From Chaos to Calm: A Naturopath's Journey Through Perimenopause

Welcome to the inaugural Chaos to Calm episode! Listen along as we dive into Sarah’s journey into Naturopathy and her personal experiences with perimenopause. She shares her passion for helping women navigate through the various stages of menopause as well as some insightful tips and ideas to transition from chaos to calm.

Tune in to find out about:
•  Sarah’s journey to becoming the Perimenopause Naturopath began
•  Her personal experience with perimenopause
•  The first signs and symptoms she encountered
•  How perimenopause can highlight dysfunction in the body
•  An insight into how Sarah managed her own perimenopause
•  Having mindfulness around your approach to menopause

Find out more about Sarah, her services and the Freebies mentioned in this episode at https://www.ThePerimenopauseNaturopath.com.au

• OPEN NOW: Discover how to use food as your most powerful medicine, smoothing hormonal fluctuations and easing perimenopause symptoms naturally. (Yes, you have more options than hormone therapy!) Say goodbye to feeling out of control and hello to feeling more like your old self every day, with PerimenoGO (because who wants to pause anyway?!)
• The Perimenopause Decoder is the ultimate guide to understanding if perimenopause hormone fluctuations are behind your changing mood, metabolism and energy after 40, what phase of perimenopause you're in and how much longer you may be on this roller coaster for.
• Been told your blood test results are "normal" or "fine" while you feel far from your best? Discover the power of optimal blood test analysis with The Blood Test Decoder: Optimal Ranges for Women Over 40.
• For more, follow on Instagram at @theperimenopausenaturopath.

Transcript

00:03

Hey there. I'm Sarah McLachlan. Thanks for joining me on The Chaos To Calm podcast, a podcast designed for women over 40 who think that changing hormones might be messing with their mood, metabolism and energy and want to change that in a healthy, sustainable and permanent way. Each episode we'll explore topics related to health and wellness for women in their 40s like what the heck is happening to your hormones, what to do about it with nutrition, lifestyle and stress management, and inspiring conversations with guests sharing their insights and tips on how to live your best life in your 40s and beyond. So if you're feeling like you're in the midst of a hormonal storm, and don't want perimenopause to be horrific, then join me on Chaos To Calm as I share with you how to make it to menopause without it wrecking your relationships and life.

 00:58

Hello, and welcome to this inaugural episode of the Chaos To Calm Podcast. I'm Sarah McLachlan, The Perimenopause Naturopath. I'm so excited to be joining you today. And in the all the future episodes that I have planned for you where we are going to smash through the myths that perimenopause has to be horrific, because it doesn't. It's common, but it doesn't have to be your normal. And we'll be talking all about how to master the chaos that can come up in your 40s and beyond as you start moving through perimenopause. And the big things that I see in my clinical practice and in my personal experience of perimenopause is that your mood, your metabolism, your energy, your digestion, all can take massive hits in this time period. So I want to teach you all about how to master that chaos. So that you can feel calmer, more in control of what's going on in your body and really comfortable within yourself and your body. Really, I want you to live your best life in your 40s because perimenopause is a time of transformation. And it doesn't have to be a horrible time and that's something I'm really passionate about and love talking about. And that is what we're going to cover a lot of in the Chaos to Calm Podcast.

 02:19

Today, Episode Number one, so exciting. We are going to be discussing my perimenopause journey and how that has spurred me into becoming the perimenopause naturopath. So I guess a bit of background might be important here. I am a later to life naturopath and metabolic balance practitioner. I started studying naturopathy. When I had two kids, I have four kids now. And I started studying because I had well simply a life changing experience with one of my kids and a constant issue that they kept having as a young child. Been to lots of doctors, just got lots of creams just that didn't really work, antibody that kind of thing. One trip to the naturopath. "Yeah, no worries, I've seen this before. Just cut out dairy or switch over to goat products." is what we did. No more, it was gone. They're probably was resolved instantly. And I thought how amazing that diet, some changes to food- simple changes to food, can really chnage how you feel and how you move through life. And so, I was like, well, I would like to learn more about that. I want to help people learn how food can really impact how they feel. I want to teach people how to eat. So I went to uni to become a naturopath. It's a 4-year full time degree so as a mum, that really wasn't an opportunity for me there. I did it part time and I did it a long time. I invested a lot of time and energy in it. Often to do my assignments, reading you know scientific journals and textbooks, while I was feeding my kids to sleep because during that study I went from 2 children to 4 children. 

 04:17

We also have a very significant life event happened in that time period as well which took a lot for us to recover from as a family, but has a really massive toll on me in terms of very traumatic and very, very stressful for a long period of time as well as growing to humans and breastfeeding them to full-term as well. So, keep that in mind because that actually forms part of my story I want to tell you today about perimenopause and how my experience has been. 

 04:48

You know at this time of recording, I am on day 354 of my cycle. So I'm like literally less than two weeks away from being confirmed as menopause or post-menopausal. But I'm not gonna talk too much about the different phases of perimenopause and into menopause today. It's a whole another podcast in of itself. So, maybe let's start at the very beginning- a very good place to start. When did it start for me? When did perimenopause start for me? What's it been like?

 04:48

So at the moment as I said, I'm in really late perimenopause. Almost at menopause. Which I'm a little sad about because I would have liked to held my period for a lot longer and you guessed it! That's a whole another podcast in why you want to hang on to your periods so stay tuned for that in the future. But for now, yeah, what I am at is very late stage in perimenopause. So, when did it start for me? Well, that's difficult to say, because, I think it started around just after 40 into 41. Which is really not uncommon. It can- those changes, start to come into the very early, early perimenopause can definitely start to come in that time period. Mid thirties is not even too young. What I did find though, when I presented to my GP because I was exhausted and that would be one of the early signs of perimenopause there for me. I was still breastfeeding though, so it was kind of confusing about why are hormones or why are my cycle or my cycle aren't changing. It was still regular and the same but I was getting more PMS which is again is common in early perimenopause. So my GP did some blood test, and did hormone testing and it showed I had low estrogen. She didn't really say anything about it though she was a bit confused by it because I was only 41 and breastfeeding so I guess it was outsie of what she thought would be normal for perimenopause. 

 06:56

At 42, I had really sudden weight gain and stress and cortisol was definitely a trigger for that as well. But that reduced stress resilience because of my changing hormones in perimenopause definitely had a play into that.

 07:12

Around 43, I started to get heavier periods and shorter cycles. This is something I see a lot with my clients and my irritation and brain fog was like next level, that time.

 07:28

Really long cycles started for me around the age of 44, which was in the start of 2019 for me. So that's been my progression since 2019. At the time of recording this in 2023, I'm still having long cycles, really long cycles right now. And maybe I'll have another period and reset myself there for to wait for another 12 months before I can be declared in menopause. So I've had lots of the really common perimenopause symptoms, and have not necessarily accepted them as my normal certainly around July 2020. I got sick of feeling like angry, grumpy, exhausted, blurred vision of myself I really did. And that was when I started to change things up and really got into diving deep into personalized nutrition and and the benefit that that can bring to us but I will talk a bit more about that later.

 08:47

So let's have a chat about perimenopause. And for me how it shone a light on my nurture points or I guess genetic weaknesses or tendencies to develop a dysfunction in perimenopause really shines a light on your body's weak points or nurture points there or maybe what is already dysfunctional. So for me that dysfunction was allergies as a kid I had asthma, eczema, I developed psoriasis which is an autoimmune condition in my late teens, and I really got that perfect storm in my 40s. I had the hormone change which is quite nice is quite vulnerable to stuff happening in our body or, or dysfunction developing alongside of chronic high level stress and emotional stress and physical stress of of having four pregnancies and breastfeeding over a decade there so for me that manifested as some new allergies, became a celiac. I have some totally nuts, allergies. like mint, such an annoying allergy. But anyway, yeah, it's like I was saying perimenopause really shines that light. 

 10:08

So if you're not in perimenopause, you have the perfect opportunity to get yourself into a great state of health before those hormone changes come through and really shine a light on those areas in your body that are more susceptible to developing disease or dysfunction. If you already are experiencing the hormone changes, it's never too late. Just remember that you can always do something, and your body will benefit from whatever you can and do do at that time to get yourself in your best state of health. So yeah, for me, that was a massive part of my early perimenopause was just a complete way out by my body. And four or five different allergies developed alongside of celiacs there as well, when exactly that was, is really difficult to tell, because I was feeling exhausted, had had massive chronic stress and trauma in there as well. So it wasn't really until probably 41 or 42, that all of those allergies were diagnosed, and we could see what had happened, and how that had sort of come about in there.

 11:21

If you'd like to know more about this episode, and my perimenopause journey, you can find the show notes and so much more at www.chaostocalmpodcast.com.

 11:32

So through all that time period in my 40s, I'm still in my 40s actually. I'm 48 now, but in my early 40s there, I had also some sudden weight gain. So I gained about of 20 kilos in a 6 to 12 month period. Not doing anything different. At that time, I was eating more of a low carb style there and I tried keto after that to try and get rid of that weight. And yeah, I hate calorie counting but tried that. Tried increasing the exercise of you know, flogging myself on the bike and in other exercise classes there as well. 

 12:23

Nothing was working, you know, herbs, nutrients, soothing my nervous system trying to reduce my stress load, which is you know, four kids and running my own business and my husband self employed too. That's pretty hard to do.

 12:37

So, I started to learn more about personalized nutrition and metabolic balance and that really was a game changer for me. I also dove deep into hormones and perimenopause and just what goes on in that phase because that's I found my as I found asking around or seeing other health professionals, not many people were talking about perimenopause itself. So this was really how I ever came to be the perimenopause naturopath, I had this deep immersion in the phase I was experiencing what many women that I know and talk to and who were exepriencing problems like me. And I just really get sick of hearing about how horrific perimenopause or menopause was. I didn't want that for me. I didn't want that for the women I worked with as well. I really want to change that narrative. I want to change it. I'm really passionate about changing that. 

 13:19

Because I just found, you know, many of my clients there tell me as well. No one was really talking about it. It was something like hush-hush and almost something to be ashamed of and I guess this is no different to our menstrual cycle right through our lives as well. Whereof, you know, the way that we approach that when we were teens. It's a little different, I think, for our children and certainly for my daughters. I'm working to change that narrative for them. But it was something seen as dirty or shameful. Which is really sad, because you know, it was actually like a superpower to be how to do what our bodies do and then grow a human. Nourish that human with our body and then our breastmilk. It's amazing. So sad that it's made to be shameful. 

 14:33

So, yeah, I've really dove deep. I love going deep into things I'm learning more about. And how we can support the body, and smooth the fluctuations. So, I don't necessarily think that we are trying to balance out hormones in this phase there. It was a natural decline to them. We really just want to smooth out the fluctuations that can come especially with estrogen which really can be alot of mischief in the body. Through our reproductive life and menstrual cycle time as well. So yeah, that's how I became The Perimenopause Naturopath. I just got so into it. I found what had worked for me and started using that with my clients, noticing that they were feeling better and less PMS, less angry, less exhausted, and you know, for those that were later on in the journey, less sweats and flushes. 

 15:36

It's like sorcery. So good to be able to help them feel great. Because for myself, I would say this is the best phase of my life, my kids are getting a little bit older, they're, I'm independent from them, they don't need me so much. I've got more time to look after myself and think about what I want moving into the next phase of life, where I'm not just someone's mum, or just someone's wife, or how do I want this next bit of my life to be one of the things I still haven't ticked off my bucket list that I want to do. I wonder what the things are that you want to do? Like, what do you imagine for yourself in the next phase of life, and I want to be in my best state of health that I feel like I am, I actually feel, you know, when I first got on top of my health, I felt better than I had in like 20 years. And a lot of my clients told me that too, I just had one today tell me, I haven't felt this great in years. So it's so exciting when that happens for you. 

 16:39

And you know, humans, we live for a longer time now. And, that is great. The last 15 years or 20 years of your life, it can be not a great quality. So, in this stage of life, in perimenopause, we are really vulnerable because of all the hormone changes that go on. And they leave us suceptible to develop chronic diseases or dysfunction. So it's really ideal time to think about and act and do things to help improve your health. And a massive way that we can do this is the food that we eat and the things that we do day in, day out. These little habits and behaviors. And that is what I focus on for me. I focus on with my clients as well. And helping them to find the foods that work really well to help them get in that best state of health. Get themselves in a great state of health to reduce that susceptibility to developing disease and dysfunction, but also, making sure that they can be active and feel great through their 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s and beyond. Be active. Be able to enjoy your retirement and go travel and take the hikes. Do the long walks on the beach. Try new hobbies and things.

 18:06

I mean, one of the first things I did after mastering my health and really getting myself into a great physical health was take up silks circus class. Climbing to the top of that silk was so exhilarating and amazing. And to do that at the age of 47 felt really great, you know, because people would tell me Oh, it's great. You can do that at your age irl.

 18:38

But it is sadly, I'm I guess not the norm in that. So it's not common for that to happen. But I wanted those sort of things to become more common for other women in their 40s. And you know, we will look at other cultures in the way that women are treated in perimenopause and menopause and revered for the wisdom and their experience that they bring and can share with the younger generation like Japan is one. They just don't have the perimenopause symptoms like we do in our western cultural in Australia and, and other countries like us. Because they don't get told that menopause or perimenopause is horrific. It's not the end. It's the beginning.

 19:26

It's the second spring is how they refer to it in China. And I think that's so beautiful. And that's what I'm looking to create for me is that second spring like a rebirth and I'm moving into that next phase and expanding and exploring all the wonderful things that are on offer to me. So that brings me to the end of this episode. Thank you so much for joining me for this inaugural episode of the Chaos to Calm podcast. 

 19:31

And I hope that hearing my perimenopause story has been beneficial to you, and you're realizing that you aren't alone in feeling like once you turn 40 You know things got turned upside down or maybe you're like a snowglobe had been shaken up and put back down to settle on your own. And if you enjoy the show, please do come and join the conversation in the show's Facebook group which is the Chaos to Calm community.

 20:24

Until next time, I am Sarah, the perimenopause naturopath. And please don't forget, perimenopause does not have to be horrific.

 20:38

It's really common for women over 40 to experience the chaos of changing hormones, mood, metabolism and energy. But I hope you know now that common doesn't have to equal normal for you or them. You can help others understand that aren't alone in feeling this way. And that perimenopause doesn't have to be horrific by subscribing, leaving a review and sharing this podcast with other women in their 40s and beyond. Thanks so much for listening and sharing your time with me today in this chaos to calm conversation.