you've arrived, and
then people are willing to partake in the conversation very quickly.
That vulnerability of sharing their own experience seems to just
(40:48):
fall away really quickly. So it seems to me that
there's quite a need for people wanting just to share,
to normalize it for themselves, and to hear of other
people's experience. That's how we learn, hearing from others and
noticing differences and noticing similarities, and so yeah, I guess
that's what I've learned, is willingness to talk to It
(41:10):
is on the increase.
Speaker 3 (41:12):
And it's really nice. I think about the shift in
people's the way people talk about or this maybe the
previous stigma around being hormonal. You know, it's like that
used to be. It was like this thing that was
obviously a reality. Yeah, we have especially you know, month
by month for most of our lives. Women are different
at different times of the month. But when you start
(41:35):
to experience big waves in that, and then as women,
we want to because we're trained to be nice and
quiet and agreeable and everything, and we don't want to,
like because it's said there's some sort of snider remark
against us. We don't want to show that. Yeah, well,
like it's a reality and it's not fun and it's
not nice and it's a thing. But I am not
(41:57):
my hormones. They will dictate how I show up and
who I am in different moments, but they are not
essentially who I am beneath them.
Speaker 5 (42:08):
Yes, yes, I don't think we've solved for it all yet.
Speaker 4 (42:12):
We're on a journey.
Speaker 5 (42:13):
So there are still some workplaces where it would be
very challenging to speak about it and there would be
a lot of shame and embarrassment. There be a lot
of hostility, and we just need to try and help
them see that there's different ways and better ways and
help people understand it. If that's a workplace therein and
they have the opportunity to choose perhaps a more supportive workplace,
(42:37):
if that opportunity arises, maybe that's a good choice. But
not everyone has that opportunity, right, There's not an abundance
of jobs that we can just jump around at our
own discretion. But I think it's about you know, us
also hoping that there'll be data that will require organizations
to start reporting. At this stage, it's not mandata that
(42:57):
they have to have menopause policies or guidelines in place,
but there is data which is collected every year which
talks about the gender gap, and then that's by Waghia
and so then in responding to how their gender gap
is changing, if more organizations are talking about, well, we've
actually done this in relation to managing menopause in our workplace.
(43:18):
That's how we've responded to the gender gap that we had.
It's going to make it more transparent in terms of
those who are and who aren't in line with what's
happening and I have opening their minds to trying to
allow for everybody to thrive in their workplace. Look at
their well being, look at the leadership opportunities, look at
(43:38):
the support that they can provide and help people move
from states of high levels of presenteeism where people want
to be there, they want to bring their best selves,
but they're just not functioning as they should. How are
we supporting them as I say, to be positively present
rather than be sitting in presentism.
Speaker 3 (43:55):
If people are listening and they are in an organization
that is not as forward thinking or in this space yet,
how can they support themselves or find support that might
begin to cross over into their working life or all
better equip them when they're managing that gap.
Speaker 5 (44:16):
I'd start with gathering some insights from within the organization.
So what data do you have that helps you understand
your workforce? You know, if you've got a predominantly male workforce.
Perhaps this is not as live an issue as one
which has either an existing or growing diverse workforce. So
I'd gather some data points and then I'd start being
(44:38):
in conversation with the women who are of ages say
forty upwards, to understand what's their experience been, how are
they finding things in relation to this, if they're open
to talking about it, and what would help them to
be able to bring their best selves through this stage
of life. You might already be doing a lot of things,
(44:59):
or have a lot guidelines or policies that exist in
some draws that just need to be taken out and communicated.
And it could well be that you have some flexible
work policies that could be used in support but no
one's talking about them. Or perhaps you would allow adjustments
to certain ways of working that are quite agreeable across
the organization, but nobody's really lift them and shared.
Speaker 4 (45:22):
That with them.
Speaker 5 (45:23):
So I'd be looking at what do we already have,
what do we now know from the governance we've done
to understand our organization better, and then how do we
start matching up those conversations to help And then from
there you can start to lift awareness, put things on
your intranet, you know, open up information channels. So it
could be there's a number of really good organizations who
(45:44):
can provide you with checklists of looking at symptoms, how
to have conversations as managers and leaders. So the information
is building, and then you can bring in other people,
perhaps you know, on World Menopause Day once a year,
to do a talk which might engage some in the
workplace to learn more about it. That would be a
good starting place, and then you can obviously build from there.
Speaker 2 (46:07):
Yeah, just thinking.
Speaker 3 (46:08):
About you know, there's been times I've spoken to women
who are past menopausal, past me, is.
Speaker 4 (46:14):
That even think postmenopausal?
Speaker 2 (46:16):
Ye?
Speaker 3 (46:16):
Past Yeah, it's a post menopausal and they've reflected back
then you know it's still feeling like there's stuff going
on for them.
Speaker 2 (46:23):
But also now with this.
Speaker 3 (46:25):
Conversation, they're like, you know, when my marriage fell apart
and I went through this terrible time of that unfolding,
I think I was a hormonal night there.
Speaker 2 (46:37):
You know, when you think about how.
Speaker 3 (46:40):
Many and that applies to the workforce too, how many
careers crumble not because of the career itself, but because
the person was in the middle of something they weren't
aware of and didn't know how to support, and didn't
know and assumed it was the circumstances.
Speaker 5 (46:56):
Yes, yes, agreed, agreed so to that, and even things
like have employee assistance programs could be beneficial. So it's
almost allowing people an avenue to have conversations about what
they're experiencing, whether it's emotionally or physically or cognitively, with
someone outside of their day to day business, and that,
you know, providing those kind of programs can be really helpful.
(47:18):
Just to start teasing you know, this is how I'm feeling,
this is what's going on. I just would check to
ensure that your EAP provider has an understanding of perimenopause
and menopause, because otherwise they might send them on routes
that don't support them. So there's been a bit of
due diligence around that too, But you're right. I mean,
it's very possible that women are pulling back from opportunities
if they don't feel that they can gain the support
(47:40):
in the workplace, or they don't understand what's happening to them.
They might be feeling less engaged and motivated, fatigued, irritable, frustrated,
a lot of things which can come from change in
estrogen progesterone. And so these are the types of things
that if people don't have an awareness of what could
be happening at that stage of life, might walk past
(48:01):
it and only realize later when they've made some choices about,
you know, not stepping up for that particular opportunity or
stepping back from maybe a leadership role that they're currently
And so that's why I think the awareness and understanding
is critical within organizations. The more we can just start
with the basics at least when we start talking about it,
(48:22):
then we're taking away the stigma and the taboo, and
then people can start to go a bit deeper.
Speaker 2 (48:28):
Is there anything that I haven't asked about that is
that you want to share.
Speaker 5 (48:33):
Learning of miss I think it's the key thing for organizations,
and I've probably referenced it somewhat is it doesn't have
to be difficult, It doesn't need a lot of money
to be thrown at it to make something of it.
And I recognize that organizations are often resource poor, and
we're going through interesting economic times locally globally, and so
(48:56):
you know, it might be there so we don't have
a budget to do this. I would actually, as I said,
start looking at what you already do. You don't have
to take a blank piece of paper out and say,
now we have to create a new menopause policy, and
that'll take a lot of investment in time and money.
There's so many policies that you probably already have around
well being programs or how people work. When COVID came in,
(49:18):
we all started to use flexible work policies working from
home that can be hugely beneficial to some women when
they're enduring particular symptoms. If I'm having a very heavy
menstrual bleed, perhaps it's easier if I'm working from home
that day because I've got access very quickly to my bathroom.
Or I can wear comfortable clothing. Maybe i can change
my hours of work, Maybe I can change my place,
(49:40):
the location, the times that I work using flexible work policies,
and those things in most organizations already exist. So I'd
just be looking at what do we already do. Do
we have a culture which allows for curious conversations and
respectful conversations to take place, and how do we help
people in their coaching conversationtions enable them just to not
(50:02):
hold assumptions, but to be curious and allowed for a
place of no judgment in asking someone, hey, how things
done for you? You haven't seemed yourself lately, or I
noticed your energy levels seem to be a bit flat?
Is there anything I can do and support? So just
some small questions without diagnosing, without holding the assumptions, and
(50:23):
really looking at performance reviews on context not assumptions. That's
critical because if we are to assume that people's performance
has dropped because they're not skilled, not motivated, not engaged
for their own personal reasons, we might be missing out
on some opportunities to help some of these people whose
engagement might be affected by their symptoms, by their brain fog,
(50:46):
by their fatigue, by their mood, by the physical concerns
that might be having which is taking them away from
being their best self. So that's why I say context
is super super important, and those conversass the meaningful conversations,
can be game changes.
Speaker 2 (51:05):
This was a really interesting conversation, and.
Speaker 3 (51:10):
When I started reaching out to people on this topic,
I kind of didn't realize this was a conversation that existed,
and I didn't realize that it was going to be
for me so interesting and beneficial.
Speaker 2 (51:24):
So thank you.
Speaker 4 (51:25):
Oh, my pleasure, my pleasure.
Speaker 3 (51:27):
Where can people reach out get access to you by
your book and anything that you'd.
Speaker 2 (51:32):
Like to promote?
Speaker 5 (51:33):
Oh, thank you. Look, I'm a big user of LinkedIn,
and so the easiest place is look me up and
connect with me on LinkedIn. So it's Karen Stain coaching
on LinkedIn.
Speaker 2 (51:43):
I'm announced that wrong. I cannot believe.
Speaker 3 (51:45):
Every time I don't ask, every time I do not ask,
I'm like, I don't need to ask this one.
Speaker 2 (51:50):
I called you Stein.
Speaker 5 (51:51):
Yeah, you've pronounced it as it's spelled, which is more
than fair enough. My folks are of South African origin,
and so the ei sound was more of an a,
so if you think of it, you pronounce it like
a mark on a shirt, a stain. So you'll always
remember that. My brother's name is Mark, which is kind
of funny too, Mark Stain.
Speaker 2 (52:12):
Jimmy Carge did it recently. Did it? Was doing crowd work.
He's the comedian.
Speaker 3 (52:16):
He's hilarious, and someone heckled him and he said, what's
your name?
Speaker 2 (52:20):
Mate? And he goes Mark and then goes like a stain.
Speaker 3 (52:23):
And I I lost it. I'm like, that's brilliant and
I love it. That's how you describe your surname.
Speaker 5 (52:29):
So that's how they can find me. I have a
website Karenstaincoaching dot com and it talks more about what
I provide executive coaching, menopause at work, keynotes, group coaching,
those types of things. My book easiest place to get
it is Amazon is a really easy place to get it.
As I said, it'll provide you with a whole lot
of strategies that you can throw into your virtual backpack,
(52:51):
have your hands free to address what you need to
hold on to during the day or push out of
your way, and then draw the strategies out of this
virtual backpack as you need them. So there's twelve strategies
and practices, lots of self coaching exercises and stories that
can help you bring it to life. And I'm running
my second book, which is about managing menopause in the
workplace and looking at self coaching strategies in support, so
(53:13):
hopefully that will be out next to you.
Speaker 3 (53:16):
I love that amazing. I'll have links to everything in
the show notes. Thank you so much Karen for coming.
Speaker 2 (53:21):
On the show.
Speaker 4 (53:21):
My absolute pleasure. Thanks for the chat, she said
Speaker 1 (53:25):
It's no never, I got fighting in my blood.
She said, it's now never I got fighting in my blood.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
I'm tiff.
Speaker 3 (00:10):
This is roll with the punches and we're turning life's
hardest hits into wins. Nobody wants to go to court,
and don't. My friends are test Art Family Lawyers. Know
that they offer all forms of alternative dispute resolution. Their
team of Melbourne family lawyers have extensive experience in all
areas of family law to facto and same sex couples,
(00:33):
custody and children, family violence and intervention orders, property settlements
and financial agreements. Test Art is in your corner, so
reach out to Mark and the team at www dot
test Artfamilylawyers dot com dot au. Karen Stein, welcome to
(00:53):
Roll with the punches.
Speaker 4 (00:55):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Great to be here, a great to have you, great
to have another fel Hello lassie who has in no
uncertain terms, I'm sure rolled with the punches that I've
recently been rolling with, and fortunately people like you are
helping women figure out how the hell we get through
this turbulent little part of our lives that we call
(01:18):
peri menopause and menopause.
Speaker 5 (01:20):
It's so good to be talking about it because there's
such an absence of understanding for so many that the
more we can talk about it gush, the healthier it
will be for everyone. So thank you glad you bring
up the topic.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
It astounds me. It astounds me as someone who has
access to so many brilliant minds and conversations through this
medium here in podcast, and I've had quite a few
in the past before I stumbled into this blindly into
this phase, I've had a few conversations on menopause and
(01:55):
perimenopause and getting ready for it. But still, I found
myself in a space where by the time I decided,
h I think this is it. I think this is
the situation I'm in, I'd been in it for two
years and that astounds me, and so I'm really open
about sharing about it. And the reason being is the
(02:17):
moment you do, I feel like everyone around me is going, oh,
hell oh, how do you like? They're coming to me
like I'm the expert.
Speaker 4 (02:25):
I'm like, I'm not. I'm not the expert.
Speaker 3 (02:28):
I'm just trying to figure it out, but no one
knows where to turn or how to get good information.
Speaker 5 (02:36):
I think what you said is really interesting because the well, actually,
let me go back a step only about fifty percent
of women and some non binary and transcendent persons have
actually heard of perimenopause. So when you talked about it
took you about two years to work it out, that
doesn't surprise me so much. And also because of the
(02:56):
vast number of symptoms that we can have, So there's
something like auty eight reported symptoms that come along with perimetopause.
What a pleasure that on their own they can feel
just like other health issues. But when you start actually
putting it all together and look at the correlation of
the symptoms and what else is happening, and where I'm
up to in my life, and what's my menstrual cycle
(03:18):
like and all of these different things, then we can
start to work out, well, what's going on for me,
and you know, start to get some other advice around us,
whether it's from general medical practitioners or specialists through otherwise.
So it's interesting you say that I also had a
kind of a long journey through understanding. I didn't know
what perimetopause was until I was in it, and it
was I was, you know, having a vast number of
(03:40):
symptoms and questioning what the hell was going on. So
that's really what started to entertain my mind as to well,
if I'm thinking this, and I coach a large number
of women, and I didn't have a lot of people
talking about it, and I thought this was really strange.
There's a lot of silence, and that started to want, well,
introduce me to me exploring, well, let's find out more
(04:01):
and then we can help others open up the conversation.
So I'm glad you actually raised the time frame, because
it's not like you just go and have one simple
test and you go, yeah, okay, I've been diagnosed and
now I know where I'm at. There's actually quite a
progressive build up of information to help you understand what's happening.
And then what do I do in order to be
(04:22):
of support to me? How do I advocate for support?
Who do I need to turn to, What are the
things I could possibly do in support of my well being?
Speaker 4 (04:30):
Those kind of things.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
He's so bang on with that. And what's interesting is
I a year ago went to have the went and
saw a doctor, specifically, finding one who who had worked
with pair of menopause and menopause, went and saw her
to talk about hormones and explore this because I'd been
(04:53):
am I just burnt out? Is this LONGTI and burnout?
Is this more related burnout? Am I overtraining? Is this cycle?
Is there a psychological element because I'm doing a lot
of work on my psychological well being and I'm bringing
stuff up and I'm working to things. So there was
all these layers, and a year and a bit ago
I went to explore the HRT route and have some
(05:16):
tests and I started and very quickly paused that journey
because I had to have some breast scans and things.
And in the pausing of it, I just went, I'm
just before I jumped straight back into this, I'm just
going to tick a few other boxes. I'm just gonna
get my sleeps or to do some things. Next minute,
I'm a year down the track. I've restarted the HRT.
(05:38):
And then at that point when I went in to
get another prescription, I raised Testosteronecause in the meantime, I've
had a lot of conversations with people on this show
and others about testosterone in women and realizing that a
lot of symptoms that go with loan testosterone were symptoms
I was experiencing and lo and behold, we test I'm low.
(06:01):
But yeah, so there was an additional year of Oh,
this could be it, and then I know, maybe it's not,
and then waiting and then still going. I was perplexed
at why when she initially tested my hormones in relation
to this thing, knowing the symptoms I'd told her I'm experiencing,
she didn't choose to testosterone at that time.
Speaker 5 (06:23):
Yes, and with due respect, the available information through the
medical system is low, and most doctors through their training
we found out through the Senate inquiry in Australia into menopause,
it was confirmed that they only typically have one hour
of training on menopause through their medical degrees, and so
(06:43):
there are a few specialists in menopause, and as much
as they might be approachable and open to it or
maybe not, it's about finding the right person and bringing
more and more information towards them. So there has been
some work that's being done to try and better inform
doctors and nurses and others as to how they can
support women going through this stage. But we've got a
(07:05):
long way to go. And in addition to that, every
woman's experience is unique. So as much as you you know,
referencing other people and finding out where you're at and others.
I think that's the interesting thing about menopause is it's
so unique and we all have different symptoms. In fact, symptomatically,
twenty percent of women will have no symptoms at all,
(07:27):
which is just really fortunate for them. But eighty percent
of women will experience symptoms. And of the eighty percent,
sixty percent will find them bothersome, so you know, they're
not able to thrive through their life. That might be
irksome in terms of their functioning, how they feel, how
they think. And the last twenty percent for them is
really life changing, so they really aren't functioning. They might
(07:48):
find that they're needing hospital treatment, or they're bed ridden
or otherwise. And if we look predominantly at that sixty
percent of women who were in that area of bothersome,
everyone's to have different symptoms, different combinations, different experience, different
environmental cues that are also impacting them. So in the
systems that they form a part, whether it's within their workplace,
(08:10):
or whether it's within their home life or the relationships,
or where they're living, or even from cultural nuances, there's
a whole range of different elements that impact on our
own experience. So it's a really fascinating conversation to have,
and it's not one that you can kind of pick
up and go here, let me reflect back to you
to show you what you're likely to experience because this
was my experience, or even that of your mom. If
(08:32):
you were to speak to your mom, just because your
mom had certain experience doesn't mean that you know it's
going to roll down to be what your experience will be.
When you were mentioning the doctors, just this week, I
had one somebody reach out to me and say she
had some conversations with the doctor, and they were brilliant
(08:53):
because they said, you know what, I'm really new to
this area.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
I don't know a lot. You've given me some good
information to follow. Let's walk through this together. So really
open about their information, which was nice. Just before getting
home half an hour ago, I've got a message from
someone talking about why the hell, Like they've gone to
see a doctor. They'd like to ask about hormonal tests
and setosterone and they've just been completely cut off and said, well,
(09:19):
we don't do that with women. They haven't tested, they
haven't looked into it, but they've just gone that's not
something we do. And I'm like, oh, man, it's so hard, yeah,
because people are going, well, who do I see?
Speaker 5 (09:31):
Yeah, And that's where it's the relationships you have. So
I do a lot of work of managing menopause in
the workplace, so helping organizations to normalize the conversation. And
the reason why the workplace is important is that where
you'll find lots of women and so if you're trying
to get the messages out as to what to do,
the more they then can start to socially connect and
(09:52):
build their sense of relatedness with others by being in conversation,
the more they share information. I do a lot of
group coaching in this space and you'd be surprised how
many women saying, oh, where are you located? You know,
do you have someone who's you said? Your doctor is
really good? What's their name? And so it's kind of
a word of mouth thing as well. And then there's
a number of people who have quite high profiles who
(10:14):
can also help you identify groups of practitioners who are
in different locations across Australian and also through the Australian
Menopause Society, they've got a really good listing which shows
people who have an interest in this area. So if
someone doesn't know where to start, you know, if your
friends can't help you and your colleagues aren't talking about it,
that might be a good place to go to The
Australian Menopause Society's website. Australasian is Australasian. I always confuse myself.
(10:40):
There's my menopause brain like playing up for me.
Speaker 3 (10:44):
I love that that is it's such beneficial information that
the one thing I really encourage people, you know, when
I do share what I share is you know, I'm
just highlighting be as informed as you can. Get an
idea of what you need to ask for, then go
and ask for it, like make your decisions. But like
(11:05):
it's such a mix of fine as best information you
can and then you are just an experiment in yourself
because the information is so sporadic out there that it's
really there's no yes or no answer, and like you
just described my symptoms aren't your symptoms, so we can't
even go off that.
Speaker 5 (11:26):
I love what you said just then about it's the
experiment because I in the background, you'll see a book
that I've written, be your own leadership coach, and in
that it's trying to support people with self coaching so
they can be their best selves and they can have
strategies and practices that they can draw upon. And in
order to self coach, it's necessary to build up your
(11:47):
level of consciousness and awareness of what's happening for you.
So building your self awareness and part of that is
noticing what's happening, identifying what's helping or what's hindering, but
then also conducting some small experiments, just as you said,
and then from that further reflection to see, well did
that take me further or did you know, have I
maintained the status quo or did it actually pull me
(12:07):
back somewhat.
Speaker 4 (12:08):
So experimentation is.
Speaker 5 (12:10):
Really important in a controlled way, and that might be actually,
you know, experimenting with how I work. If I'm incurring
lots of sleepless nights, maybe from night sweats or muscle
aggs or muscle cramps, it can really impact how you
feel and how you function, and so maybe my energy
stores in the morning aren't great, and so maybe to
(12:31):
support myself in the workplace, I might conduct some small
experiments to see, well, do I what energy do I
need to do certain types of work? And how can
I alter what I do, what level of autonomy might
I have in my work to make some choices about
when I do what across the day when I have meetings,
when I might be coaching my team, when I might
(12:52):
be writing you up reports or doing research or whatever
it is, or going through emails, and we all get
plenty of those, SOERA could involve all to support myself
when I'm in quite a fatigue state.
Speaker 4 (13:03):
What could I do? Is there room if I'm working
from home to take.
Speaker 5 (13:06):
A nap for twenty minutes? And that can really make
a difference to you. Because sleep is so fundamental to
our brain health, to our body health. I think we
underplay the importance of sleep, and that can really help
our view of life, our view towards finding solutions to
the problems we have. And if we look at perimenopause
as just being a stage of life and what I
(13:28):
need to make adjustments for, as opposed to I'm doomed
and this is terrible and woe is me. It might
not always be pleasant, but it doesn't mean that we
can't try and find more positive ways to approach it.
And that's where I think that experimentation that you refer
to can be really really helpful because we can socialize
that with people to say, well, what are you doing
about that? Oh, great idea. I might try that myself
(13:50):
for the next two weeks and see how it helps.
So I'm glad you mentioned that.
Speaker 3 (13:54):
Yeah, I was thinking before, and I don't know if
this is a question or an invitation for observain, but
this idea, I don't know the stats. I don't know
if there's I don't know if perimenopause is more prevalent,
more intense now, or it's just more we're more aware
of it. But I think about lifestyle and how you know,
(14:15):
working women, and just independence and stress and active minds,
social media, everything that pulls at our attention slash, our
stress system, our nervous system twenty four to seven now
means that as hormonal shifts occur, perhaps this lifestyle we
live is exacerbating them as well. So I think, you know,
(14:39):
because I think about all the questions that I needed
to tick off personally as an athlete. At that time,
it was like, oh, okay, so I'd had a recent
ADHD diagnosis. I'd spend a little bit of time tinkering
with stimulant medication, understanding how that felt with my nervous system,
then questioning well, is this some of these fatigue and
(15:01):
brain fog? Is it because I've because I've played with
that and put something into my nervous system that's disrupted it?
Speaker 4 (15:08):
Is it?
Speaker 3 (15:08):
Like I said, I had all of these questions about
how I did life, which was fine as a youth,
but as you know, while I'm rocketing into my forties,
the body is like, no, mate, you're not going to
have a full time or sometimes it feels like a
double full time because I just love what I do
that much. I just don't want to stop thinking about it.
So it's like, you can't be switched on twenty four
(15:30):
to seven and be a boxer and you do all
of these things and be forty.
Speaker 5 (15:39):
Well, well, you can, but it comes with choices, right,
and so there'll be certain things that you have to
give away, or there might be certain responses from your body.
And you're quite right, because the hormones are sending messages
through the brain to allow for different actions or reactions
to occur. And so even if we're thinking about if
(16:00):
these things are happening to us and we're not taking
notice of them, it doesn't mean it has to stop
us from doing something, it just might mean we do
it differently. And so I think that awareness, that building
the self awareness of what's happening to me physically, cognitively,
emotionally is very very important. Rather than letting it all
take hold and control of us, I'm one to try
(16:21):
and turn it back and try and understand, well, what
can I take control of and how is this in
service to me in being my best self so I
can thrive and not simply survive through this stage of life.
And what's my mindset towards what I'm experiencing. So if
I go into a mindset of you know, woe is me?
Speaker 4 (16:39):
This is really.
Speaker 5 (16:40):
Awful, or fear and uncertainty and feeling, you know, I'm
pulling back from relations or pulling back from perhaps opportunities
because I'm nervous. My confidence might be dropping because of
some of the symptoms I have. What can I do
to try and build up my level of confidence, of
competency and connectedness. And if we kind of break those down,
(17:00):
it becomes easier to think about, well, where does confidence
come from? And so confidence is looking at beliefs, and
it's looking at the mindset towards certain things. So, how
do I change the beliefs that I currently hold on
the assumptions that I might be holding about myself. Am
I setting a new set of beliefs which are pulling
my confidence down because I'm telling myself I don't have
(17:24):
the capacity to do something because I'm perimenopausal? Or how
do I change or address those sets of beliefs to
enable me to think differently towards things and what supportsmen
I need around me to build that confidence? Is it
feedback loops to try and hear from people what they're
seeing of me? Is it my own feedback loop for
me to be assessing and self reflecting to understand what
(17:46):
feedback is available to me from my perspective and what
supports can I have? If I don't have the answer
to something, how can I seek it from someone else
who might have expertise or experience there? So I think
if we do that, we actually address what's happening to us,
it can be also helpful rather than just moving through
(18:06):
it and kind of working it out along the way.
I think there's a really lovely proactive approach that we
can take to live our best lives and through perimenopause
when all of these changes may be happening to the
greater number of women, and menopause is going to happen
to every single woman. Four million of four billion of US,
I should say, you know, globally one billion are in
(18:27):
the age of perimenopause, and closer to home in Australia
it's about three point five million or.
Speaker 4 (18:32):
Of that age.
Speaker 5 (18:34):
There are people who are in their midlife, not their
old life. We have one hundred year life now, so
we're really in midlife. And they're able to thrive and
have vitality and interests and wisdom and experience and all
of these things, deep relationships, deep understandings of the systems
that they're a part of how things work. Coming back
(18:55):
to some of those earlier premises, it's they can lift
some things not necessarily cure for, but shift how they're
experiencing some of those symptoms by starting with self and
the mindset.
Speaker 4 (19:10):
I love that.
Speaker 3 (19:10):
Where did you watch your was your journey into this?
Did you what were you doing and when did you
turn your attention to or was this as it always
seems like people hit it and then it becomes an interest. Now,
no twenty year olds going you know, I'm really interested
in menopause.
Speaker 5 (19:28):
No, well, quite right, So I had My career was
in professional services. I was a partner of Deloitte for
some twenty four years, and sixteen of those years I
was a tax partner looking at research and development incentives
and grants for organizations. So helping, you know, organizations create
(19:48):
new and interesting things to the benefit of the Australian
economy really purposeful. But I'd always wanted to help individuals.
So when I was on my journey as a tax partner,
I was given a coach towards executive roles and it
was the first time I'd had a coach, and I
fell in love with the process of coaching. I thought,
now I know what I'm supposed to be doing, and
(20:08):
this is what my journey should be. So I did
part time at a Master's of Science in coaching psychology
at Sydney UNI, and just before I finished it, I'd
suggested to the CEO and CEO of Deloitte that I
should leave tax and roll out a coaching program I'd
designed for the women partners, the women leaders of Deloitte
Australia because it would help them have long term sustainable careers.
(20:31):
Be for their benefit to be their best selves and
also for the benefit of the firm, and they agreed.
So in twenty sixteen, I hung up my tax boots,
left tax and moved into an executive development role as
a partner of the firm and rolled this out so
each year I'd coach about eighty to one hundred women
leaders of Deloitte. It was over the years that I
(20:52):
also started to then experience my perimenopause and started to
notice that people weren't really talking about this. And I
had and you know, some who were in their more
fertile years having children, some who are at menopause postmenopause years,
so you know, into their fifties, a range of women.
But it was really quiet around the menopause conversation. And
(21:14):
as I said, I was having different symptoms myself. I
was very teary. I'd find myself all my relationships were solid,
my work relationships, family friends. There was nothing that was
going on in my life that should have created the
emotions I was experiencing, and I'd get in my car
drive into work, the tears would flood and I'd pull
myself together and perform really well and then get back
(21:35):
in the car and the tears would come again, and
I just didn't know what was going on. And I
started to notice that my hair was thinning, which was
causing me anxiety. I was getting flushes, didn't really understand
what that was all about, headaches, muscle cramps, so they
were fun through the night. So the fatigue was building,
which then affects your mood and affects the tears and
(21:57):
all this. So I started to investigate it and I
was fortunate to discover what was going on for me
and learn the term of perimenopause. But I also had
a conversation with our former deputy chair and she had
also started to experience this and was wondering why it
was so quiet. So the two of us came together
and we created a working group within Deloitte to look
(22:17):
at managing menopause within Deloitte, probably going back about a
good three years ago now. And from that we then
started to support the workforce. Our executive and our chair
came on board very quickly. We started to lift the
level of understanding and awareness in the organization, whether it
was through internet resources, webinars, podcasts, all sorts of things.
(22:42):
We ran menopause cafes to bring us the greatest of
relatedness when people come together to talk about it informally.
And I still still today run the group coaching program
which is focused on menopause at deloit or perimenopause, so
a lot has come through from that. And then outside
of Deloitte, I'm no longer partner with Deloitte, but I
still do some work with them, but I work with
(23:03):
other organizations as well. I'm also assisting other organizations with
group coaching to manage menopause awareness sessions, cannote speaking those
kind of things to uplift the conversation so it's no
longer a taboo and there's no longer silence and a
lesser amount of distress or concern in the workplace for
those who are experiencing it. So that's kind of how
(23:24):
I came into it and how I offer my support.
I hope I've answered your question.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
I love, love, love love this. What I love about
it is understanding your background and how fortunate we are
women are that someone like yourself had this existing relationship
and experience inside of a huge organization to be able
to have the trust to roll that out. A question
(23:50):
I'd love to ask is without naming names obviously, but
what has it been like approaching organizations to have this conversation?
And I imagine at a lot of the senior levels
you're dealing with men, what has what has it been
like to introduce this conversation and sell the idea, get
them on board and does it come Tiff, Just ask
(24:14):
one fucking question at a time. I'm going to leave
you with that. This is what I do. I could
just keep a layer seventeen questions on top of one
another and leave you and it is.
Speaker 5 (24:23):
No, that's right because I'll give you so much back
that so between the two of us will work it out.
It's interesting because most of the conversations you have when
you are working with organizations don't necessarily start at the
executive level. You're not around this topic. I might, you know,
I know people at that level of different organizations, but
(24:44):
they're not sitting there waiting for me to give them
a call and say, hey, I want to I was
waiting for you to call me about our menopause policies.
Speaker 4 (24:51):
So typically you're looking at who.
Speaker 5 (24:53):
Am I speaking to in the organization and what level
of attention are they paying to it? And I think
the biggest challenge. There's no well, there is some doubt
in some organizations, but there's an understanding that this affects
fifty one percent of the population. There's an understanding that
there it's the fastest growing demographic in the working world
(25:14):
in terms of women who have perimenopausal age. So and
also there's an understanding that we are now in midlife,
no longer referring to this as old age, so we've
extended the number of years we'll have in the workforce.
We have a longer life expectancy. People will be in
the workforce for a third longer than what it was.
And there's great talent and wisdom, but we find it's
(25:35):
challenging to get the issues solved, mainly because of the
attention of all the other issues that they're also trying
to solve at the same time, and the limited number
of resources and budgets that they might have available or
people internally to try and.
Speaker 4 (25:50):
Solve for this.
Speaker 5 (25:51):
And so I'd say that that's probably the biggest challenges
is how do they understand how powerful this can be
as a stretch magic advantage To help them understand that
if I have to solve for this issue about managing
menopause in the workplace. I'm actually solving for the gender
gap because many women who are going into senior roles
(26:12):
are of the aide of perimenopause or women and if
you kind of put them over each other, it correlates really,
really well. Yet there's this missing link to that conversation
talk about the gender gap. We talk about it in
terms of wage, We talk it about it just in
terms of numbers, But I would be uplifting to say,
and what's happening at that life transition for those women
who we're hoping will stay and take on those leadership roles.
(26:33):
So we want to address the system, but we also
want to address what support we're offering to those women
to be able to take up those opportunities. And there's
an advantage just in that in terms of continuing with
the great insight and wisdom and experience that these women have,
helping the younger women see themselves in those women, so
they are thinking, oh, wow, I'm going to have a
(26:54):
long standing career in this organization because you're helping me
do so through all of my transitions of life. It
can make a considerable difference from a strategic point of
view to be able to maintain your unfair share of
talented women in your workplace who'll bring the richness and
guidance and knowledge to be able to support what you're
(27:16):
doing in your workplace, and who will have deep relationships
to continue with your clients, your customers, your team members
to meet. It's no brainer, but it's helping. It's helping
organizations move it away from what they think might be
a personal issue at first instance.
Speaker 4 (27:31):
To a workplace issue.
Speaker 5 (27:33):
And so when we start to actually explore that perimenopause
is something that affects how you think, how you feel,
and how you function, and that the symptoms of perimenopause
don't stay home when you go to the office. They
don't know working hours, and so they are ratic and
unexpected and unwanted, and they'll appear and affect people in
(27:55):
the workplace so they're not thriving. Well, what can we
do in support of that, and how can we open
up conversations and get some insights from our workplace and
really just understand how we're impacted by it in our
organization to then say, well, that makes sense to do
something about it. So, you know, the more men I
speak to the more they're curious about it, the more
(28:16):
men I'm actually running programs, just starting programs for men
as well, which is separate to what I'm doing with
coaching women through menopause, because men want to have a
safe space to have conversations and not feel they've affronted
anybody by asking some questions which some women might go,
are you kidding me? Like that's what you think? And
(28:36):
so it's giving them also a safe space to open
up and understand what's their awareness and understanding how can
they support colleagues in the workplace, how can they go
home and support their life partners at home? And that's
where they get really interested.
Speaker 4 (28:49):
To say, oh my gosh, back at home.
Speaker 5 (28:53):
Now I realize she doesn't hate me, you know, it's
actually there's something going on there, And now I can
be in support rather than you know, perhaps since there's
a problem with our relationship.
Speaker 4 (29:04):
That's when it.
Speaker 5 (29:05):
Starts to get really interesting, when the men start realizing,
hold on, I could actually help my colleague have a
bigger impact here if we had a chat about it,
and if I could support it. And now I'm learning
how I can have that conversation without worrying I'm going
to be sent to HR or offend my colleague or
whatever it might be.
Speaker 4 (29:23):
So yeah, there's I guess there's.
Speaker 5 (29:24):
Different places in the organization where we'll have the conversations
just to finish.
Speaker 4 (29:29):
Off on that.
Speaker 5 (29:31):
It's really important though, that the executive understands it and
has an awareness of it and role models there under
their interest in supporting that part of the workplace because
any cultural change needs to come top down and if
it's just kind of been spoken at this level, but
when you get up there, they're going, what are you
talking about?
Speaker 1 (29:48):
What?
Speaker 4 (29:48):
We don't want to talk about this in our workplace.
It's you know, chalk and cheese.
Speaker 5 (29:52):
So you need to ensure that the executive have briefing
papers that it's been addressed with them, that they their
awareness and understanding is in But at that level they're
unlikely to be the ones who actually make change in
the organization around this, and so it's then finding out
who have they given the accountability and responsibility to in
the organization to bring this to life.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
It's just so brilliant and you I was quite surprised
the first time a bloke said to me after releasing
an episode talking about Paramam Pause that he listened because
he was around that age, and so a lot of
his friends and people that he's hanging out with or
around that age, and he was interested in understanding it.
(30:36):
And then I've since then, I've I've actually had a
number of guys say a similar thing. They're tuning in
where I'm thinking, well, take a buddy seat for a minute, guys,
I'm just gonna have a few episodes on this topic.
They want to know and I love that. I love
that so much.
Speaker 5 (30:52):
I'm glad and they I mean, I'm going public in
the next couple of weeks with a course offering that
men can join in three parts that they can participate in.
And then there's the corporate piece as well, which is different.
So doing it it's for the public domain, just to
help those who maybe their organization won't want to sponsor
such a program. And then with some organizations, we're putting
(31:14):
programs on for the men as well, so that it
can be discrete programs for men in the organization to
upskill them and help them with their understanding and awareness.
And then bringing the whole workforce together. So, for instance,
if the workforce holds these menopause cafes it's not a
women's cafe, it's for everybody of all gender, So you
get then a cross fertilization of questions and sharing and
(31:37):
information gathering, so people can benefit from that in a
really constructive way.
Speaker 4 (31:44):
You know what else.
Speaker 3 (31:45):
I love about that, Just like with stress itself, you
never know what you're in the middle of, and so
it's actually, when I think of it that way, it's
more important that the people around us stand to the
signs because they may see it before. One of the
most surprising things I felt when I started taking HRT,
(32:11):
So yeah, I started sleeping bout, I started to fill
my energy right, but this unexpected feeling of going I
recognized this. I call it my sense of self. There
was this sense of self that came back that was
like a long lost friend, and I kind of went lovely.
I think I've i'd like been a bit of a
(32:31):
husshole for the last few years, Like I just looked
and not not so much. Maybe two people maybe maybe
everyone's like, yeah, TIP actually went real witch. But in
my head even just that kind of reactive and negative
and just wound up, which you don't like. That wasn't
(32:53):
a symptom I was reporting of like, oh, I just
it was just like I'm just tired and not my
body's not recovering and I'm forgetting stuff. But it you know,
you RECOGNI this person that comes back and it's like, oh,
will that happened?
Speaker 5 (33:04):
Yeah, yep, yeah, I mean it's true. It could be
attitudinally coming across. So it could be just people feeling
your mood. And we know that moods are contagious. So
if you're in a workplace and you've rocked up and
you're feeling flat, you're feeling a bit lower down, less
people are going to want to be coming up to
you and seeking help and support and asking questions or
(33:24):
engaging you to come into an opportunity because it's not
particularly comfortable when people are that. They probably prefer to
be in an environment where there's more positive emotions that
are demonstrated. And it's not to say we always have
to be happy, but if there's a consistent kind of
theme that's coming through, so it's possible that it did
have an impact. The ripple effect can be very strong.
(33:46):
I love that you found your sense of self though,
because what a gift and what a joy, and I'm
so glad that you know that's worked for you, because again,
everyone's journey is different. So for some women HRT has
been awesome. Others use other ways to try and resolve
and work through perimenopause without it. So it's great that
you found what works for you.
Speaker 2 (34:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:07):
Yeah, And I feel fortunate with that. By way of
I've just increased the dose of my gel a little
bit yeap from my doctor. But I haven't gone and gone,
oh this is not working. It's like, oh, I'm feeling yeah,
I think of feeling really good. But also I went
I was fortunate enough to have in recent years, maybe
(34:28):
a few years ago, I'd had a genetic DNA test.
Speaker 4 (34:30):
So I had a lot of data.
Speaker 3 (34:32):
I pulled that out because I knew that I had
variations in my like there's a better word for this,
but I can't remember the letters. So the motherfucker gene,
you know, those detoxification pathways and methylation pathways and things
that related to my ability to process these hormones. So
I revisited that and started taking supplements that would support
(34:54):
these things where I had variation. So it was, like
I said before, it was using what data I had,
And I honestly think that that in conjunction with the
hormone therapy has just helped my body, has just taken
a lot of load off of my body. So but
I do feel so fortunate that I've I seem to
(35:15):
have so far landed on what is working for me.
Speaker 5 (35:18):
Yes, and it's that it's that personal advocacy of finding
out and learning and trialing things, the experimentation until you
get to a place where you can see positive change.
That's what I'd encourage people to adopt.
Speaker 3 (35:32):
Yeah, and I've had to change a lot of things.
I've have to change how I trained, and I've gone
to strength training, and I've had to completely park the
intensity of i haven't boxed for ages. I love boxing,
and now I'm trying to integrate small snippets of it
in appropriate intensities and not over like I'm one of
(35:53):
those if I did if it was awesome today, it'll
be awesome tomorrow. I want to do it again. I
want a little bit, you know. So it's trying to
find I knew normal in how do I best move
and not just go over the top yet feels good,
But if you're not going to recover a brick to
do that every day of the week. Yeah, so there's
been a lot of I mean, there's been a lot
of things that I've So it wasn't just the HRT
(36:15):
was magic bullet. It was in the middle of a
lot of changes, and then I added this to it,
and then I chose to find what other things would
support that, and yeah, patience, which is not my strong
suit by any stretch of the.
Speaker 5 (36:29):
Well, look, if you're not feeling great, you don't have
a lot of patience. We want that resolved and sort
it out. And then I guess people feel a bit
deflated if they're going and seeking support and they're not
getting the right support, or they're dismissed or ignored when
they talk about symptoms, or you know what we have.
It's been reported that we have an over prescription of
(36:49):
antidepressants because a lot of women are showing up and
then said, oh, you just take these and this will
sort you out. So it's working through those kind of things.
I'm not saying there's not a role for that, but
the question is how many perimenopausal women have been prescribed
And there's some research that's been done in Australia around that,
(37:10):
and it's concerning that perhaps it's just been what the
doctor has thought is the right response. But perhaps they
didn't have the information, their training didn't allow them to
be thinking differently, And so now we're trying to help
them think differently through the programs that are being offered
as a result of that Senate inquiry I've spoke of before.
Speaker 3 (37:27):
Yeah, And I think for me and where I was
at with understanding information and how to find it and
who to trust, I'd been exposed to enough information, not
just around this, but around everything I've learned the last
five years, having a ridiculous amount of conversations with everything
that fascinates me on this show. Start to realize that
(37:52):
you can build a case and support it with science
for everything, so you can take one I could have
taken that one set of symptoms. What this might have
been a big part of what made me slow to
pull the trigger on which way to attack this, because
it was like, well, I could go to a GP,
I could go to a bloody sports scientist, I could
(38:15):
go go to so many different places and report what's
happening and have five or six different diagnoses or ways
to resolve yes, And when you know that, it becomes
like you go the ball really is in my court
with this, How do I decide what's the best for
(38:35):
me and who I need to trust? And then when
I decide on the method or the avenue, where how
do I find the person within that that's gonna be
a fit?
Speaker 5 (38:45):
Yep, yeah, yeah, So it can take some time, absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 4 (38:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (38:51):
What what have you learned in the middle of doing
what you do that maybe you didn't expect to.
Speaker 5 (39:01):
I think what I've learned is that the world is
changing rapidly, and so there's many more conversations. Social media,
which typically we'd say is not our friend, I think
is being our friend on this to some degree, because
it's providing us ways of educating people very quickly. It's
opening up conversations, it's normalizing the topic very quickly. So
(39:24):
there's many, many more people who are talking about it
online or who are presenting on it or discussing it
and so on. So I think that's something that's been interesting,
the rise of social media, and also the rise of
the actors across the world who are of my vintage,
who suddenly also have a voice that they feel they
can talk about these things. And I mean it's true
(39:46):
that their story won't match everybody else's story, and we
want to be mindful that some of their stories are
going to be a little bit dramatic because their background
and training tells them that's part of what holds people's attention.
So we just need to work out, well, was that
an interesting story that I've learned from, or even if
my experience is different, it's great that it's being shared
(40:06):
because the more I'm seeing people share stories, the easier
it is for us to normalize these conversations. So I
think it's just been this probably in the last couple
of years, there's been this rapid change in the quantity
of information being shared in this space, which is making
it much more helpful, and everyone's open. When typically when
I tell people what I do, everyone's got a story,
(40:27):
everyone wants to talk about their experience. It's almost a
sense of relief that, oh, you know, like the TV show,
thank God you're here, we can open it up and start,
you know, you open the door and you've arrived, and
then people are willing to partake in the conversation very quickly.
That vulnerability of sharing their own experience seems to just
(40:48):
fall away really quickly. So it seems to me that
there's quite a need for people wanting just to share,
to normalize it for themselves, and to hear of other
people's experience. That's how we learn, hearing from others and
noticing differences and noticing similarities, and so yeah, I guess
that's what I've learned, is willingness to talk to It
(41:10):
is on the increase.
Speaker 3 (41:12):
And it's really nice. I think about the shift in
people's the way people talk about or this maybe the
previous stigma around being hormonal. You know, it's like that
used to be. It was like this thing that was
obviously a reality. Yeah, we have especially you know, month
by month for most of our lives. Women are different
at different times of the month. But when you start
(41:35):
to experience big waves in that, and then as women,
we want to because we're trained to be nice and
quiet and agreeable and everything, and we don't want to,
like because it's said there's some sort of snider remark
against us. We don't want to show that. Yeah, well,
like it's a reality and it's not fun and it's
not nice and it's a thing. But I am not
(41:57):
my hormones. They will dictate how I show up and
who I am in different moments, but they are not
essentially who I am beneath them.
Speaker 5 (42:08):
Yes, yes, I don't think we've solved for it all yet.
Speaker 4 (42:12):
We're on a journey.
Speaker 5 (42:13):
So there are still some workplaces where it would be
very challenging to speak about it and there would be
a lot of shame and embarrassment. There be a lot
of hostility, and we just need to try and help
them see that there's different ways and better ways and
help people understand it. If that's a workplace therein and
they have the opportunity to choose perhaps a more supportive workplace,
(42:37):
if that opportunity arises, maybe that's a good choice. But
not everyone has that opportunity, right, There's not an abundance
of jobs that we can just jump around at our
own discretion. But I think it's about you know, us
also hoping that there'll be data that will require organizations
to start reporting. At this stage, it's not mandata that
(42:57):
they have to have menopause policies or guidelines in place,
but there is data which is collected every year which
talks about the gender gap, and then that's by Waghia
and so then in responding to how their gender gap
is changing, if more organizations are talking about, well, we've
actually done this in relation to managing menopause in our workplace.
(43:18):
That's how we've responded to the gender gap that we had.
It's going to make it more transparent in terms of
those who are and who aren't in line with what's
happening and I have opening their minds to trying to
allow for everybody to thrive in their workplace. Look at
their well being, look at the leadership opportunities, look at
(43:38):
the support that they can provide and help people move
from states of high levels of presenteeism where people want
to be there, they want to bring their best selves,
but they're just not functioning as they should. How are
we supporting them as I say, to be positively present
rather than be sitting in presentism.
Speaker 3 (43:55):
If people are listening and they are in an organization
that is not as forward thinking or in this space yet,
how can they support themselves or find support that might
begin to cross over into their working life or all
better equip them when they're managing that gap.
Speaker 5 (44:16):
I'd start with gathering some insights from within the organization.
So what data do you have that helps you understand
your workforce? You know, if you've got a predominantly male workforce.
Perhaps this is not as live an issue as one
which has either an existing or growing diverse workforce. So
I'd gather some data points and then I'd start being
(44:38):
in conversation with the women who are of ages say
forty upwards, to understand what's their experience been, how are
they finding things in relation to this, if they're open
to talking about it, and what would help them to
be able to bring their best selves through this stage
of life. You might already be doing a lot of things,
(44:59):
or have a lot guidelines or policies that exist in
some draws that just need to be taken out and communicated.
And it could well be that you have some flexible
work policies that could be used in support but no
one's talking about them. Or perhaps you would allow adjustments
to certain ways of working that are quite agreeable across
the organization, but nobody's really lift them and shared.
Speaker 4 (45:22):
That with them.
Speaker 5 (45:23):
So I'd be looking at what do we already have,
what do we now know from the governance we've done
to understand our organization better, and then how do we
start matching up those conversations to help And then from
there you can start to lift awareness, put things on
your intranet, you know, open up information channels. So it
could be there's a number of really good organizations who
(45:44):
can provide you with checklists of looking at symptoms, how
to have conversations as managers and leaders. So the information
is building, and then you can bring in other people,
perhaps you know, on World Menopause Day once a year,
to do a talk which might engage some in the
workplace to learn more about it. That would be a
good starting place, and then you can obviously build from there.
Speaker 2 (46:07):
Yeah, just thinking.
Speaker 3 (46:08):
About you know, there's been times I've spoken to women
who are past menopausal, past me, is.
Speaker 4 (46:14):
That even think postmenopausal?
Speaker 2 (46:16):
Ye?
Speaker 3 (46:16):
Past Yeah, it's a post menopausal and they've reflected back
then you know it's still feeling like there's stuff going
on for them.
Speaker 2 (46:23):
But also now with this.
Speaker 3 (46:25):
Conversation, they're like, you know, when my marriage fell apart
and I went through this terrible time of that unfolding,
I think I was a hormonal night there.
Speaker 2 (46:37):
You know, when you think about how.
Speaker 3 (46:40):
Many and that applies to the workforce too, how many
careers crumble not because of the career itself, but because
the person was in the middle of something they weren't
aware of and didn't know how to support, and didn't
know and assumed it was the circumstances.
Speaker 5 (46:56):
Yes, yes, agreed, agreed so to that, and even things
like have employee assistance programs could be beneficial. So it's
almost allowing people an avenue to have conversations about what
they're experiencing, whether it's emotionally or physically or cognitively, with
someone outside of their day to day business, and that,
you know, providing those kind of programs can be really helpful.
(47:18):
Just to start teasing you know, this is how I'm feeling,
this is what's going on. I just would check to
ensure that your EAP provider has an understanding of perimenopause
and menopause, because otherwise they might send them on routes
that don't support them. So there's been a bit of
due diligence around that too, But you're right. I mean,
it's very possible that women are pulling back from opportunities
if they don't feel that they can gain the support
(47:40):
in the workplace, or they don't understand what's happening to them.
They might be feeling less engaged and motivated, fatigued, irritable, frustrated,
a lot of things which can come from change in
estrogen progesterone. And so these are the types of things
that if people don't have an awareness of what could
be happening at that stage of life, might walk past
(48:01):
it and only realize later when they've made some choices about,
you know, not stepping up for that particular opportunity or
stepping back from maybe a leadership role that they're currently
And so that's why I think the awareness and understanding
is critical within organizations. The more we can just start
with the basics at least when we start talking about it,
(48:22):
then we're taking away the stigma and the taboo, and
then people can start to go a bit deeper.
Speaker 2 (48:28):
Is there anything that I haven't asked about that is
that you want to share.
Speaker 5 (48:33):
Learning of miss I think it's the key thing for organizations,
and I've probably referenced it somewhat is it doesn't have
to be difficult, It doesn't need a lot of money
to be thrown at it to make something of it.
And I recognize that organizations are often resource poor, and
we're going through interesting economic times locally globally, and so
(48:56):
you know, it might be there so we don't have
a budget to do this. I would actually, as I said,
start looking at what you already do. You don't have
to take a blank piece of paper out and say,
now we have to create a new menopause policy, and
that'll take a lot of investment in time and money.
There's so many policies that you probably already have around
well being programs or how people work. When COVID came in,
(49:18):
we all started to use flexible work policies working from
home that can be hugely beneficial to some women when
they're enduring particular symptoms. If I'm having a very heavy
menstrual bleed, perhaps it's easier if I'm working from home
that day because I've got access very quickly to my bathroom.
Or I can wear comfortable clothing. Maybe i can change
my hours of work, Maybe I can change my place,
(49:40):
the location, the times that I work using flexible work policies,
and those things in most organizations already exist. So I'd
just be looking at what do we already do. Do
we have a culture which allows for curious conversations and
respectful conversations to take place, and how do we help
people in their coaching conversationtions enable them just to not
(50:02):
hold assumptions, but to be curious and allowed for a
place of no judgment in asking someone, hey, how things
done for you? You haven't seemed yourself lately, or I
noticed your energy levels seem to be a bit flat?
Is there anything I can do and support? So just
some small questions without diagnosing, without holding the assumptions, and
(50:23):
really looking at performance reviews on context not assumptions. That's
critical because if we are to assume that people's performance
has dropped because they're not skilled, not motivated, not engaged
for their own personal reasons, we might be missing out
on some opportunities to help some of these people whose
engagement might be affected by their symptoms, by their brain fog,
(50:46):
by their fatigue, by their mood, by the physical concerns
that might be having which is taking them away from
being their best self. So that's why I say context
is super super important, and those conversass the meaningful conversations,
can be game changes.
Speaker 2 (51:05):
This was a really interesting conversation, and.
Speaker 3 (51:10):
When I started reaching out to people on this topic,
I kind of didn't realize this was a conversation that existed,
and I didn't realize that it was going to be
for me so interesting and beneficial.
Speaker 2 (51:24):
So thank you.
Speaker 4 (51:25):
Oh, my pleasure, my pleasure.
Speaker 3 (51:27):
Where can people reach out get access to you by
your book and anything that you'd.
Speaker 2 (51:32):
Like to promote?
Speaker 5 (51:33):
Oh, thank you. Look, I'm a big user of LinkedIn,
and so the easiest place is look me up and
connect with me on LinkedIn. So it's Karen Stain coaching
on LinkedIn.
Speaker 2 (51:43):
I'm announced that wrong. I cannot believe.
Speaker 3 (51:45):
Every time I don't ask, every time I do not ask,
I'm like, I don't need to ask this one.
Speaker 2 (51:50):
I called you Stein.
Speaker 5 (51:51):
Yeah, you've pronounced it as it's spelled, which is more
than fair enough. My folks are of South African origin,
and so the ei sound was more of an a,
so if you think of it, you pronounce it like
a mark on a shirt, a stain. So you'll always
remember that. My brother's name is Mark, which is kind
of funny too, Mark Stain.
Speaker 2 (52:12):
Jimmy Carge did it recently. Did it? Was doing crowd work.
He's the comedian.
Speaker 3 (52:16):
He's hilarious, and someone heckled him and he said, what's
your name?
Speaker 2 (52:20):
Mate? And he goes Mark and then goes like a stain.
Speaker 3 (52:23):
And I I lost it. I'm like, that's brilliant and
I love it. That's how you describe your surname.
Speaker 5 (52:29):
So that's how they can find me. I have a
website Karenstaincoaching dot com and it talks more about what
I provide executive coaching, menopause at work, keynotes, group coaching,
those types of things. My book easiest place to get
it is Amazon is a really easy place to get it.
As I said, it'll provide you with a whole lot
of strategies that you can throw into your virtual backpack,
(52:51):
have your hands free to address what you need to
hold on to during the day or push out of
your way, and then draw the strategies out of this
virtual backpack as you need them. So there's twelve strategies
and practices, lots of self coaching exercises and stories that
can help you bring it to life. And I'm running
my second book, which is about managing menopause in the
workplace and looking at self coaching strategies in support, so
(53:13):
hopefully that will be out next to you.
Speaker 3 (53:16):
I love that amazing. I'll have links to everything in
the show notes. Thank you so much Karen for coming.
Speaker 2 (53:21):
On the show.
Speaker 4 (53:21):
My absolute pleasure. Thanks for the chat, she said
Speaker 1 (53:25):
It's no never, I got fighting in my blood.
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