Perimenopause is no fun alone – so why not have a party?

Taboos are funny beasts. No one invites them in but they hold back some of the conversations that we most need to have. I’ve found that having the guts to push past taboos and utter a few bold words can open a floodgate of much-needed dialogue.
That’s how I found myself around the back-yard fire with a bunch of “50-adjacent” female friends. We were laughing ourselves silly at the waywardness of our ageing ovaries and uteri over offerings of bloody marys and devilled eggs (get it? Our eggs are corrupted …). This was my inaugural PPP – a “Peri/meno Pause Party”.
To back up a bit: I’m a public health academic working on women’s issues, including menstruation and associated sexual and reproductive health. This involves running educational sessions with teenage boys and girls. I’ve been the one providing what is sometimes the first direct information they’ve ever received about periods, puberty and safe sex.
There’s a thrilling moment when the classroom shifts. Awkward whispering between the kids changes to where honesty reigns, euphemisms are exiled and direct questions prevail.
It’s an honour to make that space with and for my students. Yet, I realised that as a 49-year-old woman, I was not challenging the taboos of fertility-related issues in my own life. As my friends started whispering of their hot flashes, rising anxiety and chronic sleeplessness, I hatched a plan to change this: the PPP.
So, I sent out the invite, trying not to overthink it. It went something like this:
The result was some bold friends and neighbours saying yes, turning up with thematic food (think borscht and black pudding), then diving into a three-hour deep fireside conversation. We shared hormone tips (Who’s on HRT? How much and which one? Is the gel body-compatible? Are your breasts swelling up again like you’re pregnant? How long did yours take before it worked? OMG I love it; I can sleep again!).
We compared the contrasting medical advice that we had each received (I got the prescription from my GP; how come you were referred to the gynaecologist? I was told I was too young so they put me on the pill – but I wanted to keep the option of a baby open! What and how much are any of these doctors learning in medical school about menopause?!).
We shared the podcasts and books we’d been turning to in our respective silences (Louise Newson! Kaz Cooke’s It’s the Menopause! Woman on Fire!). The diversity of information was debated (Is this why I don’t feel as capable at work any more? Did I gain more weight from the 3pm chocolate to previously keep me awake or the post HRT bloating? How come I just don’t feel like the me I used to be or want to be?!).
We wondered what our mothers experienced (we’d never felt we could ask them). And we laughed – a lot – about the calamity and mess of it all: weird night hours of wakefulness, fantasies of yelling at those irritating colleagues, radical menstrual cycles of 11, then 42, then 67 days.
As the moon rose overhead and our conversation flowed, we felt stronger and happier for sharing and learning. This moment in time showed just how motivated women are to talk about those beastly taboos that have silenced us for generations. Perimenopause is no fun alone, so why not have a party?