Menopause: W.T.F?!?! (Stay till the end for a surprise guest!)

Speaker 1 This episode is brought to you with the support of our sponsor, MIDI Health.

Speaker 2 We are gathered here today

Speaker 2 to bitch about this thing called

Speaker 2 paramenopause. Yeah.

Speaker 2 I have been very looking forward to this hour, maybe four months, because I don't hear anyone discussing this the way I am experiencing this, which is I feel as if my mind and my heart and my body and my life and my relationships and my planet are all on fire.

Speaker 2 And when I try to express that, someone says, have you tried some hematomoglobinique? What?

Speaker 2 Like some word that is some sort of supplement. And I need like a fire hose.
And

Speaker 1 we are beyond supplements, people.

Speaker 2 And that is how I feel. Like, and then so I just need,

Speaker 2 I just ask for a little bit of time

Speaker 2 to try to express what the hell is going on.

Speaker 2 And

Speaker 1 it's a service to the people, Glennon. It's a service to the people.
If you're able to put in words this Godforsaken thing that everyone's going through, it would be,

Speaker 1 I thank you for your service.

Speaker 2 Yeah. And I also think if you're listening, maybe

Speaker 2 include your male friends in on this podcast, just so that they could learn a little bit about either what to expect or what might be going on in their households. Yeah.
This is,

Speaker 2 we have no answers, but this is a public service announcement. But boy, do I have to do it about what is.

Speaker 1 Is it like what to expect when you're expecting menopause?

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 Maybe.

Speaker 2 I mean, I'd like to start with a self-portrait that my team has,

Speaker 2 Alison and Audrey, have created.

Speaker 2 It's a self-portrait of me right now. And so I want you to look at this.
It's just,

Speaker 1 it's a Venn diagram, is what it is.

Speaker 2 And this is menopause, and this is menopause, and this is fascism. And this is me.
This flaming hot

Speaker 2 fire is my self-portrait right now. So if any of you are also living at this intersection, welcome.

Speaker 1 What's at the bottom? What's the picture at the bottom?

Speaker 2 Oh, we'll get there.

Speaker 1 Okay, we're not there yet, people. No,

Speaker 2 now

Speaker 2 do you want me to keep this up? I don't care. Like, let's see about it.
How did you do that?

Speaker 2 Okay,

Speaker 2 so

Speaker 2 I want to tell you when this journey began. I think it began at night.

Speaker 2 Okay?

Speaker 2 Night for me

Speaker 2 has become a slice

Speaker 2 of

Speaker 2 solitary lonesome hell

Speaker 2 which

Speaker 2 honestly is not that much different than the slice of lonesome ragey hell that is the day but the night is darker okay

Speaker 2 now

Speaker 2 what started happening to me in the night

Speaker 2 is that I would lay my head down and then some things would start happening. Okay.

Speaker 2 One of the things that would start happening is that my mind you know it's not it's not a calm quiet relaxing ordered place to be ever i lay my head down and it's like

Speaker 2 okay well i imagine it you know have you ever seen a beehive

Speaker 2 and then you see them on the i've never seen one in real life who has but on the nature channels and like maybe someone brings some poison and then or or smoke and then the whole beehive goes crazy and comes alive, and there's buzzing everywhere, and it's just chaos.

Speaker 2 Yes. That is what night started happening in my brain.
Okay.

Speaker 2 So there was no, there's no order to the thoughts. There's no escape from the thoughts.
There's no logic to the thoughts. It's just a million bees activate the second I lay my head down.

Speaker 2 And I try all the tricks. I count to a million.
I do letters and think of words. I do, no, the bees keep going.
Now,

Speaker 2 if somehow

Speaker 2 the bees calm enough,

Speaker 2 don't worry because then another thing happens, which is that I started getting these unbelievable skin itches. Do you remember this time?

Speaker 2 Now, when I call it an itch,

Speaker 2 it's more like

Speaker 2 a colony of fire ants.

Speaker 2 Okay. I don't know what fire ants are.
I don't even know if they're real. But this is, it feels like I'm being stung and bitten or stabbed.
Nope.

Speaker 2 It's a colony of fire ants with tiny daggers.

Speaker 1 Tiny dagger-wielded fire ants descending upon the hive of bees.

Speaker 2 Yes. Yes, bees.
And now I've got the bees and the ants. I've got the fire ants on the skin.
Armed. Armed ants.
The smoking bees in the head. Okay.
Okay. Armed ants, smoking bees.
Okay, and so

Speaker 2 I wake up. Like a band name.

Speaker 2 Yeah, and the fire ants are happening, and the skin is on fire. And the only relief that could possibly be brought for one second is the scratching.

Speaker 2 But then if you scratch, the fire ants come back double, double, double. Stabby, stabby, stabby.
Okay?

Speaker 2 All night. Now.
I'm only laughing because this is exactly what's happening. Yes.
Then nature provides, I don't know,

Speaker 2 liquid. Maybe to help with the bees, maybe to help with the fire ants.
But what happens next is I wake up in pools of sweat.

Speaker 2 I sweat through my clothes. I take off my clothes.
I sweat into the sheets. I wake up in like just puddle, puddle, puddle.
I, for the first month, think this is gross.

Speaker 2 For the next month, I don't give a shit. I just try to think of it as a water bed.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 This is how we live now.

Speaker 2 This is how we live now. We just sleep in liquid.
Okay?

Speaker 2 This is in a water bed. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Going back to your roots. Remember when that was your nickname, Puddles?

Speaker 2 Yeah, I do.

Speaker 2 Then

Speaker 2 I want to say I wake up, but no, I just stand up. Okay? I don't wake up because I never fucking fell asleep.

Speaker 2 I've been at war with nature all night.

Speaker 2 It's like the closest I've ever been to camping.

Speaker 2 Okay.

Speaker 2 And

Speaker 2 I stand up. I don't wake wake up.
I stand up.

Speaker 2 And then more things happen. Okay.
So first it was just a night experience. And then I started noticing the situation where

Speaker 2 airplanes, airplanes, if I get in a car, first it was just airplanes and cars that suddenly made me motion sick. Okay.

Speaker 2 Then it became walking.

Speaker 1 Any motion whatsoever, including with your feet.

Speaker 2 Then it became other people walking. Then I kid you not.

Speaker 2 Can I, I, there are many TV shows I can't watch anymore.

Speaker 2 I get sick to my stomach watching TV and my lying. Yeah, like, you know, the ones like The Office, where they do like, they do a lot of like TV, like camera movement.
Right.

Speaker 2 And it's like to, to, they, they like pan really quickly to, and she's like, can't do it. Can't do it.

Speaker 1 I've noticed that with Google Docs. Like if we're in a meeting looking at Google Docs, you're like, I can't watch that screen while it moves.
Nope.

Speaker 2 Okay. So then.
That was fun last year when we were on the road for Tisha's tour. It was fun.

Speaker 2 Remember, I couldn't even re-watch Friday Night Lights. Yep.

Speaker 2 Okay.

Speaker 2 Then.

Speaker 2 Some interesting things started happening, which is that I...

Speaker 2 Well, my hair,

Speaker 2 it turned a completely different category. I don't think it's, I don't think it's the texture of hair.
I don't know what it is. It's wire sticking out.

Speaker 2 This will last about 20, you know, it'll last this

Speaker 2 show, and then it will just start spiraling out. Like, do you know Miss Frizzle from the Magic School Bus? Yeah, okay.
So that's the vibe. It's a book.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 Is that a book? Nobody read to me.

Speaker 2 Is it a book? Then no.

Speaker 2 And then

Speaker 2 my one of my favorite parts of this is that i started getting this like little weird red situation on my cheeks and i was like what this is new the the cool thing about this paramenopause thing is is for the first several months you don't connect any of these things

Speaker 2 you just think all of these different weird things are happening to me right

Speaker 2 i started getting this red mask of what I now know is

Speaker 2 some sort of rosacea that comes with paramenopause, but I didn't know that for six months. So I just look like Santa Claus.
That's what I look like now. I have like 16 pounds of shellac

Speaker 2 over my cheeks. Actually, I should have just not done that for this episode.
I'll do, I'll show you guys. I love your cheeks.
Thank you, baby.

Speaker 2 For real. The redness? Yes, I think it's so cute.
Thank you.

Speaker 2 It is. It looks like she's been like sun-kissed.

Speaker 2 Sun-kissed by Satan kissed. By the devil.

Speaker 2 And Satan kissed. That's what menopause feels like so it's like the opposite of a fairy godmother it's like ding it's like ding it's like you've been satan has touched your

Speaker 2 so

Speaker 2 i

Speaker 2 and then we're moving you know we moved to shin to school the other day and we i was carrying all this shit and i passed a mirror a big mirror in the hallway and i looked into it and I realized I've been trying to figure out

Speaker 2 what I remind myself of during this six-month period.

Speaker 2 And I looked in the mirror, and I realized I know exactly what I remind myself of. This is who I am now.
When I was in elementary school, we lived in Virginia, and so we used to go

Speaker 2 our big field trip each year was to Colonial Williamsburg.

Speaker 2 Okay, you know, they'd like turn butter. It's like one of those places they pretend it's in olden days, and it's like a village, a colony like we we really used to celebrate colonialism in big ways

Speaker 2 we would send kids to celebrate it um anyway

Speaker 2 they would have us they would have a craft table

Speaker 2 and at the craft table there would be these apples and the apples had been shrunken okay they had been laid out for a very long time and so the app all the moisture from the apple it had gone away so it just become this little shrunken thing like kind of like a grape becomes a raisin.

Speaker 2 This apple became this other, like

Speaker 2 shrunken, shriveled thing.

Speaker 2 And then we would have to take the apple, and there would be all these scraps around, like that you'd make a dress out of, and you'd put little eyeballs on the apple, and you would make a doll,

Speaker 2 a dried apple doll.

Speaker 1 A dried colonial apple doll.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 I am dried apple colonial shrunken head Barbie. That's what I, oh yes, and my team found, this is the shrunken.
This is who I am now.

Speaker 2 Okay, I'm a shrunken. This is menopause.
This is all of us. We are a group of shrunken

Speaker 2 apple. All the moisture has been taken.
All the,

Speaker 2 and what I want you to know is the physical aspect, I am not just a shrunken.

Speaker 2 This is not just my appearance. This is my soul.

Speaker 1 Right, right. This is not necessarily what I look like on the outside.
This is what I look like on the inside.

Speaker 1 If you're just listening to this, you have to go watch it on YouTube because you can see the portraits of Glennon as shrunken apple.

Speaker 2 That's right. Yeah.
Oh, right, right. Because people are listening.
Okay, right, right.

Speaker 2 So,

Speaker 2 what you need to know is it's not just the actual moisture, right? It is actual moisture. It is.
I think that that is a side effect of menopause. Yes, decrease in moisture.
Human cactus.

Speaker 2 My skin, my hair, my body, my is it, is it all the sweat that gets taken at night?

Speaker 2 I mean, maybe it is. I mean, guess what? We don't know.
We don't fucking know. We don't know anything.
Because nobody tells us shit. We don't know.
I'm so furious.

Speaker 2 Okay.

Speaker 2 So the physical situation that I just described is the least of it.

Speaker 2 Doesn't matter. That's true.

Speaker 2 Does not matter. It is not just that I am an apple shrunken doll physically.
It is that I am like the reverse Grinch. Like the paramenopause has shrunk my heart three sizes.

Speaker 2 I don't think that that's the right class. You might feel that way.

Speaker 1 She does, Abby. She does feel that way.

Speaker 2 I'm not experiencing you that way. Really? Yeah, I'm not experiencing.
I'm experiencing lots of confusion and frustration.

Speaker 2 But you're not the Grinch.

Speaker 2 You're sad. It's a sad time.
It's confusing because we don't have any answers. And,

Speaker 2 you know, everybody's different, right?

Speaker 2 So, like, you go, you talk to this one doctor, and they say one thing, and you talk to another doctor because there's no real, like, steady, solid information for you because, like, your body is different, and how your estrogen and progesterone are dropping is different than, let's say, somebody else, because you might be in a different phase of your menopause cycle.

Speaker 2 Well,

Speaker 2 yeah.

Speaker 2 It's just emotionally

Speaker 2 what I would describe it as, is like, if the, if this menopause thing has taken the moisture from my body, it's like also like dropped, taken out like the joy and the will to love and live.

Speaker 2 Like, you know, things will happen that I know

Speaker 2 a few months ago would have brought made me feel a certain way.

Speaker 2 It would have brought me peace and brought me joy. I can look at the exact same thing and be like,

Speaker 2 I can see objectively that that is a happy thing.

Speaker 1 Oh, look, a joyful occurrence. Yeah.

Speaker 2 No, no, no, no. That was far too much.
Life.

Speaker 2 Oh, look.

Speaker 2 A joyful occurrence.

Speaker 2 Yeah. I think, I think also what we should talk about, too, is like not just

Speaker 2 I think that the symptoms that you're experiencing physically are also playing a big role psychologically and emotionally for you. And what would be like the actual emotions that you're experiencing?

Speaker 2 Rather than like classifying it as Grinch-like, like, what are you feeling?

Speaker 2 Well, I think I actually am a person who feels like my emotions are very, I'm a very sensitive person. My challenge in life is usually like

Speaker 2 high, high, low, low. Oh my God, I feel that pain.
I feel that joy. I feel that anger.
I feel your feelings. I feel all the things.

Speaker 2 And right now, what I, when I experience depression in my life or what's happening right now, I feel it more as like an absence of any of that.

Speaker 2 Like it is less for me of like, although I do feel my main feeling is irritation.

Speaker 2 That is, that is as close as I can get to a feeling. Right.
Okay.

Speaker 2 Every, every other feel or like, well, the kids are a different thing.

Speaker 2 I mean, the world, the universe brings paramenopause to women at a time where you're like empty nesting and you're taking care of your, you're watching your parents get older. It's just every fascism.

Speaker 2 It's just, it's not ideal times. I mean, I, I,

Speaker 2 my, when I want to make myself feel better, I read. And I was reading Virginia Woolf the other day.
And I said to Abby, oh my God, all these women, Virginia Woolf,

Speaker 2 Ann Sexton,

Speaker 2 Sylvia Plath, like, what, did we check their fucking hormone levels?

Speaker 2 All these women who had their main

Speaker 2 breaks in their 50s? Holy shit.

Speaker 2 And now it's time to thank the companies who allow you to listen to We Can Do Hard Things for free.

Speaker 1 This show is a lot about giving voice to the problems we think are our personal failings, but are actually structural and cultural crises that are impacting all of us.

Speaker 1 And if we can give voice to those and connect with each other, we can find solidarity and solutions.

Speaker 1 And I think this is true for perimenopause and menopause, which is why I'm grateful that we are talking so openly about it today.

Speaker 1 And I'm happy to share about the important work that our partner, MIDI Health, is doing.

Speaker 1 Too many of us are struggling out here on our own with perimenopause and menopause without access to informed health care, languishing on waiting lists, meeting with doctors who dismiss our symptoms, telling us just to suck it up, or worse yet, saying that it's all in our head.

Speaker 1 It's outrageous that 75% of women never get any treatment at all for their perimenopause or menopause symptoms.

Speaker 2 Well, you both and the pod squad knows that I am in paramenopause right now.

Speaker 2 But I didn't know that for a long while. I just thought that I was losing.
my mind.

Speaker 2 I don't know that anyone had ever really said the word paramenopause to me before. And I had no idea that it was coming and no idea what to expect once it was there.

Speaker 2 And I was struggling mentally, emotionally, physically, all of that. I went from doctor to doctor saying something feels off and they just kept telling me I was fine.

Speaker 2 I was not fine.

Speaker 2 Abby knows that. None of us.

Speaker 1 Narrator reports she was not fine.

Speaker 2 For so many of us, it's when we're doing everything.

Speaker 2 It's when we're parenting, it's when we're working, it's when we're caring for everyone, many of us in that sandwich place where we're caring for parents, caring for children, and we cannot find a way to care for ourselves, even though our bodies are begging for support.

Speaker 2 So I tried everything. I kept trying to optimize my health, but the truth was my body didn't need hacks.

Speaker 2 It needed care, attention, real information, and someone who understood what was actually happening to me.

Speaker 2 Yeah, the healthcare system is failing women in midlife, and doctors are uneducated, and the guidelines are outdated.

Speaker 2 And that's why MIDI founders resolved to build a company to step into this care gap and provide.

Speaker 2 I mean, honestly, this

Speaker 2 has been missing. MIDI is providing it, and it isn't just like hormones.
They offer holistic care plans tailored to each patient's needs.

Speaker 2 That may include hormonal medication, non-hormonal medication, supplements, and recommendations for alternative therapies. Treatments work and quickly.

Speaker 2 More than 90% of MIDI patients report symptom improvement within 60 days of their first visit.

Speaker 1 I use MIDI and I tell all my friends about the ease of my experience and to try it too. No more waiting months to get an appointment.

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Speaker 2 Okay, so the feeling is irritation. I'm irritated all the time.

Speaker 2 I think that one of the things that's happening with me, which maybe

Speaker 2 other people can relate to, is that I want to fix the problem. I want to stop being so feeling so awful.
I want to, so I, what I do is I identify something that's irritating me

Speaker 2 and then I go full bore to try to fix that thing. Okay, so

Speaker 2 fascism, Abby,

Speaker 2 things such as these.

Speaker 2 I mean, the other day I decided Abby.

Speaker 1 I refer to priorities. Once I get those locked down, I'm coming for the rest of you.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 Beware. I mean,

Speaker 2 I'll tell you this story, even though I think Pod Squad might get mad at me, and I'm just asking for some grace because I know you love Abby, and I promise you, I love Abby more than you. Okay.

Speaker 2 But

Speaker 2 relationships can be a challenge during this time.

Speaker 2 And

Speaker 2 I decided recently that the real problem was not menopause or fascism or the fall of democracy or the empty nesting or the whatever. It was that Abby makes too many noises.
Okay. This is a true story.

Speaker 1 Two things can be true at once.

Speaker 2 So I had like a seat. I sat her down with my apple shrunken head and said,

Speaker 2 explained why all the noises were the real problem and how

Speaker 2 my sensitivity to noises just is. Yeah.
So you have a real thing. That's a real thing.
That's happening. And that's something I'm really trying to honor because I hear you.

Speaker 1 Can we just dig into when you say noises?

Speaker 1 Let's just put a little color on that. Is this the sneezing thing?

Speaker 2 No. Well, there's a thing that happens in the morning.
I call it the elephant sanctuary. Oh, yeah.
It's like, right. It's just a lot of like honking.
And

Speaker 1 she really clears the decks in the morning. And it's like,

Speaker 2 it's just, it's unfucking believable. That's what it is.
It's also her body, her choice. All right.
I understand.

Speaker 2 Please don't, Team Abby, Team Glennon, just have some grips. Yeah, because here's the thing.
This is the thing that I've come to accept

Speaker 2 that some of the things about living with somebody are harder than others. And when we all go through this time,

Speaker 2 some of those irritations that you might be able to manage

Speaker 2 in a normal way, like, oh, that's silly, you know, whatever. That's just her.
you know, just woke up. She wants to clear her throat, whatever.

Speaker 2 But like times such as these are a little bit more sensitive. You're feeling, I really know that you're feeling more sensitive.

Speaker 2 And so, you sat me down the other day and you said, So, can we just do some negotiations on the sounds? I listed all the sounds and I said, Can you tell me which ones are most important to you? Yeah,

Speaker 2 this is for real. No joke.
Can you tell me, elephant sanctuary feels important to you?

Speaker 2 When we are doing a lot, a lot of sneezing, how do we feel about like 20% of the time muffling the sneeze instead of scream sneezing? Right.

Speaker 2 Like, how do we feel about there's a lot of throat clearing during the day? Anyway, we just had a long list and we talked about which ones are most important. The,

Speaker 2 I understand that this is not my best self. But we are not in a time such as that.
No, we are not in best self time. No, I just don't think that that's a thing.

Speaker 2 So, like, why would I hold you to the to be

Speaker 1 to that account? Like,

Speaker 2 it is my job to roll with these times. And I think that,

Speaker 2 of course, my feelings do have, I do have feelings. You do have feelings.
I do have feelings. Are they important to you, though? How important to you are your feelings?

Speaker 2 But I do think,

Speaker 2 and you did mention, and I think it's really important that, like, I need, and we need to be considering each other, right?

Speaker 2 And you are going through a tougher time than I'm going through right this moment. I am, I am on menopause's doorstep.
I know. So I want to try to give you as much fucking grace as I possibly can.

Speaker 2 And I'm not always perfect. And that's the thing that I struggle with is because when we have these conversations and we negotiate it, this is where we go move on from here.

Speaker 2 Yeah, I like to have we've decided something and then we're going to move on from the conflict with a new plan.

Speaker 2 And Abby worries that if the plan doesn't go perfectly, I will say, but we started from a new place. Yeah, whoopsies.

Speaker 1 You had a plan.

Speaker 2 Right.

Speaker 1 Can I say something about the unreasonableness too? Because I feel like what is so interesting is that,

Speaker 1 of course, that's not reasonable to monitor her sounds. No.
And also, unreasonable times call for unreasonable measurements.

Speaker 2 Absolutely. Exactly.

Speaker 1 And this is like in when you're pregnant and your hormones are insane, people understand that they're like, that chicken can't be in this house. Yes.

Speaker 1 Because that smell is making me absolutely insane but we don't have the physical representation besides the apple smoosh face and the everything we don't really have a thing that we can point to and be like that person needs special accommodation during this time because it's oh i'm sorry 15 years of your life.

Speaker 1 So, but it is the same kind of like aversions and sensitivities that we will excuse in some cases or even expect in some cases where your hormones are clearly going insane. But this is so invisible

Speaker 1 that everything looks like you're crazy.

Speaker 2 And I think it's also because culture values that pregnancy in a woman, because we think of women as just baby makers. And so they're doing their, you know, holy duty during that time.

Speaker 2 So we honor the chicken, but we don't give a shit about women who are going through menopause because they are becoming useless to culture

Speaker 2 in terms of our culture. So why would we care about about making this part, this transition easier for them? And I think it's a test to,

Speaker 2 for me, being the partner who's not technically going through menopause in like the active physical symptoms phase, but I'm getting there. It is a test for all of all of people in my position.

Speaker 2 So, for anybody out there who

Speaker 2 has a wife that is going through this,

Speaker 2 for me, I like to think about this, like,

Speaker 2 this is like the ultimate love that I can give you. And, and one of the things that I have to work on not doing

Speaker 2 is locking myself in a room somewhere else because I think that that would actually make you happier.

Speaker 2 No, seriously, because being alone, yeah. Like, to just take myself, like, the irritate, the thing that I think is probably irritating her the most out of the actual equation.

Speaker 2 Like, I have to, I have to force myself, like, okay, no, like, even if you are making noises and if even if you are irritating her, we still need to figure out how to connect during this time. Yeah.

Speaker 2 So it's like, it's like getting in there and like taking some hits. Right.
Well, the sweetest thing is the next, okay.

Speaker 2 So the next morning, we have this conversation where I bring the list of noises and I say, can we just negotiate which noises are most important to you?

Speaker 2 And then I realize in that moment, I am devoid of human emotion. I'm a robot right now.
That made perfect sense to me. I didn't understand why that would hurt anyone's feelings.
I have the list.

Speaker 2 It's a negotiation. Okay.

Speaker 2 Abby's feelings are hurt, obviously.

Speaker 2 So I put my head down at night. The bees start.
I'm like, I'm an awful person. I've hurt her feelings.
The next morning, I call my doctor. I go to the doctor's office.
I say, you have to see me today.

Speaker 2 I have to get in there. I don't care.
I say, you have to do something.

Speaker 2 I am now hurting my wife's feelings. I am doing,

Speaker 2 I am mean.

Speaker 2 I am a Grinch.

Speaker 2 So

Speaker 2 he, anyway, that's a whole nother story.

Speaker 2 When I get home, Abby's not home for like hours. I'm like, where are you? So I finally, I say, where are you? You're being weird.
Where are you? I text her and she said, I'm at the doctor's office.

Speaker 2 I made an emergency appointment so that I could get some medicine so I could stop annoying you. It was a gift of the Magi medical situation.
Like we each went in so that we could.

Speaker 2 Try to have some sort of medical intervention to stop hurting the other person's soul.

Speaker 1 To the same doctor.

Speaker 2 to the same doctor. Yeah, did the doctor mention, like, no, he can't HIPAA or something, right? Right.

Speaker 1 Oh, God, that's so good.

Speaker 2 I went, I got, I got my blood tested. I was like, prescribe me whatever the most

Speaker 2 big

Speaker 2 stuff allergy medicine in the whole wide world is. And I said, give me something, give me soul medicine.
Yeah, morphine. Do you have anything?

Speaker 2 Yeah. Yes.

Speaker 1 So the other thing is,

Speaker 2 I know that there are

Speaker 2 things to explore. I've never been so baffled by, I have lost access to the part of me who can

Speaker 2 do that. And by the way, I went to my gynecologist and

Speaker 2 I thought about not telling the story, but I'm going to because I think it's really important. And I did, I'll tell it kindly and I did talk to them directly about it.
So I feel okay.

Speaker 2 But I can't go there anymore because

Speaker 2 I

Speaker 2 go to the gynecologist and I'm going there for my health and to be for a safe place to talk about my body and my health and my experience in the world as a human being.

Speaker 2 And in the gynecologist's office,

Speaker 2 it's covered with posters, advertisements for weight loss drugs, for Botox, for fillers, for 7 million different things that

Speaker 2 don't have anything to do with my experience of the world.

Speaker 2 I feel, you know what? I feel like I'm in there.

Speaker 2 I have my paramenopause fire. And I feel like I want to be fucking Jesus and I want to start flipping tables and be like, this is a den of thieves.
And I talk to them about it.

Speaker 2 Oh, also, there's like one bathroom in this gynecologist.

Speaker 2 And in the bathroom, there's one poster, one picture, and it's like

Speaker 2 six feet tall. It's huge.
And it's a woman who has just been on a bender. And she's like sitting on the toilet with her underwear pulled down and her legs crossed over.

Speaker 2 And she's holding a bottle of vodka and a cigarette. What?

Speaker 2 I swear to God to you.

Speaker 2 What is the point of the poster?

Speaker 1 What does it say? I don't know.

Speaker 2 I say to the doctor months ago, I say, Do you think that that is the message that you want to send women who like one of the number one leading causes of women's death is addiction and

Speaker 2 alcoholism and smoking? And

Speaker 2 what, what are you doing? Like what?

Speaker 2 Anyway.

Speaker 1 What did they say to that?

Speaker 2 Okay. Oh, I hear you.
No one's she. Well, the first thing she said is no one's ever said that before.
Like that's because people fucking trust you.

Speaker 1 when they come in here and they don't know they they feel bad they feel confused about that i promise you but they don't know what to say so but i don't think think it's because they trust them, I think it's because that we've been taught to think of doctors as unquestioned authorities, and we are supposed to listen and not ask and not push back on anything that they say.

Speaker 1 So, there's, and also, it's a deep vulnerability. If you're relying on doctors to get what you need and you start questioning them, then it's your fault for not getting what you need.

Speaker 1 Like, it's a very deeply problematic. I left my OB for the same reason.
I walked in

Speaker 1 six weeks postpartum where

Speaker 1 people are experiencing depression, body dysmorphia, everything, adjusting to all of the things in the world.

Speaker 1 And there were giant blow-up body sculpt images offering body sculpt services at my OB who had delivered my baby six weeks before. And I was like,

Speaker 1 what is this doing here? Like these services should be available to people who seek them out.

Speaker 1 These services do not belong in a place where people are coming, trying to adjust to their brand new bodies for the first time. And you're offering them, hey, are you having some body confusion?

Speaker 1 How about we go back?

Speaker 1 And instead of determining whether you might have postpartum depression, which a large portion of your people in the waiting room will have, we are going to tell you you're probably depressed because your body is fat and we have body sculpting for that.

Speaker 1 Like, it is such bullshit. And And I was like, give me my file.
I'm out of here in front of the whole place. Cause I was like, this is absolute horseshit.

Speaker 1 You're not doing your job. First, do no harm.

Speaker 2 And this is. First, do no harm.
That's what I kept thinking.

Speaker 1 This is a violation of your oath.

Speaker 2 First, do no harm. That is, it is predatory.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 I.

Speaker 2 I love that you just walked out. I kept going back and being like, why does this feel so bad?

Speaker 2 The idea of like finding a new doctor to me feels so daunting. Anyway, I'm not not going back.
It's overwhelming. Yeah, it's overwhelming.
I'll tell you what. That is one

Speaker 2 when I think spiritually about menopause,

Speaker 2 I just feel

Speaker 2 that there is something,

Speaker 2 there's it's a culling.

Speaker 2 Like, I will not go back to that doctor, and I'm speaking of it now. And I will never set foot in there again.
I'm done.

Speaker 2 It is like the things that shouldn't, that never, we never should have had to tolerate are now officially intolerable. Like,

Speaker 2 I am unable

Speaker 2 to

Speaker 2 enter anymore into situations that aren't right for my soul.

Speaker 2 I'm unable to be in rooms with people who I never should have been in rooms with. I am unable to engage in parts of the culture that I never should have had to, anyway.
So, I do understand

Speaker 2 that there's something good spiritually going on with,

Speaker 2 you know,

Speaker 2 like a deep culling

Speaker 2 of of shit but it is really and and and i i am very amazed by i mean i am a person who has a lot of extra time who has extra money who has so many more resources than so many people do and i will still tell you that i don't have a single friend who knows what the hell to do and that makes me so furious

Speaker 2 because there's just sure all of our hormone levels are different different.

Speaker 2 But if this were, if men went through this, if every 45 to 55 year old men went through this, there would be fucking national holidays to take off work to deal with this shit.

Speaker 2 There would be old boys' clubs with all of this information. Like, this is, it's just that we, we as a culture do not care about women.

Speaker 2 And all of my friends who know the best mechanic, the best dentist, the best whatever are baffled about what to do about this.

Speaker 1 Well, they don't teach it.

Speaker 1 They don't, like, this is something. So, one, more than a billion people,

Speaker 2 B billion are

Speaker 1 menopausal women by 2030. Okay, that's one billion people.

Speaker 1 Half, so half of the population, this is what blows my freaky mind. Half of the population will spend one-third of their lives.
This is not a, this is not a brief period.

Speaker 1 Like perimenopause and menopause and the entire period of time that you're adjusting to that is a third of the average lifespan.

Speaker 1 And we are just like, they'll accommodate it, they'll swallow it. Oh, 40% of you are going to experience depression.

Speaker 1 40% of you, 40% of one-third

Speaker 1 of half of the population, one-third of the lives of half the population are going to experience depression. 75% hot flashes, 60% of women, brain fog.

Speaker 1 And so that, like, this is not unusual is what I'm trying to say. 85%

Speaker 1 of people who go through menopause have

Speaker 1 very

Speaker 1 life-impacting symptoms. So that is just true.

Speaker 1 And in only one-third of the residency programs in OBGYN, I'm not talking about regular doctors. So I'm training to be a doctor.
I am training to be an OBGYN in these United States of America.

Speaker 1 And one half, 100% of my population will spend a third of their lives in menopause. And only one third of residency programs have a standardized menopause training program.

Speaker 1 That's fucking insanity.

Speaker 1 And it's deliberate. There's nothing, there's nothing.
Point to one other thing that's going to affect that many people that people who are working as OBGYNs will need to be able to address.

Speaker 1 I know. Just not being taught.
So it's like you, that we're not getting information from our doctors because it's not being treated. And that's why it is

Speaker 1 like 60%,

Speaker 1 60% of all women.

Speaker 1 don't get their information about menopause from their doctor. They get it from each other.
So it's all of us trying to figure out from, and the reason that is the case is because 75%

Speaker 1 of women never get treatment from their doctor. You go to your doctor and you say, here are my symptoms.
And they say, that's normal. We have conflated normal with acceptable.
We have said,

Speaker 2 that's typical.

Speaker 1 as if that's the end of the story. That's typical should mean, what are we going to do about it?

Speaker 2 Exactly.

Speaker 1 And that that is

Speaker 1 it's it's it's absolute insanity and it should make everyone crazy

Speaker 2 i mean i just

Speaker 2 truly this was my intention for this hour and i i don't have i i am open

Speaker 2 to

Speaker 2 i don't know what i'm open to i i know there has to be a way to figure this out like i when i went to the doctor that day he prescribed me I love my doctor. I love my general,

Speaker 2 what's it called? General, oh, that's IP kit. I don't know anything.

Speaker 1 General practitioner, GP, right?

Speaker 2 Right.

Speaker 2 Um,

Speaker 1 this is not the one with the signs, right?

Speaker 2 No, no, he has no signs. Um, it's a doctor's office at his office, which is what it should be.
Yeah, it's a he has a crazy, old-fangled idea to be a doctor, exactly, on a den of thieves.

Speaker 2 Anyway, he um gave me a patch, like an estrogen patch.

Speaker 1 Oh, hormone replacement therapy. Yep.

Speaker 2 And then also

Speaker 2 a pill to take each night. I haven't started this yet because I'm so nervous about all of it.
I just,

Speaker 2 anyway, something called like progesterone that I'm supposed to take, I think, each night. So I put the patch on and change it every two weeks.
And then.

Speaker 2 Progesterone every night? Yeah. So I guess maybe I'll start that

Speaker 2 soon.

Speaker 2 But, you know, it's just,

Speaker 2 it's weird to

Speaker 2 the way it feels in in a moment is like, you know, a few days ago, I was trying to put some things in the foyer and I dropped, broke this vase and I just was like, screamed.

Speaker 2 I was just like, God damn it. Like,

Speaker 2 fuck, fuck. Like, I don't give a shit.
It's a $7.

Speaker 2 Like,

Speaker 2 and then, and then I'm standing there in the foyer and I'm suddenly like so embarrassed. It's like a flash of rage.
And then I'm so embarrassed. So then I go into the bathroom by myself.

Speaker 2 I'm just standing there. And I'm like,

Speaker 2 the best way I can describe it is: I can't figure out like how to exist. Like, I wanted to crawl out of my skin.
I'm like, try to get in the bathtub, try to get out. I've changed my clothes 17 times.

Speaker 2 I'm just trying to feel okay in my own body and in my own skin. And there's nowhere to go to get comfortable because the place that feels like suddenly it's not home is my own body.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 I think one of the things that I think is really fascinating about this

Speaker 2 is

Speaker 2 so many of us women didn't

Speaker 2 hear about this from our mothers, like their experience with menopause. One of my friends, Katie from Naples, she's very, very much down, like the menopause, which actually we should call her.

Speaker 2 She knows a lot about this stuff.

Speaker 2 And she said, one of the most important things you can do is ask your mother about what her

Speaker 2 process was when she started to go into perimenopause. What were her symptoms? Because a lot of it is genetics.

Speaker 2 But because we, because they had the memo they got was like, this is a thing we don't talk about. We just deal with.

Speaker 2 I think it is really important.

Speaker 2 that everybody listening to this

Speaker 2 who may have gone through it or may be going through it or know somebody who's going through it to normalize the talking about it.

Speaker 2 Because I think you just having this conversation with us where we're just kind of like venting about it, I think it is a very important thing.

Speaker 2 Becoming aware of some of the changes that are going on, because so much of

Speaker 2 it gets conflated with aging. Right.
Like when that's typical. Exactly.
You're like, oh, I feel like shit.

Speaker 2 And oh, I guess this is what what aging feels like. And it is not, right? Like these are all, these symptoms are very separate.
And it makes, it can make somebody feel like they're crazy.

Speaker 2 And I just want you to know that I, I think it is very important what you're doing right now, just by really having a good solid bitch session.

Speaker 2 Because I think what you're going to notice is a lot of people are going to come around and talk and want to keep talking about this so that we can find the right answers for you. Yeah.

Speaker 2 If suffering is less. It feels like, you know, what is always said in collective liberation moments where it's like, we take care of us.
Like that's how I feel about this because who protects us?

Speaker 2 We protect us. Who gets information to each other? We get information from.
Like the institutions are not going to do it for us.

Speaker 2 And it makes me feel so connected to every other woman going through this and in such solidarity because we have spent our lives caring for people, like for our children, for our parents, for communities, for our businesses.

Speaker 2 And then when we go through this, it's crickets. And that is like deeply hurtful.
Yeah. Like, and I think that's mixed up in it.
It's like, wait, what about us? Like, what about

Speaker 2 we have mothered you, we have sister you, we have held up your sky. Like, and now you're just annoyed that we're annoyed.

Speaker 2 There's just something, it's just, it's a, it's a moral wound to me.

Speaker 1 It is a wound because it's also,

Speaker 1 okay, world, I hear you loud and clear. And what you are saying unequivocally is we are absolutely

Speaker 2 okay

Speaker 2 with

Speaker 1 women having one third. And let's just put aside the other third of like

Speaker 1 menstruation and pregnancy and childbirth, which are not given the things that they need. Okay.
But let's just pretend that that two-thirds of life is just a real pleasure cruise.

Speaker 1 We are okay

Speaker 1 with women having

Speaker 1 a poor quality of life

Speaker 1 for one-third of their lives.

Speaker 1 We are okay. We co-sign on that.
And if you want to make a big deal out of what's quote-unquote natural,

Speaker 1 you are having an out-of-portion, out-of-proportion response to what's natural.

Speaker 1 When there is nothing natural about accepting people not being able to sleep, being depressed, not having the medications and the treatment that they need. Like there can be a natural process.

Speaker 1 And then we, as humans, have decided what is okay and what requires intervention in a natural process if we're not okay with the status quo.

Speaker 1 But the saddest, most crazy-making part of this is we are, in fact, okay with the status quo.

Speaker 2 We are okay

Speaker 1 with women living shitty quality of lives when it only affects them.

Speaker 2 Exactly. Yeah.
It's like, you know what else is natural? Getting a limp dick when you're old. Right.
But guess what?

Speaker 2 No, no, no. Stop the presses.
There's more funding put into fucking Viagra and those things than there's for all of menopause.

Speaker 2 There's a lot of things that happen that are natural, that are unacceptable if you're a male. Exactly.

Speaker 1 Exactly right. There is nothing more natural than being 90 and not getting an erection.
But the DOD is going to make damn sure that you can get that by mail and it's covered by your insurance.

Speaker 1 Like the DOD spends more money on getting erectile dysfunction drugs to their people than we spend on menopause because that is natural and unacceptable.

Speaker 2 Why is the word menopause? We can't even have womenopause. Like even the word is men.

Speaker 1 Well, it's menstruation.

Speaker 2 that has to do i stand by okay okay okay all right all right i'm saying we could get into the etymology but but i'm willing to get on this rage train i don't want to interrupt i mean it is nice when you think of it as a sentence like men uh

Speaker 2 pause pause it is the answer to the venn diagram All I want to say to the pod squad, anyone who's going through this, is I, as I stumble and rage my way through this, I promise to tell you whatever the hell I find out that is helpful.

Speaker 2 I will just tell you anything that works. That has worked.
I don't know if I'm going to be able to find anything that's helpful, but I promise to share it with you. And I love you, and we

Speaker 2 take care of us.

Speaker 2 And I'm grateful to you. And thank you, but both.
I know you guys have ridden this roller coaster with me, and I'm grateful for your grace. And

Speaker 2 you have been,

Speaker 2 oh,

Speaker 1 Thanks.

Speaker 1 You have done such a good job with your noises, Abby. Such a good job.

Speaker 1 We commend you, you and your patients. Low, so many

Speaker 1 noises.

Speaker 1 The menopause society is actually a good place. If people are looking for doctors who actually know what they're talking about, the menopause society is menopause.org.

Speaker 1 And they have like a listing of providers that are actually credentialed in having some kind of training. So that could be a place to start for people.

Speaker 2 Okay. And then after that, there's only one other person that I think might be able to help us, honestly, on this fucking planet.
We're about to meet her in a minute. Stay tuned.

Speaker 2 We can do hard things.

Speaker 2 And now it's time to thank the companies who allow you to listen to We Can Do Hard Things for free.

Speaker 2 This episode is brought to you by MIDI Health. If anything in this episode is resonating with you, then you might want to check out MIDI Health.

Speaker 2 MIDI Health built their company to close the care gap because every woman's menopause journey is unique and her care should be too. There are dozens of symptoms linked to

Speaker 2 hormonal changes and most of us don't even realize they're connected. MIDI clinicians specialize in this stage of life.
They listen, personalize your plan, and stay on top of the latest research.

Speaker 2 And it's not just about hormones. MIDI takes a holistic approach that can include supplements, lifestyle support, and non-hormonal options too.

Speaker 2 Over 90% of MIDI patients report symptom improvement within 60 days. And MIDI is the only women's telehealth brand covered by major insurance, which is huge.

Speaker 2 And this makes expert care accessible and affordable. Visit joinmidi.com today.
That's joinmidi.com. MIDI, the care women deserve.

Speaker 2 Madam President! Hello, how are you?

Speaker 2 Well,

Speaker 2 Madam President, I've been better, honestly. I've been better.
But I'm really, really grateful that you are here today

Speaker 2 as the president of the Do Not Care Club, which everyone I know is a member of.

Speaker 2 Can you explain to me, Madam President,

Speaker 2 why you were moved to create this club?

Speaker 3 As I sat in my car one day, I looked at myself in my rearview mirror and

Speaker 3 I just realized I was putting so much pressure on myself to be so much, to do so much, to accept so much. And it was time for me to just stop caring anymore.

Speaker 3 And I just hit that record button and asked women, Did they want to join me in the club? And overwhelmingly, absolutely.

Speaker 3 We're four million plus strong right now

Speaker 2 four million of us okay

Speaker 2 madam president what can you give us i have made a list of some things that i am not going to care about anymore and um i'm wondering if i could read it to you and then you could let me know if i could be officially accepted into the club based on

Speaker 2 what I am suggesting. yeah,

Speaker 3 let's do it.

Speaker 2 Okay, well, why don't you go first? Tell us your favorites. I would love to hear a list of things that we are not going to care about anymore as menopausal women.
Okay,

Speaker 2 good.

Speaker 3 We do not care if we forget what we are talking about.

Speaker 3 Just start a new conversation, and if we remember, we'll come back to it.

Speaker 3 We do not care if we need to turn down the music to bag out of our parking spot.

Speaker 3 We do not care if we hurt your feelings.

Speaker 3 We said what we said.

Speaker 3 And we do not care if we have cellulite on our legs. Legs is legs.

Speaker 3 That's it. So those are a few of my favorites.

Speaker 2 We don't care. Those are excellent.
We just don't care.

Speaker 2 We don't care. Okay.

Speaker 2 Here are a few of mine.

Speaker 2 Okay.

Speaker 2 We don't care if we are not going to wear stilts on our shoes anymore.

Speaker 2 In retrospect, that was dumb.

Speaker 1 You're right.

Speaker 2 Thank you. Thank you, Madam President.

Speaker 2 We don't care if we're not going to wear makeup anymore. We are not contouring or concealing or highlighting, and we're not concealing anything anymore.
Not our rage, not our under eyes.

Speaker 2 If Chad can walk around with his face hanging out,

Speaker 2 so can we.

Speaker 2 We are not gonna wear hard pants anymore.

Speaker 2 If the kids can wear pajamas to school, so can we.

Speaker 2 Absolutely. It's soft pants, or maybe no pants.
We don't care. We can do soft pants.

Speaker 2 My last one is this. We don't care

Speaker 2 if we're not going to laugh anymore at the thing you said that's not funny.

Speaker 1 We are out of lie laughs.

Speaker 2 Expect this face from us.

Speaker 2 We hope you don't care, but if you do care, we don't care.

Speaker 3 I love him, love them, love them. You are absolutely a member of this club.

Speaker 2 Approved.

Speaker 2 Madam President, thank you for your service to the people of this planet going through this phase.

Speaker 2 You are the one we've been waiting for.

Speaker 2 Please rest.

Speaker 2 Protect your spirit because we need you.

Speaker 2 Thank you, Madam President. Thank you.
The only thing I care about is you.

Speaker 1 This episode is brought to you by MIDI Health. You know what blows my mind? 75% of women who go to the doctor for menopause or perimenopause get no treatment at all.
None.

Speaker 1 It's not because we're not asking for help. It's because the system wasn't built for us.
For decades, women in midlife have been told to just deal with it.

Speaker 1 The hot flashes, the brain fog, the sleepless nights, like it's all just some sort of rite of passage that we're supposed to endure. But it's not.

Speaker 1 These are real medical issues that deserve real medical care. MIDI Health makes it easy to meet one-on-one with a menopause trained clinician from home.

Speaker 1 Someone who actually understands what's going on with your body and knows how to help.

Speaker 1 They'll personalize your plan, send prescriptions straight to your pharmacy, and best of all, MIDI is the only women's telehealth brand for midlife care covered by major insurance.

Speaker 1 Visit joinmidi.com today. That's joinmitti.com.
MIDI, the care women deserve.

Speaker 2 We Can Do Hard Things is an independent production brought to you by Treat Media. We make art for humans who want to stay human.

Speaker 2 And you can follow us at We Can Do Hard Things on Instagram and at We Can Do Hard Things Show on TikTok.