Speaker 1: 0:06

Welcome to the Uncomplicated Perimenopause Podcast. I'm Kate Grosvenor, your friendly perimenopause expert and life coach, and I'm Gabriella, kate's daughter, representing all the women who are nowhere near perimenopause but want to understand it better, whether you're just starting your perimenopause journey deep into it better. Whether you're just starting your perimenopause journey deep into it or you're a loved one trying to support someone who is, we've got you covered. We'll be answering all of your burning questions, exploring the ups and downs and sharing expert advice and personal insights. So grab a cup of tea, get comfy and let's dive into the wonderful. Get comfy and let's dive into the wonderful, sometimes wild, world of perimenopause together. And remember, no matter where you are on your journey, you are not alone. Welcome to the Uncomplicated Perimenopause. Hello, my darlings, and welcome to Series 3, I think that was it.

Speaker 1: 1:07

Episode three, series three of the Uncomplicated Perimenopause Podcast. I'm Kate Grosvenor, a perimenopause expert and life coach, and I'm Gabriella Grosvenor, kate's daughter, here to learn with you all. Yeah, we've both had a hair change. I was just looking at myself in the screen thinking I've just cut my hair off and you've gone ginger again. I am naturally ginger for everyone to know, because when we started it, I was blonde and it was when I just went blonde, we just started. So, for everyone, I am actually a ginger. You are very fun fact. Very much, very much a ginger. I would say this is quite close to my natural. Yeah, yeah, you, uh, when I burst you, you were a carrot, a long, skinny, pink, angry carrot. That's me, yeah, and I'm just going, I'm letting, I'm letting my salt and pepper shine. I'm actually quite enjoying getting grey. Actually, look at you with Gen Z terms pepper shine. Yeah, my salt and pepper shine, baby, I'm quite enjoying getting grey. It's very, very liberating.

Speaker 1: 1:56

I was going to say I have been dyeing my hair in some sort of way since I was about 11 or 12, that young. Yeah, because it was like henna. Yeah, you wouldn't know the henna like, not your the henna that you think of. It was like a mud packy thing. It smelled of like grass, and not the fun kind, but grass like, and it was like a pack that you put on your head and it was warm and and kind of smelled like hay or something and you put on your hair and it just made your hair like shiny.

Speaker 1: 2:22

Why did you start at that age? Because we were bored. It was, we didn't have any more like fun tv programs. So it's like, what do you do? I started at 14 to boredom, yeah, exactly, so I haven't actually, like, had a natural hair for a very long time. So it's like, and I discovered that these bits are actually completely natural. So this drama that that I drama that I thought my hairdresser, the lovely Michael, was creating is actually my own hair. So even my hair is dramatic, which is quite entertaining, anyway. So we digress, we digress as always.

Speaker 1: 2:53

Tell me my lovely question for today. Yes, so we have a question submitted. It's from Sue and she's from Blackpool oh, blackpool, and she's 42. Okay, hit me with it. So she says how do I actually know I'm in perimenopause? What are the signs? What are the early signs? My doctor says I am not sorry, I'm laughing because it's so difficult. Yeah, but I feel I feel symptoms and signs of perimenopause, but I'm not sure. Help, advice, okay, first of all. So my darling sympathies.

Speaker 1: 3:23

I'm going to put under this show in the show notes. I'm going to put under this show in the show notes. I'm going to put I actually have a petition in Parliament at the moment, or in the government. If everybody could sign it please, because I'm petitioning to get GPs, I'm asking the government to push to get GPs actually medically trained in perimenopause. Because it's optional which to me blows my mind, because 51% of the population is going to go through perimenopause. Because it's optional which to me blows my mind, because 51% of the population is going to go through perimenopause but they don't actually have to have training in it. It's an optional module type thing and you know I don't get it. So that's something I think in this country. No, I think I don't know.

Speaker 1: 3:57

I went to Egypt recently and I was talking to my friends about perimenopause two guys who have just finished med school and I told them that in the UK it's optional and they were like no, we had to go through for a year and a half just understanding perimenopause and menopause. In the 10-15 years they knew everything that I knew and more because they actually were trained for it. So that's bizarre. So Egypt's ahead of UK in this year. I like that. Good for them. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 4:22

So, first and foremost, it's not unusual for gps not to understand the nuances. So, yeah, it's very common to be told that you're too young. You're not too young, okay. So if we think that the average age in the uk for going through the menopause is 51, um for for the average age, and if you're a woman of color it's 49, so it's slightly earlier. So if you then take, if you then consider that the average duration is 10 years, but it could be up to 15 years, so you could start your menopause at 41. You could start your menopause at 39. You could start your menopause perimenopause, sorry at 38. You're perfectly the right age to start having symptoms.

Speaker 1: 5:03

So what are the first symptoms? The first classic symptom is hot flashes. No, because that's the one that everyone knows. But they can sometimes come, like when you're in the midst of things, yes, or they can be so subtle that you don't really notice it. So the hot flashes can come where you just think you're hot and bothered yeah, do you know? Like, so that's the only symptom that everyone, like talks about. That's the quintessential. Like women and men, you know.

Speaker 1: 5:29

But when they first come, they can just, you can just think oh, I just had a bad night, yeah, like, so the night sweats, I was stressed, I was stressed, I overheated. So you, you'll, you'll assign it to different things. Or, if it's a flash, you might just think I ate something spicy, or I had too many layers on, or I just got stressed, yeah. So we don't necessarily jump to hot flash right, so that you can explain a hot flash away, yeah, right. Or a night sweat away. So that's why we don't connect the dots sometimes.

Speaker 1: 6:01

So the first one that you will notice is your periods. But here in life, the problem, because for someone they get closer together, for someone they get further apart, for someone they get heavier, for someone they get lighter. But also if you're on any type of contraception, it also affects it. So you so here we go. But if you're on the marina coil, for example, if you have the marina coil, you don't get any of that. Yeah, 50 50 chance you'd get a period.

Speaker 1: 6:25

Did you carry on having periods after you got your coil? I haven't had a proper period since 2004. You had a baby and you weren't having periods properly. Yes, because I I was pregnant with rowan and then I breastfed rowan. Yeah, have any periods? Yeah. And then I stopped breastfeeding rowan and I got pregnant jenna. I thought you still would still have periods when you're breastfeeding. I don't know. When I was breastfeeding I didn't get any periods, because I have the marina coil and I have my periods like normal, but you were eastern dominant. You had a marina coil fitted because you're eastern dominant. Yeah, yeah, for endometriosis. Yes, yeah, that's crazy. So I never had a period so breastfeeding. So, pregnant with rome, breastfeeding rome. Pregnant with jenna, breastfeeding jenna. Then had a marina coil fitted 20 odd years and I've had what? Three or four marina coils, yeah, yeah, so you learn something new every day about your mother.

Speaker 1: 7:15

Yes, I'm not had a period since 2004, so they couldn't diagnose my period, but typically ignore me because I'm the out, because there's always outliers. That's the problem with perimenopause and this is why I get upset when people say, oh, this is what perimenopause is and that's why it's so difficult for doctors to like diagnose, and that's why I get so upset with companies that are trying to sell women supplements or this is what you need to take. So we have what? 15 different supplements? I have a lifestyle brand. For those of you don't know, the reason I have a lifestyle brand was because I got really, I really started to lose my shit, quite frankly. Um, so I couldn't think of another word but um, with companies that were trying to benefit or like sell women things.

Speaker 1: 7:56

It was like this one supplement will solve all of your menopause symptoms. And it was like, well, no, it won't, because my perimenopause symptoms are not the same as yours, I'm not the same as the next woman and you can't have one tiny little tablet that's that big, that has sold everything, everything in it. Yeah, like, don't lie, right? So this is the problem that we have. So if you're in the marina coil I don't know what, obviously I don't know anything about zoo the period thing won't exist. So we have to go to the next symptom. And this is it. It's like so hot flashes you might have explained away. Let's go to the next one, which is periods.

Speaker 1: 8:29

Periods is a usual tell, okay, but every woman's different. So some women might say, well, my periods are getting closer together, other women it's further apart. Some women it's heavier, some women it's lighter, but something is happening. What if they're regular? It can happen as well, but that's usually like, if something's happening, that's the beginning of premenopause, right, but it can be a period as well. So your periods tell all. Permanopause, pregnancy periods are huge Because that's your sexual hormones doing something Right.

Speaker 1: 8:58

Next one and also, if your system's not okay, if you're not eating enough it, if your system's not okay if you're not eating enough. It also has an effect, because none of your sexual hormones I'm going off on a slight squirrel, but none of your sexual hormones work in isolation from each other. Your sex hormones also work with your histamine also work with your insulin also work, you know, with your cortisol. Everything has an effect on something else. So when I talk to women, when I do like perimenopause workshops, or I talk to women about their stress levels, I'm always saying to them it has an impact on your perimenopause. Your gut has a massive impact on your perimenopause, massive impact, in fact, for sure.

Speaker 1: 9:34

So the next one down is sleep. If you start for no apparent reason and not just the odd night, having insomnia meaning two things either you can't get to sleep or you struggle to stay, yeah. So when women say struggle to stay asleep because I hear a lot of women talking about is because they need the loo a lot at night, is that different? That's different, and usually that's a cortisol reaction, right, or an insulin reaction. So if you typically wake up between two to four am, that's what I hear, yeah, that's the witching.

Speaker 1: 10:08

I call it the witching hour, yeah, okay, and it's quite often a cortisol thing, right, so you're not managing your stress significantly and your cortisol wakes you up and you'll know if it's cortisol because you wake up and your brain is wide awake. Yeah, so your brain wakes you up and there's not a chance you're going back to sleep like you're so, like you know yourself, you, you're, you're a night peer, right, sorry to out you like that. It's okay, night peer, but you can go back to sleep. So you go to the loo, go back, see, yeah, that's why I'm like, wow, but if it's a cortisol thing, go and you go. You might wake up and go to loo, but your brain is so because cortisol.

Speaker 1: 10:46

Cortisol is your wide-awake hormone, right, that's why you say to women don't have a coffee in the first hour and a half, yeah, of the day, because you're wasting your coffee. You know, in perimenopause we shouldn't really have too much caffeine because it's stimulating and it dehydrates us and we, you know, we have to be careful with how much stimulate stimulants we. So if your cortisol wakes you up, you'll know, because your brain is like bing, I'm awake. And now the problem with that is, once you're wide awake, you're scuffed, right, and it must be so, like it's soul-destroying, yeah, it's soul-destroying and it upsets so many women. Because this is the thing If you're not getting enough sleep, it has a massive impact on your mental health.

Speaker 1: 11:28

And interrupted sleep is even worse. Like, yeah, well, I mean not enough sleep, interrupted sleep, they're both rubbish. And it impacts your relationships because it impacts your mood, and it impacts your your food choices, which impacts your insulin levels, impacts your job as well. Everything, yeah, everything, right, you're talking about every single impact of your life. If you haven't had enough sleep and in perimenopause we actually need more sleep than we used to need how much do you need in perimenopause? The typical thing that we say to women is that you need 78 hours of sleep a night. We actually biologically need more sleep than men Because we deal with more during the day. We deal with more during the day, we multitask. Oh, I was just being no. It's fact.

Speaker 1: 12:05

Men wake up, they do what they need to do. They go to work, typically, and they come home. Right, women wake up and they're like what, what do the kids need to do? What do the pets need to do? And so, and so's birthday, when do I have to do this? And we're like get hair and makeup ready, walk closer and we're we're literally thinking on 29 different levels before we even get to work. Men wake up, they go to work, they come home and we're at work and we're starting to think about what's going for dinner. So I'm not being I'm not being misogynistic, I'm not being sexist when I say this, but it's fact. We're dealing on different levels. Okay, we've got multi-channels working. Okay, because we're the carers, we're the nurturers.

Speaker 1: 12:42

Typically we're thinking about the pets, we're thinking about school trips, we're thinking about vet bills, we're thinking about all these different types of things that men can compartmentalize much better than we can because we're thinking about all the different things that we've got to get done. So because of that, we actually need more, more rem sleep and we need more deep restorative sleep because we need to balance our hormones and our hormones do their work in the deep sleep. So sleep stage four and the admin of our brain needs to happen in rem sleep. Now, rem sleep only happens when we've gone. So we start in sleep stage one, which is we're still awake but we're dropping off to sleep. So we go sleep stage one, two, three, deep sleep.

Speaker 1: 13:22

Three, two, two, three, and we only get into rem sleep when we've done one full sleep cycle, is rem, like the four rapid eye movement, or your sleep sleep, when, when you're dreaming, no, you're actually quite close to being awake. Oh, so it happens in sleep stage two. My god, I'm learning so much. So sleep stage two, yeah, it goes. One, two, three. And there's a debate now.

Speaker 1: 13:43

They used to say three, four, and now people, some people, are saying sleep in a few stages, whatever you think. So typically we used to say sleep stage one is when you're drifting off to sleep, and we call it the hypergolic state, because sometimes you visualize things, or you have that okay, or you think there's something on the end of your bed, whatever, but you're going to sleep and you go sleep. There's one, two, three, four, three, three, two, and that's when you dream. So if you and then you go to like maybe four to six sleep cycles a night and we need enough deep sleep for to restore our hormones and to boost our immune system and that's essential in perimenopause because our hormones are up, you know and then when we go up to the sleep stage two, once we've completed a full cycle, we then need REM sleep, the sleep stage two, once we've completed a full cycle. We then need rem sleep and sleep.

Speaker 1: 14:27

Stage two, and we're doing a lot of admin right. But, um, the restorative sleep is important for us as perimenopausal women. So we need more sleep in general because we're so exhausted, so we need that restorative sleep. But we all, but as women, we need a lot of admin sleep because our brain does more multitasking. Yeah, that's why we get frustrated. Admin sleep is good, admin sleep is good, and in perimenopause we've got all the brain flogs. We need that to help as much as we can because our hippocampus in our brain we're going off on a psychology neuroscience lecture. I do apologize, but in perimenopause the hippocampus can actually shrink because of the lack of estrogen. Hippocampus can actually shrink because of the lack of estrogen and the hippocampus is the one that's responsible for the formation of new memories and we need it to be doing its job okay. So that is that comes in rem sleep. So we need the sleep right. So we need to. We need to do one on sleep at some point. But we need to therefore manage our stress because during the daytime, so that our cortisol levels are low enough to help us continuously.

Speaker 1: 15:28

Anyway, we went off on an absolute tangent. I don't apologize, squirrel, but yes, sleep disruption is a massive sign. What else is a massive sign? Joint pain, frozen shoulder, anyone? Suddenly you can't put your bra on or you just get this stiff shoulder. Like what is that? I can't move and it's just painful. What does it feel like? Like you worked out kind of, yeah, no, it's not an ache. It feels like you can't move it, so it's literally frozen. Right, that's what they call it frozen shoulder. You can have a tennis elbow, yeah, knee that creaks and clacks and doesn't want to work properly.

Speaker 1: 16:01

Plantar fasciitis, which I had for ages. What is that? So, plantar fasciitis? So it's, there's a, there's like a spongy little, like a layer between your heel and the, your inside, and where it just starts to get inflamed and very, very painful so you can't walk properly. Why? Because, why all of this? Oh, do you tell me, it's the gift that keeps. What is this? Um, yeah, plantar fasciitis is very common and it's elbow is very common.

Speaker 1: 16:26

Uh, frozen shoulder, joint pain, back pain, knee pain, standard being emotional, so crying for no reason. But that's also like when you're ovulating. Yeah, but this is the thing. So it's a roller coaster in perimenopause because your oestrogen leaves your system in like a wiggly, wiggly wind, right Wiggly line. So one minute you're sitting there and you're like I'm perfectly okay on my normal self because perimenopause will gaslight you, right. So you feel completely normal, you feel like your normal self, you're doing fine, no worries, and then the next minute you're bursting into tears and androxanthrope.

Speaker 1: 17:00

So you women in perimenopause are how we feel in the four days, five days that we're ovulating all the time Not all the time, because sometimes your balance between your progesterone and your estrogen feels normal. You can be a normal human being when you're ovulating, but some days, just, and then you're crying, yeah, and then sometimes we have the rage. We just need to marry a good man. That's the advice I'm going to give to her. You know, the thing is that in perimenopause, because you're losing your estrogen, the estrogen is the thing that makes you a nurturer. But biologically and I'm not saying that everyone has to have kids, by the way, because it's a drag, don't do it, no. No, I love you really, but the your estrogen, you're given estrogen. So you're a nurturer, yeah, biologically you don't have to, but you're more nurturing because you you've given the female hormone to nurture. When we lose that hormone in perimenopause, we become less nurturing, fact right. So you then want to spend more time on your own because you want to nurture other people less, and you also want to stab them in the eye when you get the rage, the, the rage is very real, as towards anybody, you just don't breathe. Don't look at me in that tone of voice. That's real. No, it's real. A perimenopause rage is very, very real. Don't mouth. Breathers, loud chewers Jenna's going to do horrible Slow walkers.

Speaker 1: 18:19

That one, oh that one, annoys me. Now. Why are you walking so slowly? Like, why have you got all the time in the world? Because they have joint pain? Yeah, no, but it's just like random people. And they walk in like gangs, like what are you doing? And they block the whole pavement, the whole aisle or the whole. Like just Move, just walk in a line slowly and we'll see you from a mile away. And I'm a life coach so I have to be nice and chill and sunny and happy. But sometimes I'm like right, but the rage is very, very real, unfortunately, mostly through the other side. So I'm not too bad.

Speaker 1: 18:55

I feel like I've learned a lot today from emotions. My gosh here to help, babes here to help. I just think what am I going to be like? Well, I probably won't be around to see it. I'm not sure I might, but no, I will be. We've learned you could be as young as 35 and feel a pair of menopause. That's in 10 years for me, I know that's in 10 years. I could start feeling even in 20 years, I'll only be myself. Yeah, you'll see, we get to the other side anyway. At least you'll know it all. You'll spot the signs. So that's another one, the rage and it's.

Speaker 1: 19:23

It's the other, and it's feeling just losing interest, I think, in some of your hobbies, or losing interest in things that used to bring you joy. So it's like you might have had a hobby that you just were passionate about and suddenly you're like, oh, I don't fancy it today. I just don't feel like it. No, that's a sad one. It's really sad because you might have just loved and it can be even things like gentle, part of your identity as well these hobbies. Yeah, and it's, you know, and you. So testosterone also leaves you. We've talked about testosterone before, but testosterone also leaves your body. So you might have loved some kind of like group activity and because testosterone leaves, you might not feel that confident anymore? You might not, but you might start avoiding large groups or you might start avoiding social activities.

Speaker 1: 20:10

I hear that one often. Yeah, and that's really sad because you know, like, for example, choir right, you know I'm a musical girl, I'm not and being in a choir, singing together in a choir is, is really something magical about it, lifts your soul. Now imagine you've been doing that your whole life and suddenly you're like I don't, I don't want to be around. No, that's in itself is so sad, because suddenly you're missing out on something that actually feeds your soul. Or if you played sport with a group of women like, let's say, you you're in a like a women's netball league and suddenly you're like I don't, I have time for their like camaraderie, I don't have time for their like chit chat or whatever. Like I can't bear they're all talking about me. Because you can like get slightly paranoid. Or you can get slightly like insecure and you you stop exercising because that was the one thing you did, and suddenly I'm like're like, no, not doing it. So that's awful, that whole.

Speaker 1: 21:03

You know you can get anxious in certain social situations or really start avoiding people. I think that's quite a common one as well. So, yeah, I think, start with those as signs that you know to me. So periods, sleep, joint pain, hot flashes, night sweats, kind of feeling, the whole emotional roller coaster, feeling there and avoiding things that you used to love, I think. So those, those are signs.

Speaker 1: 21:32

Is libido a sign as well? Yeah, but that can come a bit later. Right, that's not necessarily because you might also just be like I've been with you for so long. Yeah, no, that can be symptomatic of other things that can be. I mean, I could talk about that one for years, because that might be quite often if you've been in the same relationship for a long time, that can just be a buildup of anger and frustration and other issues. Yeah, yeah, a lot of women in perimenopause have lost their libido, but it can be for a variety of reasons. Yeah, have lost their libido, but it can be for a variety of reasons. All right, my darlings, I hope that helps.

Speaker 1: 22:05

As I mentioned, I'm going to put into the show notes the petition that we have in the UK. You have to be a UK citizen to sign it, but if you are a UK citizen, we'd really appreciate it. If you do sign it, I'm going to also put into the show notes about my Perimenopause membership. It's a great place to go. It costs £9 a month. It's a great place to go. It costs nine pounds a month. It's a great place to go.

Speaker 1: 22:23

If you want to have more resources, um, we do. I do a monthly master class, which is always informative. Sometimes it can be on things like weight and perimenopause, not in a kind of like you all need to lose weight kind of thing, but just in a in a kind of if you, if you are concerned that you're gaining weight, what can you do? Or there might be on one. I'm recording one tonight on anxiety and perimenopause. They're always available in your portal if you've missed one, and we do everything from recipes to yoga to um, meditations, meditations, meditations, mindset, resources, and there's a beautiful community in there as well. So there's always something you can be doing and there's always someone on hand to support you and resources that you may need. So I'll put that into the show notes as well.

Speaker 1: 23:06

Thank you so much for tuning in. We love having you with us. If you have any of your own questions, please do feel free to reach out either on our whatsapp or email or and face me up as well. All right, my darlings, take care, have a beautiful, beautiful, beautiful week. Speak kindly to yourselves, love yourselves fiercely and I will speak to you next week. Bye, thanks for joining us today on the uncomplicated perimenopause podcast. We hope you found this episode helpful and inspiring. Don't forget if you have any questions or topics you'd like us to cover. You can reach out through our perimenopause group or on whatsapp for more information on my coaching perimenopause group, or on WhatsApp For more information on my coaching perimenopause supplements, books or upcoming events. Please visit wwwkategrovernercom and if you've enjoyed today's episode, please subscribe, rate and review our podcast. It really helps us reach more listeners, just like you. Until next time, remember perimenopause doesn't have to be complicated. We're here to help you every step of the way. Stay uncomplicated.