The Menopause Midriff - Sarah Malone Life Coaching

I recently completed a Masters degree in Positive Psychology & Coaching Psychology (MAPPCP) and my final project researched how Hypnosis, Mindfulness and Positive Psychology can affect how menopause is experienced. So during this time I have had plenty of time to reflect on my experience of menopause, and I thought I would share with you my honest account.

As my mother had a hysterectomy when I was a small child, I was not aware of any menopause symptoms she may could have had, and it was not really spoken about in those times. So, my understanding of this ‘thing’ was very limited. I knew that hot flushes were a symptom purely based on working experience as a young 20-year-old. My female colleague really struggled with hot flushes as she went through ‘the change’ (as it was called back then). I remember she was always hot, her face was flushed and she had beads of perspiration on her top lip.

It was her and an office space of three ‘twenty somethings‘, we did not have a clue about the amount of discomfort she was experiencing, to be shamefully honest we were more concerned with the cold and subtly ‘winning’ the AC remote as these hot flushes could change the sweetest lady into an air con dictator. I am embarrassed to admit that a new AC unit was installed while she was absent and the ‘penguin patrol‘ instructed the engineer to place the controls out of her reach. I have a vague recollection of her poking her ruler at them in an attempt to turn them on or up!

Not one our proudest moments, I’m sure. So yes, it could be said I was prepared for the hot flushes, I just wasn’t prepared for the other delights that menopause delivered.

As it would happen Karma came calling early for me; I had just turned 40. Expectedly I did have the hot flushes, together with the night sweats and an ongoing bladder irritation and I was so preoccupied with these… I honestly didn’t even notice the weight creeping up on me—so slowly and quietly. Trousers may have felt a bit tighter and tops more snug, but you wake up to realisation when your knickers begin to cut in. I went from a standard size 12 to a curvier size 16 (on a good day!). Skinny low waisted jeans OUT, leggings and baggy tops IN! I dress for comfort and anonymity, perhaps the opposite to what I did before.

Then the ‘Helpful‘ comments come; ‘You need to exercise more’ or my mum’s favourite ‘Have you thought about joining a gym?’ To a woman that used to forge her own sick notes for PE, this is did not sit well.

So why this gain?

I was eating the same and moving the same but it turns out there are many factors that can contribute to this shift in weight distribution. Before menopause, oestrogen encourages fat to be stored in a “pear-shaped” pattern, mainly around the hips and thighs. As oestrogen levels decline during menopause, its influence on fat distribution reduces, allowing other hormones, including testosterone, to have a greater effect. This can lead to increased fat storage around the abdomen, often resulting in a more “apple-shaped” body pattern. And this was the new me!

And joy of joys, it’s not just fat distribution that changes, metabolism can slow slightly too. The body may burn energy less efficiently, become more likely to store fat around the middle, and respond more strongly to stress hormones like cortisol, making weight loss feel harder even with the same habits. Taken together, these changes reflect a natural hormonal transition rather than anything you’re doing wrong. They simply mean the body is adapting and may need a different kind of support.

I am not body shaming anyone but at a time of hormone fluctuation, this was just another thing I had to contend with

The psychological effects

While society often associates menopause with physical symptoms, the psychological shifts can be just as life changing. Research denotes that many women experience what is often described as a “living loss” — a quieter, ongoing sense of grief for aspects of themselves that feel different or diminished during this stage of life.

Now this I could relate to fully because my changes coincided with my daughter’s; as she blossoming into a young woman; I felt as though I was ballooning into an older one. There was quiet sadness in that contrast. While I was immensely proud of the confident, self-assured woman she was becoming with a developing sense of her own style, it also reflected back what I felt I was losing. I found myself grieving the earlier version of me. It felt like a deep personal loss, silent and often hidden.

Some researchers describe menopause as not as the loss of something entirely gone, but as a gradual shift in identity. It can feel like grieving the person you once were, the ease you felt in your body, or the familiarity of your younger self. This kind of loss is rarely spoken about, yet it can carry a quiet weight as women adjust not only to physical changes, but to a changing sense of self.

Generation X

And yet, within this experience there is also strength. Generation X women, in particular, have built a quiet resilience through decades of change; growing up in a world of shifting expectations, adapting to social and cultural change, and learning independence early. It could be said that this stage of life is no different. While menopause may ask us to pause and reconsider who we are, it is not an ending but a transition, a reshaping of identity rather than its loss.

There can be something quietly powerful in recognising that what feels unfamiliar is still part of a natural process of becoming. Many women begin to reconnect with a steadier sense of self, one less shaped by youth, comparison, or external expectations, and more grounded in experience, perspective, and hard-won self-awareness.

Although the journey can feel uncertain at times, it is also one that speaks to endurance. As Generation X, we have already lived through reinvention more than once, personally, professionally, and culturally. We have adapted, rebuilt, and continued in ways that often went unacknowledged, yet required real strength. Unlike the previous generation of menopausal women many of us are managing careers, supporting ageing parents, showing up for our children or even grandchildren, and still trying to find space for ourselves.

As my peers ‘caught’ me up with their menopause experiences, I notice now that this thing we all go through, can bring a sense of camaraderie. I feel that what was once ‘I’ has become ‘We’ amongst a collective of strong women. The shared conversations, mutual understanding, and even laughter about this change creates connection, reassurance, and a feeling of solidarity during a stage of life that was often navigated in silence.

So this is another chapter in that same unfolding story. We are not losing ourselves, but evolving, carrying forward everything we have been, and everything we are still becoming.