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#82 Adele Johnston: Menopause 101: Education, empowerment and lifestyle changes
967 Plays1 year ago
In this episode of the Kate Hamilton Health Podcast, I chat with Adele Johnston, a dedicated menopause coach, to dive deep into the crucial stages of menopause and hormone health.
Adele opens up about her personal experience with early menopause and how it inspired her to support other women navigating this life stage.
We explore a range of topics, from understanding hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and menopause replacement therapy as well as the importance of nutrition to fostering a positive mindset and self-connection.
Adele shares practical advice, actionable tools, and empowering insights that will help you live a vibrant and confident life through menopause and beyond.
Whether you're experiencing menopause yourself or want to support someone who is, this episode is packed with valuable knowledge and support.
Key Questions Discussed in This Episode:
- What inspired Adele Johnston to become a menopause coach, and what were her early challenges?
- How can Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) and lifestyle changes support women during menopause?
- Why are education and advocacy important in empowering women through menopause?
- What should women know about the different stages of menopause?
- How can nutrition, including healthy fats and protein, help manage menopause symptoms?
- How do mindset, mindful eating, and social connections improve well-being during menopause?
- What practices can help women connect with themselves and enhance their menopause journey?
Links & Resources:
- Listen to Adele Johntson’s podcast: https://open.spotify.com/episode/4C3U6HlhExBitwyyMR4Pi7?si=95018b57ad2b4480
- To get Adele's FREE set of morning affirmations: https://adelejohnstoncoaching.com/empowering-confidence-50-i-am-affirmations/
If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with friends who might benefit. For more health tips and updates, follow me on Instagram and TikTok @katehamiltonhealth.
Music by LiQWYD Free download: hypeddit.com/link/xxtopb [http://hypeddit.com/link/xxtopb] Promoted by FreeMusicPromo [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbycji-eySnM3WD8mbxPUSQ] / @freemusicpromo1
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Transcript
Introduction to Menopause Coach Adele Johnston
00:00:09
Speaker
Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of the Kate Hamilton health podcast. So in today's episode, I chat with the menopause coach Adele Johnston. And when I tell you that this is an episode that every single female should listen to, I am not joking.
00:00:27
Speaker
It is relevant to your daughters, it is relevant to you, it is relevant to your mothers. Anyone who is female should listen to this episode. Not only is it extremely informative, it is extremely empowering.
Adele's Journey to Becoming a Menopause Coach
00:00:41
Speaker
Adele is an absolutely phenomenal woman with a phenomenal story as well, and she does an amazing amount of work to help women through early menopause, through perimenopause, menopause in general, hormone health in general. We have the most amazing conversation around her own experience of early menopause.
00:01:06
Speaker
in her thirties and what that experience was like for her, what has brought her to where she is to today to become the menopause coach, the research that she does, the work that she does with other women.
Understanding Menopause: Awareness, Education, and Lifestyle
00:01:19
Speaker
We talk a lot around so awareness, education, HRT, lifestyle, the different stages of menopause and what we can do in our own lifestyles to make this experience as empowering as possible. We talk about nutrition, how important nutrition is and she talks about vegetables and she talks about healthy fats, protein and how important these
00:01:43
Speaker
play in particular in relation to hormone health. Then we talk a lot around mindset and positive psychology. And she is currently doing a PhD in positive psychology, if I'm not mistaken. She shared some of her expertise around how we need to connect with ourselves.
00:02:02
Speaker
and she gives some great tools that we can use. And if you check the show notes, she it has kindly shared some resources with us as well that we can use. So I really hope that you enjoy this episode. Please share it with any females in your life that you think can benefit from this episode. And I will talk to you all soon.
Adele's Personal Health Journey and Career Change
00:02:25
Speaker
Adele, welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much for having me. It's honestly such a pleasure.
00:02:31
Speaker
No, honestly, I'm really, really looking forward to this conversation. Most of my clients are age 40 plus. So menopause and perimenopause, postmenopause, you know, these are issues that we are dealing with on a daily basis. So I always just want to learn more, talk more about these topics and in general, you know, be able to provide more value and education to my clients as well. So I'm excited to learn everything that you have to share with us. But before we get into all of that.
00:02:57
Speaker
Would you like to share a little bit about you, your personal story and what kind of has brought you to being the menopause coach? Oh, right. So yes, I'm Adele Johnston, the menopause coach, right? But not always. and Was that the case? So my background was actually I had been in women's health for years, years and years, helping women with self-connection, self-confidence and self-esteem. But I worked in corporate for many, many years as a corporate senior leader.
00:03:26
Speaker
And so I suppose what it all kind of changed for me was when I was 33, I started to notice that I just wasn't feeling myself. And it was that whole piece of high, successful, stressful career, having twins, not really knowing whether it was one thing or the other and just putting everything down to just a busy, busy life. It wasn't until I was 35 that I then thought, this is hormonal. This isn't normal.
00:03:54
Speaker
And it took 20 months from that point for me to be confirmed as having early pedimenopause.
Challenges in Diagnosing Early Menopause
00:04:02
Speaker
So from that point, it was quite an intense journey of 20 months of tests, checks, you know, the the continuous thing of you're too young for it to be menopause or the blood review would come back and they'd say everything looks normal. So that was a real challenging time.
00:04:19
Speaker
So at 37, I then got it confirmed that I had early perimenopause. But in between all of that, I had completely lost who I was. I was losing my marriage and I resigned from my successful six-figure career.
00:04:36
Speaker
walked away from that, left it all behind within a week and a half. If I couldn't even do my notice, I was that unwell. So it really, really significantly changed my entire life in that not only financially were we then under a bit of strain and pressure, but I was losing that relationship with my husband's and I'd already lost a lot of who I was.
00:04:58
Speaker
And it just made me realise that at that point, it wasn't okay. It wasn't okay that we didn't have more understanding of menopause. You know, this is not something that might happen to every female born female at birth. It will happen. The kind of stats around it are around 80% of women will have symptoms. They will experience changes. And 25% of women will have such significantly life-altering changes and symptoms.
00:05:27
Speaker
And yet, whenever I went to try and get some help, there was nothing available to me. And the doctor even phoned me and said, I'm really sorry, I don't know anything about the menopause, but I can maybe get you some HRT. And that was the start of everything for me saying, this is not OK. We need to change it. We need to make menopause mainstream and everyone needs to know about it. Well, what a story. And to be able to go from but wondering what is wrong with me and I presume like did you go through like stages of like you know is is this mental health is this is there something physically like really wrong with me like did you have to go through tests did yeah and before you got to that stage where you get that diagnos not diagnosis but where it's confirmed you are in perimenopause
00:06:15
Speaker
Yeah, 100%. So it was, like I say, 20 months of really intense health anxiety. They were checking me for everything, which we give gratitude for, right? That when they came back and said, Adele, your cervical cancer screening has been completed and it's clear. Adele, we're checking you for endometriosis and adenomyosis and all of that is clear.
00:06:37
Speaker
You know, we give massive amounts of gratitude that is clear and we've got that health bill, but it still didn't explain why I was having the horrendous symptoms and the changes. So yes, I had cancer scares. I had the word cancer knocked about so many times and it just became a real big 20 months of deep health anxiety of being frightened to eat foods.
00:07:01
Speaker
to be you know frightened to be in environments where I thought right this and this environment can be quite toxic. What if I do have cancer? So it was a real big intensity that took a long time to overcome.
00:07:16
Speaker
Yeah, and the stress attached to the uncertainty as well then doesn't help.
Symptoms and Health Scares of Early Menopause
00:07:20
Speaker
Would you be okay with sharing a little bit about you say you lost yourself and what were the symptoms that you were experiencing that made you feel so unwell? So this is the thing, we have this and I have this available. So if anybody needs to see the list of symptoms, because you might be think, I want to see whether I have these, just reach out and I will send you a free template, which has all the symptoms that you can just tick next to.
00:07:44
Speaker
But ultimately, from from head to toe for me, I ended up losing a lot of my hair, so I'd be in the shower in the morning, be just washing my hair every third day as I did, and lots of clumps of hair coming out. you know Not just a few strands, but clumps of hair and had a little bit of pattern baldness that started to happen at the front, which was quite alarming.
00:08:06
Speaker
I had night vision changes so where I'd normally been able to see absolutely fine, I then wasn't able to see at night time without glasses on. So my night vision changed and had a lot of haloing around lights, I couldn't read road signs so I couldn't drive at night until I got glasses. I had dry eyes, I had swollen nasal cavities. So where I say this, a lot of women will think, oh my God, is that what this has been? It's almost like you've constantly got blockages in your nostrils. There's nothing up there. So even though you're cleaning yourself out with ah with a tissue, there's nothing there, but it feels very stuffy and blocked a lot of the time. Itching ears, itchy throat, bleeding gums. So that's the head part. Obviously the health of anxiety I've covered, the sleeplessness.
00:08:58
Speaker
I then started to notice changes in breast tissue, I had lumps that would appear under my armpit and again upon checks they were all fine but deemed to be your body maybe has an infection but I constantly had the enlarged glands and lymph nodes to suggest that I was under a viral attack.
00:09:20
Speaker
So my immune system was really compromised. I'd catch common colds and viruses, mouth ulcers constantly. Right to the point where I had really severe itchy skin. So on my legs, my belly, everywhere to apart from my face. And it was to the point that I would actually cause myself sores through the night time when I'd scratch. I had really bad heart palpitations.
00:09:47
Speaker
So again, having never experienced that in my life, I thought my first lot of heart palpitations was a heart attack. and that whole breathlessness which led to an anxiety attack. Right down to, you know, abdominal challenges, and both vaginal and bowel and gut. So, vaginally, I was really sore. I would bleed during and after sex. I would have really painful sex. I couldn't go for a smear test without being in excruciating pain, even though they say it shouldn't hurt.
00:10:22
Speaker
And I ended up with a lot of vaginal discharge that was quite alarming, so changes within that. So yeah, there was a whole array of different symptoms from head to toe, more than what we've just even covered here, but a lot of them both physical and mental.
00:10:39
Speaker
Yeah and then like the the anxiety that goes with not knowing what it is because at 33 was it you started to experience symptoms that's not something that you're even going to be in your radar that that's what's going on.
Menopause in Younger Women: A Need for Awareness
00:10:52
Speaker
I thought that at that point you know even though I was working within women's health and confidence I'd never been explained to me at all. And this is nobody's fault. We don't point the finger, but it'd never been explained that menopause isn't something that happens. It's not like an old lady thing that we get in our 80s or 90s. This is something that as we start to transition through the phases of our fertile journey, it can happen at any age. And the youngest women that I have met within my network, one was 12 and one was 13.
00:11:25
Speaker
So this is not something that just happens. It is rare that that that that occurs, but it happens in teenage years as well. And when we think to the school system, yeah like we're we you know we have sex education, we learn about the reproductive system, we learn about puberty, we learn about periods. yeah We learn about childbirth, we learn about you know all of the conception, all of that, but we don't learn about menopause.
00:11:50
Speaker
more on 50% of the school population will have to go through it at some stage of their lives. It's something that really needs to be brought into the education system. Yeah, I completely agree with you. I think that you know we're we're seeing a lot of headway, even just in the last three years, we've seen a lot more come through kind of mainstream and across social media and platforms there. When I first started out talking about my own menopause journey and helping other women,
00:12:15
Speaker
there wasn't what we have today. So I'm super grateful that you know that' it's evolved massively even just in the last few years. And I've been here doing this thing for the last five years. So when we think of it in that form, we've got a lot more happening and a lot more awareness.
00:12:31
Speaker
But yeah, we're right. You know, we we do, we get education around how not to become pregnant and then when we become pregnant, how to be healthy in pregnancy and how to, you know, have a really good labor. And we have obviously the exceptions for all of that. But not every woman will choose to become pregnant and not every woman will be able to. So it's again not something that every female will experience whereas as menopause on the other hand, no female born female at birth with female reproductive organs will skip menopause. Every single 100% of women in this world will go through menopause at some point in her life.
00:13:12
Speaker
you're right, it's so great that the conversation is changing and that education is out there. And I do think it will become more mainstreamed in the coming years that now, thanks to social media and you know people like yourself that are speaking out on it, that are educating people on it, and it's it's going to make a difference. But in relation then to taking it to a little bit more of a positive note, let's relate it to your story still at the minute. When you get it confirmed that this is what what you're dealing with, what happened then to get you to this good place that you are today?
00:13:43
Speaker
Yeah, I mean I give massive amounts of gratitude again to the point that I probably had what 99% or 99.9% of women did not have at that point and we're changing that now. But that was awareness of of where are to seek help. At that point I was getting a lot of mentorship as soon as I reached out to certain menopause specialists.
00:14:06
Speaker
to then say, look, I don't want you to just become my menopause specialist. I want you to educate me. I want to know about what is happening. This is my body. I am responsible for it. It's not my GP's responsibility to care for my body. It's mine. This is me. So I actually went inside the world of I want to know everything. I want to read all the research. research I want to get all the medical
The Role of Mentorship and Self-Education
00:14:30
Speaker
journals. I want access to things that I can't just go Google. So I went and I got myself a menopause doctor mentor.
00:14:38
Speaker
And Zoe was like my app she still is my absolute savior within this space, and I'm still mentoring with her even today. But what that gave me was the opportunity to read a lot of medical research. And I am trained in doing that as as a nutritionist. So again, I'm grateful for the training that I've had. But then I was able to jump onto a chat with her and say, hey, am I understanding this right? Is this this?
00:15:04
Speaker
and then able to translate that from being quite complicated medical research into, so really what they're saying is if it's this, you're going to experience that. And by her being able to help me to break that down into very understandable terms.
00:15:21
Speaker
I was then able to say, OK, so that's the gaps that I have that I now need to go and find solutions to. And that's why I then became the menopause coach and educator because I actually went deep inside the body of research. I looked at the evidence based science information that we had around the body and how we can actually support our body through very holistic approaches. But also I don't ever shame away from this but I replace my hormones so I made the decision to start hormone replacement therapy or menopause hormone therapy as we're hearing it called more now because of multiple different reasons.
00:16:05
Speaker
but mainly because the body of research that is available highlighted to me that I was far too young and exposed to greater risk because of the loss of my estrogen. So my estrogen levels were basically that of what we would see typically within a woman in her 60s when I was in my 30s.
00:16:27
Speaker
And you know to look at me, you wouldn't know that because I've actually you know got really quite youthful looking skin. I don't have a lot of wrinkles. And so to look at me, the medical teams were all kind of saying, well, no, you you're not. you you don't You don't look like you've got low estrogen. But actually when we performed a lot of the assessments and tests, not just that, but my testosterone was non-existent.
00:16:53
Speaker
So there was a lot of a lot of hormone deficiency and discrepancy within my body and my theories. So it very much led me to that lens of I want to know what's going on. I want to know where I've got gaps. And then I want to go and find the right people to help me with this. And that's why I've become who I am now so that women can come to me and my team and say, please help me. And we can say, great, let's get to know where your gaps are.
00:17:24
Speaker
and where to start. Yeah. Amazing. Let's talk a little bit around hormone replacement therapy and your thoughts on that, because I know a lot of women feel conflicted. They're hearing different bits of information. You know, you shouldn't, you should. I hate like i hate the word should. I hate the word shouldn't. What are your thoughts on it? And I know it's going to be different for everyone.
00:17:44
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. So I mean, on the whole should and shouldn't, this is something that as a positive psychology coach, I do a lot of teaching around as well, because should brings shame.
Hormone Replacement Therapy: Choices and Benefits
00:17:53
Speaker
And when we think about I should be doing this, there's that element of not wanting. So we need to be able to want to do something and bringing ourself inside a space of knowing our bodies.
00:18:05
Speaker
That's always where I encourage every woman, regardless if they're working with us or not, but encourage every woman to get to know their bodies and, you know, body and what they would like. So not what they should be doing, but what they would like. And with hormone replacement therapy or menopause hormone therapy, when we break this down, what we're not doing with it is we're not actually replacing hormones. The game and the aim with this is never to bring those hormone levels back up to where we were in our kind of teens, if you like, when we're at our highest fertility level. But it's to make sure that we're not dipping below what we deem to be that threshold line of bone protection, heart protection, organ protection. I'm not going to include the word brain protection in there just yet because we don't actually have
00:18:57
Speaker
the solid evidence yet to say that estrogen is equalling brain health and protection, but we do have a strong body of research right now coming out from noodle scientists to show that the brain is so much healthier with estrogen.
00:19:13
Speaker
So I'll revert it back on that one. But when we think of it that way, the idea here is to make sure that dependent upon where you are in your menopause journey, I was in my thirties. Therefore, my risk of osteoporosis just went through the roof because my estrogen levels were so low We already have one in two women post-menopausal who will develop osteoporosis. And the reason for that is not just one thing, but estrogen plays a massive foundation within bone health. So as we lose our estrogen levels, we enter post-menopausal life, we're left with less than 1% of that hormone left in our body. It's the queen bee hormone. We need it for hundreds of functions.
00:20:02
Speaker
So I wasn't willing to jeopardise my skeletal health knowing that, well, when I'm postmenopausal, I've got a one in two chance of developing osteoporosis.
00:20:16
Speaker
Yeah, and having not even reached midlife at this stage. Yeah. No, I wasn't taking that risk. I wasn't also taking the risk that my heart disease and cardiovascular level disease risk would go up by 50%. I wasn't willing to accept that actually I'm potentially heightening my risk from what some of the evidence would say of developing breast cancer, for example. However,
00:20:43
Speaker
And I think it's important we talk about this. I have greater risk of other types of disease. I have greater risk of cancer related disease if I am of an obese level BMI or body. Okay. If I am consuming high levels or above 14 units of alcohol per week.
00:21:08
Speaker
yeah I don't do either of those things, so I don't live in a high BMI body and I don't consume alcohol. I have it maybe once in a blue moon if I fancy it. So again, looking at the risk factors, there's two great risks that are a higher prevalence of breast cancer or disease development than HRT was.
00:21:29
Speaker
But I knew if I didn't supplement in with this hormone that I potentially would develop osteoporosis and I potentially would then be at 50% greater risk of cardiovascular disease, which already runs in my family. We also have a really high rate of dementia in my mum's side of the family. And again, I wasn't willing to accept that my children might watch me go through that type of end towards my life.
00:21:58
Speaker
So I made the decision that based upon the fact that HRT preparations now are transdermal, which means they come in through the skin barrier, we don't orally ingest our estrogen anymore.
00:22:13
Speaker
But where are this whole big risk factor from HRT and breast cancer originated from was a very flawed study that was conducted. Yeah. And you're nodding and it like, yeah, we all we've all heard about it and how the newspapers picked up on some of the body of evidence from that, which was actually very quickly discredited. That full study has been republished again.
00:22:39
Speaker
and absolutely counteracts what was said and and released within the media. It was old versions of HRT that were used in that study and most of the individuals that took part in the study were postmenopausal, 60 to 65 plus. So it was flawed. So I again, and this is why I always suggest get to know what you want, not what you're told you should do.
00:23:06
Speaker
Yeah. So like what I, what I'm taking from this is getting contact with someone who specializes in menopause. Educate yourself. Myself or anyone listening don't need to be going through medical studies. We have people like you to help us, you know, how to break it down for us so into layman's terms and just know.
00:23:29
Speaker
The pros and cons of everything. what What is going to actually help you personally? It's not a, I should be on HRT. It's like, I'm choosing to do this because. Absolutely. Absolutely. And do you know, there's so many preparations out there. You know, we're we're up at like maybe the mid fifties. So 55 different preparations if we put a number to it. This is not just about one box of tablets that every woman takes that says HRT on the front of it.
00:23:54
Speaker
This is about, well, what's going to work for you? Do you want a gel? Do you want a patch? Do you want a combination? Do you just need to have estrogen or do you need a progesterone as well? And it doesn't need to be complicated. This is where I think a lot of individuals will overcomplicate because they don't understand the dynamics of how hormone replacement therapy or menopause hormone therapy can work.
00:24:21
Speaker
Yeah and it's about navigating it like you see with knowledgeable menopause care givers. That's going to help you massively. Because I think a huge issue in Ireland, no not for everyone and I don't know what it's like in the UK but a lot of women will go to their doctor and you have to fight.
00:24:39
Speaker
to get listened to, to be taken seriously, to even be offered the chance to go on HRT. And this is I think where it's really important, you know, that individuals like yourself come in to help but educate women, and empower women to, to advocate for themselves. And yeah like do you do you find that something with the women you work with that they're experiencing as well?
00:25:01
Speaker
Yes, majority. So when with the work that we do, and I love that word empowerment because it's one of our core values, and the empowerment comes with understanding. So empowerment is not just a word that we see, we empower you. We empower you through helping you understand what is happening to your body and what options you have that you get to go make a decision on that's right for you.
00:25:24
Speaker
yeah compassionately and safely. As part of all of that, what we actually do is we write to the GP practices in advance of any appointment. okay And what that does is it helps everybody involved. The GP, because the chances are nine times out of 10, GP practices do not have a menopause specialist within them.
00:25:47
Speaker
The reason for that is not a core part of GP curriculum when they're training as a doctor. They will approximately in 10 years of study time get around two hours of women's health education and and not much of that is on menopause. It's predominantly around contraceptives and prescribing of.
00:26:08
Speaker
So these junior doctors, when they graduate, have no understanding really of menopause. They know that it'll happen, but again, it's this whole piece of every single female patient that walks through that door will experience menopause at some point. And the symptoms that these women experience that they're bringing to their GP It takes for just one knowledgeable GP in that practice to say, well, wait a minute, there is like a whole host of things going on here. Do you not think that it's root cause? Menopause. And that is beautiful because we then get to help support the roots.
00:26:43
Speaker
rather than trying to topically and anti-biotically provide an antidepressant to provide support for the the individual symptoms. So we find that writing and engaging with the GP practices in advance settles the GP's mind, that the patient that they are working with, our client, is supported by us.
00:27:06
Speaker
And we're able to then help to say, based on our health assessments, here's what we are recognising. And this is what we would ask that you support with. That is so helpful. Is there something that you just provide within the UK?
00:27:22
Speaker
No, absolutely not. So we work with women all over the world. We've got clients that are in America, the UAE, we've got Dublin, we've got... Yes, the UK is a big part of what we do. And and Europe, you know, basically predominantly whittled white.
00:27:38
Speaker
oh yeah no I was just wondering, was it something that you were only able to kind of interact with doctors within the NHS? But that's really good to know. No, not at all. And a lot of the times because of confidentiality and GDPR, we need to be very, very careful around some GPs will not accept us engaging with them directly. So we do it through the client.
00:27:58
Speaker
their patients. So for example, if you and I were working together, I would provide all of the information in our letter headed paper and I would email it to you to then and email off to the GP.
00:28:10
Speaker
Yeah. And so that you're heading into your appointment armed, you can even have a print and be like, look at this. So no tell were so when you go into your seven minute consultation appointment of which you maybe get around five or six minutes to actually be in conversation, you're walking in and the GP is already a aware of what you're going in for, what you're there to discuss.
00:28:29
Speaker
And what we find is majority of the time our clients will walk into their appointment, they feel more settled because they understand the GP's already been advised. And when they go in, the GP's there and just says, okay, so what HRT would you like?
00:28:44
Speaker
And we've already then had the conversation with our client before they've gone to that appointment to say, okay, but what HRT will we explore together? Because here are different options. And based on your health, your lifestyle, how you live life, we deal with a lot of noodle divergent ladies. So again, sometimes remembering to apply their gel every morning can feel too overwhelming. Therefore, a patch might be a better option because that's a once a week change at the beginning.
00:29:14
Speaker
I'm like, wow, but let's let's move on and talk a little bit around lifestyle because I suppose what I would would like to ask you about is a little bit, I'm 38 myself.
Lifestyle Choices for Easing Menopause Transition
00:29:22
Speaker
but I work with, ah as I said, a lot of women 40 plus. So I'm very aware of what my clients are going through and that it's something that I will be going through probably relatively soon. But lifestyle wise preparation, as in what kind of lifestyle could we incorporate in our twenties, thirties, whenever?
00:29:41
Speaker
to give ourselves the best chance as we start to go through this change. And also then, you know, after we've consulted our doctor and what you know we're we're on HRT, what kind of lifestyle do do you recommend we should consider to you live our best lives, I suppose? so Yeah, that's a really good question. So free petty menopause, if we look at it that way. Okay, we've got these stages within our life. We've got our pre-menopause stage of life, which is, you know, we we probably aren't even really aware of what menopause is. We've maybe been aware of like our grandpa and our grandma. Oh yeah, she gets some hot flushe. She gets a bit crabby sometimes. And you know, I don't really want to be around her when she's like that.
00:30:24
Speaker
There's menopause, right? This is what the young crowd are seeing, young teenage girls. At that point, realistically, it's too overwhelming to start introducing this whole concept of, you know what, at some stage in your life you're going to enter menopause and here's what you need to know. Because they're navigating having just started their menstrual bleed.
00:30:43
Speaker
you know, they're they're getting through and learning their body from a ah place of menstrual cycle starting. So at a point in that life span and my girls are coming up for 14, I've got twin 14 year old from October and my two are so fully aware of tracking their own menstrual cycle of what to expect and what's right for their bodies. But we've had obviously the conversation because of the work I do about petty menopause and that they will experience it and what they need to know. What we've typically kept it to is learn your body, learn your body's communication with you.
00:31:23
Speaker
yeah If it's normal, not normal, what feels good, what doesn't feel good. So for the petty so the the the kind of pre-pity menopause stage versus young teenage girls, what we would say is prepare by getting to know your body.
00:31:37
Speaker
Okay. Learn your cycle. Understand when you can recognize you're in your luteal or your follicular phase. Recognize when you you feel that you are in ovulation because we can learn our body's communication through that cycle.
00:31:55
Speaker
So that's number one. When we start to enter it into petty menopause, that can happen like we see at many different age categories. But the number one message that I always give out to women is about never be fearful of it. Menopause gets to be a beautiful, vibrant time in a woman's life.
00:32:17
Speaker
where again, we need to relearn our bodies because they're changing. And it's not something to fear, but rather something to understand how you can then best support your body. So if you're recognising as you've learned your body's norm, ooh, that feels different, or hmm, I've not had a 28 or 30 day cycle this time, I've had a 21 day cycle this time.
00:32:45
Speaker
So if we start to see changes like that happening, we recognize that that's not what's normal for us. And then as we start to enter into the perimenopause cycle, where a lot of these symptoms that we've talked about earlier in our episodes can start to become familiar, again, it's understanding that we might have, yes, some lifestyle interventions.
00:33:08
Speaker
But if you're already living a life where the foundations of, for example, nutrition are there, yeah this is not about what you should or should not have. It's more about, are you bringing in enough plant-based foods?
00:33:24
Speaker
yeah And I'm not saying everybody has to be vegan. What I'm saying is plant-based foods need to, not shoot, but need to be present in your day to day. Think about your roots, fruits and veggies. What one more veg can I add to this meal is always a really easy question. So nutritionally, yes, but we also as women need to make sure that we are bringing in really good solid healthy fats.
00:33:50
Speaker
into our daily diet and we advocate around 35 to 40 percent of daily calorie intake being healthy fat. The reason for that, and this is where we hear the word fat and women automatically say, I just need to go fat free because it's going to help me with body fat and dietary fat and body fat are two entirely different things. So they're not one and the same. The dietary fat that we eat contains beautiful cellular level molecules and we need it for our brain, our heart.
00:34:26
Speaker
but also for our endocrine system which is what controls all of our hormones. So healthy fats equal happy hormones is always what we say. And protein, without protein intake, you know, we are one big walking protein. We need to have complete amino acids within our protein structures and if we're not bringing those food types in, we're really jeopardising our muscles,
00:34:52
Speaker
The more muscle volume we have, not only are we protecting our skeleton and supporting our mobility later in life, because the work we do in our twenties supports our theorties and forties and beyond. But we need to consider that actually the more muscle that we have, we're not talking about you needing to become a female bodybuilder, but The better your metabolic health, so your metabolism, we burn more calories, the more muscle we have. You know, I think with so much nutrition information out on the internet now, it can be very
00:35:29
Speaker
confusing and, you know, even, you know, people being like protein, protein, protein, and suddenly everyone's like, protein puddings and protein. And I'm like talking a bit more about healthy whole foods. And yes, that there's nothing wrong to have a bit of what you enjoy, but it doesn't mean pumping your system full of ah all of Aldi's protein product that, you know, eating good quality sources of protein. I'm so glad you mentioned about the healthy fats and hormone health. We're doing a lot of this in my coaching at the minute talking about hormone health.
00:35:55
Speaker
and how important healthy fats are. it it this like I think particularly our generation, anyone in their 30s, 40s, 50s, that's probably two generations, but we're diet culture babies. Fat free or low fat products, but it's actually very detrimental for females. yeah we're We're purely just talking about females born female at birth here. So men very much love, but we're releasing you from this. It's it's a lot around, you know, the endocrine system functions beautifully. It's like an orchestra, isn't it? So each instrument within there will do its job and do its job beautifully together. But if we are not then supporting the body through those healthy dietary facts,
00:36:35
Speaker
the hormones within the bodies do not get to thrive and function as optimally as they get to and need to. So we are compromising our hormone health by going fat free or low fat in product. So, you know, even things like Greek yogurt.
00:36:51
Speaker
I absolutely invite every single listener right now, and I'm sure they already do this, so to walk past the 0% and the 0% fat-free yogurts. They maybe play a role within certain points of life, but actually you're marginally increasing your calories, like negligible. You'll probably sneeze and burn the difference in the calories of what you would between a 0% and a 5% Greek yogurt. So opting for a bit of a higher intake is going to support you.
00:37:19
Speaker
Can I just be there with in relation to the the Greek yogurt? So technically the fat in Greek yogurt is saturated fat. Would I be correct? Yes, but saturated fat isn't bad. this is where that's yeah ah It's going to be like him how much of a balance of saturated and unsaturated fats are we are yeah and then this is it like we? We get stuck into this culture of, oh, yes, actually, in fact, really, really bad. But actually, when we talk about foods, it's not so much about labeling them as good or bad. It's not coming inside the space of saying, yeah, you shouldn't have that as bad and you should have this as good. Because the psychology of the human brain, and I'm studying my master's in human psychology at the moment, the psychology of the human brain is that we will naturally gravitate
00:38:04
Speaker
towards towards the, well, it's the rebel in me, but if I'm told not to push the big red button, I will push it because I'm like, well, I've been told not to. But I could just walk past it if nobody brought it to my attention. But it's the same with foods. So naturally, we won't gravitate to, for example, we normally find within 0% fat product. They will add some sweeteners or artificial flavorings. They will add some sugars to that as well. So we find that the sugar content can be a bit higher. But again, no oh you know sugar is not bad. It's not that we're having
00:38:42
Speaker
Diabetes created because someone has eaten too much sugar. It's all about the balance of, you can still enjoy the pizza and the donut. But let's be sensible about saying, but I have had fruits and vegetables today. I've brought in some whole grains for my fibre. Yeah, I've hydrated well. It's the balance. I think it's very much about eating things.
00:39:07
Speaker
because they're giving you something, right you know, giving your body some good rather than eating things because it's got less this or less that or restricting things. The first bite of any meal will always taste the best. And it's the same for alcohol, the first sip of the glass of wine or the first sip of the morning coffee is always going to be the best because again,
00:39:28
Speaker
there's a reason for that. It's the first taste. So it's about learning, and and this is probably where we're we're switching then into the psychology of eating as well now, but it's about learning to be present with your body's senses when we eat.
Mindful Eating and Lifestyle Balance
00:39:42
Speaker
And as a Westernized culture, we have actually, we've probably never been taught this when we've been young, but we've also distanced ourselves from our bodies.
00:39:51
Speaker
when we eat. So instead we will sit in front of screens or we will be on TikTok scrolling away as we're eating. What that's doing is it's numbing the brain away from being present, from using the senses, the eyes to eat, the nose to eat, the ears to eat, the mouth to eat. We need all of these and the touch. And actually at some point your body will signal to you, actually quite full now,
00:40:19
Speaker
Yeah, I've maybe had 60 to 70% of the meal and I'm pretty full. So we take a break and then we ask ourselves again, am I ready for the rest? And if you're not, then you've consumed what your body needed. But the trouble that we have is we live in a very mindless environment that we will eat on the go. We will eat at our desks.
00:40:40
Speaker
Yeah, we've all been guilty of it. one And actually the brain doesn't have a moment to process that it's eating because we're focusing on other things and we're eating at the same time.
00:40:53
Speaker
Yeah, it's very much creating that boundary and that space for you to to have that separate time, that eating time where we live in such a fast paced world that not everyone will take that protected time to sit together. It's actually, if you're familiar with the Mediterranean diet pyramid, you'll recognise that right on the baseline of that pyramid, the foundations of any healthy cultural diet,
00:41:19
Speaker
is not the food, it's the connection and the socializing, it's being together with those you love and trust. Then when we start to eat, we're present in the moment of connection. So there's a lot to be said for our hell is deeper and wider than just the food that we consume, of course it is. It's also how we live our life, it's also how we socialize and how we take care of our mental being.
00:41:47
Speaker
Yeah, the answer really is, isn't it? like Whether we're talking about menopause, whether we're talking about nutrition issues, it's slowing down and and reconnecting with yourself, getting off your phone, stop rushing to the next thing, where and actually connecting with yourself. Yeah, with yourself, exactly. yeah And it's amazing what can happen then when you know when we give the power back.
00:42:09
Speaker
to the person and say, this is your body, this is your responsibility, and that might trigger a few people. It's not your GP's responsibility to make sure you're healthy, it's your own. You make the choices of what you choose to do each day, whether that's a, I will get up and go for my daily steps for health, for my heart and my mind, or I won't.
00:42:31
Speaker
I will go and do the resistance based training. We're not saying you have to join a gym to do that. Yeah, a lot of my ladies are not gym goers and that's cool because we do other stuff like weighted vests for walking or we walk to the shops, get our shopping in the backpack and walk home. That's still resistance training.
00:42:52
Speaker
because the more that we can then do the resistance on the bones and the muscle, the longer that we are protecting our skeleton and our system. And your 50, 60, 70 year old self will thank you for the work you do with your body in your 20s, 30s and 40s.
00:43:09
Speaker
but in relation to I suppose empowerment and you know that connection with self I i would love to talk a little bit around the mindset side of things and you know that like you spoke a little bit earlier about the shame and the isolation like that that's some women experience with menopause and you have spoken about how you help women to become vibrant and confident through this phase of life. So I'd love to hear your thoughts on on anyone listening and you know and myself included, how do we achieve that as we go through this stage of life?
Mindset Tools and Positive Psychology
00:43:42
Speaker
I mean it's it's such an important part. I would say that
00:43:46
Speaker
throughout So I have a ah proven three-step formula. It's called the reclamation formula. And the first two pillars we've basically spoken a little bit about today, which is nutrition and lifestyle. So again, we can kind of say, right, we've touched upon those. But we normally to typically spend around 80% or more of our time inside our coaching programs working in the mind pillar.
00:44:12
Speaker
And this is everything from positive based psychology, and there's a difference between cognitive behavioral therapy and positive psychology. Yeah, because CBT will typically keep us, and it's a beautiful form of therapy, and it serves a purpose and a role, but it will typically keep us within the trauma experience. We live discussing that.
00:44:34
Speaker
Where we come into taking back the control, because a lot of women will feel like they lose their sense of self through menopause, not only are we experiencing these symptoms, but we're also seeing physical changes, so that physiological change in our and our body shape.
00:44:52
Speaker
A lot of women, as we start to transition into perimenopause and postmenopause, with the reduction in estradiol, which is one of our estrogens, we think of estrogen as being plural, we lose that queen bee part of our estrogen, so estradiol. And as she disappears over our menopause journey,
00:45:15
Speaker
but Our body's ability to make sure that the the body can you know stabilize and release insulin and glucagon within what is required within the body's functionality changes. Estrogen plays a really cool role in that. So what we can find is if we put this into basic form, our body's ability to actually store body fat is changed, it changes, it modifies. yeah And where we've maybe be contained or held onto some of our fat stores, our fat cells and lipids and our legs, for example, a lot of women will say, but my legs have got really defined and toned in my menopause, but my fat distribution is now sitting in my belly.
00:45:58
Speaker
yes Yeah. So we might be like, oh, I'm loving this. And this was one for me where I never had great legs. I'm five foot eight and I'm pretty much all legs. And I never ever had good legs in my opinion. So I wouldn't ever wear shorts.
00:46:13
Speaker
didn't really like to wear anything that exposed them. Whereas now I'm like, get me a pair of shorts because I have longed. This is wonderful. Yeah. I'm like, this this is actually really good. I really like my legs and my perimenopause. But it then transitions to having abdominal fat. And that's an area now for me that was never an issue. That wherever I gain body fat, it will always sit within my belly. And we hear that with a lot of women. Yeah. The meno belly.
00:46:41
Speaker
and So there's a reason that that happens in the chemistry of the body, in the physiology of the body. If it's not just something you have or have not done, there is a reason that we hold more body fat around our belly. So that's a big one. That's a huge thing that a lot of women really do struggle with that change in shape.
00:47:04
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. So the reason that I highlight all of this is because your body both physically and emotionally will be going through changes. So we do lose a sense of who who we are. Clothes that we maybe love no longer fit. We we cover it up and we hide. So the sense of confidence and self-esteem can really be challenged. A lot of women will change away from careers or they'll stop themselves going forward for promotion because of that lack of confidence.
00:47:30
Speaker
So what we really advocate here is reconnection with self. And we do that through a proven process, which is not the same for everyone. This is not about, you know, you're going to go through a five or 10 step journey. For some it might be 20 steps, for others it might be five. And it's about understanding where you are. So learning your body. yeah If you don't already do these things, I'm going to give you some tools just now.
00:47:59
Speaker
So every morning when you waken, and these are beautiful positive psychology, if you think of them as like visualizations as well, because we do a lot within the mind and the heart connection, a brain to heart connection. So when we waken in the morning, the very first thing that I invite you to do is to open your eyes and take a moment to just be present in your physical body.
00:48:24
Speaker
and you can perform a bit of a body scan. So rather than the alarm going off in the morning, we wake with a bit of a jolt, we jump out the bed and we're rushing around from minute one. Give yourself even 30 seconds to switch off the alarm, to sit up in the bed and ask yourself, how do I feel today?
00:48:46
Speaker
Yeah, and starting at the top of the head and just visualizing a white light traveling from the top of the head all the way to the base of the feet. How do I feel today? Right, that's it. 30 seconds. You are now inside connection with yourself and your body.
00:49:04
Speaker
The only problem I have here with this is I'd be afraid if I don't jump out of bed, I'll fall back asleep. Can this be done? Can you get up and sit in a chair in another room and do this? You can get up and go in the shower. yeah I have some women, yeah, I have some of my clients who will say, oh, I have to do the whole three, two, one and just get myself out of bed or I'll never get back.
00:49:23
Speaker
And that's okay too. So again, this is working with you and what you know you need. Taking yourself maybe as soon as you switch the shower on in the morning, if you shower it in the morning, I'm thinking, right, this is my opportunity as soon as I step onto the water to connect with my body. How do I feel? And what am I letting go of? Maybe it's a beautiful visualization technique too. If you're holding on to some anxiety or you're feeling some tightness in the body,
00:49:50
Speaker
Yeah, I've got a bit of a headache today, or whoo, my heart palpitations are wild at the moment. And when you're in the shower, you're able to visualize letting the headache wash away down the drain, letting the heart palpitations wash away down the drain. So when you emerge out of the shower cubicle,
00:50:10
Speaker
You're able to say, that's me cleansed. I'm ready to start my day. If you can breathe it away, if you're not in the shower, it's supposed to be a similar kind of visualisation. Absolutely. Absolutely. So letting this be yours. But the very first step in this would be spend a few moments, even if it's 30 seconds.
00:50:31
Speaker
body scan. How do I feel today? Yeah. How do I feel today?
Morning Affirmations for Confidence and Mindset
00:50:36
Speaker
I was listening to a podcast with Mel Robbins and yeah way she does the whole high five in the mirror thing. It made me realise when she was talking about doing a high five in the mirror and looking yourself in the eyes every morning. I was like, I never like for, like you said, take that time to have that body scan, but I'd never take time to actually look at myself in the mirror. So what I've started doing is when I get up, you know, we go to the bathroom for a stick and I'm washing my hands. I would usually just be gone.
00:51:00
Speaker
I wouldn't even look at myself. So I actually look at myself and be like, and kind of and just say good morning to myself. Yes. Oh my God. Yeah. This this is where, if we're starting at the very start of our journey and we're looking at women who have really significantly disconnected from cell, looking in the mirror is torture for these women. Yeah. Yeah. This is not something, you know, and anyone listening to this right now thinking, Oh my God, I could never do that. I could never look at myself. I don't like a mirror.
00:51:29
Speaker
we work with a lot of women in those situations. yeah So the steps of doing that visualization of self, whether it's first thing is sitting up in bed or getting in the shower and really connecting with the body, what we get to then do, and I'm more than happy to share this with you and your audience as well. So I have a morning affirmations ritual and it's under 10 minutes long. So it's brilliant for it if you are just popping on in your bathroom or your bedroom whilst you're getting ready. You know, you're brushing your teeth, you're putting your HRT on, you're putting your face cream on, you're doing your hair. It normally will give you 10 minutes. And all you need to do is subliminally listen to the messages of the affirmations. And these affirmations are what help us to spiral up rather than spiral down. And an upward spiral energy source is all about feeling empowered.
00:52:25
Speaker
Yeah, having the energy to say, I feel capable today, I feel powerful today, so it helps to bring the energy spiral up just by listening to them. So more than happy to share that for you. Yeah, it's impossible. Like, will you have a link that you could send me that we could put in the show notes that people could click to be able to access? That would be amazing, yeah.
00:52:49
Speaker
Why? So you can listen into those, they're kind of based around kind of confidence boosting affirmations and whether or not you choose to say them back to yourself, you will know when you start to repeat the affirmations that you are progressing in that self-connection. I'm believing I am worthy of this life.
00:53:08
Speaker
and I love that you all you're saying all you need to do is put it on, it just like it's on in the background, you're getting ready, yeah you don't have to believe it straight away, you're just listening. it you You don't. And this is the thing where it's not about toxic positivity of confidence, it's actually about relearning to connect with your body and your cell. I've actually just done, if this is appropriate to share, but tomorrow, so and the 29th of August, 2024, I am releasing a new podcast episode, which is all about the parasympathetic nervous system.
Preview of Next Episode: Parasympathetic Nervous System
00:53:44
Speaker
So you'll be familiar with the three F's, fight, flight, or freeze.
00:53:48
Speaker
yeah But there's actually a fourth one. So I share with everyone inside that episode tomorrow, on the 29th of August, the fourth EH within the parasympathetic and the sympathetic nervous system connection. The reason I bring that up is because it doesn't actually begin with EH, it begins with EH.
00:54:07
Speaker
So I'm not going to spoil it. No, don't spoil it. Well, I will put a link to that in the show notes as well. So and if after you finish listening to this podcast, if you're like, you know what, I need more of this, then be able to click a link and then that that's to your own podcast. Yeah, it goes then to.
00:54:24
Speaker
Yeah, the Menopause Coach is my podcast and the ad episode that we're about to release, like I say, is really, it dovetails into this conversation beautifully because it's all about how women in particular, so we've got research on this, believe it or not, but women in particular, and I'm going to be careful what I say, so I don't ruin the episode. We are doing ourself a very big health disservice and creating a lot of disease with this one thing. So this one final fourth F within fight, flight or freeze response is creating a lot of disease in females. And we've got a lot of emerging research that proves it. So it's by bringing that awareness to the point of this that actually pouring back into you, learning to be okay with you and saying yes to yourself,
00:55:13
Speaker
Having daily self-cares, taking this time to connect with your body each day is going to significantly improve your health better than any supplement stack ever can.
00:55:25
Speaker
And it's free. Amazing. I think that is a pretty nice place to finish. but I'm conscious of of your time and you've given us so much value here in all areas. Thank you so much. If people do want to connect with you, obviously they'll be able to click through that link in the show notes to the podcast. But where's the best place to, to connect with you?
Connecting with Adele Johnston
00:55:45
Speaker
So I'm probably most active across Instagram just now. That's probably where we share a lot more of our bite-sized knowledge and information, but you can just jump onto Google and put in Adele Johnston, the menopause coach, and it will bring up all the platforms that we're on, whether it's the podcast, the website, et cetera. So whatever platform you're most active on, but Instagram, you will find me the.menopausecoach.
00:56:09
Speaker
Final question, put you on the spot a little bit. I ask everybody this. What does the word health mean to you? Freedom. Oh, I love this. Without our help, we don't have anything, right? Without our health, no material items are relevant. Without our health, we don't have our mobility. We don't have freedom of choice. We literally become imprisoned in a body that we cannot live through.
00:56:38
Speaker
I love it. Adele, thank you so much. I really, really have loved this conversation and I cannot wait to share it with everyone. Thank you so much. Thank you. It's been a pleasure. Thank you for inviting me.
00:56:50
Speaker
I just want to say thank you so much for listening to the podcast. It really means so much to me that there are people out there actually listening to what I have to say and to the conversations that I'm having with others. So thank you so much. If you are enjoying the podcast, could you please make sure that you are subscribed? And if not, if you could hit that subscribe button, it really does make that much of a difference. Also, if you would like to leave a review on any of the episodes that you listen to, that you particularly enjoy. I would love to hear what you have to say. And also, if there's an episode that you've enjoyed, please do share it on your social media, in your WhatsApp groups, with your friends. If you're sharing it on your stories, please tag myself in it and whoever I'm interviewing, this it would be greatly appreciated.
00:57:32
Speaker
Also, if you're interested in working with me and my wonderful team, please do you contact me about applying for coaching. So you can contact me at KateHamiltonHealth at gmail dot.com or on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, all Kate Hamilton Health, and you will be able to apply for coaching. We can organize to have a chat and see if it's a good fit for you and get you moving towards your goals.