Speaking out about perimenopause at work
Our focus for this Season is the 4 Ms (Monthlies, Miscarriage, Maternity and Menopause) and I'm delighted to welcome Zoe Latimer as my guest. Today, we'll be speaking out about perimenopause at work.
A big thank you to The Surrey Park Clinic for sponsoring this season. Many of us don't prioritise our health. Whether we are juggling work, home-life or family, we often put our health concerns to the bottom of the list. But going through periods, gynae concerns, fertility problems, pregnancy and menopause can be physically and emotionally draining and can affect our confidence. The Surrey Park Clinic can help and will put your health first. Open 6 days a week and offering both virtual or in-person consultations, they are offering our listeners 10% off all initial consultations when you reference this podcast. To find out more, call 01483 454 016 or visit www.thesurreyparkclinic.co.uk.
About this episode
Our focus for this Season is the 4 M’s which are Monthlies, Miscarriage, Maternity and Menopause, and how these can affect women at work. I’ll be talking to some incredible women and experts from around the world to share their real-life stories, advice and tips, to inspire you in your career.
Today I'm welcoming my good friend Zoe Latimer as my guest. Zoe is Head of Commercial Strategy at the Ministry of Defence and like me is currently going through perimenopause. Today we'll be breaking the taboo by speaking out about perimenopause at work, talking about the impact of perimenopause on working women, and tips and advice in managing symptoms whilst progressing your career.
Resources
The Surrey Park Clinic: The Surrey Park Clinic is offering our listeners 10% off all initial consultations when you reference this podcast. To find out more, call 01483 454 016 or visit www.thesurreyparkclinic.co.uk.
Free Energy Tracker from Karen Skidmore: Business, Life & Leadership: www.karenskidmore.com/theconfidenceconversation
A great list of the many perimenopause symptoms: https://www.meno-me.co.nz/the-34-symptoms-of-perimenopause/.
Defence Women's Network on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/13977947/
Women in Defence UK on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/women-in-defence-uk/
MPowder: https://mpowder.store
Moody Month app: https://moodymonth.com/app
Channel 4’s Menopause Policy: https://www.channel4.com/corporate/menopause-policy
My Confidence Matters Hormone Hubs: A major obstacle for women at work is dealing with the 4 Ms – Monthlies, Miscarriage, Maternity and Menopause. The symptoms and side effects of all of these can be debilitating, impact a woman’s confidence and can lead to many days of sick leave, taking extended time off work or leaving the workplace altogether. Our Hormone Hubs are eight-week virtual group coaching programmes delivered on Zoom for up to eight women at a time to support your women with coaching, health and wellbeing support, access to specialists and providing a support network of colleagues. They can be run as a Menopause Hub, Monthlies/Period Hub, Maternity Hub and/or Miscarriage Hub depending on the needs of your organisation. Get in touch to find out more.
Episode transcript
Joy Burnford: Hello Zoe, and welcome to The Confidence Conversation.
Zoe Latimer: Hi, Joy. Thanks for having me.
Joy Burnford: It's lovely to have you here. So this episode is speaking out about perimenopause at work. And for those listeners who don't know, perimenopause means ‘around menopause’. And this is the time when your body's actually making the transition to menopause. And it usually starts in women around their 40s. But it can be even earlier and it can last for years. It’s something I'm going through at the moment. I didn't quite expect it to happen quite so soon in my life, but it has! I know you've had experience with perimenopause over the years. I think potentially you're still in that phase. And it'd be amazing if you could just talk to me a little bit about when your symptoms started. And whether you realised that's what it was at the time. Just tell me a little bit about your experience. And this phase of your life.
Zoe Latimer: Yeah. So you know, it started, and you really made me think about this actually, kind of how long ago this started. So I'm 46 and about 2016, going into 2017, I just felt like there was always something, I felt slightly like a hypochondriac. There was always some weird symptom or something that’s not quite right. And in the end, I just started jotting things down and sort of thinking these don't seem particularly linked, they don't seem at all related. And some of those things where sense of smell really changed. And this was pre-Covid. And I kept getting this weird taste in my mouth, and then stuff that was slightly innocuous and could be anything, like feeling bloated, digestive issues, more migraines, and I didn't know I'd kind of had but the more and more symptoms that I was getting. And I just kept jotting them down and keeping note of them. I was sort of aware that you know, I'm coming up to mid 40s. You know, this could be a possibility. I think the thing that really, really hit me though Joy was December 2018, my husband was actually away, and I had a complete meltdown. I was utterly convinced that I was pregnant. So I would have been, you know, with a seven year old child, I'd had really terrible postnatal depression after having her and so the thought of being pregnant in my mid 40s, which for some people is fine, but for me really wasn't. It really, really, really freaked me out and my body felt so pregnant, you know, my breasts, my belly, everything was like this is unbelievable. And it wasn’t until I went to see a doctor fairly sharpish that they confirmed that I wasn't. And that was the point. And that was the doctor who was just so fantastic. Just saying, I think this is perimenopause. And that's okay. You don't need to worry about it.
Joy Burnford: And wonderful that you had a doctor who recognised that because I know a lot of people go to the doctor and they just get given antidepressants or, you know, they don't recognise you know, symptoms for getting better, I think, from what I've heard, but
Zoe Latimer: I think so. I think there's a lot been done by the likes of Davina McCall and Meg Mathews and others to just talk about it and make it you know, less of an embarrassing topic.
Joy Burnford: So you've talked about some of those physical effects. Can we talk about some of the sort of psychological effects? So how did it affect your sort of emotional mental wellbeing?
Zoe Latimer: So this is the really hard stuff, right? The physical stuff you can try and deal with and you can get over. In corporate life, it's unforgiving, as you know. And the single biggest thing that I have found hardest during this time is the brain fog. It is absolutely at times, it can be crippling, it can knock your confidence, it can absolutely pull your own credibility away from you. I had an awful moment, in an interview earlier this year, where I swear, I couldn't even have told you what my name was. And that brain fog, and that sort of panic and anxiety isn't something that I've been particularly used to in my personal or working life. So that was a real shock and actually makes you sort of question yourself, you know, you hear about lots of women who, you know, they start hitting menopause and they withdraw and they pull away from stuff at work, because the responsibilities suddenly become too much
Joy Burnford: Did you need to take time off when you first discovered this and when it sort of started impacting you?
Zoe Latimer: So I have taken time off over the last couple of years. Definitely for side effects and symptoms of perimenopause. I'm not sure that I've ever badged it as that Joy. I'm not sure that I've kind of explicitly declared that on my sickness form.
Joy Burnford: Have you spoken to your employer about it? I know you moved companies around when you first started getting your sort of perimenopausal symptoms, and I think you've talked to me before about how you felt it was a really difficult thing to cope with them? Tell me a bit about that sort difference from when you first experienced it in your last organisation and then moving, you know, to your new place of work.
Zoe Latimer: I didn't broach it with my previous employer, right. It just wasn't the right kind of environment to talk about that at all. And I think there were probably other things there that would have complicated that conversation. And I felt like this was something that that I had to deal with, in that place. Certainly, where I work now, the Ministry of Defence, it’s very different approach. And you would, you would almost think the opposite, but it’s really been actually, the inclusion and the communities within defence. And the fact that you know, as a senior female in defence, you can talk quite openly about this and kind of coach people and interest people and empower people to talk about it. It's a really different environment. I've certainly spoken to my current line manager about it, who also is going through similar symptoms, and that's helpful. I'm not sure I'd want to talk to a bunch of military guys about it. But in the future, why not?
Joy Burnford: I think that's a challenge, isn't it? Yeah, I think you feel more comfortable relating to another woman, I guess the challenges could be around if you have a male boss, you know, how do you broach that. And I know a lot of companies are now doing a lot more around menopause and menopause policies, and all of that, which is great.
Zoe Latimer: There's a particularly great network in defence. And actually anyone can join on it on LinkedIn, which is the Women in Defence Network, and they are doing so much to raise awareness and do sessions. And again, I think that it's just so important for people to be aware of it, the problem that I think with perimenopause, it does just feel like lots of little symptoms, and it kind of builds up and builds up to a point where then you just feel like you utterly can't cope. And that's the frustration. That's the real challenge of actually being able to step back and say, Okay, I can do something about this symptom. And I can do something about this and I need to take a bit of time for myself, to rest to recuperate. And again, I think that that's just been quite important for me.
*** Joy Burnford: I do hope you’re enjoying the conversation so far. I want to take a moment to tell you a little bit more about my reasons for doing this podcast. At My Confidence Matters our mission is to advance gender equality through building confidence and capability. I’m passionate about enabling every woman to have the confidence to progress in their career, and I love talking to, and sharing women’s stories to inspire others. This podcast forms a small part of what we do, and if you think there’s room for improvement in the way your organisation understands and manages the issues, barriers and obstacles that women face in the workplace, please do get in touch or tell your HR contact about us.
And don’t forget, if women’s health issues are impacting you at work, the highly experienced team of specialist fertility and women's health consultants, nurses and sonographers at The Surrey Park Clinic are offering you 10% off all initial consultations when you reference this podcast. ***
Joy Burnford: I don’t know about you, but I only really learnt the word perimenopause about five years ago, and knowing what it was. I just thought menopause was like you were just going to suddenly find that you stopped your periods. And that was it, like goodbye periods. And that was it, you know, you might get a bit of you know, hot flushes or whatever. But over the last five years, I've become much more aware of this. And obviously, my mum never had any symptoms, she tells me she didn't have any menopausal symptoms. So I've haven't really ever had any experience of that growing up. And I think also children at school don't tend to have too much education around it, which I really hope changes in future.
Zoe Latimer: My mum and I were talking about this recently. And she said, you know, we never heard of the perimenopause, you know, you knew about the change. And it was, you know, some sort of dark guarded secret, you know, and she said, we didn't have the internet, so you just didn't have that accessibility to look at, look things up and diagnose yourself with all these random ailments, which I feel like I probably spent quite a few years doing.
Joy Burnford: And I don't know about you. But well, when I was growing up, I thought the menopause happened to women who were like, kind of wrinkly and grey. Like, oh, my goodness, I'm not there yet.
Zoe Latimer: I know. I know. Yes. But you know, I think we're embracing it.
Joy Burnford: So you're much happier now. Which is amazing. I think when we first met, you did come to do some of our training, didn't you? Like you did our Speak Up programme, which I wonder if that was, you know, linked to perimenopause.
Zoe Latimer: It’s a good point, it was. And it was such an opportune moment that you were running those courses and talking about how much confidence matters, and particularly in the workplace. And it really helped me find a voice. And it really helped me just connect with a different group of people who happen to be female. And it was a really supportive environment. And I think that, again, there's this talking and being in these communities, whether that's one or two people or more is so important. Maybe it's me, but I quite often feel like I'm going a bit crazy, or that it's just me. And if you don't vocalise that, and if you don't talk to other people, you can imagine how quickly you'd go in a downward spiral.
Joy Burnford: Absolutely. And it's something I'm actually looking at now, looking at whether we can help organisations offer things like group coaching around topics like, you know, menopause, or returning from maternity or some of these other challenges that women face, that men don't have to, you know, obviously, there are other things that men have to deal with, you know, in other areas. So, tell me now, obviously, you've kind of come out of the other side, or maybe not, maybe you don't feel like you're coming out the other side! So it's really, you're sharing your advice with our listeners. So what's your advice for women now, if they wanted to talk to their line manager, or employers about what they're experiencing? You know, how can they go about raising it? Do you think they should and what support could they be asking for?
Zoe Latimer: So I think it's definitely worth understanding whether there is a menopause policy at work, you know, there are a few places that are doing it, Channel 4 have got some really great work underway there. And I know some other organisations and central government are definitely working on pulling together some of these resources and content, but see if there's something available, see what your employees programme offers. But that might feel like quite a big step to take. And I think just having a confidence with somebody where you work, just helps, you know, you might have that moment in a presentation where you go completely blank and you need them to help you out. I think there's absolutely no shame in that. Don't broadcast it if that's not your thing. I know lots of friends, colleagues, actually, we're all really vocal about it and we will tell whoever wants to listen about, you know the benefits of HRT or exercise or cutting certain things out of your diet, and I talk to my daughter about it a lot. She's 10. So she's coming the other way. So this household is a rage of hormones.
Joy Burnford: Poor men in the house, that's all I can say!
Zoe Latimer: I think you know, if it is something that you feel is so adversely affecting your work, you've got to talk to somebody in your line management chain, because they might be thinking, what's happened, what's happened to this person, they don't understand. That conversation doesn't have to be a complete outpouring, maybe it will be actually, you might find that then you can just come away from some of those things that are a bit more uncomfortable for you, when you're having a particularly anxious or down moments. Or if you've got particular symptoms, that just means you don't want to be sat in an office or on Zoom, you know that you can just have some reasonable adjustments to make sure that works for you. I would say that one of the biggest things is, and I mentioned it earlier, is just having a bit of time for yourself. And if you can do it every day, I do a half an hour HIIT class, every day.
Joy Burnford: Wow. Impressive.
Zoe Latimer: But if I don't do it, I'm miserable.
Joy Burnford: And my dog walking, I suppose.
Zoe Latimer: And it is just that moment of you, that kind of you reflect on your day, and it gives you a bit of time to think, or you just completely exhaust your brain so that you can have a bit of a rest from the noise that's chattering away.
Joy Burnford: And we were talking briefly about HRT, and I think that's the other thing, I didn't realise that there is a lot of different medication out there. It's not just one pill that you can take. And there's so much, I think my advice from my personal experience that I've been through that, you know, there's so much out there, don't just sort of accept the first thing that you're given, look into it and research it as well, because that's something I wasn't aware of.
Zoe Latimer: Oh, yes, I think it's a real trial and error. And I've been, I've been relatively lucky with HRT that it really, it really suited me, and that I've benefited quite quickly. But I've heard horror stories from people of, you know, it just not working, and not having that cooperation and relationship with a doctor or health provider to kind of try different things. It must be incredibly frustrating if you try and it doesn't work.
Joy Burnford: Absolutely. And I ended up going to a private doctor, actually, and spoke to somebody. And I think my recommendation would be if you can do that, try and find a private doctor to have a good hour and a half conversation, not just a 10 minute window, and really understand and get them to talk to you about the options because that made my life so much easier. Because I was like, wow, you know, there's all these things that I can do. But I don't think I would have got that.
Zoe Latimer: I agree. I agree. I think some of some of the specialist healthcare in this area is definitely picking up. But I recognise that's just not for everybody.
Joy Burnford: Brilliant. And I think in terms of sort of tips and advice. You've talked about, you know, doing stuff for yourself. Have you got any advice about, I don’t know whether you do this, but sort of anything about monitoring your cycle or your productivity levels? Have you ever gone into that sort of that area?
Zoe Latimer: I have done. I have done a few things. So actually, one of my symptoms in the last 12 months, it's been particularly awful is that I've had eczema all over my face, never had it before. And it got really, really terrible. And so I became quite good at not only doing a sort of food diary, but also monitoring symptoms, monitoring all my vital stats, and just really keeping an eye and some of those trackers are fantastic. And I heard one of your guests the other week talking about one of those trackers, the Tracker?
Joy Burnford: Yes, Karen Skidmore’s Energy Tracker.
Zoe Latimer: Yes, it was Karen. I can't remember which one I've used. I've used a couple. I use them for a couple of months. And then I dip out but it's good to see a pattern and it's good to kind of just pick up on things where you go. Uh huh. That's the point where I'm feeling rubbish. And I need to just go on a long walk.
Joy Burnford: And it's creating that habit, isn't it and just trying to remember to do that. Yeah, absolutely. So we've talked a lot about if perimenopause is affecting you or if it might be affecting you in the future. There'll be listeners today who are not necessarily in that space, but they may be line managers or colleagues or friends. And I wondered if you could sort of given advice about what they can do and how can they show support to others who may be going through this? What would your advice be to them?
Zoe Latimer: So I think, like any good coach in this situation, be there to listen. It's such a frustrating time. Whenever it happens, and you feel so much mixed up about it and that, you know, you might feel slightly like a hypochondriac or that you're going slightly mad, you might not be sleeping well, sometimes you just need somebody to really listen, and you might just need a good moan. Or you might just need a little bit of advice. But actually, if people could do that, I think that would be so supportive. And, you know, share the advice and tips if you're female, or you know, your wife has some great things that she does, you know, feel free to share it. You know, this is something that is becoming more and more present and more talked about. And I think the more we just dispel any vicious rumours about it happening to old people than we are, we're in a good place.
Joy Burnford: Absolutely. And you're right, it's that listening is so key. It's not about trying to fix something, as you know, I'm writing my book called ‘Don't Fix Women’ for exactly that reason, because a lot of it is about coaching, it's about listening, and being there for people and you're totally right. So looking back now, you know, what's your one top tip, if we can leave our listeners one top tip for women who are struggling with perimenopause at work today?
Zoe Latimer: So I think you know your body, you know when something doesn't feel right, even if it's a tiny niggle, and my tip is just listen to what your body is telling you, tune in, understand what it is, don't dismiss it. And then try and come up with a plan of attack, you could sort of really boil the ocean, you could diagnose yourself with all kinds of things. And I really, really wouldn't encourage anybody to do that. But you know, you ultimately are the only one that knows if you're not feeling right.
Joy Burnford: And if listeners need additional support, do you have any suggestions of good websites or anything like that, other resources that where people can go? Well, also, we'll look at putting some of these in the show notes as well.
Zoe Latimer: Yeah, so there are some definite resources, M powder is one of the communities that are pretty good. And I've used their resources quite a lot. I have to be honest, I've got a couple of groups of friends who are just full of advice and tips. So what I will do Joy is I will send you over some of those links, because as usual, my memory has just,
Joy Burnford: completely been hit by brain fog, it had to happen!
Zoe Latimer: I know. I know.
Joy Burnford: Thank you so much for sharing and being so honest, it’s such a personal thing. So thank you so much for sharing your experience with listeners today. And it was lovely to have you on the show.
Zoe Latimer: Thank you Joy.
Joy Burnford: And that’s it for this week. Thank you very much for listening and I’ll be back again soon with another Confidence Conversation. If you know anyone who might find this podcast useful, please do pass on the link and it would give me a real confidence boost if you could subscribe, rate and leave a written review (on Apple podcasts here or on Podchaser here). If you like what you’ve heard, sign up for updates where I’ll be sharing tips and notes from each episode and you can send in your ideas for future topics.
And remember you can get 10% off all initial consultations at The Surrey Park Clinic, when you reference this podcast. To book, get in touch at https://thesurreyparkclinic.co.uk/.
Thank you, and until the next time, bye for now.