One of its co-hosts is Holly Wainwright. A British expat who has lived in Australia since the 90s, in the past few years she has been hosting her own podcast, MID, tackling self-care and tricky topics, with an aim of sharing wisdom with her audience.
Speaking to Francesca Rudkin and Louise Ayrey on the NZ Herald‘s lifestyle podcast, The Little Things, Wainwright said that the big window between 35 and 65 where things change was not something she was fully prepared for.
“There’s lots of levels to it, isn’t there? Because there’s the hormonal stuff, and then there’s just the fact that there’s a lot of what one of the guests on an episode of MID has described as ‘midlife collisions’.
“There are a lot of big things [that] are bound to happen in that phase where maybe you’ve been parenting for a while or maybe that never happened for you and you are reckoning with how you feel about it or with choices you’ve made.
“Maybe your relationships are changing, a lot of divorce in midlife, a lot of separation, a lot of friend dynamics shifting. There’s a whole lot of stuff happening.
“But with the hormonal stuff, I think I wasn’t ready for it because I think I was the kind of Gen X feminist who was very reluctant to give my hormones too much credibility in my world.”
Wainwright said discussions about menopause were never talked about when she was younger because you could be dismissed as being “crazy”.
She recalls even trying to cover up weaknesses 16 years ago when she was pregnant with her first child, so as not to show any weakness.
“So I think that I’ve been a bit of a denier of the realities of the female body and the impact it has on you.
“But then what happens is perimenopause and menopause comes along and just smacks you right in the face. And you have to kind of [realise] this isn’t just me who’s dealing with all these wobbles and issues and physical symptoms that don’t make sense and worrying you’re losing your mind. This is hormones and I can’t deny it any longer.
“So in some ways it’s been a bit of a reckoning for me.”
In the past few years, Wainwright has noticed a big change in these types of conversations. Mamamia put together a summit about perimenopause recently, and the company was blown away by the response to it.
She’s even seeing the impact it is having on younger generations.
“The young women I work with, they talk all the time about what phase of their cycle they’re at, how they’re feeling about it. It’s really shifted and, and I’m really delighted about that.”
And while she is glad that these conversations are being had, Wainwright also wants to ensure that it’s not the sole thing defining women.
“I don’t want every conversation around women in their 40s and 50s and beyond to be about hormones.”
She said many women about her age have experienced a lot, surviving numerous challenges, and have reached a stage where they have a lot of experience and wisdom to share.
“Exactly that moment, you are kind of pushed aside by the culture and society, whatever that means, and sort of pitied a little bit, and it’s like you’re not really relevant anymore, are you?
“So I really wanted to make a show that explored all these different parts of ‘mid’ but with a positive feel to it.”
Listen to the full episode of The Little Things for the full conversation with Holly Wainwright about celebrating “mid” – including the best parts of this time, challenging the feeling of being “invisible”, beauty standards and what her advice to younger women is.
Holly’s new novel, He Would Never, is available in bookstores.
The Little Things is available on iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. The series is hosted by broadcaster Francesca Rudkin and health researcher Louise Ayrey.
