What is Hotflash inc? What’s the USP, you ask? Why this, why now?

Read this Q+A conducted with founder Ann Marie McQueen conducted ahead of the Livewell With Nakheel event and all (ok some) answers will be revealed. 

What has surprised you about menopause?  I interviewed the famous makeup artist and businesswoman Bobbi Brown the year she was turning 50 (I was 37). I asked her how she felt about it, and although I was expecting dread or something, there was a long pause. She asked how old I was. Then she said: “Ann Marie - you are going to love it.”

She told me everything gets easier. She said all the things she knew I was worrying about at that moment would go away. She told me it felt amazing.

I was shocked. This was completely different from everything I’d heard about getting older up until this point. I was terrified of it. But everything she has said about it has turned out to be true. 

Why does menopause have such a bad rap?

There has also been a push to medicalize menopause ever since hormone therapy appeared on the scene almost 100 years ago. Whenever you hear the words “disease” or “deficiency” around menopause, you know someone is trying to make money. It’s simply not true: its natures planned end of fertility. That’s it. 

Also, the fear of aging is steeped into our culture, no matter where you are. And the two are always linked. And so this has fed into the shame and stigma. 

But this notion that somehow we become irrelevant is not true! 

We even have an evolutionary theory for why women even go through menopause, and it’s called the Grandmother Hypothesis. It’s seen in the animal kingdom, in whales and giraffes and probably a lot of other creatures, and it describes menopause as an evolutionary necessity, because women are so useful to their tribes after they are done raising their kids.

The good thing is, everything about this is changing. Older women are shaking off the stereotypes and I’ll tell you something: once you decide you are okay with it, everything else gets better.

What has your perimenopause been like? 

It’s been going on for 10 years and I think it’s almost over. At least I hope it is! It’s never been the same for more than a couple of months: I’ve run the gamut from panic to sleeplessness to depression, weight gain, breast pain, body pain. Now I’m just tired and forgetful, but older women tell me this will pass.

What’s perimenopause?

Well, menopause is really only a moment in time: when you haven’t had your period for one full year. Perimenopause is all the time before that, and it can start without you really knowing it because your periods are still regular. Sleep problems and mood issues can be the first signs, and they can start in your late 30s, because perimenopause can last for more than a decade. And no one really knows how many symptoms there are because hormones affect all our systems. There’s lots of women on TikTok acting them out.

What’s the best way to help yourself through perimenopause? 

The best way to help yourself through menopause is to get a good team: that includes friends (online or in person, best combo is both) to lean on when things get hard. It’s great to get a doctor you can trust, maybe a therapist, maybe a complementary practitioner who can do acupuncture or massage or something like that. Eating whole foods, making sure to walk and lift weights – walking has been shown to be one of the most effective exercises in study after study, and we need to lift weights to keep our bones strong – getting good sleep, managing stress, addressing any childhood trauma and working on those bad habits like drinking or smoking will help.

A lot of doctors don’t know very much about this whole transition, believe it or not. Some of them never studied it in medical school, some only for a few hours. So we have to learn to be the CEO, director, best friend and mama to our menopause experience. No one else is going to do this for us: it’s the ultimate passage to adulthood. 

What do you want women to know about menopause?

Menopause isn’t scary. Menopause is simply a moment in time, when you haven’t had your period for a year. No one can predict when it will happen - it’s  a little bit like getting your period for the first time. People sometimes call it second puberty. It’s a natural process and it does sometimes require A LOT of changes to deal with. There’s hormone therapy,  supplements, nutritional overhauls, stress management techniques and much more. Once you know what’s happening and make some of those changes, it’s actually pretty manageable.

You also want to make sure that you don’t have any other issues: we can become really vulnerable in this transition and develop lots of issues, including insulin resistance and thyroid problems, all which exacerbate things.

Always make sure you do your research, take the opinion of more than one trusted expert, do what feels right for you and remember: this doesn’t last forever and it’s going somewhere good. The rest of your life! 

What should men do to support women?

Well first of all, men go through a hormonal shift too. It’s called andropause, or manopause, or male menopause, or male hypogonadism, or a term we’ve been hearing a lot lately, Low T. And there’s a lot of shame and stigma, and a lot of people don’t believe it exists, so although it’s more gradual, in a lot of ways it’s similar.

As for men who want to support their wives, listen to her, ask her how she’s doing, try not to irritate her or give her a hard time, and let her know you aren’t going anywhere - you’ll be here through this and on the other side.

• This Q+A was conducted as part of the Livewell with Nakheel event on March 18, 2023 in Dubai.