When Hormones stop hiding the Truth. Perimenopause exhaustion, the reckoning after survival mode

I was having a conversation with one of my sons the other day about parenting now versus what I received. He thought it wasn’t much different accept for the presence of technology and having to navigate the impact of that on children. I said it was different because our parents often had their parents nearby and we were also a part of a community who looked after each other. Today we live in such an individualistic way and whilst in our area we have a strong community, the fact remains that people are really busy and trying to get by the best they know how and having to do it largely on their own.

Then I thought to myself, so many of the women I work with arrive at perimenopause in survival mode. Completely exhausted from all their years of mothering. For many, the years of mothering where we have sleep deprivation, a heavy emotional labour that we carry and years of trying to juggle work and home, the endless giving of energy mean that they live in a constant state of adrenaline and cortisol, just to get through the day. The lack of the ‘village’, of communal nervous system regulation means women are doing it alone all the time.

The workplaces we are in are designed for male bodies that have a linear hormonal cycle, predictable energy no ebb or flow. Not a 28 day cycle that has big fluctuations. Women’s bodies are cyclical, not linear. Energy, focus, and capacity shift across the menstrual cycle, and later in life, across hormonal seasons. But the expectation is “always on,” with no space for luteal slowdown, rest, or recalibration.

As technology innovation, particularly with AI and productivity culture has become the norm we see 24/7 emails and messaging which results in blurred boundaries. The demand is: faster, always available, produce more. Women’s bodies , designed for rhythmic cycles of activity and rest, are being pushed into an unnatural pace. This results in dysregulation, burnout, sleep disruption, and a sense of disconnection from their body wisdom.

As we normalise this we tell ourselves, this is what mothering means today, this is what being an adult woman means today. But the cost is high because our nervous system becomes very frayed and depleted. So by the time perimenopause arrives and estrogen and progesterone are both low, we experience; disturbed sleep, small stressors can trigger big reactions, our emotional regulation is harder, and or body doesn’t bounce back the same way it used to.

Most of us haven’t learned much about the impact of our hormones on our nervous system at all.

So yes, there is a question we have to explore about learning about our hormones and their impact on our nervous system and our behaviour. But for me, the bigger question is; How do we design lives, workplaces, and communities that honour the body, especially the cyclical, relational, deeply intuitive female body? And if you are thinking male bodies aren’t impacted by all of this, think again. Until we address all of this, our health, healing our nervous system, learning to find some regulation, it will all feel like we are swimming upstream.

Perimenopause as Turning point.

The reality is perimenopause often reveals to us the impact of decades living in survival mode. As estrogen and progesterone decline, their buffering affects on the nervous system start to fade. Estrogen is supportive of bonding, it is the soothing and accommodation hormone, it supports oxytocin and the bonding and pleasure from connection that that brings. Progesterone brings us calm. Also these two hormones don’t decline in an orderly fashion during our perimenopause transition. Progesterone declines first and estrogen has lots of ups and downs that makes us feel internally chaotic, as it moves towards its lower levels once we reach menopause. What they do both reveal is nervous system exhaustion and without their support we can no longer mask the cost of being in survival mode.

Oxytocin, pleasure and women’s nervous systems

Oxytocin is a key neuromodulator of the female nervous system. For male bodies Dopamine does this. Pleasure, touch, connection and community increase oxytocin, which builds resilience and vagal tone. Reduced estrogen can reduce oxytocin but pleasure can replenish it. Pleasure isn’t an indulgence, it is biology. Every moment of genuine pleasure — a hug, gentle self-touch, laughter with a friend, being moved by music, lying in the sun, safe intimacy, sexual and sensual pleasure — stimulates oxytocin, the neuromodulator that calms the female nervous system. Oxytocin counters cortisol and adrenaline, it strengthens vagal tone (our capacity to return to calm) and it builds a felt sense of safety and belonging. When you look at from this perspective, pleasure becomes medicine for midlife. It replenishes what decades of survival mode drained away.

Vagal Tone and Menopause

Vagal tone measures the activity of the vagus nerve, which regulates the body's "rest and digest" functions, and it's often assessed through heart rate variability (HRV). So Vagal tone is the body’s ability to regulate stress and return to calm. A lower vagal tone = more reactivity, poor recovery from stress, disrupted sleep. Estrogen decline may reduce vagal tone, making regulation harder. There are practices that help: yoga nidra, breathwork, gentle movement, singing/humming, somatic experiencing, safe touch. Yoga Nidra has been a game changer for me and I have found when I do it consistently, I sleep well. My brain also feels more relaxed. Somatic experiencing has many ways it helps but in this context it helps people build their interoception which is their ability to be with their internal experience - feelings, sensations, emotions. So when we become dysregulated it can be so helpful because we have a connection with all our feelings and emotions and have strategies to be with them and let them move through us. Rather than resisting them. All of this isn’t just “self-care”, it’s rewiring the nervous system for the next stage of life.

The bigger question: Lifestyle and systemic change

The real problem isn’t our biology - it is the culture we live in. Lack of community, unsupportive workplaces, and unrealistic expectations push women into survival mode. Women’s cyclical bodies need rhythms of rest and renewal, but society doesn’t recognise or honour them. We are made to feel like something is wrong with us. We are made to feel we are not resilient enough. Menopause is clever in many ways, It is a truth teller that often opens our eyes to dysfunction in our facets of our life. Culturally it reveals this mismatch. It’s not a personal failing; it’s a cultural design flaw. I wonder what would happen if work hours were designed around the rhythms of a female body?

Post Menopause brings Sovereignty

Menopause is not just loss, it’s an initiation into a new stage of power. With nervous system healing, women can access deeper calm, intuition, and authority. Post-menopause can be a time of reclaiming sovereignty, no longer running on survival mode but living in alignment with what nourishes us. Menopause is the autumn season of our life and often involves lots of reflection and review where we are called to let go of what we don’t need anymore. Many women often find their physical and mental health creates a strong impetus for all these changes to happen. It is hard to ignore what no longer works for us.

Menopause is not a medical “problem”it is a cultural opportunity: a chance to change how we live. Every time a woman honours her cycle, chooses rest, or reclaims pleasure, she disrupts the old patriarchal model and helps build a new one. So here we arrive with an invitation. What would it look like if we built a culture that truly supported women’s bodies — not just to survive, but to thrive?

For me the bigger question here is It’s not women’s bodies that are broken. It’s the systems we’re forced to live in that ignore how women’s bodies actually work.

Do you ever wonder why breakups physically hurt even when we are over the person?

I was reflecting recently on something I’ve felt myself and seen in many clients: that even when you know your relationship is over, your body might still ache with a different kind of grief — the loss of the other body. The loss of the nervous system pattern you've known.

You see when we end a long term relationship, whether it be an intimate or close platonic relationship, it is not only the financial and logistical separation and negotiation that happens. Our bodies keep the score and there is a physical separation of nervous systems that have entrained to each other.

Our nervous systems attune to the bodies we live with. Even if the relationship was painful or over long ago, your body might still long for their touch, their presence, even their smell.

This isn’t about wanting the person back — it’s about missing the co-regulation, the shared rhythm your nervous systems built together. It’s why sleeping alone can feel painful. Why your skin aches. Why you cry and you don’t know why.

Entrainment is when two nervous systems get in sync with each other, a bit like two clocks ticking together or two metronomes lining up. When you live with someone, your breath, heart rate, stress patterns, and even sleep rhythms start to line up with theirs. Your bodies learn each other. That’s why, when they’re gone, your body still remembers that pattern — and it can feel strange or even painful until you find a new rhythm.

The entrainment of nervous systems, especially in close relationships, is such a subtle and powerful force. It’s part of why even dysregulated relationships can be hard to leave — because the body gets patterned into that rhythm, even if it’s chaotic or unpredictable. I some times think of this phenomena as co-dysregulation.

In healthy relationships, this entrainment creates a deep sense of safety and grounding. But in any relationship with proximity over time, the nervous systems begin to sync — breath to breath, step to step, sleep cycles, even hormone levels. It's primal. It's ancient. And when it’s gone, the body doesn’t just let go because the mind says it should.

When this stops, the body reacts with disorientation, grief and longing.

This isn’t about missing the person romantically or doubting the decision. It’s about the withdrawal of co-regulation — a physical and energetic loss. Where there was once a warm body, there is now space. The nervous system goes through a recalibration, and sometimes, a kind of withdrawal.

We can experience shame and confusion around this.

Many people feel embarrassed or confused by their grief, especially if they initiated the separation or felt clear. They may wonder: “Why am I crying? Why does my chest ache? Why do I feel so alone? It is important to normalise that this is nervous system memory, not a sign that they’ve made the wrong choice.

What are some practices that can support you?

Orient to touch — a hand on the heart, a warm wrap, a pillow beside your body in bed.
Use scent, rhythm, and sound to create new patterns of regulation.
Let the body feel the grief — let the tears, the ache, the longing move. The body needs to move downward to express grief so sometimes, lying on a soft nest of pillows can be a really supportive way to do this.
Use nature, animals, breath, or trusted others to co-regulate in new ways.

Remember, relationships ending can be both a liberation and a loss. Our bodies are sometimes slower than our minds when it comes to moving on and they ask us to honour what was, whilst we are moving into what is next for us.

The invitation here is to trust the wisdom of your body and honour this unique grief without judgment.

Healing our abandonment wounds

Many of us have abandonment wounds. They are deeply imprinted in the nervous system, often at a very young age. When our early emotional needs weren’t met—when we lacked attunement, presence, or consistent caregiving—an abandonment wound can take root deep within us.

There are many reasons this happens, sometimes it is a really stressed or depressed parent, a parent who is extremely unwell themselves, and unable to connect and attune to us. Sometimes it is circumstance. I have worked with many people who were premature babies who spent their first few weeks in a humidity crib, so didn’t get the touch from their parents in those first few weeks to soothe their tiny nervous system. Even though one of their parents were most likely there with them all the time, sitting by them, they were separated by a little wall.

This is how deeply wired we are for connection and co-regulation when we are tiny. Our nervous system learns through regulation from our parents and caregivers.

Abandonment wounds are not always obvious. Sometimes they show up not as a gaping wound, but as a subtle hum of anxiety in our relationships. A feeling of being "too much" or "not enough." A belief that love must be earned, not received freely.

To avoid the unbearable terror of disconnection, many of us learned to fawn. We became hyper-attuned to the emotional landscape of others. We learned to appease, to over-function, to say yes when we meant no. We self-abandoned in hopes of staying connected.

Fawning is a survival strategy. It’s what our nervous system chose when fight, flight, or freeze didn’t feel safe or available. While it helped us survive, it often keeps us from truly living—because it asks us to leave ourselves behind.

Healing the abandonment wound isn’t about blaming our caregivers—it’s about reclaiming the parts of us that learned love meant losing ourselves.

Attunement is largely body based; eye contact, mirroring through action and language and most importantly, we attune through touch. These are all essential in establishing secure attachment. When these components are missing our nervous system learns to perceive that we will be left on our own.

For female nervous systems, which are more finely tuned to social engagement because we have lots of estrogen, which creates oxytocin, wiring us for connection and bonding - this perceived abandonment can often be felt more intensely. So we fawn to establish connection.

When we fawn, when we please, appease, over-function, we abandon our own needs. We stop asking for what we want, because we know our needs won’t be met. We hyper-attune or hyper-socialise to stay connected and receive the sense of love, safety and belonging that we all need at a very foundational level just so we can function.

Healing self abandonment begins when we learn not to abandon our selves. When we learn to feel our big sensations and emotions and stay in our body, expanding capacity inside of us to be with what what life throws our way. When we learn to self-soothe and have our little strategies to come back to our zone of resilience. This establishes a sense of safety and trust within ourselves and then we learn to trust others.

It starts with learning how to stay with ourselves. To feel what we couldn’t feel then. To expand our capacity to be with emotion and sensation—including the terror that once overwhelmed our small bodies.

Very slowly, as we learn to stay, something beautiful happens; we begin to trust that we will no longer abandon ourselves and that safety, the safety of self-attunement, becomes the foundation for all our relationships.