The Psychology of Menopause | Tamsen Fadal

I'm on the set one night and we're on a commercial break and I felt something that I'd never felt before. I had this heat come up through my body and just sweat break out everywhere, my heart racing, like pumping. And I was like, I'm gonna pass out.

She's a New York Times bestselling author of How to Menopause.

She's a powerhouse in women's health.

Emmy-winning journalist and health advocate, Tamsen Fadal.

I was told not to bring it up on television and I did. And they said, could you please stop talking about this over and over again? Just please stop. Nobody wants to hear about this all the time. And I said, 1.2 billion women globally are in this transition in life. Everybody needs to hear about it.

Coach me and our entire community up.

A lot of the men in those rooms go, oh my gosh, I had no idea what my wife was going through, but all of a sudden I was living with a stranger. My wife has not wanted to have sex with me or be intimate with me or have me even touch her for a long time. I didn't know what was going on. I thought it was me.

I did not get properly trained here. It looks just like anxiety and/or depression, but they never said anything about menopause being a differential diagnosis. So I think, like, sadly, how many misses have I had?

I've had doctors tell me they had 1 hour, gynecologists maybe I had one doctor tell me that they were offered free pizza in exchange for a luncheon to talk about menopause. And I say, oh, I get it. You weren't trained. There weren't doctors, you know, online talking about it. There weren't pharmacists talking about it. Everyone was sort of on their own to figure it out.

This conversation is certainly for women, but this conversation is also for men. It is materially important for the relationships we have.

For any man that's out there listening, you're not going through menopause, one, but understand that you are gonna be going alongside somebody who is. And whether that means that you are at the head of a, a big corporation Whether you're in a corporation, or you're, you're working next to women, or you're a son, or you're a father, or you're a partner, somebody in your life's gonna be going through that. And they don't have to go through it, but they do have to understand it.

If we knew what you knew, how would men be better partners?

So for me, the number one, one, one thing that I focus on first has to be—

Tamsen, I've been looking forward to this conversation For a long time, I've been trying to understand this process that you have become an expert in, and I'm limited. I don't experience it, so I can only observe it. And this conversation is certainly for women, but this conversation is also for men, me included in that narrative, obviously. Because if you are a father, if you are a partner, and in the home, in the workplace, it is materially important for the relationships we have.

Mm-hmm.

And so thank you for coming. Thank you for writing a book. Thank you for your mission here. So if we just start with, like, what would you wanna say to men about the woman's experience with menopause?

Well, it's exciting to be here, and it's exciting you asked me that, because I've been talking to men recently, and I think it's so important. They can't be left out of this conversation. And for any man that's out there listening, like, yeah, be lucky you're not going through menopause, one, but understand that you are gonna be going alongside somebody who is, and whether that means that you're at the head of a big corporation, or you're working next to women, or you're a son, or you're a father, or you're a partner. Somebody in your life's gonna be going through that. And so for men to do 2 things, they don't have to go through it, but they do have to understand it. And it just needs to be the simplicity of it and not make fun of it. And I think that we came from a place for a very long time where it was the haha in every sitcom and every rom-com. And we laughed a lot about it, which is fine because there are some very funny parts to it. But I also think understanding it so you understand that this person in your life hasn't changed to to a point where they're not themselves anymore, but something is changing in them.

I think that that nuance is really important. My wife would say often, like, I feel different. And so you're saying they haven't changed, but that there is a change.

I think they don't feel like themselves anymore. And I think that you'll hear that over and over. There was actually even a study, because women were going into doctors saying, I just don't feel like myself anymore. I don't know what's going on, but I don't feel like myself anymore. So yes, your body's changing. And I think that a lot of things are changing, but you're not a different person. And what happens and how this shows up, will start in a relationship is that men will come to me and say, I don't know my wife anymore. Like, she doesn't want me to touch her. She doesn't want me to come near her. She's frustrated all the time and everything. I don't know what to do. I'm getting my head bitten off. But that's not the person that's changed. It's something that's happening to them that is making them change in that moment, 'cause this is a transition.

How did you get here? How did you get to studying this at such a rich level?

I know, I ask myself that sometimes because it really, it all sort of happened for me in a very organic way. So I was a newscaster and a journalist for 30 years, most recently, in New York for 15 years. I put New York to sleep, I say. I did the evening news. I started out doing the morning news, so I was the girl that got up at 3 o'clock in the morning. I was on your television at 4 o'clock in the morning and talking about the events of the day. Eventually moved to evenings, and I was having a tough time around 46 years old, 47 years old. I'd get on a set, I would just not feel like myself in terms of I didn't feel comfortable having a conversation. So a conversation like this would make me nervous to have.

Mm-hmm.

Because I wasn't able to have coherent thoughts anymore. I would read a teleprompter and I'd look at a word that I'd known forever and it wouldn't come out of my mouth, even though I knew I knew the word. And so my confidence was really taking a beating. I went to a doctor because I had experienced weight gain. I experienced moodiness, just kind of not like feeling agitated all the time. And they wrote in my notes like, patient complaining of moodiness and weight gain, and put me on an antidepressant. Fast forward now to 47 years old, and I'm on the set one night. And again, I've never heard the word perimenopause or menopause at that point. I'm on the set one night, and we just finished the part of the newscast. We're in a commercial break, and I felt something that I'd never felt before. I had this heat come up through my body and just sweat break out everywhere, my heart racing, like pumping. And I was like, I'm gonna pass out or fall over. I don't know what to do. I got off the set, went to the bathroom, and just promptly laid down to the floor to calm my body down.

By the way, you're a great writer.

Oh, thank you.

So I appreciated this part in your book. You're like, germs and all.

I didn't know what it was. I was face in the toilet, my face. Yeah, I didn't care at all.

Did you think it was a heart attack? Did you think it was a panic attack? Did you, like, where did your mind go?

I'd never had a panic attack before, so I'm like, I'm not nervous doing my job. I've done this job for 30 years. Like, I don't get nervous doing that. So I knew that that wasn't, it wasn't something odd like that. I was like, is it food poisoning? Am I having a heart issue? Like, I really did sort of run that gamut, And I remember laying with my face, like facing the toilet going, what is going on? And I worked the night shift and it was primarily, mostly men that worked there. And my 2 producers came in, they're like, knock, knock, are you okay? And I said, yeah, I'm fine. My skirt up, you know, it was just, it was crazy if I go back and look at that. But that's how severe and how scared I was at that point.

Yeah, so you had a moment obviously that you said, okay, I gotta figure this thing out. And you went into the world and there wasn't a lot of commercially available resources No. Right? So much so that your doctor was a little callous in the way that he or she recommended your diagnosis, right?

Yeah.

So before we get to resources, can you go to the medical model for just a moment?

Yeah. So this is 2019. Things have changed quite a bit. The medical model in terms of what you do. So I didn't know what I was dealing with at all. And I wound up going to my OB-GYN, and I did some blood tests. I went to my general practitioner, and I said, I got I don't know what's going on. This happened. I'm a little scared. I don't want it to happen again. God forbid it happens on the air and I don't get off the set on time. And eventually I got a note in my patient portal that had 4 words in it, in menopause, any questions? That was signed by the doctor. And I went, I'm in menopause? I'm too young for menopause. I didn't know the average age. I didn't know anything about it. I'd never had the conversation with anybody in my life. My mom died when I was 20 years old, so I didn't have the conversation with her. So I was flabbergasted. And then the callousness of the message was alarming too, 'cause I thought, are there options? What are the options? What are the questions I'm supposed to ask?

I'm classically trained as a psychologist with specialization in high performance, and I did not get properly trained here. So when you described in your book and just now, let's call it hot flashes, let's call it racing heart rate, there's maybe a malaise, there's a cognitive, it looks just like anxiety and/or depression.

It does.

However, it is foundationally different. One of the things that I am grateful for is in my rotations, internships, the supervisor was very clear, like, look, do not diagnose depression without blood work. I said, how come? Because hypothyroid looks almost exactly like it. Okay, so they were close, but they never said anything about menopause being a differential diagnosis. So I think, like, sadly, How many misses have I had? And so, like, thank you, first and foremost, and I can't go back and change those, but, like, it does concern me that the training that folks are getting around this differential diagnosis.

Well, it's shocking, actually, and I had no idea. I mean, I had no idea. I'm a journalist, I'm not a doctor, I'm not a physician. I have now come to know a lot about this, but I wanted to make sure, I understood it for myself, first of all. And then I, when I jumped into understanding it after that diagnosis, I jumped in to go, well, what, what the heck is menopause? And why didn't anyone talk to me about this? And certainly, why didn't the doctor want to have more than that conversation? Now I go back and I say, oh, I get it. You weren't trained. It's not, it's never been a comfortable conversation for a lot of people. First off, that doctor wasn't trained in medical school. And the only option for that doctor was to go out and seek education on their own. I've had doctors tell me they had 1 hour. I had doctors tell me that they had, even gynecologists tell me they had maybe a week of, gynecologists, maybe a week. I had one doctor tell me that they were offered free pizza in exchange for a luncheon to talk about menopause.

Hmm.

So it's a real thing. So there's so many different parts of this conversation and different pillars where I understand now why we're where we are today, why women were not informed, especially during this time, why doctors haven't been comfortable talking about it or treating it, why medical schools stopped doing it, which goes back to a study in 2002, which confused a lot of people as to the effects of hormone therapy. And so there's a bunch of things that added up to put us where we were. And this is now 2019 that we're talking about this, where there was limited information. If I had Googled it back then, very limited information, just more of the who, what, where, when of it. There weren't influencers talking about it. There weren't doctors online talking about it. There weren't pharmacists talking about it. Everyone was sort of on their own to figure it out.

Yeah, well done to be on the frontier of this and make some noise and make some impact. Can we start by grounding in the actual experiences or symptoms of menopause? And I even hesitate to say symptoms. I'm not sure why, but there's over 30, according to the way that you've described it to me. There's over 30, and I don't expect you to list all 30 of them, but just ground what's actually happening.

Yeah. And there's even more than that, honestly, if we look at everything. We talk about hot flashes, we talk about anxiety, talk about brain fog, we talk about mood changes, we talk about libido changes. They talk about painful sex. It can be nausea, migraines, joint pain, weight gain. I mean, those are 10, right off the bat, that nobody wants to deal with one. And so what's interesting about—

Skin, hair.

Skin, hair dryness, because there are estrogen receptors essentially All over your body. And when your estrogen goes down and plummets during this time, you start to see the effects of that. And I think for me, what was most like, you know, sleep problems. I think what was most important to me anyway, because I was in the corporate world, is I wasn't sleeping, I was gaining weight, and I was on television every day. So that was making me scared. And I had brain fog. So those were my 3. Oh my gosh, if these things, none of these things are working very well, I'm not sure how I go into my job every day confident.

This is a call to psychologists right now, my peers, without proper digging in the context of the symptomology, meaning age, whatever, and functionality, that sounds just like anxiety or depression.

Sure.

That sounds just like a handful of easily diagnosed conditions. But it is biological. This is not psychological. There are psychological symptoms, if you will, but it's a biological origin. And because of that, we need to also address the biology. So are you more of a fan, if you will, of bottom-up, meaning hormone therapy, or top-down psychological and behavioral, or an interactionist approach to work with the conditions?

I think it has to be a little bit of both because—

As most reasonable people do say.

Well, I think so, because psychologically, if you're not even willing to accept— you have to be willing to accept what's going on, too. And I think that what happens during this time is there's a lot of things happening all together, right? For me, I went, I'm in menopause. Does this mean it's over? Like, I didn't know when menopause happened. I didn't know if it was 70 years old.

70, yeah, right.

Yeah, I really thought that like, wow, this is an age thing. And I think that that's what's going on with a lot of women, because we have associated that with much later in life, much further down the road, and not quite as sexy, not quite as pretty, not quite as ambitious, not quite as whatever. You know, behind, invisible, whatever word you want to use to describe that.

Because there is a psychological, behavioral, and sociological condition that's at play.

100%.

Yeah, because our society, you know, there's a productivity that is kind of a big thing. And if you are— our producer and I, we're kind of workshopping scenarios about how could we be great here at Finding Mastery and places that I go work at. How can we be great? for women during this condition? And it's like, I don't know, if I had a broken leg, people would say, hey, you need a stool. But for somebody that— should I make an assumption that if somebody is, I don't know, 48 to 55, somewhere in that range, correct me if I forgot the ages wrong here, should I make an assumption that menopause or perimenopause is online and happening, and to be a great teammate, there's things I could do?

Absolutely. And I'd start that age at 40.

You do 40, start at 40.

Well, the average age of menopause—

For perimenopause.

Well, the average age of menopause in the US is 51. So that's the average age.

That's the average. So plus minus.

You've got to count back 4 to 10 years. So I would start saying, I mean, essentially perimenopause and menopause, it means a change in hormones, right? A transition is starting to happen.

The way you just said that is like so clear, so grounded, no taboo. It's like, hey, hormones are changing. No kidding. For me too. Yeah, yes, all of us. Different ways. Okay. I love that clarity, and it just kind of takes this ageism thing out of it. Finding Mastery is brought to you by granola.ai. Some of the most important work we do happens in conversation. It's in the meeting, it's in the one-on-one connection. It's the moment someone shares an idea that could shift the direction of everything. And the greatest gift you can offer in those moments is your full attention. That's exactly why I love Granola. Granola is an AI notepad. You take down the notes that matter to you, and Granola transcribes the entire conversation right beside them. So what does that mean for me? It means that I get to be fully present, to listen deeply, to give real attention to the details and the nuances, the, the thing behind the thing, knowing that Granola is there taking notes for me behind the scenes. And the best part? It works right through your device's audio, which means it integrates seamlessly into your video conferencing tools that you already use. No big setup, no awkward bots. All I do is let folks know that Granola is transcribing in the background. Happy days, we're off and running. I use it every day, and what's remarkable is how it helps turn a conversation into something useful. When we're done, I've got a clear, organized recap of what's said, along with a clean list of action items and clear next steps. Nothing slips through the cracks. That is the gift of Granola. I think you're really gonna like what they're doing.

If meetings are eating up your day, Granola is a no-brainer. You can try it totally free Totally free. Just head to granola.ai/mastery. That's G-R-A-N-O-L-A dot A-I, granola.ai/mastery, to get your time back. Try it for free at granola.ai/mastery.

Finding Mastery is brought to you by LinkedIn Jobs. If you've ever hired for a small business, you know the real cost isn't just the salary. It's the time that you lose when the fit is off, the momentum that stalls when that fit doesn't work. And that's the pressure of having to get it right while you're still running everything else. That's why paying attention to LinkedIn Hiring Pro. It's built for the reality of hiring when you're operating lean. You describe the role in plain language, and then Hiring Pro helps you draft the job post, surface the right candidates, and then narrow to a shortlist without turning hiring into another full-time job. And when applications start coming in, it doesn't leave you buried in resumes. It streamlines screening, including AI-powered interviews for initial conversations. How about that? So that you can spend less time searching and then more time connecting with the people who match what you need. With HiringPro, you can hire with confidence knowing you're getting the best talent for your business. In fact, those hiring with LinkedIn are 24% less likely to need to reopen a role within 12 months when compared to their leading competitor. Join the 2.7 million small businesses using LinkedIn to hire. Get started by posting your job for free at linkedin.com/mastery. Again, that's linkedin.com/mastery.

Yeah, there's an ugly stigma with menopause and perimenopause, right? I mean, there really is. If I went up to somebody, it was— I'll give you this example. My dad's 86 years old. He has learned more about menopause now than he ever wanted to know. And so is my 15-year-old nephew.

Yeah.

They are both well-versed. They're— and my husband, they're well-versed men. 15, 67, 86. And so I think what's interesting about it is my father was at a at a class that he goes to. And he said that there was a woman next to him that was getting hot. And he said, is it the menopause? Maybe, 'cause my daughter wrote a book on it. And he told me, and I said, Daddy, you can't go and talk to— you can't go up to a woman and ask her if she's in menopause. I appreciate that you're trying to be an advocate here.

This is where I get confused. One, I love the laugh about it because it's true, right?

Yes.

And I love that you call it the menopause.

The menopause, that's what he said.

Yeah, right, yeah. Well, our producer is from England.

Yes.

And she— we're workshopping you know, I quote, scrimmaging this conversation, and she kept calling it the menopause. I was like, wait, are you making fun of it? And she's like, no, God, no. But that's how they call it in the UK, the menopause.

And that's how my dad says it, who's 86, and he's from Texas, so I don't know.

Okay, got it. So, all right, in menopause, so 42, what do we say?

So I look at it like this. 51 is your average age, and there are some variables with that, obviously, but, you know, 10 years. So let's go back to 40 years old, approximately. Your hormones are starting to change. So that's why I would, you know, part of the advocacy that I am doing as somebody who is a layman, that's not, I'm not a doctor, I'm not a, I can't make changes, policy change, any of that kind of stuff, but I really would love to see a baseline. So when you go into any type of doctor, whether it's 35 or 38, they go, yeah, you know what, you should start looking at all these symptoms. And if you're seeing any of those, you could start to be within the age range.

Oh, you wanna know symptoms? not hormonal panels.

Symptoms, because perimenopause is diagnosed by your symptoms.

Symptoms, yeah.

Yes, because you're fluctuating all over the place. It's a chaotic time. So you might go in one day and have one number, and another day, go in and have another number.

Hormones are difficult to measure.

Yes.

Difficult, we can measure them, but because they're so time-sensitive, that's the difficult part.

Yeah.

Yeah, so, okay, so you wanna do symptoms early, and then just get a baseline there.

Yeah, because I think it would make it a lot less scary, And I think it would make it a lot more clear what was coming up. Because right now what's happened is women come into 45 and 50 years old, and they go, and a doctor says, oh, you're in menopause now, or you're in perimenopause. And you go, what am I supposed to do? Now I've got all these things to deal with. I gotta deal with my sleep, my brain, I gotta eat protein, protect my bones. You know, you've got women coming out with a list of 50 things that they're supposed to do to beat menopause, and it can be very overwhelming.

I do wanna get to the practical piece.

Yeah, absolutely.

And before we go there, I wanna go to 20%, I think, women in the workforce in the US are in menopause. If we add perimenopause, it's going to at least double that.

Yes.

Okay, so let's say between 20% and 40% of the US workforce are in the age range where hormones are fluctuating, where there are biological, sociological, and psychological impacts from it. And I want to be a great teammate. I love that. So we've got a real mission that we're on, and we need everybody to be great for that thing to For us to give a chance. So how can, just coach me up. How can I be a great teammate to, you know, not to make the blunder maybe that your dad eloquently, like, you know, but how can I be great and not reinforce the stigma, not make it awkward, but be direct, be kind, be like just a great teammate. Like, coach me and our entire community up.

I would love to, because I think that men really have a place in this conversation. And for the beginning of the conversation, when we were first starting to have it, women were like, We're taking care of it ourselves. And that's how we felt. It's how I felt. But now I realize men have to be a part of this conversation. We're everywhere all together. Even if you're not in a relationship with a man, you're dealing with one at work, or you're talking, or you might have a son or a brother, whatever that is. So, you know, I think in the workplace, a couple of things, and I think that this is where it can start. If you're somebody that is able to implement policy and change in a workplace, have some type of say when it comes to insurance policies or, you know, healthcare or whatever that is, If you're somebody that has that kind of say, this should be on the table there so that it's part of the healthcare system. So maybe it doesn't even have to be a conversation within the workplace. That's one area. Another area is we talk about, I talk to a lot of HR departments and a lot of HR leaders, and the big question is, how do I go bring this up to my employees without making them feel uncomfortable and myself feeling uncomfortable? I have been to so many big companies that will bring me in and say, just talk about it, so they'll feel comfortable talking about to this third party, me, or somebody else that might have an expertise in this kind of conversation. So they can talk to you, relate to you, read a book. I have 2 films on it. So I bring assets. What are the films so people can look? The M Factor 1 and 2. The M Factor 1 is Shredding the Silence. We've been in over 1,000 cities with it. We bring it into communities, give it to them for free.

Well done.

Thank you. It's really been a learning curve for me to understand what's needed. And then the M Factor 2 was Before the Pause, about perimenopause, because I think we have got to talk to younger people too. We've gotta talk to younger women and younger men so they understand what's going on. So the second area I think is dealing with HR and being able to bring a third party in so that that's not the responsibility of the workplace to say, we're having a menopause seminar, everybody, and we're leading it. 'Cause I don't think that's always comfortable.

But if they bring you in, there's an expertise, there's a, you know, and obviously you have an eloquent way of talking about it and you bring some levity to a very serious condition.

Thank you.

Yeah, so.

I try to because I think it can be really, It can be really— if I go in there and I list all the symptoms, they're like, just get out, lady, just get outta here. But I think it's really important. And I see what's interesting is that a lot of the men in those rooms come up to me afterwards and they go, oh my gosh, I had no idea what my wife was going through, but all of a sudden I was living with a stranger. Or, oh my gosh, my wife has not wanted to have sex with me or be intimate with me or have me even touch her for a long time. I didn't know what was going on. I thought it was me.

Mm-hmm.

And so that's been a really exciting breakthrough, I think, in this conversation over the course of the last 5 years. And then I think the other way is to make sure that there is an open policy where somebody can feel comfortable going in there and have the conversation and say, hey, I need a fan at my desk, or, hey, I might need to do XYZ and go see the doctor because I've gotta go get this taken care of. I worry about the workplace, and we have a lot of legislation state to state that is being, you know, is passing right now, which is exciting, but I worry about the workplace 'cause I never want it to harm women. We have women working longer than ever and in bigger roles than ever before. And I don't want that to ever harm them, where somebody goes, oh gosh, we don't wanna bring her in here because she's gonna be going through this for 10 years. That concerns me.

Yeah, so that was what we were scrimmaging yesterday is like, where does performance and biological/psychological challenges impact performance? Like, where is that kind of imaginary line? And I don't think there's an easy answer.

Well, and I think that that's also why when I say there's so many different areas we have to tackle at the same time. We have to tackle educating the doctors. There's no question about it. Like, that has to happen.

You go docs, you go HR.

I go docs and telehealth, 'cause telehealth is able to move people faster than anybody else, which is super exciting, because we're able to get women in, get them seen. They're not waiting 6 months for an appointment. They're able to, if they decide to go on hormone therapy to help, great. If they decide to do something that's non-hormonal, great. But at least they're being seen at a quicker pace, quite frankly, than going to offices. So that's one area. And then the other area is educating Women in general, so they understand what to look for, so they can go in as their biggest advocate. Because unfortunately, the onus is on women to go into a doctor's office, which is why I give so many free resources away, because I don't know how else to tell them what to do. I'm like, here's a symptom tracker. I don't care if you write it down manually and tell the doctor what you're dealing with, so at least they can start on a path of getting help.

I like that a lot, the consumer advocacy or patient advocacy, for sure, Again, I'm not working with this population, but if someone were to come to me and give me the list of symptoms, and I'm not trained in it, and I miss it, and I'm like, oh, good, I've got a protocol here, but it is actually biological, meaning it's a hormonal thing, I'm wasting time and energy and resources. And if a patient-client were to come and say, hey, doc, are you sure? Because I'm actually, I'm 52 years old, and I've been having this trend, and I go, oh. Well, Like, that would've been— yeah. Okay. But go now drop down to the layer of teammate. So my teammate, either as a peer in the organization or I'm reporting to, or as a direct report, it does not matter to me the directionality, but my teammate or the person I'm working with in an office is 48, 52, whatever.

Yep. Dealing with symptoms or not symptoms or whatever it is.

Yeah. Just coach me up.

Being aware of it, first of all. Being aware of it, being willing to, and it depends on how close you are or how comfortable you feel, of talking about this openly, because I don't think there's anything wrong with that, of, hey, my wife is going through perimenopause, she's been dealing with XYZ. I don't care how people bring it up into a conversation, but I will tell you this from experience over and over. The minute I crack open the door a little bit to have the conversation, people open it up so quickly because they wanna talk about it, because it's not been talked about before.

Mm.

And I really think that that's And that's something that's important. I mean, when I go into places to talk, I had a cameraman running after me down the hallway. He's like, how do I bring it up to my wife? My wife, how do I bring it up with her without insulting her? And I said, I don't know, say you heard this girl talking about it on MTV, and I don't know if you're going through this or not, but it was really interesting.

Yeah.

Because here's why. It's not just about menopause, perimenopause, it's about long-term health. We're talking about brain health, heart health, bone health. We're talking about long-term, ramifications if we're not dealing with what's going on right now.

There you go.

And that's health. You'd bring that up to anybody.

Yeah, it's foundational. What do you think the cost of losing talent in the workplace is for not addressing something that is, again, biological?

Oh, it's a huge cost. I know that Mayo Clinic had a study that had come out not too long ago. I think it was like 2 years ago, and it said there's $1.8 billion being lost when people are not showing up to work because of symptoms, when we're losing top-tier talent, because these people are people that are very, and have been in the workplace a long time and very experienced, that's a huge number, and that's what companies will listen to.

Wait, why are they not coming to work?

Symptoms, not able to come to work because they're not feeling right. They're missing time at work because of menopause symptoms. Some people have very severe symptoms of menopause. People are not just hot flashing. There's other things that are going on. And I think that when you're talking to workplaces, if workplaces aren't gonna talk about, okay, yeah, I know women go through all sorts of things, they're gonna have children, then they're gonna go into this cycle. If we're not talking about any of those things, And we just talk about what we're losing in terms of money, I think that that's where we see a lot of people paying attention.

Did you have that condition or experience, or are you—

Myself?

Yeah.

No, I did not show up to work, but I did not show up to work necessarily as good as I could had I known 10 years earlier that's what I was going through. If I knew I was going through that, I would've, for me, because I can do hormone therapy and I really understand it now, I would've hopped on hormone therapy and I would've been sleeping at night. I would've been feeling better. I wouldn't have been having hot flashes. I wouldn't have had that incident on set. But I'm glad I did because now I feel like I can educate other people. I wouldn't have cared. I wouldn't have known.

Isn't that something where, like, oftentimes our moments of great confusion or despair or whatever turn into a real purpose?

It really did. It was never a conversation I'd had. I lost my mom early. I think she wound up, was going through a medical menopause, but we had no idea.

She didn't die?

Yeah, my mom passed away from breast cancer.

From breast cancer, yeah.

But she had, because she went through breast cancer, and she had gone through chemotherapy and a double mastectomy. I think it put her into a premature menopause, a medical surgical menopause.

Okay, I'm gonna go back to this. Coach me up again. Like, do I bring it up? Do I not bring it up? Do I—

I'd rather you insult somebody and help them than not bring it up.

Okay, great. And then I hear like an HR narrative, which is like, wait, hold on. Like, now I've made like somebody feel uncomfortable, but I was actually trying to be a great teammate.

But I think that's okay to have those conversations out loud. I don't think you're saying, hey, Hey, you look like you're not yourself anymore. You look like you've gained a little weight, you're not sleeping. Is it menopause? I mean, that's obviously not what we're talking about, but I do think you can be a great teammate of being open to that conversation if you're bringing it up in a way that is as comfortable as you can bring it up.

Let's say you're in the corporate environment and you're going through about, let's just stay on hot flashes for a minute, and you are the lead on a project. You got great momentum. You've got all the kind of seasoned wisdom about the client and the profession And it's pitch time and you're the point person and you're having like, you're in a phase where it's like, man, these hot flashes are uncontrollable. I do not want to show up—

Terrible.

You know, to my client's office in front of whatever number of people, pitch this brilliant idea and have them think that I'm a nervous wreck and that I'm not confident because that's what sweating obviously looks like, right? Would you shoulder tap somebody and have them sub in for you, would you address the room and be like, hey everybody, I got something that I believe in, it's gonna be amazing. And I've got this thing that's going on, it's called menopause. I'm sweating, it's not nervousness, I'm gonna kick ass. How would—

That's me.

You would do the second one?

100%.

Yeah, you wouldn't—

I used to do it in the studio after I found out. I'm like, guys, I'm sweating, it's a hot flash, sorry about that. And there would be a little of a laugh because that's what this was. It was a self-deprecating moment. But I'm telling you that I taught so many people as a result of that.

And if you were on air having a hot flash, that's kind of like the pitch moment?

Absolutely.

What would you do?

I mean, I think that that's the only way to do it. I probably did do it during that time because I was told not to bring it up on television. And I did, because remember, we're at a different time now. This is a few years back. And they said, could you please stop talking about this over and over again? Just please stop. Nobody wants to hear about this all the time. And I said, everybody needs to hear about it. Over a billion women globally, 1.2 billion women globally are in this transition in life. Everybody needs to hear about it, because I really think it's unfair, actually, to men too, in this conversation, for them not to know what's going on.

Yeah, right.

I do. And I wouldn't have said that 5 years ago.

Is this an unfair understanding that I have? Is that when menopause kicks in and it's happening, it doesn't go away, and it is not something that women are wanting, meaning hair, skin, this, that, and the other, mood, weight, whatever this symptomology is, that it's like you just kind of endure it, or there's a way to gracefully work with it where wisdom is part of the experience, as opposed to, like, I'm just going to grind it and fight through it. Teach me how you think is the best way to approach this.

Yeah, I love this question. I think my answer has changed over the years. I think my answer would have been years ago, go to a doctor and see what they tell you to do. And if you got a good doctor that's going to listen, and then I think And I think what happened and what caused me to do the films, write the book, really lean into the advocacy part of it, is I realized that women have to take charge of it. And that has to be from top to bottom and bottom to top, like all over. It needs to, you need to really take charge of that. So I think for me, it's getting the help that you can get if it's hormone therapy, but it's also really understanding the other things that need to be done, because you're never gonna waste your time doing these things, 'cause we're talking about long-term. I always call it the next 30. The next 30 years is really what we're talking about. We're not talking about just this transition in time where your hormones are going to change, because they're going to balance out at some point. And you're going to be, you know, menopause is one day after you haven't had your cycle for a year. That's what it is. That's what menopause is. All these symptoms of chaos are the things that are leading up to it that are perimenopause. You've got this one day of menopause.

Symptoms of chaos, that's so good.

That's what they are. And then, because I can never pinpoint what they are, it's just chaotic. And then after that, it's called postmenopause, but I kind of hate that word. So you're just menopausal the rest of your life.

Right.

But I don't even think you need that title anymore. And I hope we get to a place where we're not doing that, where it's just like, this is that next chapter of your life. But what's important when we're going through this and trying to beat the symptoms, or at least work with the symptoms, I think it's important to say, okay, what do I want the next 30 years of my life to be like? If you hit menopause at 49, you're probably most likely, pending something really, gonna be at 79 years old. What do you want to do to make that great?

And this is a really good time Finding Mastery is brought to you by David Protein. Travel a lot at Finding Mastery, and sometimes travel makes it tricky to eat well. Best intentions, and then you're at the airport, and then suddenly the only options around you are the ones that you'd rarely choose at home. Something I come back to often is that discipline isn't really about willpower in the moment. It's often about choice architecture, setting up your environment ahead of time so that the easy choice and the good choice are the same one. That's the role David plays for me on the road. Road. The Gold Bar, it's their flagship, high protein density, great texture, flavors that make it easy to stick with. So when I throw a few in the bag before my trip, I've already made the decision. The hard moment later takes care of itself. And the team here at Finding Mastery, they love the bars as well. They are ripping through them in the Finding Mastery lab. Salted peanut butter and fudge brownie seem to be the fan favorites right now. They have built something with real rigor in a crowded, sometimes ambiguous space like nutrition. That matters When it's something that you reach for again and again. David Bars are now available in major retailers like Walmart and Target. And if you'd like to buy them directly and get a special offer for being a Finding Mastery listener, head to davidprotein.com/findingmastery, where right now, if you buy 4 packs, you'll get the 5th one for free. Again, that's davidprotein.com/findingmastery. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Oslo Sleep Buds. Here's something I come back to with almost every high performer I work with: you can do everything right during the day, but if the night consistently falls apart, so does recovery. That's exactly the problem Oslo set out to solve, and that's why I invested in the company. I love what they're doing. They just launched Sleepbuds 2. This is the next generation of the world's smallest earbuds built for one thing: sleep. And once you're Once you're falling asleep, they switch to built-in sleep sounds on their own. Over time, the app even shows you personalized sleep patterns so you can see what's actually helping you recover. Sleep is a skill. You can train it, and the right tools make it easier to protect. Protect your sleep. It matters. Do not leave your recovery up to chance.

Right now you can get $20 off with the code FINDINGMASTERY at oslosleep.com. Again, that's findingmastery@ozlosleep.com for $20 off.

From an evolutionary standpoint, what is the reason that this is— this is probably more philosophical than anything else, but is it to remove childbearing, to reduce or remove childbearing at a certain age because of the complications that happen Both to child and mother. Is that the kind of most, I don't know, basic evolutionary?

I think that's the most basic evolutionary. I mean, and if you think about it, these are also the women that have come back and are helping, you know, helping the women that are younger with children at some point. You know, these are the mothers that are— there was like a grandmother hypothesis that, you know, a lot of people talked about for a long time, and a lot of people have gone like, oh, we're not going to talk about that anymore because these women are more than just grandmothers now, you know what I mean? When they hit this age period.

There was some research.

There was a lot of research about it, yeah.

That women that had grandmothers that were alive and active were able to have more children? Is that— do I have that right?

I think so. What I turned to was a lot of the research that had to do with the brain, of understanding that, you know, when you're perimenopausal or pre— when you're perimenopausal, you've got all this activity going on, you've got this nurturing during this time until you hit menopause. And then menopause, not that you're not nurturing anymore, but really it's a different part of your brain. that's clicked on now, where you're not kind of so empathetic, you're not child caring, you're not taking care of children and caretaking all the time. And that's when you hear women being like, I have no more Fs to give, you know, is that you're now focused on yourself during this time. Which is why I think we use the word wisdom and wise all the time. But we see women come on the other side of this and go, hey, this is the best time of my life. And I see it over and over again. And I wish that we could show younger women those examples so they understand this is a transition you're gonna go through. hopefully with enough advocacy, education, doctors being trained, new advances in medicine and science, here are your 2 solutions, 5 solutions, 10 solutions. Do one of these, and you're going to be on the other side of this without any problems.

Which is hormone therapy, which is sleep and behavioral kind of practices, exercise, lift heavy weights, do some cardio, invest in—

Protect your bones.

Protect your bones, yeah. There's a nutritional category, which is, again, Against, like, the protein, and you've written all about, your chapter headings are exactly that. So you've hit all of those. Can you give us just a couple things that you're practicing amongst those 4 or 5 that we just mentioned?

Yeah, I think it can be overwhelming when you get that list. You're like, wait, I gotta do sleep and heart and bone, and what, my bones? I never thought about my bones, did you, at 20 years old? It was like, I just wanted to not break one. This is a long-term life practice, not a let me try to get through this as best I can practice. I think what happens is women go, oh, I really gotta focus back on myself right now if I wanna be okay during this time. Like, I'm paying attention to me. In journalism, we, you know, stayed up late, got up early, like, worked, you know, all ends of the clock. Stress was immense. We were always on a crunching, traveling. And so I don't think I ever went, I gotta really work on my stress management. That was never a conversation I had.

Yeah.

Like, ever. And I wasn't in elite sport, and so that was never part of my life. But for the majority of women, they're working, raising kids, dealing with family, caretaking, you know, a lot of the sandwich generation, not focusing on themselves. And I think this has been a time, you know, for them to do that, whether it's in the 40s or in 50s. And I see it over and over again. And so that gets me excited. But I hope they're not— I don't want them to just do it for this to get through. I want it to be for that long term and really understand why they're doing it.

Niche down.

And I think it's for everybody.

Yeah, niche down to be super practical.

There's so many symptoms. So, for me, the number one, one, one thing that I focus on first has to be sleep. And I would say that to anybody, because you're not going to even remember to make a doctor's appointment if you're not coherent about what's going on. You're not going to want to get up and work out. You're not going to want to go make a Mediterranean diet if you are sleep deprived. It is the single worst thing that it could— I believe that. So, with my sleep, I pay full attention to it. I pay full attention to the scrolling that I used to do. My sleep routine, I never had a sleep routine. I didn't even know what sleep hygiene was back then. But I've had enough doctors that I've talked to about sleep to pay attention to what to do if I can't fall asleep, and how to get up and get out of bed as quickly as I can to be able to come back to bed to go back to sleep. I talked to one of the doctors and she said, I go into my kitchen when I can't sleep and I read cookbooks. And I said, why? She goes, have you ever just sat and tried to read a cookbook? And I go, never. And she goes, that's why.

Yeah.

And I said, oh, that's a really good idea. So getting out of bed and not fighting that is big deal. Sleeping in a cool room, which I know there's a lot of, you know, back and forth if you've got a partner, and that can be frustrating.

What temperature do you like?

I like about 68.

Yeah, so do I.

My husband likes like 72, and so there's 2 degrees is a lot of—

It's actually a big difference.

It is a big difference. It's a huge difference.

We have a mattress solution that we love that has temperature changes on both sides.

Is it really been a big difference?

Game changer. Game changer.

I think I got to get serious about that again.

Yeah, yeah.

Because I really believe we have a lot of tools out there that we didn't have before to be able to handle some of these things. And that's a really great one to have. So you're not sleeping out on the couch to, you know, just get out of bed.

Blankets off or on, whatever it is. Blankets off, on, off.

Like the foot in and out of bed all the time is like kind of the running joke. I do go to bed at the same time every night as best I can. And I really try to do that. And I live between New York and LA, so it's hard. So I find myself having to get into bed, you know, try to pair those times up and do the same thing in the morning. And then in the morning, I never did this before either, the last 4 years, out of bed and walking. And I don't care if it's 10 minutes in New York City down the block to go get coffee, or it's here in LA and getting out by the water, but I do that every morning. I'm out.

Yeah, first light and last light are both interesting behavioral kind of things that you can do.

But they're easy, you know, they're easy because they're not asking too much of you. They're not asking you to go to the gym and do 30 minutes of cardio and then weightlifting. So that is one area that I think is the most important important, if there's anything else. And then the second area, I guess I would say, for me anyway, is I know working out is really important, but I think food is my second. Like, I really have to have the focus there. And the fact of adding all these supplements can be so confusing. And I think women have cabinets full of them because a lot of things promise. And by the way, if anybody sees something that's like, menopause everything, we can fix it all, that is not going to fix anything. So I just hope that that's that's something that people know, because a lot is being sold to women right now to fix everything.

There is a thing happening. Menopause is—

Beyond, yeah.

Yeah, like, it's a great conversation that is happening. So there's more remedies, if you will.

100%.

So there's a swell, which is pretty cool.

It really is. And I feel like, just going back for a second to what you were saying about in the workplace, I think that that's what makes it a little bit easier to be able to bring up those conversations, or in a relationship to bring up those conversations.

Yeah, it's very cool.

I think it makes it a little bit easier, because it It has become a word that is not cringey, and it was cringey for a while. I think it was like, oh gosh, that means old, and ugh, I don't wanna be associated with that. And now I hear women saying, yeah, I'm in, actresses, celebrities, when Halle Berry comes out and says she's in menopause, I wanna be there too. And I feel like young women are having that conversation as well, which is super exciting to see the generations.

You've had some prominent female voices on your podcast that have spoken about menopause. Who are some of those?

Yeah, Halle Berry was one. She was my first guest, which was super exciting. Naomi Watts had come on to talk about it. Melinda Gates was on just recently making a big announcement about an incredible amount of money that she's going to be donating toward this. I think it'll be a big game changer in terms of helping educate doctors, which is more and more doctors, which is exciting. Because to your point, different disciplines didn't have education about this. Like, even the OB-GYNs struggled to get somebody to talk about this stage in life because it really wasn't On radars, which is so bizarre.

Well done. What's the name of your podcast?

The Tamsen Show.

Yeah.

Well, I mean, well done on all fronts, being on the frontier and honestly and earnestly leading it. And so it leads to a couple more questions I have about intimacy, libido, sex. And if your partner spouse is sweating or agitated and irritated and tired, this is not the recipe for great sex.

Yeah. That's not the time to be intimate. If I needed to, if I could just put a little ass You know, I think being understanding about it outside the bedroom is really where you have to have that conversation. I put together this little men's guide 'cause somebody said, are you gonna write a book for men? And I went, no, men are not gonna read a book on menopause. I don't care that men is in the title of it.

But they'll read a book about sex.

But they'll read a book about sex and intimacy. But, you know, I think it's really important to have that conversation outside the bedroom, first of all, and be able to be understanding. I did a visit to a men's group and there were these 6 guys talking about menopause and it was the coolest thing ever. And one of 'em said, you know, I just gotta say, once I learned that menopause was the thing and I wasn't the problem, I'm like, yeah, you can teach an old dog new tricks. I'm happy to learn different things, but thank goodness it's not me. And I think that that's what a lot of men have been dealing with, of thinking like, wow, what did I do that I'm not attractive anymore? It's not working between us anymore.

Is there a pause in sex for women in menopause? Meaning, like, if I take a female's voice, I am just not interested in sex. Is there a pause?

It depends if you get help. Like, you know, women can start hormone therapy in perimenopause and go right through it. But if you are dealing with painful sex, that's the last thing that you wanna be having. And low libido is a part of these hormones that are really fluctuating in a lot of different ways. The good news is there are solutions for it. There's vaginal estrogen that can help to make sure you don't have painful sex. And there's hormone therapy that can help with that low libido. And there are prescription drugs out there right now. There's one, Addyi, there's Viossa, There's different drugs out there that can help with a sex drive. When we look at these kind of meds, men have like 26 different medications plus to help in the bedroom, and women have like 2 or 3 that help with libido.

How about it?

Yeah, how about those numbers?

Yeah, right. Okay, so drill down one more time. Like, what can husbands do to be great teammates, partners?

Yes, be understanding of it. Not think that we're just— you're gonna jump into like the, the TV show sex, you know, like we roll into bed and we're all sweating. We're already sweating, so we don't need to do that part. But there needs to be the intimacy part that starts, like the real intimacy part of it being, you know, a little, a little more romance, a little having this conversation outside the bedroom, inside the bedroom, being patient in terms of understanding what's going on. And I swear, I think there have been huge changes in relationships with men just understanding these words. I mean, I think that's kind Yeah. Oh, you do? I do. I was on a phone call with a guy this morning and he had my website up and his wife came by and said, I read her book. And he's like, really? I'm talking to her about menopause. I'm like, that guy's totally gonna have a great night tonight.

Yeah, that's right.

He's talking about menopause.

Yeah, right. He's trying to understand. Yeah. Okay, so I have one experience of menopause that I'm intimate with my wife. I've gotta say that she was rad. Just like she does everything in life, she faced it full on. She educated, she researched, and then she put in the work to make changes. And I do think that both of us fell into this uninformed narrative based on, I think, marketing bad information about hormone therapy.

Sure.

So we missed, we're both well-read and well-informed, and we missed it. And that would've been a game changer for her. But like, I watch her and she is on it on every front, on all 5 factors that you can invest in. And I don't know if this is right or wrong, but I think you've got to really work to have a chance of being graceful during this phase. Would you co-sign that, or would you say, no, you're kind of using an old model to address this?

No, I don't think that's an old model at all. I think that I always get very sad when somebody misses that window, and there is this window. Look, there's guidelines, and the guidelines are changing and being updated all the time, where at one point, if you're 10 years past when you went into menopause, most likely hormone therapy, or 60, most likely hormone therapy is not going to be recommended. But even that's changing now. So there are some tweaks to that. But I had to work hard.

You did too.

Absolutely. I had to work hard at my relationship. I was newlywed, by the way. I was 50 years old, and I was like, I don't think I'm interested in sex. I mean, my poor husband was like, wait, what happened?

You were—

3 years ago, it was very different. You were different when we met. And so, yes, I think I've had to work at it. I have to think about it. I think about it all the time. And more than I think about menopause, I think about what do I want these next 30 years to look like? And it's very important for women to pay attention to bone health, heart health, and brain health. Those are the 3 things that can really get impacted during this time.

What do you do for bone health?

So for bone health, I'm lifting all the time. And if I do supplements, like the supplement I'm adding there is vitamin D, K2, and protein. I've had a protein. I never paid attention to it before. I'm a Gen X, '80s girl. I was like, you know, you just gotta not have any fat in your— Did you drink from the hose?

Did you drink from a rusty hose?

I drank from the hose. I ran on this slippery thing down a hill. I, you know, biked without a helmet on. Didn't tell my parents where I was going for hours. Yes.

Right, okay. So on that front, like, can you address your experience or understanding of the narrative and the science around Yeah, absolutely.

So, you know, hormone therapy, there was at one point before 2002, 40-plus percent of the population in perimenopause, menopause was on hormone therapy. Today, we're just eking up to 5% of the population. There was a severe, severe drop-off, a very significant drop-off in 2002. There was a study called the Women's Health Initiative that came out with these headlines that got women very confused. And just to kind of filter it all out, the headlines essentially read, And it said estrogen could cause breast cancer. That is what women heard. That is the scariest thing in the world to a woman. My mom was diagnosed at the age of 44. So for me, that was the cloud of doom that lived over my head all the time. Like, oh my God, when is the day? When is that call going to come for me? So that has something— and today, if you talk to women, they don't necessarily know that there was a 2002 study that scared them. But if you ask a woman, what do you know about estrogen or hormone therapy? Most often they'll say, like, I don't think it's safe. So part of my work has really been to explain to women that it's not for everybody, but it is for a majority of people that are able to do it. If you have not had breast cancer, if you do not have history of a stroke or blood clot, you know, most likely— and there's a couple of other, you know, contraindications, but most likely you can do hormone therapy. And now the question is, do you have a doctor that can explain that to you? And then the next step is, if you don't want to do that, what are my other options? And luckily, we have a drug out now that can help with hot flashes. We have the drugs we were talking about for low libido. So there are different things you can do if you're not able to do hormone therapy. And the reason that both sides of the coin are very important to me is because if my mom were here today, I don't know that she could have been a candidate, was a candidate for hormone therapy. She had a very aggressive form of breast cancer. So most likely we would've had to figure out some of those other things for her to do.

Very cool. Yeah, thank you for that. 'Cause that's what I was alluding to earlier is that we didn't realize kind of what was happening and we hook, line, and sinker bought that idea about estrogen-related cancer, come to find out, And then I found out it was not right.

Well, some doctors still believe that. Some doctors won't prescribe it. Some doctors don't feel comfortable prescribing it. And so that's why I think it's important when I said at the beginning, the onus is on the woman. It's not only to go into a doctor's office and say, hey, this is what I think I'm going through. It's also finding a doctor that feels comfortable talking about it.

If we knew what you knew, how would men be better partners?

Oh, I think men could be great partners. I think you could go along with some of these things that we are being told to do all the time. And women are being told to get outside in the morning. with your partner. Maybe you go to the gym with your partner and work out. Maybe you figure out how to help with some stress management. I think men can be great partners by just understanding what they're going through or providing solutions. Hey, you know what? We were talking about menopause the other night. I heard this interview and there's a couple other things maybe we can try. I think that would be nice to have a partner do that so it doesn't feel like such a woman problem that she has to go through on her own. Yeah.

And if we knew what you knew, how would we be better leaders in the workforce?

Oh, I think that men can be incredible leaders by just being able to be aware of what's going on and seeing it and saying, like, what can I do to help my workforce? Whether it comes from what kind of policies we have in the workplace or what kind of things we can implement, what kind of programs we can bring in. Can we bring in some kind of longevity program that makes women feel like, okay, we're not pointing to you as a woman in menopause, but this might be able to help you?

What's your call to action for women that are in a leadership position? Maybe they're a senior leader or vice president, maybe not a CEO, or maybe, but you choose which level you want to talk through. What's your call to action there? Finding Mastery is brought to you by our flagship mindset training course, Finding Your Best. Anytime you feel the pull to reset, to zoom out, to refocus and ask, am I moving toward the person I want to become? It helps to remember this: lasting change comes from training. Not resolutions, not short-term sprints, but deliberate practice of the skills that shape how we show up in work, in relationships, and in the moments of great intensity as well. That's what Finding Your Best is all about. It's a science-backed framework for training your mind. It's the same set of tools that we've taught to Olympic athletes, top executives, elite military teams, and artists at the peak of their craft. In this course, you'll learn the foundational psychological skills to be your very best, full stop. And the best part is you can start anytime. Right now we're running a limited time offer on Finding Your Best. Simply head to findingmastery.com/course and use the code RENEW100 to get $100 off your registration. If you've been waiting for the right moment, this is a good one now to lean into. Spring and summer, they are powerful seasons of momentum. It's a great natural time to step into growth, to refocus, to recommit to who you want to become. And this discount will not be around for long. So go to findingmastery.com/course, code RENEW100 for $100 off today, because your future is not shaped by what you intend, it's shaped by what you train.

Oh, I would love every woman to just be educated with the, the top bullet points of what this is and have an open-door policy so women feel comfortable going in and talking about it and never get penalized.

There you go. Take me 5 5 years forward, what are we doing in the workplace that's different? Or let's go 3 years.

3 years.

And then let's go out like 10 years.

I wish now, but in 3 years, I hope everybody has access to some type of doctor in their programs, in their healthcare policies and programs, where they can go access this. So it's just part of what happens. We have that when it comes to reproductive years. We should just have that continuum. For some reason, when it comes to women's health, that hormone continuum, that, you know, should exist stops right here in midlife. It just kind of falls off. So I would love for there to be, hey, guess what? At this point in your life, we've got— we can provide you with telehealth services that are part of your policy, whatever that is, so women can move into this next chapter. Because we have a lot of women that are going from having children right into perimenopause, and some women get pregnant in perimenopause, you know. So this— it's not like there's this big line in the middle of it. This is like what women go through in general. So I hope that we have that continuum where it goes all the way out past menopause and post-menopause, 'cause I think we're gonna have women in the workplace so much longer. And that's what I'd like to see. I mean, I'd like to see that right now. I'd like to not have this conversation about menopause being this stopping point, what do we do? I want women to know what to be able to do, and doctors to know what to be able to do, and leaders to know what to be able to do.

There you go. For biology, medication and biology, can work sometimes well, sometimes it's really, really noisy.

Sure.

However, there is still a psychological thing that takes place in context of social structure that values A, B, and C indicators of beauty and does not value people sweating and does not value people that are deregulated because of sleep deprivation or sleep restriction. So there's this thing that happens to our identity And there's an asterisk here for me. If we're allowing the external world to dictate our internal experience, which my experience has been the most powerful people on the planet, that direction doesn't work. They're working from the inside out. To your point earlier, it's like, hey, I'm having sweats. I got a great idea. You're going to want to hear this. If I sweat, it's not what you think it is. And just kind of owning their experience.

Yeah, it's confidence.

So can you speak to identity And can you speak to some of the psychological challenges, like confidence, like self-esteem, like ambition, potentially, like drive? Can you speak to some of those things that you personally went through or that you'd like people to understand a little bit better?

Yeah, I had a real lack of confidence when I started going through these things because I wasn't sure, I didn't know what was going on, first of all, and then I didn't know what to do about it. And I thought something was going on.

So just that increases anxiety.

Oh my gosh. I mean, my whole job was to read. And so I would look at the teleprompter or look at my partner at the desk, and I, I couldn't finish a sentence. I wouldn't have been able to sit here with you. I would have been sweating. I would have been a little panicky that I couldn't, you know, I would be reaching for words. And so, so I know what that feels like, and it's pretty awful. And so I understand when a woman is in a boardroom and goes, oh my gosh, I don't even know what I'm doing here. And I have this and I can't figure out what the next slide is. So I understand that lack of confidence, and it does have a lot to do with what you feel comfortable doing next, right? So it's not just confidence in that moment, it's confidence in who am I now? This isn't who I was before. I was this person that would come in here and rule the world, and now I feel like a very weakened, watered-down version of myself. So I understand that. What I also understand is once I figured out what was going on in your Your wife could probably attest to this. I felt so much more powerful, not because I had solved menopause, but because I understood that I was now on a track to fixing some of these things that were going on, or at least addressing them, if I couldn't fix them. And I think that that's where I come in, because for a long time, I went, well, what do I know about this? I'm not a doctor. And then I went, oh, but a lot of the doctors are still learning at the same time. And when I realized that in real time, average women like me, were learning at the same time, I went, oh, okay, we do have something to say. And it did give me a lot of confidence in terms of being able to speak about it. And then one by one, I would see women changing and becoming more confident. I saw doctors that had an OB-GYN practice of delivering babies switch over to do midlife health. I mean, I saw women making real changes in their lives.

Is that the title, Midlife Health?

Yeah, they're doing midlife health now, which is essentially treating perimenopause, and menopause and those post-reproductive years, which I think is pretty incredible.

That's a cool framing. Speaking of framing, let's go above the line, below the line, just for a minute. Symptoms to strengths. Yeah, we gotta deal with some symptoms, and we've gotta address some of those challenges, but what percentage of time am I focusing on strength building versus symptom management? And on the strength building side of the equation, like, okay, this phase, if you haven't figured it out yet, we are gonna triple down on confidence building, on how, where it comes from, from your self-talk. Nothing outside of you can determine your self-talk. You are fully responsible for the way you speak to yourself. Confidence comes from what you say to yourself, and it has to be grounded in real things. Fake it till you make it. Please let that thing fly. It's done. It's like, that is the— we don't want anything fake. I don't want to fake anything. Surgeon. I don't want fake psychologist. I don't want to fake—

Menopause.

Nothing like fake. Did you just get that out of the system? So developing strengths like confidence, like using this as a moment to say, okay, if you haven't fully figured out your identity, let's do that now. You get to decide. The world does not decide your station or your position in life, full stop. There's influences that are sometimes harder for other people than whatever. Your purpose, now's the time. Your sense of like efficacy, where power comes from for yourself. All of those asset-building strengths.

Mm-hmm.

This is a great time if you haven't invested in them to make sure that you own them.

100%. And reducing any type of shame or guilt during this time. I think that those are really big ones because I think that as women, we have spent a lot of time outward, right? Everybody else. And I think you've got to reduce the shame and the guilt and take that inward a little bit because you're not going to be good to anybody else if you can't even function. And quite frankly, I don't know anybody that can. that could under some of those circumstances. Now, I want to say, not everybody's menopause is the same. Some people, my best friend went through it without any problem at all. But what she didn't do was address these long-term things. So, she didn't pay attention to bone health. She didn't pay attention to heart. So, right now, she's got osteopenia. So, this is that time, whether or not you're dealing with severe symptoms and hot flashes and joint pain and low libido, these are those years 40 to 50 to whatever, wherever you are, to be focusing on those things. And when we bring up men, it's a great time for men to be doing that too, quite frankly. So I don't think anybody loses if we're talking about that kind of focus of the strengths.

We're in an ecosystem. We're more like a coral reef than like these individual humans going through life. Like, no one's doing this thing alone.

No.

But that is part of the experience when you are embarrassed by a set of symptoms or behaviors are compromised. So can you give the women in our community right now a final word on perimenopause, menopause? Can you just share your best with them right now?

Yeah, I feel like on the other side of this, I think I've become stronger than ever before. I feel like I see women doing that. I feel like I see women going, you know what? I'm shedding all the BS that I lived with for such a long time. Don't know how I lived with it for such a long time, but I'm not doing it anymore. I want to say this, there are solutions to all these things. There are ways to be so proactive in it where if you're younger, you can take charge of it now. You don't have to wait till you're 55 years old to start thinking about this stuff. And you're never going to hurt yourself by paying attention to it early. And I can't stress that enough, because if I'd have known some of these things at 40 years old, I wouldn't have been blaming everything else around me. I was blaming my divorce. I was blaming my job. I was blaming all these other things. And in reality, I wish somebody had said to me, go talk to XYZ doctor, go, go to this person, see if hormone therapy is an option for you, get on it, and cruise through these next years. And I think it would have been very, very different. Because I get very excited when I see how powerful women are, and they really are powerful. And these are incredible times, and so wise, and have so much to offer in the workplace and/or in doing something else. And those second act careers, those second act jobs, Sometimes they get me more excited than anything. Before I came on, I was talking to, I was talking about a woman who recently switched her career. She's 50 years old doing something amazing. And I went, oh my gosh, she went through menopause. She's amazing.

Tamsen, thank you for leading from the front.

Thank you.

And thank you for the conversation. And where's a place that you hope people can go get the resources that you're providing?

Yeah, tamsenfadal.com. We have links to everything there and we have a downloadable for men so they can get all that and more.

Well done. Appreciate you.

Thank you.

Next time on Finding Mastery, AI is advancing faster than most of us can fully process. But what if the most important question isn't what this technology can do, but who we choose to become alongside it? Dr. Mike sits down with futurist Jamie Metzl, who has reimagined the 10 Commandments for the age of AI to explore the values we need to guide us and why shaping the future requires all of us to become active participants. Participants, not passive bystanders. So join us Wednesday, September 9th at 9 AM Pacific, only on Finding Mastery.

All right. Thank you so much for diving into another episode of Finding Mastery with us. Our team loves creating this podcast and sharing these conversations with you. We really appreciate you being part of this community. And if you're enjoying the show, the easiest no-cost way to support is to hit the subscribe or follow button wherever you're listening. Also, if you haven't already, please consider dropping us a review on Apple or Spotify. We are incredibly grateful for the support and feedback. If you're looking for even more insights, we have a newsletter we send out every Wednesday. Punch over to findingmastery.com/newsletter to sign up. The show wouldn't be possible without our sponsors, and we take our recommendations seriously. And the team is very thoughtful about making sure we love and endorse every product you hear on the show. If you want to check out any of our sponsor offers you heard about in this episode, you can find those deals at findingmastery.com/sponsors. And remember, no one does it alone. The door here at Finding Mastery is always open to those looking to explore the edges and the reaches of their potential so that they can help others do the same. So join us next time. Our community, share your favorite episode with a friend, and let us know how we can continue to show up for you. Lastly, as a quick reminder, information in this podcast and from any material on the Finding Mastery website and social channels is for information purposes only. If you're looking for meaningful support, which we all need, one of the best things you can do is to talk to a licensed professional. So seek assistance from your healthcare providers. Again, a sincere thank you for listening. Until next episode, be well, think well, keep exploring.

Come on.