E051: Menopause

now on to this episode.

Hello. This is James, and this is Jane, and here we are again with another episode of a world of work podcast. What are we chatting about today? Jane, today we are talking all things menopause. Oh, what fun. I've waited all my life for this conversation.

I don't know if you're serious or not, so yeah, we're going to talk to the brilliant Reese Devlin from let's talk menopause, and we're going to look specifically at what the experience of women in the workplace is, who are experiencing menopausal symptoms or perimenopausal symptoms, and how they we can maybe meet their needs better in the workplace. Yeah, that's right.

This is part of our series on inclusion, and as Ruth says, this topic of menopause probably sits fairly well with a lot of women's health issues, but also, there are some messages to do with inclusion in relation to menopause as well. So we think it fits well here, absolutely. So I think we can probably dive straight in. Let's do it.

Okay, so here we are. We're in the core of this week's episode. We're speaking to Ruth Devlin from let's talk menopause, and the conversation today is all about menopause. Before we get into the conversation there, Ruth, would you be able to introduce yourself to the audience and say a bit about your background. And yes,

sure, hi there, and thanks for having me on great. So I'm a registered nurse, and when I started experiencing permenopausal symptoms myself, I was a little concerned about the disparity of the information out there and also the lack of information available. So in about around 2014 I set up, let's talk menopause to help to raise awareness, but also to provide easy accessibility to information which was easy to understand but remained accurate and evidence based.

Yeah, and if we think about, you know, menopause in the world of work, it's not in least in my experience and background, been a topic that's been high on the agenda. And, you know, this series is about inclusion and diversity. What's your view about the role of menopause? More,

yeah, no, I quite agree. It has remained this topic which, which does? There's a great stigma attached to menopause, unfortunately. And I think it's now becoming a topic with the, you know, the the raised amount of media, that's that media coverage around menopause, but also, menopause is COVID under the under the Equality Act 2010 so that's making a few organizations perk up and think that they need a menopause policy, which is a good thing, but also to make sure that women are valued within the workplace, particularly Because we, you know, we are an aging workforce. We weren't designed to live this long women. You know, in the early 1900s of maybe, average age was 59 we menopaused at 57 menopause at later age. And now average age is 83 and we're menopausing, you know, around 51 years of age. So demographics have changed slightly, and so we have to be in a healthy state moving forward in the workplace. Yeah,

that's powerful. I hadn't realized about the sort of reflections on later life and the extended life period and work in that stage. That's interesting. I listened to somebody a little while ago. I listened to a podcast on menopause as part of my prep great, and they mentioned two stats that really stuck with me that I wanted to get some reflection on one it said that for some women, they'll spend about 25% of their working life in a menopausal, perimenopausal stage of life, which seemed like huge to me. I'm putting my hands up on fairly nativist subject. And the second thing they mentioned is they said that they think up to 10% of women leave a workforce during that menopausal period. Have you got thoughts on?

Yeah? No, that's absolutely true. Yeah. I mean, it's one of these topics which remains, because it remains to be this taboo topic, unfortunately, and at the end of the day, it is just part of a woman's hormonal journey. So that's part of my job, I feel, is to raise awareness and provide information to try and normalize it as a topic. But yeah, women, because it's a female health issue, and they don't think that it's a value reason to take time off work, they'll maybe not communicate with their managers or communicate with their colleagues as to the reasons that they're taking time off work or that they're embarrassed by the symptoms that they're experiencing. So some, maybe the some of the psychological and emotional symptoms though you know that they're experiencing, and they don't like to admit that they're experiencing those, or then some of the physical ones they're finding embarrassing as well. So, but they they don't value those symptoms enough to either go to their GP with or to communicate with their. Menopause, then manages that it's a valid enough reason to take time off work. So then maybe, but then take low paid roles, part time roles, and then eventually, unfortunately, take early retirement.

You know what's interesting? I in one of my last last jobs, I managed a team, and several of the women were of menopausal age, and only one of them actually spoke to me, and so we had a conversation, but I didn't initiate it. I didn't, you know, I wouldn't have known how to go about initiating that conversation, and I think she was uncomfortable about it as well, so it was a little bit difficult. But if I think about her career trajectory, she ended up diminishing the things that I feel that maybe she wanted to do, and her confidence in the role, and ended up moving into a sideways role, and then ended up leaving the organization

that I was in. And I think it is really sad, and I think sometimes it can also be your perception of how you are performing within your role as well. So, you know, to colleagues, you outwardly, you might be just behaving as normal, maybe slightly more rotable, and maybe having the odd flush, but actually doing, you know, coping with your workload satisfactorily, whereas you yourself, it's bit like the spawn analogy. You're sort of serene on the on the top and then peddling furiously away underneath, and you're not coping at all, not coping with life, not coping with relationships and or the pressures at work as well. So it's all about communication and information. And I

think one of the things that's really, really struck me since I've started exploring some of the material around it is how little women themselves are necessarily aware that that's where there's, particularly in the early stages and and some of the some of the psychological symptoms around anxiety, around lack of loss of confidence, quite It seems to be that people are understanding now that a lot of women may not understand that's what they're experiencing at the beginning of that, and then lose this confidence and start to feel like there's something wrong. Yeah,

yeah. No, definitely. And I think some of those symptoms that you mentioned, the emotional, psychological ones there, they can be some of the first symptoms to appear, but you don't necessarily associate those with the perimenopause. Yeah, a lot of women, you find they don't really want to think that that stage in their lives. They don't realize it can start in their early to mid 40s with some of those symptoms. And you know, we're not known as that sandwich generation for anything. We've maybe got teenage children, which create a little bit of pressure on one side, and then we're coping with elderly parents as well. So a sandwich between the two. We don't get much time to think about ourselves, either. So these symptoms can slowly start to evolve, and we're putting down anxiety and stress, you know, for other reasons, rather than just having the contribution of Eastern deficiency in there, you mentioned just to because I think

it's a really important point. James was just saying that maybe his knowledge about the basics of menopause, and certainly mine given my hand too, because I, I had a really interesting conversation with my GP. But it would be really helpful, because you, you just mentioned that symptoms quite often start in the early to mid 40s. Now it would be really helpful, probably for the audience. What? What would it what would be early, what wouldn't be early, and how long can it go on for different stages?

So I have a phrase menopausal. I have a phrase perimenopausal, post menopausal. Okay, understanding that would be helpful.

Okay, no, that's fine, right? Okay. So if you're pre menopausal, in that reproductive phase prior to anything starting when you're perimenopausal, that's the most symptomatic stage. Prior to becoming menopausal, you can only be classed as menopausal when you've had 12 continual months of no bleeding. And then so you're only menopausal for one day, and then you go into your post menopausal years. The misconception around that word perimenopause is that a lot of women I come across, they don't think that, you know, they have that that's the stage that they think they have to put up and shut up with all their symptoms, and they have to get through that and get to the menopausal stage before they maybe start trying to think about getting treatment. If they want treatment, then that is the time that they should go and seek advice and have that conversation with the healthcare professional, fine. So that perimental stage then, and how long does a perimenop stage last? Oh,

well, that's very, very different for each individual. I mean, you know, stats say between four and 10 years, but it is really very, very different with each individual. And that's that's also why it's such a complex topic for people to cope with. Because, you know, we've got 80% of women will experience symptoms. We've got 20% of women who just sail through and wonder what all the fuss is about, which, you know, creates the problems, because they really, genuinely think, you know, something running on again, and they've no idea how debilitating some of the symptoms.

And just when you mention the symptoms, am I right? I've read somewhere that the symptoms kind of very much can come and go and go and present for a while, and then disappear, and everything seems like everything's fine, and then it comes back again. So it's very sounds, very disconcerting.

It is very disconcerting. It's very random. You know you as when you first start off in that perimenopausal phase, as you say, symptoms can come and go with all your hormones fluctuating up and down. And then as you gradually that. Gradually go through the stages, then it become more profound. Yeah, definitely. But there's huge range of symptoms, as though the 34 different symptoms is easier, sorry, 30 more, 34 different symptoms, you're obviously, hopefully not going to get. You might not experience any. You might be fine, definitely, definitely already down that road. So it's easy to it's

easier to it's easier to understand them. Split them up into different categories. So you've got your physical and you've got your psychological symptoms, and those are classed as your relatively short term symptoms, and then you've got your genitourinary symptoms, which some of your long term symptoms, so anything to do with your urinary symptoms and your vaginal symptoms as well. So you've got long term symptoms as other ones, like osteoporosis and cardiovascular as well. But you're not all going to experience all of these symptoms, so it's easy to understand, if you split them up into these categories and then explain the different ways you can cope with all these symptoms. And

wow, okay, and then from a work perspective, which is what we often talk about, and it's kind of our main focus, yeah, what for you? Why is it really, really important that people in the workplace understand a bit more about the menopause, about the symptoms and about the way it

impacts? Well, I think because you everybody experiences them in such an individual way, you know, one person will have maybe a hot flush to one person might be a warm glow. Might go a little bit red in the neck and the face. You know, the second person along the line, they look like they've just walked off a squash court. So within two or three minutes, they are literally dripping with sweats. So they can be really some of the symptoms can be really debilitating. You know, if you've got problems with every you know the most common symptoms that people know about hot flushes and night sweats and night sweats and then changes in your menstrual cycle. So some women, again, the ones that sail through it, they will just stop having their periods, and then they'll, you're or maybe have gapping in between months, you know, and and, and then they'll just fizzle out, whereas other people, they develop really heavy bleeding. And this can be really debilitating, especially within the workplace, you know, especially if you're in an office which is miles away from the local boots or something like that, and you having just have a random period, you have flooding, you have heavy bleeding, and it's extremely debilitating.

Yeah, and when we think about you mentioned earlier, things like a policy around this, and then you know, when you're describing the impact that it has on people in the workplace, I haven't really come across a menopause policy before can I say a little bit about what that might be and what people might Yeah,

it's like any policy that you have within the workplace. It's just covering you really need to cover all the different symptoms that you could potentially suffer from and ways to cope with those symptoms, and also provide guidance for management. So provide guidelines for management to adhere to, you know, provide making sure that they're providing consistent behavior towards women who could be in that time of their lives, but also making sure that they know the reasonable adjustments to make within the workplace, so practical measures that they could take, which usually don't actually cost that much, but it just means that, because you're accept, you know, acknowledging it as a long term health condition. It's not a lifelong condition, but it is a long term health condition. By acknowledging it as that and providing the policy and then making those reasonable adjustments, you are then valuing and supporting your workforce on

you. Is there something about sort of making the policy public that brings this as a conversation,

I think so, yeah, and it needs to be easily accessible, and also not a great tomb of document that people are not going to go near. You know? I mean, you can get an awful lot onto four a four sides and just making it easy to read and understand, so that people will actually bother to read it.

And do you come up in your work? Do you come across organizations doing this well, yes. And what's that difference it makes to the women involved? Huge

amount of difference. Yes, definitely. Because even a couple of organizations I've worked with, you know, if you if they provide a talk for staff, they're always encourage men to come along to the sessions as well. More often than not, you'll maybe get one or two token men, or you won't get any men at all, yeah, which is a no brainer. That sounds right, yes, well, it's for a couple of reasons. A they don't want to they're not interested, they don't want to attend, or they're really interested, but they don't feel that. They don't feel comfortable attending with a mass of women, or they don't think that by attending, that the women attending will feel comfortable. Yeah, you know, to be able to ask those sensitive questions. So there's a huge diverse range of reasons why they don't attend. So ways of getting around that is to provide mail only sessions, which have been really useful, really, really well attended and really interactive. So they've worked really well. You know, I've had emails back from male managers who have said, it's brilliant. Now my now my staff, know that I'm informed they they might not come and talk to me about the vaginal dryness, but they'll come and talk to me about all sorts of different issues. They'll feel more able to actually admit that they're feeling as they are feeling, and, you know, describe the symptoms, and know that they're going to listen to Yeah, which is good.

And in terms of. Of, you know, putting together, this feels like the type of thing that organizations that listen to us might look to put together for themselves or bring people in. What kind of things would you cover in a session, either, you know, a mix mixed sex session, or a session for men?

Okay, so first of all, I would do the basics about the menopause. So you go through all the symptoms, the physical symptoms, psychological symptoms, gender and symptoms, long term symptoms, and then ways in which you could cope with those symptoms. So whether that's either naturally through lifestyle choices, diet and exercise, or I would always explain the basics about hormone replacement therapy, and then alternative remedies and supplements, and then the alternative therapies that everyone needs to engage with as well, and then also cover reasonable adjustments that businesses can can make going forward, things like, you know, if you've got business, industry or organization where people wear uniforms, for instance, you know, somebody who's having lots of hot flushes, they need a good supply of uniforms to change during the day, and they need to be made of natural fibers, because synthetic fibers are nightmare if you're getting hot and dripping with sweat, yeah, and things like, you know, if you've got problems with your menstrual cycle, your miles away from the nearest pharmacy or boots, then just providing free sanitary products within the bathrooms is a no brainer, and it doesn't cost a lot.

Well, the fact that that doesn't happen anyway is a whole nother podcast. It does. It does in some organizations. Interestingly, the library I use Edinburgh library, I use University. They have a whole students Student Society for doing that. And I I just think it's brilliant. And I think, yeah, it's very simple thing to do.

It's so simple. So it sounds like a lot of what organizations need to do is think more and engage with the topic and

just provide simple information sessions for staff, but make sure that managers and HR are attending as well, and that can be a little bit of a problem, because they're very good at providing information sessions for the staff, and then they don't follow that through with the managers coming on board as well, and you're not going to make Those reasonable adjustments. If the managers aren't on board and informed, you can't just do the tick block exercise. You have to, you have to be informed.

So I've got a question, yeah, and I guess my question is a little bit from my perspective and where I've been in the past. We we are speaking about menopause here as part of our series about inclusion itself and things like that, I guess, as somebody who's been a male manager of women of menopausal age in the past, what could I do in the future to be more open and to be more you know, the type of person that people might want to speak to about their menopause? Obviously, it feels to me that I wouldn't want to initiate those conversations. Tell me if I'm wrong. But what could I do to to come across as inclusive and to leave the door open so that people could feel that I was approachable, if that was the right thing for

them? Okay? So you could do it in a slightly raised very hard, obviously, to start a conversation with a female colleague and even suggest, do you think you're menopausal? It's not really a good line to come out. My palms are sweating, even just literally every listener don't

do that. They don't do that. That is really not the right route, even if you know any colleagues for a very long time, I think initially, do it in the roundabout route. So so provide the education for people so that they know that that it's becoming a topic which is, which is at the forefront of your mind and that you're accepting as a long term health condition, and then provide information which is accessible so and also, if you put putting flyers up so bullet points flies up around the office as well, to make sure that people know it's acceptable to talk about it as a topic, maybe not specify, even just go along lines and specify menopause, maybe, maybe do it under the umbrella of women's health, female health issues. So you're covering things like endometriosis, infertility and menopause, just to make people so there's not as much stigma attached as well. But you'll find that if people know you've had that information session, then they'll feel more comfortable coming along to talk to you.

And if they're really stuck for resources, they could say, oh, I listened to this great podcast with this lady talking about menopause in the workplace, it was really useful, yeah,

but it's having resources available to to signpost people to as well. So if you've got small, small bits of information that you can hand out as well, or that are just on site that people can pick up as well. So, you know, signposting to really good websites, websites like the patient arm of the British menopause society is the women's health concern. So they've got really good fact sheets on there about any topic, from HRT to breast cancer to journalists use anything like that, you know. And if you're prematurely menopausal, then the daisy network is a really good website to sign, paste people to. If you've got one of the five gynae cancers, then the Eve appeal is a really good resource things like this deal,

and you mentioned in your introduction that you really passionate about evidence based information, absolutely. And so it sounds to me like these are good places. They might all. So be some information circulating around? It's not always evidence based. Could that be? Is that, I

mean, there's a huge amount of information on the internet, isn't there? It's just, it's just making sure that you're putting those right websites out there? Definitely. Yeah, listening to the people who really work within, within the organizations, and who you know, clinicians who are practicing currently, as well within the field of menopause. So I'm say take the topic of HRT. I personally wouldn't read a newspaper on HRT. I would go and read up about that on the British menopause society or other women's health concern websites I just read. Do you have a website name for the British menopause society? Is it just it is British menopause society.org, sounds like a good link for people that does. Yeah. And also, can I say,

if you know of a GP who is maybe not as informed as they might be, I mean, GPS have a very, very hard role, but if they're not interested in female health, then you know it's not their speciality. So go, go on to the British Mel society. Try and get them to actually join. Doesn't cost that much, but if they don't join them, they can scroll onto the top to publication, scroll down for tools, for clinicians, and they'll get really good summaries on any topic to do the menopause. That's excellent. Yeah, really helpful. Yeah. And you should download, just anybody who's a practice manager, download those summaries, laminate them, put them in their office, and it's a really good resource.

Oh, that's brilliant. Yeah. And do you when you when we talk about research, obviously, historically in women's health generally, there has been, should we refer to it as a little lag in maybe exhaustive research, in the way that some of the other more generalized health conditions across the population have been done? So there's been, there's certainly, I've read, probably in the papers, but that there is maybe there hasn't, up until maybe the last decade, been as much research on women's health issues as there might have been on counters and health issues that affect both men and women. That is that something that's true is that getting better.

No, I can, has been a lot of research done? Yeah. I'm the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the British menopause society, they continually having researched. So do you think the challenge is, then it's not reaching the public? I

think the challenge is, yeah, communicating that information and all that knowledge to the general public. Yeah. So they kind of doing all this work. But then

you usually find that a lot these, lot of these organizations are run by clinicians who are still practicing. So they have full time jobs, and so they're very busy people. So if you, if they, you know, if you go to one the BMS is conferences, you've got clinicians who are lecturing and speaking, and that, you know, in addition to the to the their everyday roles, so you know that it's limited to the amount of time they can they can put into these things,

yeah, of course. And so obviously, it sounds like you're trying to fill some of that void, trying to

bridge the gap slightly. There's lots of people like me. There's quite a few more people in down in England, definitely. And lots of organizations who could recommend as well. If you're in England and you want some referrals? Yeah, definitely got in touch. But no, it's getting that information out, but getting it out into very, you know, easily accessible and making it easy to understand for the Layperson as well. Okay,

great. Well, you know, as we've been having this conversation, we've had conversation topics that help, probably, individuals focus on their experience in menopause, and their, you know, the people that they work with, and little bits for organizations as well. We've talked a little bit about there still being some stigma around menopause, and maybe it not being as much of a conversation topic in broader society as it could be at that broader societal level. Do you think there's stuff that people can do to de stigmatize menopause or bring it more to the public conscience, broader society, as in, as in, not just within the workplace, but within, you know, I guess popular culture, media representation, yeah,

yeah. I mean, Reese, I just recently had a book published, which is, men, let's talk menopause. Because, you know, a lot of women who come little plug, there lots of women who come along to my talks, they, you know, they're saying, Well, this is great, but I'd really like my partner or husband or male colleagues to have all that information. So it's, again, it's providing information in an easy to read format and easily accessible format. And

when you just going back to you mentioned you do some men only talks, so they've got a space to ask me, Did they ask? Is it very much the same questions that the women are asking or

very similar questions. And I don't change my slides at all. I don't change the information I give at all. They get every single bit of information. So literally, just about giving them that space, giving them that space,

and they are genuinely really interested and want to know, because they lots of time. You think, you know, if you're a male manager within the workplace, you've probably got a perimenopausal partner or wife at home, you know something's happening with these colleagues that you know you've been working alongside or for the last 10 years, and you're sort of sandwiching them between the two. You just don't, you don't want to go home, you don't want to go to work. Don't what you're going to get when you get there. Yes. So it's with sheer relief sometimes that that men get the information said. Know, you know what to expect, I think. And you know, knowledge is, is very important, isn't it? Yeah,

yeah, it's good. When we started this conversation back at the very beginning, we had a couple of conversations about a little bit about the stages of menopause. I don't I think you asked a question about ages, and you talked about sort of premature menopause and things like that, yeah, could you talk through roughly what the ages are. I know it's unique, but roughly,

yeah, roughly menopausal age is about, is about 51 perimenopausal, and then you are, majority of women will be fully menopausal by the time they're full 5456 Yeah, if you're prematurely menopausal, that's classed as being 45 and under. Okay, so you've got quite a let me think there's stats, it's but it's one in 100 or under 41,000, under 30. So, and that's for differing reasons. So maybe naturally, they're prematurely menopausal, or maybe through unfortunately, haven't had surgery or chemotherapy or radiotherapy, something like that. So and differing reasons. Yeah,

so one in 1000 is a small number, but it's not vanishingly small. No, so pretty much. I guess everyone that listens knows somebody who would have been menopausal in that under 30, yeah. And it can

be really debilitating, you know. And also the z then the issue of fertility problems as well, if you're becoming prematurely menopausal and maybe you haven't had time to have your family by that times, there's all sorts of fertility issues as well to think about. Yeah,

that's interesting. And in terms of some of the systems, some of the symptoms, we've broken them down into physical, psychological and genital urine area, yeah, in terms of some of the psychological ones, what would you summarize up as, or what types of things do you think people so

the classic things that people experience are anxiety or stress, irritability, anger. You know, one woman said yes to me under talk. She said, rage, just rage. Okay, yep, that's true, yeah, and low mood swings. But low mood swings are really, really different to clinical depression, you know, but some people could go on to develop depression as well. Anxiety could lead to panic attacks, things like that. But it's learning how to cope with a lot of the symptoms naturally, which is really important. So if you go and see any menopause specialist or anybody who's treating you, they should always go, and they always will. If you go and see a menopause specialist, they will talk about lifestyle choices. First and foremost, the diet, your exercises, with any health issue, trying to go down that natural route to start with is the best, is the best way to go down first of all. So what you eat, what you drink, how much you're exercising, can really have an impact on on how you're experiencing your symptoms and then thinking, you know, particularly for some psychological, emotional symptoms. And there's an awful lot of research going into cognitive behavioral therapy at the moment, positive mindfulness, thinking about apps like headspace and calm, things like that, really important to engage in all these things

and with those sort of psychological symptoms, what sort of time span. I mean, does it does it change? Is it fluctuating? It

does it fluctuates with your hormones? Definitely. Yeah. But also, there's always different contributory factors as well. So it's not just the estrogen levels that are declining. It's your pressures from work, pressures from family relationships, things like that that play a role, lots of different things that impact and

I'm guessing that at times, things that you might have normally been able to roll with, been resilient, been able to cope with, suddenly, might have a spike in absolutely the way that you react to them. Yeah, you

might start catastrophizing a bit, a bit too much about certain things which you would never have been bothered about it, you know, certain people that like just take an example of, you know, friend of mine saying, you know, I just stand in front of my wardrobe and I absolutely dither about what I'm going to wear that day. She said, Why am I doing this? You know, just simple things like that. And then people wonder, why? Why? Why am I doing this? Now, you know, it's just just your brain. Just don't think it's just the imbalance and hormones. So the more you can think about trying to rebalance those hormones. So rebalancing the hormones naturally, first of all, and then, if I'm full, you know, if you if you feel, you know, lots of people will say to me, How do I know when I need hormone replacement therapy? Well, I think you know the time to go and have that conversation with your healthcare professional is if your symptoms are really impacting on the quality of your life. And then that's maybe a time when you might want to go

and you mentioned those natural things around diet and exercise, I would imagine sleep must play as

well. Yeah, no, definitely change. Yeah, no, definitely. And a lot of people will experience insomnia at this time, and chops of sleeping at this time, yeah, definitely. But there's, again, there's lots of different contributor factors. So you've got, you know, pressures from work and children. You know, we're all living very fast, frenetic lifestyles these days, unfortunately, not giving ourselves enough time. So that's all about. And somebody's always about giving, making sure you've got good sleep hygiene. And then, you know, we're all on our LED screens late. You know, your bedroom is an extension of is not an extension of your office, that sort of thing. You know, trying. Shut down an hour before you go to sleep for insomnia, all your screens, things like that. And

then just interesting, because we've asked this question in a couple of episodes about what, what women are now doing, who maybe are experiencing symptoms in the public eye and what? So we talked about this with them, with a couple of the other episodes about if someone was looking for a good role model who's talking about this stuff in the public eye? Yeah, obviously, we've got your website, we've got some good places, but are there, are there women that you see talking about this in the public eye that you think, yeah, they talk a lot of sense, or that they seem to signpost in a good way, as in better known people, yeah, kind

of people that might be sort of a part of people's daily lives anyway, because they're either on telly or they're reported. Well, I

think the coverage that they did on BBC Breakfast was exceptional. That was really good. They really, they went and chatted to the BMS, and they really got the right people on that program. So they did the week's coverage on that and got the right was that that was quite recent. That was quite recent, yeah, with Louise. I can't remember her second name, sorry. I know breakfast, Penny, yes. So she had been experiencing paramedic symptoms, and so they went around in the right way. So that was good. So if you can see any coverage on that was good, okay, also the Kirsty walk documentary, who she did that probably about two, think three years ago. That that was a very big 2016 Yeah,

good. I know. Do you think we will see? I mean, this is this is somewhat guessing, but given the way that we're becoming more open about this and we're talking about these issues more, do you think we'll see more women in the public eye talking about it with comfort? Do you think that's so? I think

so. I think the more it's talked about, the more it's normalized and the less stigma attached. So people, you know, feel that they they were, you know, more comfortable talking about it. Definitely, I don't think, yeah, I think that will definitely move forward.

Good, cool. And last question, a bit of a leading one. Hopefully it doesn't answer here. Well, the second last question, there'll be two leading ones in when we talk about, you know, rolling out things like inclusion and training and things like that in organizations. In your view, do you think that this should form part of all the inclusion training that's out there? What's your view? Yeah, I do agree with it. Yeah, definitely. I think

it's a very important topic. But I think try and include it in the umbrella of women's health issues overall, you know, because there's lots of different you know, issues like endometriosis women, there's quite high percentage of women who suffer from that and suffer in silence as well, because they're embarrassed by that, or they don't know, you know, what they can do about about that condition as well. So any any health, any female health issues, should be, should be included in a menopause policy, in a policy. Cool. Is it time for the last leading question? You can go for the last question.

If anybody wants to find out more about you and the things that you do, how can they find out? How can they learn from what you've been

doing? Okay, well, I've got a website which is called, let's talk menopause.co.uk. My email for that is info at, let's talk menopause.co.uk so one word, just yeah, no hyphens

or anything, or lowercase, yeah. So they can get in touch me by that, yeah. And if they want, anybody wants to organize a talk within their organization again, just drop me an email and we can have a conversation. And what was your book again? Can I get that

on your website? Yeah, they can get that on Amazon or Waterstones. And that is men. Let's talk menopause. Maybe I should read that. Yeah, I feel like I might buy it for you. Conversation,

on break this morning. It shouldn't be right?

Yeah. Well, it's humorous as well, and it's got some sketches in that my son did as well, just to add a bit of humor as well, but, but the information in there is packed with information. So brilliant. Sounds

like a winner, yeah?

Well, it's just time to say thank you. I guess that was excellent. Really informative. And speaking for all the guys out there, it is, you know, this is a conversation that I think a lot of guys don't have, and that people struggle with. It's a bit of a strange and unusual conversation for a lot of men. So I think for more of it, guys can get involved.

Yeah, everybody. I'm I'm apparently, on the face of it, one of my first friends experience symptoms. I'm probably not, but apparently am, and I, I was surprised how hard it was to figure out what the right information was to do. So thanks for coming on talking and hopefully people can take something to improve the experiences of women in the workplace. Absolutely brilliant. Well, thanks for having

me on. Okay, here we are. You're back with us now. That was our conversation with Ruth. I thought that was excellent. Yeah,

it's really nice to know there's people out there like her talking about this issue and helping people understand what it means for women in the workplace.

Yeah. And from, you know, from a male perspective, I think it's a conversation, but it's sometimes difficult for men to get involved in for several other reasons that Ruth mentioned in there, and I think anything that we can do to learn more. And be more inclusive is really helpful. Yeah, I

really took from like, it's interesting, she's a registered nurse. She was a nurse, right? And I there's a real, no nonsense, practical, helpful approach that I really appreciated in the way that she approached a lot of that information. Yeah, in terms

of takeaways, one of the things that I wanted to bring up here was something that we actually mentioned offline, but I think it's worth bringing up. She said that one of the things that organizations can do that can be really helpful to increase awareness and inclusion towards menopausal women is to create menopause drop in rooms or drop in sessions. And she said, Well, these are monthly or BI monthly sessions where you get a room with lots of information about menopause, and women can just drop in. They can read information, they can speak to each other, and they can have it as a space to engage with menopause as a topic and get to know other people. So I thought that was a great suggestion that we didn't manage to squeeze into the actual recording. Yeah,

I think that's it makes total sense, right? A place that you can just get away and be yourself. And I think the other thing that I think was really interesting was that she called out that idea that there isn't research. There's lots of great research. It's just that maybe it's not always communicated brilliantly. So if you go looking at some of the places that she suggested, there's lots of really useful information, evidence based that will help you understand a little bit more about this topic. Yeah,

cool. All right. Well, I enjoyed it. Informative. Another good episode, I think. So. I guess it's just time to say, we'll catch you later. Yep, absolutely. Have a have a good week. Yep, Bye, everyone.