What The Peri? - With Kirsten Cooke

(Ep 9) You've been doing the same thing for a year. You trained through Christmas, and through the cold of Winter, and right through the school holidays. You did not miss a session. And at the end of that whole year, you feel like you have very little to show for it. Or it looks nothing like that at all — you haven't trained in years, you've had a go at starting three times already, and each time the body didn't answer the way it used to. Two completely different women, handed exactly the same piece of advice. Move more, and eat less. That was me too, from the other side of it. There were weeks where my alarm went off at 4.15am so I could be teaching a class by 5.30am — 12 to 15 high-intensity classes a week, plus my clients and my Pilates. When my body changed in my forties I did what nearly thirty years in this industry had taught me to do. I ate less. I trained more. Nothing happened. What was missing wasn't knowledge and it wasn't effort. It was a name. Nobody ever said the word perimenopause to me. So this week I'm doing exercise, properly. At twenty-five, one kind of training quietly covered your fitness, your weight, your bones, your muscle and your mood, all at once. That's over — and it isn't because you got lazy or got old. There are three separate jobs now, and no single kind of exercise does all three. One promise before you start: nothing in this episode asks you to give up something you love. In this episode: → What this actually feels like — a year of turning up with very little to show for it, and the woman who can't face walking into a gym at all → The two clocks — why muscle is a slow leak and bone is a cliff, and why both pick up pace right now → The three jobs — build and defend your muscle, keep your bones, look after your fat and your heart → Bone doesn't care how tired you get, it cares how heavy the weight is — including the study done here on the Gold Coast → Cardio versus weights, settled — what each one is for, why "toned" has two ingredients, and what to eat before you train YOUR TRAINING TOOLKIT — where to start this week: Two strength sessions a week, heavier than last time · Compound movements — squats, hinges, pushes, pulls, presses and carries · The last couple of repetitions genuinely in doubt · Rest at least two to three minutes between sets · A thousand more steps a day, not ten thousand · Add one fast thing · Don't train on an empty stomach · Give it eight weeks Small changes stack. You don't have to fix it all at once — you just have to start. If you've spent this year quietly deciding that you've lost the discipline you used to have, or that your body has stopped answering you — please consider that you might simply be a woman who was handed one lever and told to pull it harder. You didn't fail at this. You don't need to work harder. You need to work in different places, and nobody told you the job had changed. Ready to work with me? The Peri Protocol is my personalised coaching program for women in perimenopause and menopause. Apply here → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/apply Grab your free guide — download your free What the Peri? guide → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/free-guide Come say hi 🌸 Follow along on Instagram and Facebook @kirstencookecoaching — I'd love to hear what resonated with you. Research referenced: Greendale GA et al. (2012). Bone mineral density loss in relation to the final menstrual period — Journal of Bone and Mineral Research Khalafi M et al. (2023). The effects of exercise training on body composition in postmenopausal women — Frontiers in Endocrinology Isenmann E et al. (2026). It's never too late: resistance training, strength and body composition in females across the lifespan — Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport Watson SL et al. (2018). High-intensity resistance and impact training improves bone mineral density and physical function in postmenopausal women — the LIFTMOR trial, Journal of Bone and Mineral Research Kemmler W et al. (2015). Exercise and fractures in postmenopausal women — Erlangen Fitness and Osteoporosis Prevention Study, Osteoporosis International Note: This episode is about what your training needs to do now — not about being smaller. If your weight, your eating or the way you feel about your body has become distressing, please talk to someone. And if you have pelvic floor symptoms, a prolapse or a bone density diagnosis, see a practitioner who works in that area before you lift heavy. This podcast is for educational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Always consult a qualified healthcare practitioner for personal medical decisions. If food, eating or body image is causing you distress, the Butterfly Foundation National Helpline is 1800 33 4673, 8am to midnight AEST, seven days. If you're experiencing a mental health crisis, please contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 (Australia).

You haven't changed a thing. Not one thing. You're eating the way you've always eaten and moving the way you've always moved, and somewhere in the last year or two your body has quietly rearranged itself. Jeans that still do up, but sit somewhere new. A dress you've worn for years that suddenly needs smoothing down before you walk out the door. Closing the bathroom door now when you shower, because you're too embarrassed for your partner to see you undressed. Dreading shopping for a wedding outfit, or worse, a swimsuit. Saying no to the event, and no to the day at the beach. And the scales, which you'd think would explain all of it, telling you almost nothing has changed. That was me, with nearly thirty years in this industry behind me. I ate well. I trained harder than almost any woman my age I knew. And none of it made the slightest difference — and it wasn't confusion, because I knew exactly what I was looking at. It was disappointment, and a sense of injustice that for all that work it simply wasn't showing. What I couldn't name, for years, was why. Nobody ever said the word perimenopause to me. So this week I'm doing the big one. Where the weight actually goes in perimenopause and why it heads for your middle. What's ageing and what's menopause, because they are not the same thing. Why eating less and doing more cardio is the combination that costs you most right now. And what genuinely helps instead. One promise before you start: there is nothing in this episode about eating less. In this episode: → What it actually feels like — the changing room, the bathroom door, the swimsuit, and the point where you start saying no to things → Where the fat goes, and why — and how oestrogen was quietly directing the traffic all along → Why the scales stopped telling you anything useful — you're gaining fat and losing muscle at once, and the number can't see either → Age adds it, menopause moves it — and why that distinction changes everything → What's pouring petrol on the fire — eating less, doing more cardio, and the diet cycle that hands you more body fat at the same weight every time → What actually helps — protein, fibre, sleep, fasting, hormone therapy, and three things to start this week YOUR MID-SECTION TOOLKIT — where to start this week: Change what you're measuring — clothes, photographs, strength, and a tape measure round your middle once a month · Demote the scales, don't bin them · Protein at breakfast · One extra serve a day of vegetables, beans or wholegrains · One change to your sleep, and only one · Stop cutting calories as your opening move Small changes stack. You don't have to fix it all at once — you just have to start. If you've spent the last few years quietly deciding that you've let yourself go, or lost your discipline, or that something in you is broken — please consider that you might simply be a woman whose hormones changed the rules underneath her without telling her. You didn't do anything stupid. You did what you were taught to do. The instructions changed, and nobody sent you the new ones. ─────────── Ready to work with me? The Peri Protocol is my personalised coaching program for women in perimenopause and menopause. Apply here → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/apply Grab your free guide — download your free What the Peri? guide → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/free-guide Come say hi 🌸 Follow along on Instagram and Facebook @kirstencookecoaching — I'd love to hear what resonated with you. ─────────── Research referenced: Greendale GA et al. (2019). Changes in body composition and weight during the menopause transition — JCI Insight Pontzer H et al. (2021). Daily energy expenditure through the human life course — Science van Gemert WA et al. (2015). Effect of diet with or without exercise on body composition in postmenopausal women — SHAPE-2 Jóźwiak B et al. (2024). Exercise alone and with time-restricted eating in menopausal women — Journal of Translational Medicine Note: This episode is about where fat moves and why — not about being smaller. If your weight, your eating or the way you feel about your body has become distressing, please talk to someone. This podcast is for educational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Always consult a qualified healthcare practitioner for personal medical decisions. If food, eating or body image is causing you distress, the Butterfly Foundation National Helpline is 1800 33 4673, 8am to midnight AEST, seven days. If you're experiencing a mental health crisis, please contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 (Australia).

(Ep 7) You get through the day. But you are not the woman you were, and you cannot work out where she went. The sadness that turns up with no reason attached. The rage that goes off before you can stop it, and the guilt at eleven o'clock that night. The days you feel nothing at all — not upset, just flat. And the swinging between all of it, with no warning and no pattern, until you genuinely start to wonder whether you're losing your mind. You love your family completely — and you also want everyone to stop needing something from you for five minutes, and you feel horrendous for wanting it. And underneath it all, the question nobody can answer: how long is this going to last? That was my life for years. The hardest part wasn't any single symptom — it was that I didn't feel like myself, and I had no idea how long it would go on. I was prescribed antidepressants, more than once, and not one person asked a single question about my hormones. It took me about three years to work out what was actually happening. This week I'm going to the emotional side of perimenopause — the part that does the real damage. What's happening in your brain chemistry and why it's the swinging that hurts, not so much the low. How to tell hormonal mood changes apart from clinical depression. What to ask for at your next appointment so you don't lose the years I lost. And what genuinely helps. In this episode: → What it actually feels like — the rage that arrives before you can stop it, and the anxiety in women who've never been anxious → Anhedonia — why you can be clinically depressed without ever feeling sad, and why so many of us get told "you don't seem depressed" → What's happening chemically — why erratic hormones do more damage to your mood than low ones → What to ask for — and the one question that changes the appointment → What actually helps — what the guidelines really say about lifestyle before medication YOUR MOOD TOOLKIT — where to start this week: Name it out loud to one person, in the true version · Ten minutes of daylight within an hour of waking · Two sessions that make your muscles work — strength training came out better for women than men · Book the appointment and ask "could this be perimenopause as well?" · Ask for your thyroid, iron and ferritin, and B12 Small changes stack. You don't have to fix it all at once — you just have to start. If you've spent months, or years, quietly believing you've become a worse person — angrier, colder, smaller — please consider that you might simply be a woman whose chemistry changed underneath her without anyone telling her it would. You have not lost your warmth. It's still there. ─────────── Ready to work with me? The Peri Protocol is my personalised coaching program for women in perimenopause and menopause. Apply here → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/apply Grab your free guide — download your free What the Peri? guide → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/free-guide Come say hi 🌸 Follow along on Instagram and Facebook @kirstencookecoaching — I'd love to hear what resonated with you. ─────────── Research referenced: Badawy Y et al. (2024). The risk of depression in the menopausal stages: a systematic review and meta-analysis — J Affective Disorders Malhi GS et al. (2021). The 2020 RANZCP clinical practice guidelines for mood disorders — ANZ Journal of Psychiatry Noetel M et al. (2024). Effect of exercise for depression — BMJ Senate Community Affairs References Committee (2024). Issues related to menopause and perimenopause — Parliament of Australia Note: Perimenopause raises the risk of depression, and mood changes are often the first sign. If your low mood is persistent rather than fluctuating, see your GP — and ask about your hormones as well, not instead. This podcast is for educational purposes only and is not medical advice. Always consult a qualified healthcare practitioner for personal medical decisions. If you're struggling, please reach out — Lifeline 13 11 14 or Beyond Blue 1300 22 4636 (Australia), both 24 hours a day.

(Ep 6) Have you ever been mid-sentence — mid-thought — and had the whole thing simply vanish? Not slip away and come back a moment later. Gone. Or walked into a room and had no idea why you were there? Or reached for the simplest word — banana, fork, the name of someone you’ve known for years — and found nothing there at all? For months, that was my every day. It honestly felt like someone had invaded my brain overnight — this sharp, capable brain I’d built a whole career on, suddenly not mine anymore. And the hardest part wasn’t the forgetting itself. It was the frustration of grasping for a word that just would not come while everyone waited, and the quiet loneliness of holding it all together on the outside while, on the inside, I no longer recognised the person I’d become — and for all my trying, could do nothing to control it or make it stop. It took me a long time to understand what was really going on. It’s hormonal. It has a name. And for the vast majority of us, it’s temporary. This week I’m pulling perimenopausal brain fog apart properly — because it’s one of the most frightening symptoms and one of the most misunderstood, and it does not stay politely in the background. This isn’t “just push through and hope it passes.” It’s what’s actually happening in your brain, why it goes after your words specifically, how to tell it apart from Alzheimer’s, and a real toolkit for getting your sharpness back — everything from what you can change this week to the honest long-term picture almost nobody talks about. It’s the episode I wish someone had handed me before I lost months to the fear. In this episode: → What brain fog actually feels like — at home and at work: the blank rooms, the words that vanish mid-sentence, the paragraph you read five times, and the invisible exhaustion nobody around you can see → What’s really happening in your brain — oestrogen’s role across your memory and focus, and why your brain is recalibrating on less fuel, not breaking down → Why it’s almost certainly NOT early dementia — the three clear ways to tell the difference, and when to see your GP anyway → The honest long-term picture — the higher Alzheimer’s risk in women, and the genuinely hopeful flip side: up to about 45% of dementia risk is within your control → What pours petrol on the fog — sleep loss, stress, low iron or B12, an underactive thyroid, alcohol and ultra-processed food → What actually helps — protecting your sleep, lifting heavy for your brain (not just your body), eating for your brain, and lightening the invisible mental load → The one thing to start this week to feel a little more like yourself again YOUR BRAIN-FOG TOOLKIT — where to start this week: Protect your sleep first · Lift heavy two or three times a week and move your body daily · Eat for your brain — protein, oily fish, and 25–30g of fibre · Ask your GP to check your ferritin and iron, your B12 and your thyroid · Get it out of your head and onto paper, without shame · Have the honest conversation about your options with a practitioner who understands menopause Small changes stack. You don’t have to fix it all at once — you just have to start. If you’ve been quietly terrified that you’re losing your mind — you’re not. Your brain isn’t broken and it isn’t slipping away. It’s recalibrating, on less fuel than it’s used to, in the middle of a hormonal upheaval nobody warned you about — and for the vast majority of us, the sharpness comes back. You’re still in there. Your clever, capable brain is still in there. And there is a great deal you can do to help it. ─────────── Ready to work with me? The Peri Protocol is my personalised coaching program for women in perimenopause and menopause. Apply here → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/apply Grab your free guide — download your free What the Peri? guide → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/free-guide Come say hi 🌸 Follow along on Instagram and Facebook @kirstencookecoaching — I’d love to hear what resonated with you. ─────────── Research referenced: Greendale GA et al. (2009). Effects of the menopause transition and hormone use on cognitive performance in midlife women (SWAN) — Neurology Mosconi L et al. (2021). Menopause impacts human brain structure, connectivity, energy metabolism, and amyloid-beta deposition — Scientific Reports Maki PM et al. (2022). Brain fog in menopause: a health-care professional’s guide for decision-making and counseling on cognition — Climacteric Livingston G et al. (2024). Dementia prevention, intervention, and care: 2024 report of the Lancet standing Commission — The Lancet Note: Perimenopausal brain fog is extremely common and, for most women, temporary. This episode isn’t a substitute for assessment — if your memory changes are severe, steadily worsening, or frightening the people around you, please see your GP. This podcast is for educational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Always consult a qualified healthcare practitioner for personal medical decisions. If you’re experiencing a mental health crisis, please contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 (Australia).

Have you ever fallen asleep exhausted, only for your eyes to fly open at 3am — wide awake, heart pounding, mind racing through everything you forgot to do today and everything you have to remember tomorrow — while the whole house sleeps around you? Welcome to what I call the 3am club. I was a fully paid-up member for years: a personal trainer who spent her whole career telling everyone else to protect their sleep, quietly running on four or five hours of broken sleep myself. I told myself it was the kids, that I'd simply become a light sleeper — until it kept getting worse and I realised something bigger was going on. It was hormonal. And once I understood the mechanism, everything started to change. This week I'm pulling perimenopausal sleep apart properly — because it's one of the most devastating symptoms and one of the least talked about, and it does not just stay in the bedroom. This isn't "have a warm bath and cut out caffeine." It's the real, physiological reasons you're lying there wired at 3am, what's actually happening in your body while you're awake, and a proper toolkit for getting your nights back — from what you can change tonight all the way through to the options most women are never told about. It's the episode I wish someone had handed me before I lost years of sleep thinking I just had to cope. In this episode: → Why perimenopause wrecks your sleep — the hormones that gang up on you all at once: falling progesterone (your built-in sedative), night sweats, oestrogen and melatonin, and the 3am cortisol and blood-sugar surge that wakes you wired rather than groggy → Restless legs and night cramps — and the surprising link between your dropping oestrogen, your iron, and the ferritin test to ask for → What's really happening while you sleep — why your nights got lighter and more fragile, and why it's always 3am and not 11pm → Why there's no one-size-fits-all — how your own biology and chronotype (whether you're a night owl or an early bird) change what actually works for you → The toolkit, layer by layer — the foundations, the natural support worth knowing about, and the bigger levers, including the option for sleep that hardly anyone mentions → The one thing to start tonight to take back some control YOUR 3AM TOOLKIT — where to start this week: Anchor your wake time (yes, weekends too) · Get morning light within 30 minutes · Keep the room cool and try a warm shower before bed · Move the last glass of wine earlier · Long, slow out-breaths when you wake at 3am · Ask your doctor about your ferritin, and about progesterone and CBT-I Small changes stack. You don't have to fix it all in one night — you just have to start. If you've been lying awake at 3am, quietly convinced you've simply become a terrible sleeper — you haven't. Your biology changed, and no one told you. It's real, it's physiological, and a great deal of it is workable. ─────────── Ready to work with me? The Peri Protocol is my personalised coaching program for women in perimenopause and menopause. Apply here → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/apply Grab your free guide — download your free What the Peri? guide → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/free-guide Come say hi 🌸 Follow along on Instagram and Facebook @kirstencookecoaching — I'd love to hear what resonated with you. ─────────── Research referenced (all verified Aug 2026): Baker FC et al. (2018). Sleep problems during the menopausal transition: prevalence, impact, and management challenges — Nature and Science of Sleep. https://doi.org/10.2147/NSS.S125807 McCurry SM et al. (2016). Telephone-Based Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia in Peri- and Postmenopausal Women with Vasomotor Symptoms (MsFLASH) — JAMA Internal Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamainternmed.2016.1795 Balban MY et al. (2023). Brief structured respiration practices enhance mood and reduce physiological arousal — Cell Reports Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.xcrm.2022.100895 Note: In Australia, melatonin is TGA-regulated and largely prescription-only (with a pharmacist-only prolonged-release option for adults 55+). Speak to your doctor or pharmacist. This podcast is for educational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Always consult a qualified healthcare practitioner for personal medical decisions. If you're experiencing a mental health crisis, please contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 (Australia).

Have you ever been mid-sentence in a meeting, or standing at the front of a room full of people, when a wave of heat rolls up your chest and neck, your face flushes, you start to sweat — and you have to carry on as if nothing's happening? Or woken at 3am drenched, heart pounding, wide awake, wondering what on earth is going on with your body? Hot flushes and night sweats are the symptom everyone jokes about — and the one almost nobody actually explains. I've had one hit me mid-class, microphone on, teaching Reformer in front of a full studio. I know that exact kind of alone. This week I'm pulling hot flushes and night sweats apart properly — because once you understand what's actually happening, it stops being something to feel embarrassed about and starts being something you can do something about. This isn't "avoid caffeine and buy a fan." It's what's really going on in your brain when a flush hits, why it's not in your head, and the full range of what genuinely helps — from the small things you can change tonight through to the medical options most women are never told about. It's the episode I wish someone had given me before I spent years thinking I just had to put up with it. In this episode: → What a hot flush actually is — why it's a brain-signalling event, not a heat problem (it's not in your head, it's in your hypothalamus) → Why they don't only happen at night — the daytime flushes that hit mid-meeting and mid-presentation, and why your brain goes offline when one lands → The professional and emotional toll nobody talks about — and why it makes so many women quietly question whether they can still do their job → Why night sweats aren't the only thing stealing your sleep — low progesterone, the 3am cortisol surge, and why sleep hygiene alone can't fix a hormone problem → How long this really lasts (the number will surprise you) → What actually helps: cooling and breathing, the natural remedies with real evidence, HRT, and the newer non-hormonal medication → The one thing to start this week to take back some control COMMON HOT FLUSH TRIGGERS — start tracking these this week: Alcohol (especially red wine) · Caffeine · Spicy food · Sugar spikes · Heat (hot showers, hot drinks, warm rooms) · Stress and cortisol surges · Tight, synthetic fabrics Your triggers are yours — keep a simple diary for two to three weeks and your own patterns will show up. If you've ever felt embarrassed, dismissed, or like you were being dramatic — you weren't. This is real, it's physiological, and you deserve real help for it. ─────────── Ready to work with me? The Peri Protocol is my personalised coaching program for women in perimenopause and menopause. Apply here → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/apply Grab your free guide — download your free What the Peri? guide → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/free-guide Come say hi 🌸 Follow along on Instagram and Facebook @kirstencookecoaching — I'd love to hear what resonated with you. ─────────── Research referenced: Thurston RC (2018). Vasomotor symptoms: natural history, physiology & links with cardiovascular health — Climacteric Avis NE et al. (2015). Duration of Menopausal Vasomotor Symptoms Over the Menopause Transition (SWAN Study) — JAMA Internal Medicine Maki PM et al. (2008). Objective Hot Flashes Are Negatively Related to Verbal Memory Performance in Midlife Women — Menopause Bommer S et al. (2011). Sage (Salvia officinalis) for menopausal hot flushes — Advances in Therapy Veoza (fezolinetant) — TGA-approved in Australia 2024; liver-monitoring guidance added 2025 This podcast is for educational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Always consult a qualified healthcare practitioner for personal medical decisions. If you're experiencing a mental health crisis, please contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 (Australia).

You're not going crazy. You're not broken. And no — it's not "just stress." Somewhere in your 40s or 50s your body starts doing things no one warned you about — the broken sleep, the rage out of nowhere, the anxiety, the brain fog, the aching joints — and none of it makes sense. So you ask for help. And too often you're turned away. Told you're too young. Too stressed. That your bloods are "normal." You leave more defeated than when you walked in, quietly wondering if you're imagining the whole thing. You're not. And you're not alone. What the Peri? is for the woman navigating perimenopause or menopause — or lying awake wondering if this is it — who's done being confused and just needs someone to make it all make sense. I'm Kirsten Cooke: 30 years in health and fitness, and I've lived every one of these symptoms myself. This isn't a lecture from someone who read the research. It's the conversation I wish someone had sat me down and had with me years ago. In this episode: → My personal perimenopause journey — and why this podcast exists → The statistics that prove this is a systemic failure, not a personal one → What perimenopause actually is — and why it's different from menopause → All 34 recognised symptoms — plus the extras that don't always make the list → Why these symptoms happen, at a hormonal level → What to do this week: starting your symptom diary DOES ANY OF THIS SOUND FAMILIAR? Hot flushes & night sweats · broken sleep · brain fog & memory lapses · anxiety, low mood & unfamiliar rage · joint pain & stiffness · weight that won't shift · low libido · thinning hair · heart palpitations · burning mouth · a changed sense of smell · easy bruising… and many more. If you're nodding along — this episode is for you. Not sure if this is you? → Download your FREE Guide: www.kirstencookecoaching.com/free-guide Ready for real support? → Work with me: kirstencookecoaching.com/apply RESOURCES Track your symptoms with the free Balance app by Dr Louise Newson: drlouisenewson.co.uk REFERENCES – Australian female suicide rates by age group: AIHW / ABS Causes of Death 2023 — aihw.gov.au – UK divorce & menopause: Office for National Statistics; Stowe Family Law Survey 2022 – USA divorce rates over 50: Bowling Green State University, 2022 – 39% of menopausal women offered antidepressants first-line: Newson Health Survey — drlouisenewson.co.uk – Newson Health survey of 5,744 women: drlouisenewson.co.uk – Menopause research underfunding: Nature, 2023 – Female-specific conditions receive ~1% of biopharma R&D: McKinsey Health Institute – Santoro N et al. (2021), The menopausal transition — Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism If anything in this episode hit close to home, please reach out for support. In Australia, Lifeline is available 24/7 on 13 11 14. The change you didn't ask for. The conversations you need. Work with Kirsten: https://www.kirstencookecoaching.com Say hi: @kirstencookecoaching on Instagram and Facebook

Have you ever felt like something has shifted — like you don't quite feel like yourself anymore — but you can't put your finger on why? So many women are living with anxiety that came from nowhere, bone-deep exhaustion, broken sleep, weight that won't budge and a fog they can't shake — without ever realising it could be perimenopause. I was one of them. I saw five different doctors trying to get answers. Not one of them told me the same thing. This week I'm taking you one level deeper — because when you understand how your three key hormones actually work, everything starts to make sense: your symptoms, your treatments, and why one doctor says one thing and the next says the complete opposite. And more than that — understanding these hormones is how you learn to recognise what your body is telling you, and how you advocate for yourself when something doesn't feel right. This is the episode I needed before I walked into any of those appointments — no jargon, no agenda, no medical degree required. In this episode: → My experience with five different doctors — and what went wrong → Oestrogen: the three types, what it does, and why fluctuation matters more than decline → Progesterone: the calming hormone nobody talks about — and why women without a uterus still need it → The crucial difference between synthetic hormones and bioidentical — and why it matters → Testosterone: the forgotten hormone, and the global testosterone crisis leaving women behind → The hormonal hierarchy: cortisol, thyroid and insulin resistance → The exact blood tests to ask your doctor for — and what to look for in the results → Why understanding your own hormones is the key to recognising your symptoms and advocating for yourself BLOOD TEST CHECKLIST — take this to your appointment: Foundational: Full blood count · Iron studies (ferritin) · Thyroid panel (TSH, Free T3, Free T4) · Vitamin D · Vitamin B12 · Fasting glucose & insulin (or HbA1c) · Lipid panel Hormone panel: FSH · Oestradiol (E2, day 2–3) · Progesterone (day 21) · Total testosterone · Free testosterone · SHBG · AMH (optional) If you've ever been made to feel like it's all in your head — it isn't. Understanding your body is how we take our power back. ─────────── Ready to work with me? The Peri Protocol is my personalised coaching program for women in perimenopause and menopause. Apply here → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/apply Grab your free guide — download your free What the Peri? guide → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/free-guide Come say hi 🌸 Follow along on Instagram and Facebook @kirstencookecoaching — I'd love to hear what resonated with you. ─────────── Research referenced: Global Consensus Position Statement on the Use of Testosterone Therapy for Women (2019) Davis SR et al. (2015). Testosterone in Women — The Clinical Significance. Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology Australasian Menopause Society — testosterone position statement This podcast is for educational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Always consult a qualified healthcare practitioner for personal medical decisions. If you're experiencing a mental health crisis, please contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 (Australia).

If the words "hormone replacement therapy" make you nervous — you're not alone. For over twenty years, women have been quietly suffering, too frightened to even consider HRT because of something they half-remember hearing: that it's dangerous, that it causes cancer, that it's doing something artificial to the body. I've lived that fear and confusion myself — told by one practitioner HRT was dangerous, by another that it was essential; put on it, taken off it, and put back on again. So this week, we're setting the record straight. What HRT actually is (and what it absolutely is not), the truth about the 2002 study that scared a whole generation of women, and why so many of us are still being failed by information that's more than two decades out of date. Because the decision about HRT is yours to make — but it should never be made from a place of fear built on flawed science. In this episode: → What HRT actually is — and what it's not (hint: it's not artificial or dangerous) → The 2002 WHI study: what it found, what was wrong with it, and why the fear persists → Bioidentical vs synthetic hormones — and why the difference matters → Why no two women metabolise hormones the same way — and why one size does not fit all → Why HRT is one piece of the picture, not the whole answer → The lifestyle foundations that matter whether or not you choose HRT — sleep, protein, strength, stress → Understanding your unique biology through epigenetics — the most empowering step you can take → Who should be cautious about HRT — the real contraindications → How to find a qualified menopause practitioner FOUR THINGS WORTH SCREENSHOTTING: · Modern HRT uses body-identical hormones — not the synthetic types used in the 2002 study. · The increased breast cancer risk in that study was smaller than the risk of one alcoholic drink a day. · The timing hypothesis: starting HRT within 10 years of menopause is linked to reduced cardiovascular risk. · Transdermal oestrogen (patch, gel, cream) doesn't carry the same clotting risk as oral oestrogen. You deserve to make this decision from a place of knowledge — not fear. ─────────── Ready to work with me? The Peri Protocol is my personalised coaching program for women in perimenopause and menopause. Apply here → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/apply Grab your free guide — download your free What the Peri? guide → www.kirstencookecoaching.com/free-guide Come say hi 🌸 Follow along on Instagram and Facebook @kirstencookecoaching — I'd love to hear what resonated with you. ─────────── Research referenced: Manson JE et al. (2013). Menopausal Hormone Therapy and Health Outcomes — the WHI Randomized Trials. JAMA Australasian Menopause Society — Position Statement on Menopausal Hormone Therapy (2023) British Menopause Society — HRT and Breast Cancer Risk International Menopause Society — White Paper on HRT (2021) This podcast is for educational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Always consult a qualified healthcare practitioner before starting, changing or stopping any hormone therapy. If you're experiencing a mental health crisis, please contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 (Australia).