177: Mellowing Menopause with Jane Ordaz

Jane Ordaz joins Sundae for a frank conversation about menopause. A subject matter expert and founder of The Menopausal Expat, Jane explains how hormones can intensify the typical challenges of a globally mobile life. The ladies share solutions to improve wellbeing through any transition. They also explore why, despite the advancement of female empowerment, topics related to aging remain shameful and controversial.

The post 177: Mellowing Menopause with Jane Ordaz appeared first on Sundae Schneider-Bean, LLC..

At perhaps the best time in history to be a woman — fearless, bold, limitless in our capabilities, and unapologetic in our empowered femininity — why are we still so embarrassed to age?

Menopause happens. It’s natural, inevitable, and universal. It’s not as if you can blink and miss it. If you consider the peri-and-post symptomatic phases, the average woman can spend a dozen+ years affected by “the change.” 

And if you’re an expat woman who’s going through menopause, you could be experiencing transition in triplicate. Then, you can misconstrue your feelings, think you’re in the “wrong place,” and make a big mistake.

Even though menopause is something that every middle-aged woman will go through, we continue to cower about it. (Instead of initiating conversations that focus on facts rather than stereotypes.)

This week, we’re not just making peace with menopause, we’re celebrating it. It’s my pleasure to welcome Jane Ordaz, founder of The Menopausal Expat. A trailblazer for destigmatizing this taboo, Jane’s a subject matter expert on going through menopause while living a globally mobile life. 

What You’ll Learn in this Episode:

How to prepare now for old age
Why hormones can influence everything
Balanced nutrition & natural solutions
Gaining awareness through journaling
Choosing to suffer less

Listen to the Full Episode:

Want exclusive access to no holds barred discussions with experts like Jane? They happen in Expats on Purpose ALL.THE.TIME. It’s where you’ll get private invites to participate in global challenges, hot topic workshops, and daily love from Sundae. All 100% online and 100% FREE. Bring a friend and join the fun today.

Featured on the Show:

Channels to reach Jane Ordaz

Facebook:  The Menopausal Expat
Website: The Menopausal Expat 

Jane’s Expat Happy Hour Training
Sundae’s Facebook Business Page – Sundae Schneider-Bean LLC
Sundae’s Facebook Group  – Expats on Purpose

 

We’re delighted by our nomination to the global Top 25 Expat Podcasts!

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Full Episode Transcript:

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Hello, it is 10:00 am in New York, 4:00 pm in Johannesburg and 9:00 pm in Bangkok.  Welcome to Expat Happy Hour. This is Sundae Schneider-Bean from www.sundaebean.com. And I’m a solution oriented coach and intercultural strategist for individuals and organizations and I am on a mission to help you adapt and succeed when living abroad and get you through any life transition.And I really mean it when say any life transition. The transition we’re going to talk about today is one that most people think lasts only one year. But actually it can last more like 12 or 13. You guessed it. We’re going to pause to talk about the transition of menopause. You might be asking yourself “Sundae what the heck does this have to do with expat life?” You will find out it actually has a lot.

Sundae: And it is my absolute pleasure to welcome our special guest Jane Ordaz the founder of The Menopausal Expat. Jane, welcome to Expat Happy Hour. 

Jane: Thank you so much Sundae. 

Sundae: So here’s the thing. I’m going to brag about Jane a little bit and tell you more about her. She is the founder of The Menopausal Expat and her purpose is to create a rebellion. To stop the silence. to make it easy to say “I am menopausal.” As if you’re saying “I’m asthmatic.” Because so many in the globally mobile population will go through it at some point or they’ll be partnered with someone who is and we just don’t talk about it. And the part of the purpose about Jane’s work is to change that.  

So Jane, thank you so much for adding a voice to something that feels so taboo.

Jane: Yes and hopefully doing things like this can stop it from being so taboo. For example when I put the idea out to some friends, “So I’m going to start this business and I’m going to call myself The Menopausal Expat.” I got “Why would you do that?” And someone else said “Do you think that’s a good idea? Do you think people really want to be associated with that word?” And so I had a little bit of hesitancy for like 20 seconds and then I thought, “No I’m going to be loud and proud and call myself The Menopausal Expat because I know that I’m not alone in this.”

Sundae: Well in the thing is, you know, Jane I work with a lot of people who are going through transition.  They’re looking for purpose and meaning and they’re feeling stuck. And because the women that I work with are often, you know, 40s, maybe right on the cusp of 50 or a little bit older. They’ll be going through menopause and not even name it. And there’s this shame around, “What’s wrong with me? Why am I gaining weight? Why am I forgetful? Why am I no longer happy with my expat life? Why am I upset and my partner?” There’s a lot of shame going on and I’ve noticed in my coaching that it does impact their transition. 

So it’s like we’re in a life transition. Maybe the kids are moving away for college. Then there’s a transition around wherever you’re living in the new country and the exoticism of expat life has worn off. And then you’re biologically going through another transition. I think you’re the one who said it, “It’s like a transition within a transition within a transition.” 

Jane: It’s massive. So I suppose if I can just go back one step. I came to Mexico when I was 49. And some of the things I was experiencing. I thought I was experiencing because I was making the transition into a different culture. And when I look back, you’re exactly correct, I was experiencing the transition into a different culture and the transition into a new body, into a new way of being. But I conflated both of them together and didn’t even recognize. 

So one of the parallels that was very strong for me is I’ve always been a confident, quite courageous, quite out there person. And all of a sudden I was sitting in this room in this house in a country I didn’t know and I didn’t want to go out. I wanted to just hibernate, to cocoon. And I thought “Gosh, I’ve lost all my confidence here, what’s happening?” So I think I read about 40 books in the first few months I was here because I was like, “I’m not stepping out of the door.” And now I realize, gosh so many women go through that as part of the menopause. A loss of wanting to be social, a loss of feeling that ease being with different groups of people and with networking. 

So some of the things you have to do to settle or to maintain relationships in a new country are very very difficult to do. Because your body, your instinct in a sense is telling you “Don’t do that. Why would you do that?” So I think I hid away and I didn’t have anyone to talk about it with really. And the other side of that was I also became very irritable. So, I remember going to, I did venture out a few times, and I went to a few things, and I remember someone saying to me “Oh, what does your husband do?” And I was like, “Oh shut up about my husband. He’s really boring. Let’s talk about something else.” Thinking I could do that. But of course this person had never met me in her life before. And they were probably like “Who is this prize grump?” I listened to your podcast about the party faux pas, party fouls. I was thinking I was one big grump on the end of some of that stuff. Not understanding it I thought that something had psychologically and physically changed me when I went through immigration in Mexico. But it wasn’t, it was more than that. It was more complex than that. 

Sundae: And isn’t that dangerous? Like when I hear you say that, think of how easy it would be to say to yourself “I’ve made a huge mistake. I should have never moved here. The reason why I’m feeling that way is because of Mexico.” Or “The reason why I’m feeling that way is because of my partnership.” It could be so easy to miss that and then blame it on something that it’s not and then reverse a decision that felt right.

Jane: Yes. Yes it can. And my saving grace if you like, was going and studying to do a course and it forced me to get on the bus. It forced me to talk to people. And I suppose in that situation I could fall back to being a comedian. So fanning myself all through the classes  and thinking “Why did I come to this bloomin boiling hot country when my body is on fire?” 

But I did know then, because I wear my heart on my sleeve a lot of the time, I did notice then people looking at me very strangely when they were saying “Oh, so you’re struggling to to adjust to the temperature?” And I was like, “No it’s my internal thermometer. I’m menopausal.” And then you notice people trail away from you because they don’t quite know what to say. So the idea of being able to come together and bring a group of people to connect with others is one of the ways I want to try and change that really, to say you’re not alone. There are many many groups on Facebook for women with the menopause. I haven’t come across any that are with the menopause and living abroad. And so then it’s just two very particular circumstances I think that come together. 

Sundae: And I love that you put that out there. Because it does take this shame away. It’s like “Why do I have to be so private about something that actually happens biologically to women around the whole world for a decade?” I can only think about myself, when I think about hormones and changes I don’t think if I am anything I’m probably perimenopausal, if I were to put myself in a box. But I know that my hormones were changing. And I remember going to my doctor to look at my blood levels what was happening. 

And it was almost frightening how your hormones can impact your confidence, your moods, your level of aggression or emotional well-being. When I first went to the doctor to check what was going on with my skin, because my skin was breaking out and I was having like, I was a little bit testier with my kids and I normally am. And I’m like “This isn’t me?” But my skin was like the physical manifestation of “Wait, there’s something going on my body.” And I went and I checked with the doctor and she said to me, she’s like “Sundae, we’ve looked at your hormones and you’re basically a man.” 

Just like something was going on. And what was so, unnerving for me was she helped balance out what was going on with my body through nutrition. It was all natural supplements. And when we got back to a more balanced situation, I realized that when I was on that higher level of the spectrum of what was going on was from testosterone and everything. I was actually way more confident. I would do a podcast. I’m like, “Oh, that’s great just send to my producer.” But once my hormones got balance back and they were more on the estrogen level. I was noticing I took longer to make decisions and I was feeling less secure about my work. And that terrified me because I felt like “What is my personality?” “Am I just a hormonal makeup of whatever is going on in my body at the time?” And then the next time I went into my doctor, she said, “I think we’ve taken this a little too far because now you’re off the charts with estrogen.” 

And it was like during a time where my theme was feminine rising. And I’m like, “I think I’ve taken this a little far.” But for me, it’s like “Who am I?” And I don’t know if the women that you’ve talked to, I started to ask myself then “Who is ‘Sundae’ no matter where her hormones fallout?” So you start to question who you are.

Jane: For sure, and I see lots and lots of comments and talk to women and they’re like “I don’t recognize myself anymore. I think I’m going crazy. I wake up and I cry. I wake up and I don’t want to get out of bed where I was once very energetic and motivated. I’m shouting at everyone. I look in the mirror and I don’t like what I see.” So there’s a lot of questioning. And some women suffer on, if you’ve got a scale of 1 to 10 and 10 is very bad, there are images of women at that end that have severe severe mental health problems. 

And this week is mental health awareness week. I know in the UK, I don’t know if it’s a global one. But there are a lot of posts right now around being kind and being gentle and being understanding. And I think we need to extend that to ourselves. Because once you’re kinder to yourself and you kind of accept, that’s how you’re feeling, it can be an easier process. Or you can ease the process to start to learn to understand this person that’s coming through. 

But if there’s no one to talk to about that and it’s just you and you feel that you’re changing into this monster, which some people do feel, or you’re changing into this very very depressed person. Then where do you turn to? 

I mean to be honest until I went through it. I didn’t think about it. My mom passed away many years ago. And I remember her sweating a lot which I now know was the menopause. I think she was having hot flushes. But she never spoke to me about it. We didn’t talk about it. 

Sundae: It’s not part of your culture. It’s too much shame. And for me, I’m so grateful that I went through that small period where my doctor was there to help me see what was going on with my blood and my hormone levels. And now I think when I notice with my clients, when I see something come on, I’m like “Go get your blood tested. Go check out with the doctor.” Because even as a coach, you can’t coach biology. This has to be a team effort. You need to have a holistic support, one to say “This is a natural process that’s happening. It’s not comfortable. It’s okay, and let’s see how we can support you naturally.” And in your mental health or your physical health so that you suffer less. 

So you are all about helping individuals find their voice, follow their own path and succeed. I know that you do that based on 25 years of experience that you’ve had in the creative sector and in your coaching. Tell me what advice do you have for what women need to know about this? And what tips do you have for them? 

Jane: I think the first thing you need to know is there are over 30 symptoms. And that’s just the symptoms that come up constantly, to do with your mental and your physical well-being really. So I think it’s always worth getting a checklist of those and looking, “Which do I have?” And search for them, share them. Because I can guarantee any symptom you’ve got, even if it’s rarest, somebody else will be having as well. So I think it’s always good to clock them and to know that you’re not on your own.

And the big bee in my bonnet at the moment is, look after yourself. The well-being is so important. Because it’s almost like how we look after ourselves now is a blueprint for how we will age. How we will live this part of our lives. So to get the habit and to practice is a good thing to do it now. And you know, whatever exercise you like. It doesn’t have to be anything strenuous. I think I’ve talked about this before, I’ve kind of always been allergic to exercise. So I’m not a natural exerciser. So I’ve had to get savvy with it really. My thing has been yoga which has been the thing that’s really really helped with the strength building, some of the physical symptoms, breathing through the hot flashes. 

That whole holistic body has been very very good for me. And one of the other symptoms that I can guarantee nearly everybody I talk to suffers from is anxiety. So meditation, anything that’s mindful to get that anxiety under control is a very good thing. Because it seeps into everything doesn’t it? Once you become anxious you don’t find your purpose anymore. You don’t find your focus anymore. Everything gets ten times worse. 

Sundae: And downward spirals. Then your relationship gets worse and then you feel bad about that. And then you feel upset and it goes into your parenting. And it goes into you taking care of yourself and then you eat or drink differently. It’s just a downward spiral. 

Jane: And I mean the next one I say and it’s a really hard one, is to try and talk to our partners about it. I mean, I’m in a heterosexual partnership so it’s been an education process for my husband. Because if I haven’t talked about it, then he certainly hasn’t talked about it. And I imagine that’s very similar for lots of heterosexual couples. So if you are in a partnership, I think it’s really important to try and find a way to talk to that person about what’s going on. It’s very easy to scream “I’m menopausal.” Which I have to say I’ve done on occasion.

But to try and help someone to really understand. And I think sometimes just presenting them with “Gosh look, look at all these things that can happen when we go through this period of our lives.” Is a good place to start really. Because you need someone who understands why you are going to bed in the afternoon and collapsing. Or when you say you feel tired it’s not just because you didn’t sleep a little bit, it’s because your whole body is feeling completely drained and fatigued. So they’re the things that I start with really. 

Sundae: But you know this kind of frustrates me. Like why that, after 10 months of pregnancy and childbirth and breastfeeding. menstruation. Like there’s a part of me that wants a resistance. Like why can’t we just get that over with and why does it have to last 10 years and 12 years. But it is the way it is.

The one thing that I want people to know I think. Is that feeling like crap is not okay in a sense of, you have to acknowledge when you feel like crap, but do not settle for feeling like crap. That being uncompromising about “I feel like crap today and that means I need to relax or I need to take a nap or I need to change how I’m eating.” That I feel like there’s some acceptance of when we don’t feel good and just being a martyr and moving forward. And so these strategies that you’re mentioning are ways to go against that. Not that you’re going to feel perfect and you know all of that. But giving yourself permission to make 45 minutes for yoga or five minutes for meditation so you feel less like crap. 

Jane: Yeah exactly.  Because it’s true. The bottom line is nothing necessarily takes it away. I didn’t go down the medic or HRT route, I know some people do and that I hear women tell me it helps a lot. But I didn’t go down that route. So there is always a thing of carrying on regardless. And it’s very hard to carry on regardless. I mean I did it for a while. I had never taught before and when I came to Mexico I taught in a school. And I would be standing in front of a class of teenagers with my fan. Really just dripping with sweat. Actually forgetting what I was about to say and having to say to one of them “What was I talking about before?” 

And I just plowed through it and carried on. And it was very very hard. And I suppose that’s the other thought it leads me to is at the moment I’m in a very lucky position where I can set my own schedule. And sometimes I don’t feel so great in the mornings so I will take an extra half an hour to rest or read or do whatever I feel like doing. But if you’re maybe the lead on an assignment or you’re working in the country where you’re currently living, that can be really really hard.  And if you look at the stats in the UK not that many businesses have menopause friendly policies. So you have to be even more careful about taking care of yourself if you’re working where you can fit that time in to recharge your batteries and to try and do things that make you feel better. 

Sundae: So to be extra diligent. Take care of yourself. I call that to double down on your first class self-care. 

Jane: Yeah. for sure. 

Sundae: So you came into my Facebook group Expats on Purpose and you delivered training. And the center of it was about, “There’s a reason there’s a pause in menopause.” So for those of you who are listening who didn’t watch that. I want to hear from you Jane. Give us the gist of your core message there. What’s so important about the pause in menopause. 

Jane: For me and I don’t want to in any way dismiss that people go through a very difficult time and that it’s tough to go through the menopause. But I also hold out for the fact that it’s becoming the next stage of you. Not necessarily changing you but just becoming that next manifestation of yourself in what can be a brilliant exciting time of your life. So for me, that’s why the pause is there. The pause is there so that if we listen to ourselves and we take stock of what’s happening with our body and celebrate all that we’ve achieved in our lives to becoming more wise and more wonderful. Then it could potentially be one of the best times in your life. Even though that might sound really dismissive when you’re listening to this and you feel like absolute crap. 

But what if, I always come back to this, what if it really could be this time when the ideas flow. The energy might go but you can have great spurts of energy. Now I have great spurts of clarity. I’m still suffering symptoms, but my memory is getting a bit better now. And I have great moments where I’m like, “Oh my gosh, I’ve got to do that. I’ve got to write this. I’ve got to make that.” And I feel really really energized. 

And so part of me is like, what if we change the narrative about how we talk about it, if we’re realistic about what it means and we give women the right support and we can bring women together to support each other so we’re not alone? And alongside that we change the story that we tell about the menopause. You know, someone sent me a message today with age defying cream. I don’t want age defying cream. I want someone to send me a message with age enhancing potions do you know what I mean? It’s like it sounds like a really simple thing.

Someone was talking about the new avatars you can put on Facebook and there isn’t an option for any gray hair. Well, I want to have that. Silver sister and silver, you know vision in my life. So that’s how I see it. And by flipping the script a little bit and flipping the story I was telling myself. I was really able to basically first of all take charge of myself and then take charge of what I was doing in Mexico. Which I hadn’t; I had gone along with other people’s ideas because I was floundering really. And so I was able to take charge of that for myself. 

And I got this statistic by 2030 1.2 billion women will be menopausal. Now that won’t be 1.2 billion of us all moving around the world, but it will be a lot of us. And if you could enhance that energy rather than making us all feel so terrible that we might be on this trajectory that’s now the downward spiral or the downward slide. I think that’s a really exciting prospect.

Sundae: I just have had goosebumps on my arms the entire time that you were talking. And what I love about that is if we’re doing the work to take care of ourselves physically, high self-care, acknowledging that you’re not going to feel like you did 10 years ago, doing what you can to work with what’s going on in your body rather than against it. Then we open up this portal for spurts of creativity, spurts of stepping into this next phase. 

And I love the quote that you shared during our conversation from Margaret Mead, she says “There’s no more creative force in the world than the menopausal woman with zest.” And this for me when I hear you talk about that and I hear your call to imagine it is this counter to the shame that we currently feel. So thank you for that. I thank you for that voice. And you know, it’s no surprise that you help individuals find their voice. I hear your voice. I hear the path that you’re carving for yourself and for your clients. So this is really actually a call for hope. This isn’t just a decline. This could be a catapult to creativity. 

Jane: Yes, exactly, and it’s very interesting. So I was just reading something earlier about, I can’t remember the name of the writer, but I’ll put it up later maybe. She’s a writer and she has written a book with older female characters in it. And she cited some studies that basically say as we get to our 50s there are many studies that show that we get happier. Maybe because we finally got the child we wanted or we’ve got the job we wanted or we’ve got the life we wanted. For whatever reason, maybe we’re free of the children we had. There are many reasons why that might be. So mine is like a call to all the warrior women out there that we have this message that okay, we get happier. And then on the other hand we have this other thing going on that’s hammering us into the ground. So why not take charge of the hammer ourselves and let that creativity flow out of us in whatever form that might take. I think some people do get more creative in terms of producing things. Some people get more creative in terms of how they’re thinking, what they’re doing with their lives. 

I want this to be a really exciting time. I spent a lot of my twenties thinking I wasn’t good enough and thinking I was too thin. I’ll be buggered if I’m going to spend my 50s thinking I’m not good enough and I’m too fat. It’s just like I have had enough, I am not too thin or too fat. I just am. I think for all of us, it’s always a work in progress, isn’t it? Being happy with yourself. But definitely when you come together with other women and you see their responses and you hear their responses to things you’re doing it’s great. 

I sent my website out and someone wrote “Oh my gosh, this felt like a call to come home, it felt welcoming.” And that was really nice because it’s like, let’s all come to this little menopause mansion and take care of each other. Even if from a distance with our words and with our deeds.

Sundae: It’s so beautiful. You know, what I was thinking as you were speaking there is that, I think we’ve lost ritual. And you know indigenous cultures are still working hard to keep ritual in their lives and their community and pass on rites of passage to sort of honor that in their culture. And I feel like you know fast-paced western cultures, like ours have lost that. And what you’re doing essentially is bringing back some of that. You know a space and now for expats, a digital space for people to gather and to be part of a community who is going through this transition together.

And the other thing I can’t help but think about is if anybody knows how to do transition, it’s the globally mobile. So we have skills that we can access that we’ve used in other contexts that can be valuable right now. And that’s what’s beautiful about it that expats are well poised to take on this transition that’s going on in their bodies and in their lives because we’ve done other transitions well, we can do this one well too.

Jane: I was thinking this morning in my whole list of ideas. That in my life when I was a bit younger I had certain, I used to call them my wise women that were usually women who were kind of 20 to 30 years older than me. And I used to ask them stuff. But obviously then I got to be older and now they’re no longer with us so I can’t ask them. So right now I don’t actually know women older than myself who passed the transition if you like. Now I was thinking, wouldn’t it be great if we could have like a wise elders expat network of women that we could go to to ask what happened? Because we don’t all have the comfort of families and mothers and aunts and carers and older women around us. And sometimes I think we’ve lost that kind of risk being respectful for that elder wisdom who could help us pave the way really .

Sundae: And I’ve had the pleasure to work with experts who are 70 plus. And it is so amazing. Like the wealth of knowledge they have so yeah, absolutely. There are people in Expats on Purpose who are in that stage of postmenopausal and that sort of life phase where they’ve got the wisdom. So this is a call specifically to them to be part of it too because they have a lot to share with those of us who are behind them. 

So we’ve talked about what women need to do and we’ve talked about the importance to involve their partners. What else do we need to know when we’re thinking about this transition within a transition within a transition. 

Jane: Gosh, I think, well when you put it like that isn’t it within a transition? We’re carrying a lot of weight. I think we have to know that, we’re carrying a lot of weight and you have to go easy on yourself and cut yourself some slack. So don’t beat yourself up and give yourself some time to think “What is it that I want with the next part of my life?” You may already have that. You may already have a successful career. You may be on a lead assignment. But where do you want that to go? What do you want might be the next step? Do you see a next step? I think it’s good to think about that. Is the next step that you’re going to create something of your own? That you’re going to write a book? That you’re going to do more gardening? Like let’s become more. 

I mean you use this word a lot. But let’s do that thing with more purpose. With a bit more conviction. Because it’s so easy to put those things off and put them to the back. One of the things I started to do was actually write down a diary of what my body clock was like when I was good, when I wasn’t so good. So I’m quite accurate now. I know the window of time that I have. So really now unless I get things done by 2:20 in the afternoon. I’m a goner. I don’t really function very well after that. So I will do the easy stuff after that, if anything. Sometimes I don’t do anything.

So I think it’s important to start to recognize your own rhythm and your own pattern. And program in “When can I think about what I want?” Be very specific about it and be ruthless about it. If you do have a family or you live with other people just tell them to leave you alone for 20 minutes to do that thing you want to do.

Sundae: Totally. So the theme that I’m noticing Jane, first is drop the shame, second work on yourself in terms of taking care of you, third is come together with people in a similar situation so you can be supported and support. And this beautiful thing that’s coming out of it is to change the story. What if this is a story of you as a warrior woman. And this process of you becoming that next stage of you. 

So thank you Jane for your voice and for helping put out the call to the warrior women out there. If they feel a call and they want to know more about you tell us where they can find you and what you’ve got going on in your corner of the world. 

Jane: Okay, so I have a website The Menopausal Expat. So you can see more about me on that. I also have a Facebook group called The Menopausal Expat so it’s quite easy to find. And what women are doing in there is talking to each other. And I’m also starting a series of expert topic  Tuesdays. Maybe every other Tuesday. I have one coming up that I’m so excited about next Tuesday, which is a week on Tuesday. Which is with Dr. Sara Kowski who’s a sleep expert but a menopausal sleep expert. So she’s not just any sleep expert she deals especially with the menopause and sleep. So we’re going to be doing a Facebook Live together. So if you join up for that group, you can hop in, you can ask your questions to her life or you can join and post your questions and she’ll be able to answer them. 

So that’s the place I want to bring women together and invite guests in so we can get some of the specialist knowledge that we need. Because the other thing is there is so much information out there. You need to try and navigate it in small bite-size chunks I think. So I’d love for more people to join us in that group. 

Sundae: So if you’re listening to this the day that goes live, it probably will go live on a Monday. That means that immediate Tuesday she’ll be showing up live. If you’re listening to this later then go into The Menopausal Expat Facebook group and grab the recording. I’m also going to add in the show notes the contribution you did, Jane, in Expats on Purpose about “There’s a pause in menopause,” If you want more, plus we’ll put in the show notes links to your website and to the Facebook group. 

Jane is so wonderful. Thank you. I have to say this kind of felt risky for me to bring up the topic of menopause in a forum that talks about expat life. But I decided to do it because like you I’m so committed to dropping the shame around life transitions, especially those that affect women that are hidden. And this is part of the ups and downs of our expat life when we start to question whether we’re doing the right thing, have we made a big mistake. We’re making it more about you than it is about your physical transition that you’re going through. So thank you so much for your time today and all that you do. 

Jane: Thank you, Sundae. And it’s true. There’s no shame in menopause. No shame whatsoever. It’s bloody hard, but we have to refuse to feel shamed. 

Sundae: Yeah, absolutely. 

So you’ve been listening to Expat Happy Hour with Sundae Bean. Thank you for listening. I will leave you with an anonymous quote that touches on transition in general. “Your life is a story of transition. You are always leaving one chapter behind while moving on to the next.”

 

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