I have been very touched by your responses to an article I wrote for Caria, Mental Changes During Menopause. What a thoughtful, smart, brave group of women.
Your honesty reminded me, yet again, how important shared experience is for all of us, to not feel alone in difficult times.
Because, the details of our lives are different from one another, but through menopause we share a great deal — from physical pain to lack of sleep to cognitive changes.
No matter what shape our lives take, the medicine for greater well-being is the same: to accept, to exercise self-compassion and to go deeper into what matters to us.
I’d like to share more on this topic with you, as well as to respond to some themes in your comments about the first article.
Accept, but Still be Proactive
Some women said they could see the wisdom of acceptance during menopause, but also felt that tools to improve mental acuity, like eating well and brain games, were a good idea. To that I say a resounding, “Absolutely!”
Accept your new realities of menopause, but be proactive, too. Menopause brings changes you can’t control, so take positive control wherever you can. Exercise your mind and body, see your doctor to make sure there are no health issues that need attention, meditate if you’re drawn to or reconnect with a creative project.
Take advantage of the wide range of resources here on Caria, such as articles, courses and guided practices.
Other women said they wanted to practice acceptance around their cognitive changes, but found it really hard. I did too.
I only started to turn the corner when I realized how resistance affected me. When I paid attention to it, I noticed that resisting my symptoms made me extremely tense, anxious, brittle and vulnerable. When I tried to be more accepting, I was a bit more open, soft, available. Sometimes this openness uncovered some sadness or grief, but I was more relaxed, more present and had more capacity to connect with people.
What Can you Do Instead?
Many of you said you shared the feeling of being less yourself because of some cognitive changes. For me, these changes were quite depressing, until I was willing to consider different ways of being and expressing.
For example, humour is a core coping mechanism for me and my siblings. It is an effective way we learned to deflect tension in the family. Laughter can be a wonderful way to break tension and reconnect. But, during menopause, I felt humour had become a kind of veil, a safe way to cover over my more genuine desire which was simply to be loving with others (you can always say you were “kidding,” if things don’t go according to plan).
So, I started to keep an eye out for times I used humour as a shield, as well as other reflexive ways of behaving. I don’t want this to sound laborious, just another thing to work on! We’ve all had enough “learning experiences,” am I right? It was more a curious exploration for old habits that I might want to leave behind.
You’ll know if this kind of exploration could be a fit for you. As some ways of being and expressing become less available or automatic during this time of life, there may be other, more true ways waiting to be–finally–rediscovered.
If they are genuine, natural parts of you, they’ll grow with your attention and caring like an acorn grows with warmth and water. Things that cover over your nature, like those habits we learn to get by, actually take a lot of energy to maintain and must eventually fall apart.
Meditation Changes over Time
It was so helpful for me to hear that quite a few of you said you enjoy meditation, but have found that harder with menopause, too. I appreciated this because I went through a very painful period when, as a lifelong meditator who depended on the peace and clarity in practice, I found it increasingly hard to focus.
For a few, desolate months, I felt I had lost something central to myself and my well-being.
I tried to identify the reasons for it, but in the end decided it didn’t matter. Instead, I leaned more on acceptance and self-compassion for what I was experiencing: a hard time focusing and inability to sink quickly into silence. Then I was more able to be present with what was there, rather than what wasn’t. I was still there. I used body- and breath-centred meditations more than mind-centred meditations to ground in my body which in turn helped my mind to refresh and calm down.
Keep It Simple
Our minds want to make everything extremely complicated, especially if it’s something that upsets us like these cognitive changes. We think that something as simple as going for a walk or doing a breath meditation for five minutes is kind of pointless. “What good is that going to do?”
We want to mentally understand, before we try. But ideas and understanding don’t always make us happy or increase well-being. Try going for a walk. Or, doing a breath meditation. See how you feel, what changes. That’s all that matters in the end.
To find guided practices on dealing with cognitive changes, head to Caria’s Explore section and check out the course called “Combat Brain Fog.” I hope they will be a help to you all.
Originally published on hellocaria.com.