Women of a Certain Stage

In this episode, Lauren welcomes Megan Bird from Seattle, Washington—event planner turned perimenopause podcaster and newly minted menopause coach. Megan's story is one many will recognize: the perfect storm of kids, COVID, and perimenopause that drained all the joy from what used to be her dream job, leaving her confused, stuck, and searching for answers.
For nearly 15 years, Megan ran a successful event planning company (70% weddings, 30% corporate—though financially the inverse), fueled by her love language of words of affirmation from grateful clients. But when her "give a shit was just tapped out," she knew something was profoundly wrong—she just didn't know what.
This conversation dives into the snake oil saturating the menopause industry (from useless supplements to sketchy "qualifications"), why Megan waded through the noise to find real, evidence-based education, and how sleepless nights with sleep scores between 20-50 finally pushed her toward exploring hormone therapy. She also shares why she initially didn't plan to coach but changed her mind halfway through the diploma, and how she's now launching "Coming of Rage"—a perimenopause-focused podcast co-hosted with her best friend since age eight.
If you've ever felt your joy bleeding away without understanding why, if you're waking up soaked through and changing clothes at 5:30 AM, or if you're desperately seeking real information in a sea of misinformation, Megan's story will resonate deeply.
Key Points Covered:
• From Dream Job to "I Don't Give a Shit": For 15 years, Megan owned an event planning company that was her pride and joy—weddings and corporate events (Xbox PR team included). She loved ushering stressed clients through high-stakes, high-budget events and basking in their gratitude: "We couldn't do this without you." That affirmation fueled her—until it didn't.
• The Trifecta: Kids, COVID, Perimenopause: When kids came along, COVID hit, and perimenopause started, the things that used to feed Megan "started to really fall flat." She struggled to understand why things that made her happy no longer worked. "All my joy is bleeding away," she said. "On paper it looks like you have everything, but it felt not that."
• The Confusing Soul-Searching: Megan felt "really stuck and really confused as to why I was stuck. It felt really sad." She couldn't put a finger on what was wrong—a common experience for perimenopausal women who don't yet realize what's happening.
• Early Onset Dementia Fear: Lauren shares her own experience of thinking she had early-onset dementia, highlighting how common it is for women to have no idea menopause is the culprit—even healthcare professionals like Lauren with a background in performance don't always connect the dots.
• The Snake Oil Industry: Megan describes the supplement industry (especially in the US) as "overwhelming"—particularly hair loss products claiming to fix perimenopausal hair loss. Her OB/GYN best friend confirmed: "That is just absolute garbage. Half of this stuff doesn't even get absorbed by your body."
• The Chocolate Bar Con: Lauren shares seeing a chocolate bar with a new label and tiny new ingredient (that does nothing in that quantity) repackaged as "menopause chocolate" at twice the price. Same product, new marketing gimmick.
• Sketchy "Menopause Coach" Programs: Before finding Women of a Certain Stage, Megan investigated programs that felt "very oily"—downloadable bundles of papers with no human interaction. "If you just regurgitate this 500-page printout, you can be a menopause coach. I wouldn't trust somebody with that accreditation. That feels really sketchy."
• The Instagram DM Reality Check: Lauren shares a recent message from someone who took a downloadable course (no coaching assessment, no human interaction) and now doesn't know how to actually coach, get clients, or build a business. "Can you just tell me what to do?" The person was referred to a business coach because information ≠ implementation skills.
• Why She Chose Women of a Certain Stage (The Big 3):
Personal connection: Listening to Lauren's story resonated deeply—"I felt like I connect with this person"
Top-tier experts: Meeting and learning from "movers and shakers in the industry" gave phenomenal confidence
Live, synchronous learning: "I wanted dialogue. I wanted to meet other people in the cohort. I wanted community."

• Asynchronous vs. Synchronous Explained: Asynchronous means no real-time interaction—just workbooks, tests, and due dates done alone. Synchronous means face-to-face (or screen-to-screen) learning with mentors and cohort members. Megan didn't want to be "floating out there in the menopause space alone trying to grab at stuff."
• AI's Role—But Humans Are Essential: Lauren discusses how AI is coming thick and fast (she attended Oracle conferences on AI back in the early 2000s), but believes deeply: "We still need that human-to-human contact. By seeing each other's eyeballs, watching body language, being in the same vicinity—that's what gives us fuel to be the best version of ourselves."
Timestamps:
[00:01:00] From dream job event planner to "give a shit tapped out"
[00:02:00] Words of affirmation love language and client gratitude
[00:04:00] Kids, COVID, perimenopause trifecta
[00:06:00] Desperate for real information in the noise
[00:07:00] Snake oil salesmen everywhere
[00:09:00] Sketchy menopause coach programs
[00:11:00] Why Women of a Certain Stage (the big 3)
[00:13:00] Asynchronous vs. synchronous learning explained
[00:14:00] AI is coming but humans are essential
[00:16:00] Waking up at 5:30 AM in Seattle
[00:17:00] Coming of Rage podcast launch
[00:19:00] Coaching mind-change halfway through
[00:22:00] The birthing industry comparison
[00:24:00] Not everyone can deep dive for 90 hours
[00:27:00] American healthcare's preventative care failure
[00:29:00] Sleep: The #1 cross to bear
[00:32:00] Hockey stick sleep decline and considering HRT
Connect with Megan:
• Instagram: @comingofrage • LinkedIn: Under construction (coming soon!) • Podcast: "Coming of Rage" launching end of February 2026
Resources:
• Women of a Certain Stage Menopause Coach Diploma: https://womenofacertainstage.lpages.co/menopause_coach/
• Free guide: "Top 5 evidence-based menopause resources" → womenofacertainstage.com/menopause-resources
• Oura Ring: Sleep and body temperature tracking
• Women's Health Initiative (WHI): Original 2002 study and subsequent updates
Content Warning: This episode contains frank discussion of sleep deprivation, night sweats, loss of joy, and includes swearing. Megan's podcast "Coming of Rage" will feature "lots of swears"—listeners, you've been warned!
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Meet your Host:
Lauren is the founder of Women of a Certain Stage and creator of the Become a Menopause Coach diploma program. Having experienced early menopause at 37 (diagnosed in her early 40s after initially fearing early-onset dementia), Lauren is passionate about providing real, evidence-based education in a market saturated with snake oil and misinformation.
Lauren's program features live synchronous learning with top-tier experts, human-to-human connection across global time zones, and ongoing community support for 12 months post-graduation.
Ready to cut through the noise and get real menopause education?
Book a free discovery call: https://bookme.name/womenofacertainstage/lite/tmsh
Join a live cohort where you'll learn from medical experts, practice coaching skills in real-time, and build a community that will support you for years to come—not just hand you a 500-page printout and wish you luck.
Disclaimer: Information shared is for educational and entertainment purposes only and doesn't replace medical advice. Always consult with healthcare professionals for your specific situation. Sleep scores mentioned are from consumer wearable devices and should not be used for medical diagnosis.

In this episode, Lauren welcomes Sarah Cooper, founder of Flamingo Menopause Coaching and a graduate of the Women of a Certain Stage Menopause Coach diploma program. Sarah brings over 10 years of HR experience, specializing in diversity and inclusion strategy, employee experience, and most notably, building workplace belonging—particularly for women navigating menopause.
Sarah's journey from contact center customer service to leading diversity and inclusion initiatives for an entire organization is a masterclass in identifying gaps and creating solutions. When she joined her last corporate role, they were just beginning to explore menopause support. Sarah volunteered to set up the menopause support group from scratch—and what she learned became the framework for seven other employee network groups across the organization.
This conversation explores what diversity and inclusion really means beyond checkbox exercises, why belonging (not just fitting in) is the foundation of workplace culture, how one painting of a flamingo became a business metaphor for creating safe spaces, and why Sarah's "menopause geek" tendencies finally found their perfect outlet after redundancy gave her the push she needed to go all-in on her passion.
If you've ever wondered how to make menopause support feel like genuine cultural change rather than a lunch-and-learn tick-box, or how to transition from corporate security to entrepreneurial freedom, Sarah's story will inspire you.
Key Points Covered:
• From Customer Service to Employee Experience: Sarah started her career in contact centers on the phones, then transitioned into HR about 10 years ago—swapping customer experience for employee experience, which became the foundation for her people-first approach.
• The Menopause Support Group That Changed Everything: When Sarah joined her last company, they were just beginning their menopause journey. She volunteered to set up the menopause support group from scratch, and her learnings from that became the framework for seven other employee network groups across the organization.
• What D&I Actually Means: Diversity and inclusion isn't just about reporting gender pay gaps or diversity in hiring (the "hard elements"). Sarah's strategy was heavily focused on belonging—making sure everyone in the organization felt they had a place, were accepted, understood, and valued for their unique contributions.
• Belonging vs. Fitting In: You can have diversity and inclusion policies without having a diverse workforce. True belonging means diversity of thought, acceptance, finding your place in the organization, and feeling like you truly belong—not just fitting into someone else's mold.
• The Family Analogy (With Caveats): Sarah is resistant to calling workplaces "families" because you're being paid to be there and many families are dysfunctional anyway. But the sense of belonging she aimed for was similar—ensuring women of a certain age don't feel pushed out, misunderstood, or like they no longer belong.
• Culture Starts with Line Managers: Senior leadership matters, but most employees (especially in large contact centers) never interact with the CEO. What makes the real difference is your immediate team and line manager. Do they understand you as a person, not just your role? Do they show kindness, flexibility, and genuine care?
• Common Sense Isn't Common: Sarah's HR mantra: "If we just had managers that use their common sense and were nice people, we wouldn't have HR problems." But somehow that common sense seems to "leave them at the door" when they become managers.
• Lunch-and-Learns Don't Change Culture: One soft lunch-and-learn on menopause (or any topic) doesn't make culture change. Real transformation requires line managers and team leaders developing life skills—listening, communicating, understanding—that go beyond any specific diversity topic.
• The Flamingo Story: Sarah originally planned to start her business in 2020, but COVID derailed it. After getting made redundant again, she thought: "If I'm ever going to do it, I need to do it now." The name came from a painting she created at a leadership offsite—despite her art teacher once telling her she had "good ideas but couldn't put them into practice."
• Creating Safe Spaces to Thrive: The painting instructor broke the task into manageable chunks, created an environment where everyone felt safe, and didn't judge anyone's work. Sarah came away with something that "vaguely resembled" the example and thought: "I quite like this." That experience of creating safe spaces for people to thrive became her business philosophy.
• Flamingo Fun Fact Friday: Sarah is implementing "Flamingo Fun Fact Friday" on social media—sharing fun facts about menopause to educate and engage her audience with personality and playfulness.
• The Menopause Geek Revelation: Sarah has "always been one of these people that researches the hell out of something" and became "a bit of a menopause geek." When she got made redundant, she'd been thinking about training anyway—and realized this was her moment.
• The Conference That Changed Everything: Before being made redundant, Sarah saw Lauren speaking at a conference (where Vicki Ramsden also spoke, who later became a faculty member in the diploma). That planted the seed for choosing Women of a Certain Stage.
• Why This Program: Sarah knew she didn't want a self-paced online course with no interaction ("I just don't do it"). She wanted live sessions with accountability. She also didn't want to just train people to deliver material—she wanted coaching skills because coaching was already part of her leadership style.
• The Comprehensive Factor: Sarah was impressed by the comprehensiveness—not just menopause and coaching content, but also business mechanics for setting up your own practice. The quality of teaching and variety of expert speakers exceeded her expectations.
• The Personal Growth Surprise: Sarah expected to learn information but "hadn't expected to grow so much as a person and increase my confidence." She realized she needed to take more care of her own health and wellbeing—practicing what she was learning to teach.
• The Decluttering Turning Point: For the first 3-4 sessions, Sarah was "just learning it"—studying how coaching was delivered. Then they hit the decluttering module and "something switched in my brain." She finally let herself be coached rather than studying the process, and "that was the turning point."
• Allow Yourself to Be Coached: Lauren always says during the menopause plan delivery: "Allow yourself to be coached. Don't study how I'm delivering this." The magic happens when you stop analyzing the technique and actually experience being coached—that's when transformation occurs.
• The Freedom of Entrepreneurship: Sarah loves the freedom to do what she wants without someone telling her what to do. Her brain constantly fires with ideas while walking, shopping, watching TV, or at the gym—"Oh, that would be a really good post!"
• Risk-Taking When Passionate: Sarah isn't naturally a big risk-taker or daredevil, but she's realized: "I don't mind taking risks when it's something I'm really passionate about because it feels like the right thing to do."
• The Corporate Safety Net vs. Solo Reality: In corporate, you have admin people, comms people, technical people—everyone doing their specialized thing. When you work for yourself, everything is down to you. Even if you outsource, knowing how your own business works and setting up systems is crucial.
• Finding Your New Rhythm: One of the biggest challenges is creating a new routine when you no longer have meetings, deadlines, and projects dictated by others. You need discipline and self-imposed deadlines or "you can easily find yourself wasting the day" and it becomes "an expensive hobby."
• Project Management Still Applies: Sarah used to manage projects with tools and techniques in corporate. She's had to remind herself: "All those things will help me. If I do a project plan, it will help me." The skills transfer—you just need to apply them to yourself.
• Outsource Your Weaknesses: Sarah tried to create her own logo—it was "rubbish." She outsourced it for a reasonable price, and someone turned Fabian (her flamingo) into a professional brand with a full toolkit, colors, and social media-ready assets. Play to your strengths; outsource the rest.
• Pay in Time or Money: You're paying either way—either with your time or with money. When something clearly isn't your strength and you'll waste loads of time on it, outsource if you can.
• Learn Before You Outsource: Even if you plan to outsource eventually (like social media), learn the basics first. You need to understand messaging, calls to action, information types, sources, and brand fit before handing it to someone else—especially when accuracy matters.
• Your Brand Will Evolve: Logos change, messaging changes, how you talk about your work changes. Sarah's seen people get stuck in "I need the website, I need the logo, I need everything perfect" when the first thing they should do is reach out to their existing network—that's where initial business comes from.
• The Gym Talk Success: Sarah did a talk at her local gym. One woman almost didn't come because she thought

In this episode, Lauren welcomes back Carey Peters—actor-turned-entrepreneur, co-founder of Health Coach Institute (HCI), and the coach who taught her how to coach. This is a raw, unfiltered conversation that veers beautifully off-script, touching on everything from voice training and stage presence to psychic downloads, the brutal realities of scaling to eight figures, and why menopause might be the greatest gift of midlife.
Carey brings over 20 years of business-building wisdom, having co-founded Holistic MBA and HCI, which graduated over 40,000 coaches and achieved one of the biggest exits in EdTech history before she stepped away in 2025. Now working privately with founders in the $1-5 million revenue range, Carey shares what she wishes she'd known before building her empire, why most coach training schools are failing their students, and how one to three strategic adjustments can completely transform a business.
This conversation is part masterclass in business strategy, part spiritual journey, and entirely Carey—bold, honest, hilarious, and deeply human. If you've ever wondered whether you should scale or stay small, whether that seven-figure dream is worth the 80-hour weeks, or how to coach with your whole heart while maintaining boundaries, this episode is for you.
Key Points Covered:
• Voice as a Tool: Carey discusses the importance of vocal training for speakers and coaches, drawing from her theater conservatory background. She emphasizes that voice, like clothing and physical embodiment, is an emotional communication tool that requires technique to appear natural.
• Unconscious Competence vs. Conscious Teaching: Carey reveals she's terrible at teaching stage presence because she has "unconscious competence"—she knows how to do it naturally but can't break it down. However, she's an excellent business teacher because she had to learn it step-by-step without natural skill.
• Psychic Coaching & Soul Connections: Before client sessions, Carey receives "full downloads" of what's happening—sometimes relatives come through to chat. She's unsure what's actually happening ("Am I the avatar of a 12-year-old girl in the year 2312?") but trusts what she hears and follows it.
• The Terror Barrier: New coaches hit what Carey calls "the terror barrier"—full-on terror when entering sessions. The scripts in her programs weren't meant to be permanent crutches but "training wheels" to ferry coaches through that initial fear until they gain 1% more confidence.
• The Massive Gap in Coach Training Schools: The biggest players in coach training (especially private equity-owned ones) fail catastrophically at one thing: sharing student success stories. With 40,000 graduates between Holistic MBA and HCI, there should be 20,000 stories showcasing return on investment—but PE-backed schools don't understand information marketing.
• Students Are the Stars, Not the Founders: When PE investors pushed to make HCI an "institution" rather than "the Carey and Stacy show," they missed that the answer was making students the stars. The #1 objection to enrolling is "Will I make my money back?"—and only student stories prove that convincingly.
• The Woman Problem in Coaching: 95%+ of coach training students are women, yet most major schools have no female faces representing the brand. Women need to see other women who've done it, who understand the unique layer of self-doubt, need for permission, and patriarchal limitations wired into female nervous systems.
• It's Only Been 50 Years: In 1974—when Carey was born—women in the US were finally allowed to get their own credit cards without a man. That's only 50 years ago. Women are still emerging from under "the crust of patriarchy" and need female role models who understand that journey.
• The Simplest Possible Strategy: Founders in the $1-5M range need to answer "Why do I want a $10M business? Do I even want that?" before diving into strategy. Often they need just 1-3 adjustments to scale—not a million things—plus the simplest possible structure to support creative minds.
• You Need CEO Eyes: Between $1-5M revenue, you can't afford a CEO but desperately need one. You need external perspective on operations, hiring, structure, and risk management because when you're in it, you can't see clearly. Mistakes get exponentially more expensive.
• The $3.5M Ceiling: Carey and Stacy hit $3.5M two years in a row and realized the choice: learn to become operators, scale back to an exclusive high-ticket model, or "shoot for the moon." They chose the latter, selling to partners who'd achieved a $750M EdTech exit—Carey's "MBA she never got."
• Top Line vs. Profit: "Seven-figure coach" typically means $1M+ revenue but only $200-300K profit. Turnover looks glamorous; profit margin is what matters. Carey emphasizes founders often bring on team too quickly, destroying profit margins unnecessarily.
• The 90% Profit Margin Secret: One-on-one private coaching with the right clients (working 1-3 years at premium rates) offers 90% profit margins. Carey coaches six days per month—far less work than building an empire but potentially comparable income without the stress.
• Lifestyle vs. Empire Building: Empire building is 70-80 hour weeks for years with enormous risk and pressure. Lifestyle businesses offer work-life balance while still requiring real work. The question isn't which is "better" but which aligns with your actual goals and values.
• The Hustle Culture Lie: Anyone teaching "get to seven figures without hustle and grind" is selling bullshit. Building to millions requires enormous work, mistakes, pivots, and grinding—there are no shortcuts. The person teaching the system worked their ass off to create it.
• Would They Have Made More Coaching Privately?: Looking back, Carey wonders if she and Stacy would have actually made more money over the years doing high-ticket private coaching instead of building HCI. It's a legitimate question founders should ask themselves.
• The CEO Struggle Is Universal: Watching accomplished CEOs with impressive backgrounds still struggle with operations, org charts, managing people, and daily business decisions was eye-opening for Carey. Even "experts" don't have all the answers—everyone is figuring it out.
• The "New Level, New Devil" Reality: Whatever level you're at in business—starting, scaling, exiting—there's always a new challenge. It doesn't stop. Everyone has the same beating heart and needs connection regardless of their revenue numbers.
• Brian Franklin's One-to-One Model: Carey credits executive coach Brian Franklin for teaching her the simple but powerful model she now uses for private coaching—focusing on lifestyle business principles rather than empire-building complexity.
• The Menopause Superpower: As estrogen drops, the biological imperative to please disappears. Carey describes no longer tolerating family dysfunction, relationship drama, or anything that doesn't serve her. The "veil lifts" and you genuinely stop caring what others think—it's freedom.
• Built on Big Wounds: Great businesses are often built from big wounds. For Carey, part of her drive to build HCI came from "I don't matter, so if I achieve a lot, I'll be seen as important and valuable." Letting go of HCI allowed her to realize: "I matter no matter what. I don't have to do anything."
• The 2025 Energy: Having left HCI in early 2025, Carey describes it as a "nine year" (endings, completions, letting go) leading into a "one year" (new beginnings). Her intuition shows something new is coming, though she doesn't know what yet.
• Surrender & Motherhood: When Carey suspected she was pregnant at 40+, terrified and spiraling while driving to LAX, she heard a clear voice: "Surrender." She knew immediately she was pregnant and had to have the baby. Her daughter became "the best thing I've ever done" and the catalyst for becoming the person she needed to be.
• Soul Destiny in Coaching: Carey believes deeply (whether right or wrong) that there's a soul-level reason she meets each client or student. It feels sacred and special. Even recording videos for 40,000 HCI students, she felt she loved the person watching and wanted them to "mostly feel loved."
• The 1.2 Billion Woman Market: With 1.2 billion women currently going through menopause globally, it's a massive underserved market. Lauren's tight specialization in menopause coaching is precisely why it works—it's specific, there's enormous demand, and it's what women in that age group are constantly discussing.
• The Male Menopause Coach Success: One of Lauren's graduates is a male VP in financial services who trained as a menopause coach after nearly divorcing over his wife's menopause experience. He now charges $20-30K for relationship coaching—far cheaper than the six-figure divorces his colleagues would face.
• Fall in Love With Your Clients: A phrase Carey and Stacy taught that initially confused Lauren like "a brick." Now Lauren tells her students the same thing: "Fall in love. Make your heart meet their heart. Connect with them where they are." By week 17-18 of each cohort, Lauren keeps tissues nearby because she doesn't want it to end.
• The Prize of Not Caring: At 51, Carey has reached the point where she doesn't care about proving anything, needing recognition, or...

In this episode, Lauren Chiren welcomes Kate Atha, a graduate of the Women of a Certain Stage Menopause Coach diploma program who brings a deeply personal and profoundly important perspective to the conversation about surgical menopause, fertility loss, and finding your identity in midlife.
Kate's journey is one that too many women experience in silence—years of battling stage 4 endometriosis, multiple surgeries, a difficult IVF journey, and then waking up from what she hoped would be a partial hysterectomy to discover it was total, effectively ending her fertility dreams in an instant. With minimal psychological preparation, no grief support, and just a prescription for HRT handed to her before discharge, Kate was left to navigate surgical menopause, identity crisis, and profound loss largely on her own.
This conversation explores the devastating gap in support for women who enter menopause through medical intervention, the quiet grief of childlessness that society often dismisses with unhelpful "advice" about adoption, the triggering nature of celebrations like Mother's Day, and how Kate has transformed her pain into purpose by becoming a menopause coach and advocate—both within her corporate HR role and beyond.
Kate also opens up about the changing relationship with alcohol in menopause, the "sober curious" movement, and why she believes menopause is far from a "saturated market"—there's still so much work to do.
Key Points Covered:
• The Endometriosis Journey: Kate suffered with stage 4 endometriosis for years before diagnosis—stuck bowel, removed fallopian tubes, recurring cysts the size of grapefruits. Unlike many endo sufferers with debilitating daily pain, Kate's pain was primarily during menstruation, which delayed proper diagnosis for approximately 8 years (the current average).
• The Doctor's Dismissive Response: When Kate first went to her GP with stomach pain, she was met with "Have you been Googling? You're obviously thinking the worst"—a dismissive response that's all too common for women with endometriosis and other reproductive health conditions.
• The Hysterectomy Shock: Kate consented to various surgical options including total hysterectomy, but conversations with her consultant had been hopeful it wouldn't be that severe. Waking up in recovery still groggy and sick to learn it was indeed a total hysterectomy—with no working ovaries—was devastating.
• Zero Psychological Preparation: The consultant returned hours later to say "You're entering menopause, you'll need HRT" and simply left the room. No grief counseling, no psychological support, no explanation of what surgical menopause would mean—just a prescription to be filled within two weeks.
• The Double Loss: While being told about menopause, Kate's brain wasn't even there yet—she was grieving the end of her fertility journey. Years of IVF (which was "not a really good experience"), countless surgeries, and the dream of biological motherhood had just ended without warning in a recovery room.
• The Fertility Dreams We're Conditioned To Have: Kate speaks honestly about being conditioned that "this is what we do—we're females, we produce babies, we get married, we have kids, we're homemakers"—and the profound grief of that life path being suddenly, permanently closed.
• Time as the Only Healer: Kate describes how "just gradually, bit by bit, it didn't hurt as much"—the rawness of "you are not going to be a biological mum" faded over time. But there are still triggers, particularly around Mother's Day, even though she has a wonderful relationship with her own mother.
• The Unhelpful "Adoption" Suggestions: Well-meaning people asking "Haven't you looked into adoption?" don't understand that for many women, the desire is specifically to have a baby that "comes from me and is part of me and my husband." Kate and her husband did explore adoption but decided it wasn't for them—a deeply personal choice that deserves respect.
• The Bond Over Shared Pain: Kate found solace in a best friend who also went through unsuccessful IVF, creating a shared understanding of the pain of "not getting to be the mums we wanted to be." Having friends at different stages—some with children, some without—meant she had support depending on what she needed.
• The Bitter-Sweet Joy for Others: The complex emotions of being genuinely happy for friends who fall pregnant easily while simultaneously feeling internal pain—"Oh, why wasn't that me?"—is a reality many women with fertility struggles know intimately.
• The Support Gap for Surgical Menopause: Lauren highlights that Kate's situation—being thrown into menopause at the peak of trying to start a family—happens "sadly too regularly" with insufficient support. Women in surgical menopause need specialized care that acknowledges both the hormonal transition AND the grief, trauma, and identity crisis.
• Why Kate Trained as a Menopause Coach: Despite knowing very little about menopause after her hysterectomy, Kate saw the coaching program on LinkedIn and thought "that sounds like a piece of me." She wanted to educate herself while potentially adding another skill to her corporate HR toolkit—and learned massively about her own menopause journey in the process.
• The Work-Life Balance Struggle: Kate admits to constantly having to check herself on work-life boundaries—checking Teams on her phone after logging off, quickly replying to "just one more email." It's an ongoing challenge requiring daily awareness.
• Exercise as Escape and Empowerment: Kate loves the gym, sport, squash with her husband, learning golf, and used to play cricket until a back injury. She particularly enjoys sports that "historically women weren't meant to do"—if someone says she can't play it, she'll have a go.
• The Corporate Alcohol Culture: Kate describes how alcohol is "heavily interwoven with corporate life"—client meetings, socializing, celebrating success, breakfast meetings followed by evening drinks, work away days centered around alcohol. It's so normalized that opting out still carries stigma.
• The Menopausal Alcohol Intolerance: Since entering menopause, Kate has become "a complete lightweight" who feels "horrendous even if I've just sniffed a glass of wine." She's reached the point of questioning "Why am I doing this to myself? I'm ruining a whole weekend and not even enjoying it."
• Sober Curious Defined: For Kate, being "sober curious" means "I am interested in a potentially life without alcohol" and exploring "what's my relationship with alcohol?" She acknowledges her past relationship with it wasn't healthy—too much reliance on binge drinking and consuming all weekly units in one evening—but emphasizes "each to their own" without judgment.
• Leading Menopause Work in Corporate: In her HR role at a large global insurance company heading up an employee forum, Kate already ran a monthly menopause support group before training as a coach—working with senior stakeholders and executives on awareness initiatives.
• The "I Thought I Knew" Revelation: Despite running workplace menopause groups and rating herself "7 out of 10" on menopause knowledge, Kate was shocked by how much she didn't know when she started the diploma. "There is still so much that I completely don't know."
• Menopause Is NOT a Saturated Market: Kate pushes back against claims that "menopause is everywhere, it's a trillion-dollar industry, it's saturated"—emphasizing "No, it is really not. There's still so much to do." The narrative that menopause awareness has "gone too far" is false when women still wake up from surgery with zero support.
• Future Plans: Kate wants to work with private clients one-to-one (she currently does group work), explore local community-based groups, potentially run retreats, and continue her corporate awareness work. As she says: "Watch this space."
• Life Skills Beyond Menopause: The menopause plan teaches fundamental life skills—decluttering, boundary setting, self-care—that help everyone "whether you are going through menopause and having all of that fun, or not."
• The Age Stigma: Kate realized she wasn't wanting to talk about being menopausal because "I felt that people would think that meant I was old, I was a certain age." She questioned this embarrassment—why the discomfort with being associated with a particular age? It's societal pressure: "You're this age, you do this, you look like this."
• Identity Crisis in Menopause: The question "Who am I now?" becomes profound—comparing yourself to your 20s and 30s, noticing wrinkles, grieving past abilities. But as Lauren frames it in the coaching scripts: it's an opportunity to explore, stop, think, reset, and decide "What do I want my future to look like?"
• Transforming Pain Into Purpose: Kate has taken her lived experience of surgical menopause, fertility loss, and navigating corporate life through hormonal chaos and turned it into a mission to support others—particularly those who've experienced similar trauma and loss that society often minimizes or ignores.
Timestamps:
[00:01:00] Why train as a menopause coach?
[00:02:00] The endometriosis journey and misdiagnosis
[00:05:00] Waking up to unexpected total hysterectomy
[00:06:00] The double grief: Fertility and menopause news
[00:08:00] Coming to terms with childlessness
...

In this episode, Lauren welcomes Sally, a graduate of the Women of a Certain Stage Menopause Coach diploma program who spent decades in executive search, specializing in C-Suite placements and working with some of the most senior women in corporate leadership.
Sally's story is one of intentional transformation—leaving behind a high-powered career not because she had to, but because she wanted to explore what came next. Despite sailing through menopause relatively symptom-free herself, Sally was drawn to the program as a lifelong learner who recognized the profound connection between women's midlife transitions and the executive exits she witnessed throughout her career.
This conversation explores the "mahogany veneer" of wisdom Sally accumulated through thousands of executive interviews, the patterns she observed in senior women's confidence (or lack thereof), the guilt that high-achieving women carry across all aspects of life, and why she believes at least 50% of women leaving C-Suite roles are doing so because of menopause—even though it's rarely discussed.
Sally shares her insights on what it takes to help senior executives break free from their "chrysalis," the power of truth-telling wrapped in compassion, and why she's committed to using her accumulated wisdom to support women through their next chapter.
Key Points Covered:
• The Mahogany Veneer of Wisdom: After decades in executive search conducting thousands of interviews across multiple cultures, industries, and geographies, Sally describes herself as having accumulated a "mahogany veneer"—not mica, but genuine depth—touching on so many aspects of leadership and humanity that it creates profound wisdom.
• The Hidden Menopause-Executive Exit Connection: Sally estimates that at least 50% of women leaving C-Suite roles are doing so because of menopause, yet this connection is rarely (if ever) discussed in conjunction with executive transitions. She's exploring research from CIPD, ACAS, Bank of America, and other financial institutions to investigate this further.
• Why She Trained Despite Not Suffering: Sally was fortunate to sail through menopause with minimal symptoms, but was drawn to the program as a lifelong learner (having completed a master's degree in her 40s and Montessori teacher training in her 30s) who wanted to keep developing skills and expanding knowledge—even if she wasn't initially sure how she'd use it professionally.
• Scratching the Surface of C-Suite Women: Despite impressive accomplishments and senior positions, Sally consistently found that C-Suite women have remarkably little confidence when you scratch the surface. She wonders how much of this is influenced by perimenopause and menopause symptoms that go unrecognized or unaddressed.
• The Transition Crisis: Senior executives—both men and women—struggle profoundly when moving from executive to non-executive careers. Women in particular often feel lost, despite decades of achievement, when making this transition.
• The Sacrifice Required for C-Suite Success: Women who reach C-Suite positions often sacrifice family life, social connections, spiritual development, health, and other life domains in pursuit of excellence. The constant guilt of "never doing anything as well as you should be" at work, with family, or with friends becomes an exhausting burden.
• Double Standards in Leadership: Behaviors that are acceptable and even celebrated in men are deemed "unacceptable" or "aggressive" in women. Sally describes being called an "agitator" or "up for yourself" simply for having opinions and speaking out against unfairness—behaviors that would be called "leadership" in male colleagues.
• Higher Standards for Women: Women are measured differently and held to higher standards, particularly women of color who face even greater barriers. Women have to try harder to achieve things and prove themselves more than their male counterparts.
• The Practice Client Revelations: Sally discovered that beneath the presenting issue of menopause, her coaching clients all shared fundamental life issues—partner challenges, control issues, not sitting down for meals together, rushing through everything, and particularly struggles with decluttering and asking for help.
• Partners as Obstacles: A common pattern emerged where partners (male, female, or otherwise) were often significant obstacles to women's wellbeing, but this only surfaced around weeks 3-4 of the coaching relationship. Sally learned to sense this bubbling beneath the surface and gently create space for clients to talk about it without feeling they were "betraying" anyone.
• The Decluttering Week Breakthrough: Of all the menopause plan modules, decluttering and asking for help created the most transformation. Sally was shocked to discover that even her successful, accomplished clients weren't sitting at tables for meals, were rushing through everything, and lacked basic healthy habits around water intake and self-care.
• The Nutrition Week Challenge: Sally admitted she struggled most with the nutrition week, finding parts of it "very American" and "unrealistic" for her time-strapped clients with multiple children. This became a teaching moment about recognizing her own judgments and learning to plant seeds rather than prescribe solutions.
• The 1% Improvement Philosophy: Rather than expecting clients to go from 2/10 to 10/10, Sally celebrates helping them reach 5-6/10 in just seven hours of coaching—recognizing that wherever someone is in life, there's always a next level and always another step to take.
• The Chrysalis Metaphor: Sally describes her coaching approach as helping people realize they've built a chrysalis around themselves—they have beautiful wings but are trapped. Her role is helping them break out of that chrysalis and realize they can fly.
• Kick and a Cuddle Coaching Style: Sally believes "the truth is a gift" but must be appropriately wrapped. Too many people avoid telling the truth to spare feelings, but real help comes from honest feedback—whether about body language, voice, presence, or imposter syndrome—delivered with compassion.
• Loneliness at the Top: Senior positions are profoundly lonely. Sally shares a story of leaving a note under a new CEO's hotel room door during his "three-month wobble" with affirmations, which he kept in his office—highlighting the desperate need for trusted support at senior levels.
• The Safe Space of Coaching: The menopause plan gives women permission to talk about things they haven't even allowed themselves to think about. As layers get unpicked, clients experience "aha moments" where their jigsaw puzzle starts coming together—not completed by the end, but with a clear picture emerging.
• NDAs and Settlement Agreements: While Sally hasn't had direct visibility into how many women are exited via non-disclosure agreements potentially linked to menopause, she suspects it's significant. NDAs are often used when someone is in a moment of weakness or vulnerability, lacking the mental fortitude or finances to fight properly.
• The Gift of Time: After leaving executive search, Sally appreciates having the luxury of time to let her thoughts naturally evolve, reflect on her journey, and decide how to share her next chapter without arbitrary deadlines or pressure.
• What Lights Her Up: Sally loves giggling with like-minded people, fighting unfairness, being a listening friend who gives people "airspace to talk," and engaging with fascinating people—even (especially) the difficult ones that everyone else avoids.
Timestamps:
[00:02:00] Saying thank you: Reframing the LinkedIn farewell
[00:04:00] The C-Suite exodus and menopause connection
[00:06:00] Struggling with the nutrition week
[00:08:00] What really comes out in coaching sessions
[00:11:00] Why Sally trained without having symptoms
[00:13:00] Working predominantly with C-Suite women
[00:14:00] The confidence deficit at the top
[00:16:00] Sacrifices and double standards
[00:19:00] The VA revelation: Cards and guilt
[00:21:00] NDAs and settlement agreements
[00:23:00] The chrysalis and beautiful wings
[00:25:00] Creating safe spaces for conversation
[00:27:00] What makes Sally smile
[00:30:00] The wisdom worth translating
[00:31:00] Why trust the process works
Resources:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/sally-a-f-springbett-she-her-b8b3224/
• Women of a Certain Stage Menopause Coach Diploma: https://womenofacertainstage.lpages.co/menopause_coach/
• Research on menopause and workplace exits:
CIPD (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development)
ACAS (Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service)
Bank of America studies
Women in Banking and Finance research
Portal library section: Work and Menopause resources

• Free guide: "Top 5 evidence-based menopause resources" → womenofacertainstage.com/menopause-resources
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Meet your Host:
Lauren is the founder of Women of a Certain Stage and creator of the Become a Menopause Coach diploma program.