A Decade Of Misread Symptoms

For a decade she woke up screaming in the night, her anxiety was rising, her moods were shifting, her body was sending signal after signal, and every system around her, medical, relational, professional, missed it entirely. What she was experiencing wasn't a mental health crisis, it was perimenopause. And her story is not unusual. Today, we are having the conversation that millions of women need, and far too few are getting.

What Perimenopause Really Looks Like

Today, we are talking about perimenopause, what it really is, how it gets missed, and what it means to truly listen to what your body is telling you. This one is for every woman who has been handed a prescription when what she really needed was a conversation. So, Alison, welcome to Healthy Mind, Healthy Life. I am so glad you're here.

Thanks so much for having me. That's a wonderful introduction. I couldn't have written it better myself. Thank you. Yeah, it's interesting to be a good idea. Thank you for being here. Thanks for having me. Thanks. Yeah. It's interesting to hear the story. Please go ahead. Summarized um coming coming back because yeah, it's um it's so it's kind of difficult to admit that I missed all the signs myself and that I didn't realize I was in perimenopause for so long. Because I'm a women's health care provider, I'm a certified nurse midwife, and I work in women's health and have for 25 years. Uh I I'm afraid to say I was part of the problem and not recognizing perimenopause in myself or other women for that matter. Uh, and you hit the nail on the head. It's like women are getting prescriptions, principally for antidepressants, instead of the conversation around the normal changes that occur in midlife and what can be expected when our hormones are declining. And there's a lot of support. There's a lot of options for treatment, including prescriptions for hormonal therapy, but there's also so much more. And I'm so interested in having the conversation because I want women to start recognizing these signs sooner so they have the context to understand that they can listen to their body and understand it in the lens of the natural unfolding of perimenopause. If you have ovaries, you're going to go through perimenopause at some point. And it's something that isn't discussed enough, especially for younger women, and it just gets ignored and kind of denied, and people kick the can, so to speak. Like they they just assume they'll cross that bridge when they get to it. But really, if we start educating people and people understand it's on the horizon, that it's inevitable, that it is an eventuality, then when we start experiencing things like sleeplessness or mood disorders or irritability or insomnia or night terrors or these disturbances in our body, we can have that context and say, oh, this is these are early signs of perimenopause. I can expect that this is going to happen. And once I know, then I can treat it with self-compassion and an increased bandwidth for understanding our experience, as well as any number of treatment options from herbs and supplements to considering hormones when you feel like it's time.

Absolutely, Alice. And I'm so glad that you started with this because I think what's really needed in this field is more and more awareness. And I think this conversation is here to do exactly that. So before we begin, there is just a gentle disclaimer to the listeners. Some statements reflect personal belief and experiences and are presented as individual views, not medical advice. So listeners should consult qualified professionals for medical conditions. And now that we have this out of the way without wasting any further time, let's

Why Doctors Often Miss The Signs

move on. So, um, Alison, before we get into the education and the empowerment, I want to start with you personally. So you have shared that you didn't recognize your own perimenopause until a full decade after the first signs appeared. And you were working in healthcare at that time. So, what does that tell us about how poorly understood that this transition actually is for a lot of women out there, even among the people who we trust with our health?

Most doctors and healthcare providers interviewed will say they only got uh maybe from anywhere like a 30-minute lecture to maybe a couple of classes on menopause counseling and treatment. And this is these are OBGYNs, even specialists in women's health, that may have had a short uh uh review of menopause counseling uh and treatment. And it's not really a specialty that's being promoted. Uh, the last few years with uh the advance of the American Menopause Society and more research and more data coming out that we're seeing in menopause study, this conversation is getting forwarded. But even OBGYN's specialists in women's health don't get a lot of education in their standard education. And then if you think about family medicine, generalized practitioners that aren't women's health specialists, they really aren't getting a lot of menopause management education at all. Uh, furthermore, when doctors uh, and forgive me, this is like all American-based, US-based um awareness. I'm not sure exactly worldwide or how it applies in other countries. But um, in the US, we have uh uh general practitioners, and when they graduate school, uh, they will choose to continue their educational credits, and they might decide that they have more interest in dermatology or pediatrics, and they're not continuing to advance their study in women's health or menopause specifically. So uh where I live is in a very small rural area, and uh we have doctors that have been practicing for 30, 40 years after they've graduated school, and a lot of the data and science isn't getting out to the providers enough to uh really forward this conversation. Women over 30 years old at every appointment should be introduced to the conversation about menopause. That this is a physiological change that every woman will experience. You know, teenagers get more education for like sex ed classes in elementary school than midlife women get around menopause. So uh less than 5% of women in the US are on hormones. And we know that estrogen deficiency contributes to a number of age-related diseases. You increase the chance of having multiple systems uh responding to the decline of estrogen. You have estrogen receptors in every organ of the body. So around uh 45, 55 years old, we're really it's well documented, this decline of estrogen, and women just aren't being treated. There's no other hormonal decline. Like if insulin is declining, if your thyroid is declining, we're treating those hormonal deficits. But estrogen decline, which every single woman will experience, we're just ignoring for the vast number of women in the US for that matter. And I imagine and in every other country in the world, women's health is notoriously underfunded, understudied, underdelivered. And uh, this is a lot about educating the public so that they can advocate for themselves what to ask for, uh, what sort of labs to request, what sort of medications there are available, and to start having this conversation with other women as well.

I think what you just um, you know, brought up that that's so important because women's healthcare in every part of the world is so neglected. And you know, that misdiagnosis isn't just a medical inconvenience, it's it's a deeply disorienting experience for a woman who is already struggling to be told that the problem is her mind when the problem is her hormones, and and that gap between what's actually happening and what she's being told is happening can do real damage to her mental health, to her physical health as well. So I'm really glad that you brought that up, Alison. And it's saddening to hear uh the reality, really. Uh, but hopefully, this conversation will uh be educative enough for a lot of women out there to figure out what what's happening is real and uh you know it can be taken care of as well.

Midlife As A Transformational Portal

And now, Alison, let's go underneath the surface for a moment. So you have described um perimenopause as a transformational portal, not just a medical event. So, what are the deeper things that tend to surface for women during this time, emotionally, spiritually, in terms of identity, that the clinical conversation almost never makes room for?

We're talking about a lifetime of cyclical living that most women will be operating with a monthly cycle and a monthly bleed. That energy of the bleed is a vital life source that is being surrendered in the menstrual flow and that is exiting through the root chakra. So, in the lower portion of the body, we're having a flow of energy towards the earth every month as we open to bleed and surrender to this experience. When we begin to hold that energy and have this transformation, this energetic transformation, when the cycles begin to decrease, that energy then has the opportunity to be resourced and risen through the body into a spiritual awareness and a spiritual awakening. This energy then can be accessed and nurtured in its development towards the higher chakras. And we really see an unfolding of the psyche, this potential for a complete restructure of identity and psychic awareness in the midlife experience. There's only three times in a woman's life that hormones will drive this metamorphosis in adolescence, in motherhood, and in menopause. Hormones are completely storming the brain at these times. And if you can imagine at what the personality changes a teenager goes through, the personality of changes that a mother goes through, and the personality changes that are available to a menopausal woman also. Perimenopause is that time, plus or minus 10 years around menopause, that we see that change starting to take place. Those signs in the body, those physical signs, the mood disturbance, the weight gain, the irritability, the palpitations, the sleeplessness, all of these symptoms are letting us know that there is a huge transformation happening in the body. So when we start bringing in that energetic awareness and start tapping in to bringing that life force up into the heart, up into the throat, up into the third eye and the crown, it's been incredibly uplifting and amazing to witness women come into their identity, find empowerment, find a deeper sense of connection to their intuition, a deeper sense of self-agency, a deeper sense of self-awareness, a better sense of boundaries and where they want to put their focus and attention. We talk about the people-pleasing that happens so often as women are groomed to take care of others. And when we get to midlife, Perimenopause asks us to pull the curtain back and really take inventory of who we are taking care of and why. Often the children will have left the home. Women find themselves in a relationship with their partner that they're getting to know again in a different way without having children in the home, uh, and negotiating priorities around their own self-awareness. It's kind of like when you go to the gym and you only have a short amount of time to work out, like you kind of work out harder. It feels like that to me when this awareness of your own legacy comes in at midlife, and you're like, what's really important? How do I want to show up? Who do I want to be? How do I want to live my life? How do I want to be in relationship? What do I want to achieve? It forces the issue. Perimenopause has this way of really forcing the conversation of saying, uh, things are changing and you're entering a chapter in your life that you get to choose who you want to be. And it's it's up to you at this point to to set the course, to point your ship, to calibrate your compass. And when women tap into that energetic flow and open the heart and the higher chakras so that they're tapped in, tuned in, and aware, mindful of how they want to operate in the world, they're just so much more powerful. When we have that self-awareness and our ability to be completely embodied in every interaction and every moment, we have more authenticity, we feel like our true selves, and we make a more lasting impact in the world.

Yeah, feed it beautifully, Alison. And I think everything that you have shared, it makes so much sense, and everything is just so spiritually aligned. Uh, I had no idea, but uh what you just described, it it you know brings a different kind of perspective into our lives um about menopause, about uh the cycle. And honestly, the idea of bypassing the story we have built around our pain and and going directly into the into what the body is carrying, that's that's such an important distinction. Because the mind can reframe and rationalize, rationalize endlessly, but the body keeps the record honestly, and learning to listen to it differently changes everything. And I'm glad that you helped all of us, you know, see it from a different perspective

A Grounding Message For Sufferers

today. Uh, but Alison, before we close for today, I want to ask you something for the woman listening who has been suffering quietly. Maybe she has been told that she's just anxious, just stressed, or she needs to lose some weight, or just going through a hard season. Maybe she has been handed a prescription that didn't feel right. Uh, maybe she has been carrying this alone for years. So, what would you most want her to hear right now?

First and foremost, I want her to know that what she's experiencing is normal, uh, that she's not alone and uh that she's she's not going crazy for lack of a better word. You know, when we are gaslit and told that our experience um doesn't have merit and that the answer is just to medicate and that there is no root cause analysis, we're really missing an opportunity to connect with a client, a patient, another person in a way that's validating and affirming of their experience. Uh perimenopiza is incredibly um dysregulating. It's an unstable time and it's a challenging time for many women. Uh so first and foremost, that context is so important to realize this is a normal transformation. It's physiological, it's biological. Uh, what you're going through is what women have been going through for millennia, right? Then we can get into the somatic processing of tapping into all the story and the self-judgment and the criticism and the expectation that I'm supposed to be something different and really nurture the self-acceptance, the self-compassion, and increase that capacity for the emotional experience. It can be difficult to be moody and irritable and brittle and sharp. And so, what's underneath that? What are the symptoms telling us? Is it an issue around unexpressed anger? Is it rising feminine rage? Is it a need for boundaries? Is it repressed sorrow or grief? And when we get into the body, we can really track where these emotions are held and how they can be expressed, finding new pathways to help find release for our emotions like that. And then this biological need to find hormonal balance. When the prescription is an antidepressant, it's doing nothing to help you balance your hormones. So we're talking about estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, and any number of supplements that help women feel more regulated, more calm, get better sleep. All of these are essential pillars to feeling healthy and stable. Then we can talk about the spiritual meaning of the experience. But this is the approach, the holistic approach of body, mind, and spirit.

I'm really glad you shared that and listened because I think so many women out there really needed to hear this in order to not feel alone. So thank you so much for this. And here's what I am holding from this conversation. Your body was never failing you, it was asking for something more than anyone around you knew how to give. And it is never too too late to start listening. So Alison, this conversation has been so necessary, and I know it's going to reach women who have been waiting for exactly these

Resources To Start Your Next Step

words. So for anyone who wants to learn more, connect with you, or explore your work in women's health and somatic healing, where can they find you?

My uh quiz is a really wonderful place to start. Uh, it's at healwithalison.com slash quiz. And this is the well, the wise woman quiz. It's helping you identify the voice of your intuition and how information comes to you, connecting with your inner wise woman, your your inner voice, your intuition, your truth that you carry. Uh, my website, heelwithalison.com and my Instagram, Alison underscore lawn underscore CNM.

Amazing. Thank you so much for sharing all that, Alison. And we will make sure to include all the details in today's show notes so that it's just one click away, and our listeners can reach out to you whenever they need to. Thank you, Alison, and thank you to every woman listening today. Whether you recognized yourself in this conversation or whether you're going to share it with someone you love who needs to hear it. Your body is wise, your symptoms are not weakness, and you deserve care that meets the whole of you, not just the parts that fit neatly into a prescription pad.

Closing Reflections And Share Request

This is Healthy Mind, Healthy Life. And if this episode opens something up for you, please share it. There are women in your life right now having this experience in silence. A single conversation can change the direction of someone's healing.