Why Everything Comes Up At Once In Perimenopause - And How To Handle It

Perimenopause can feel like our whole inner world cracks open at once — even when we've done years of therapy and personal development. In this episode, I explain why that intensity is not a malfunction. It is a deliberate hormonal shift that ends suppression, opens the subconscious, and activates dormant potential simultaneously.

I cover:

• Why the hormonal shift in perimenopause is designed — not a decline or an ovarian failure
• The oestrogen veil lifting and what it opens in the subconscious
• Why unresolved feelings, abandoned parts of self, and dormant potential all surface together
• Cutting out the noise, slowing down, and creating the space this transition demands
• The old self composting — why identity can feel like a costume, and why that's right
• The 3am wake-up loop as a completion signal, and a practical way to work with it
• Isolation as one of the hardest parts of perimenopause — and why we need our sisters
• The broken transmission from wise women and why oral guidance from lived experience matters
• Circadian rhythm support and living in tune with nature — what changed my sleep in two days
• My own three years of perimenopause retreat, and what's supported me through

I also share my personal experience — including what it's actually felt like to go through this nose to the fire, and what I'm coming out the other side knowing.

I've recorded a free guided practice to help you create more capacity in perimenopause — 10 to 15 minutes >

I'm also running regular workshops on navigating perimenopause as an initiation, and I offer 1:1 perimenopause support >

Transcript

Why Everything Comes Up At Once

Melanie Swan 0:00

Hello, hello. Welcome to this episode that is all about perimenopause and why why everything comes up at once and how to handle it. So just to set context, I'm 50 next month at the time of recording and my cycle has almost finished. So I'm almost I'm almost done, which feels, which feels amazing. So I'm gonna give you like a full update in a separate episode that's just all about how I've worked through it and what I've done to support myself. But for this one, I just want to focus on why everything comes up at once, because that's that's the main thing that is um hard, I think. So yeah, and especially if you've done therapy already, you've done inner work, you've read books, you've done courses, you've built awareness of patterns and process some of them. And then perimenopause arrives, and it you know, sometimes it can feel like it didn't count because everything comes up and it can feel like it's all at once. In reality, perimenopause starts quite slowly, actually, but we we tend not to notice it until we feel disoriented in a way, uh, and maybe overwhelmed. So it's everything happening at once that is the difficulty, really. So often at the same time as feeling disoriented, we start to kind of not recognize ourselves internally and physically, and our life can feel like it belongs to someone else. And we're really, we really can be left wondering, like, what the hell is happening? So, yeah, in this episode, I want to explain what's happening, why it's happening, and how to handle it, so that we can go through it this very natural transition as a potent rite of passage, and I'm gonna be really practical about it. So I don't want to, I don't want to bombard you with kind of rite of passage and potent and powerful and initiation because when you're in it, it's not it's like I don't give a shit about that. I just want to know how to handle this, so yeah. So yeah, the first the first thing I want to say about this is that our hormonal cocktail shifts and it shifts during perimenopause, and it's meant to. This is not a decline or an ovarian failure, or that we never used to live this long and we used to die before. It's not, it's

The Hormone Shift Is Intentional

Melanie Swan 2:43

a very natural transition, and everyone experiences it differently, but it's not it's not a condition to diagnose, it's not the body's failure, it's it's very natural. So, yeah, we're not malfunctioning. Uh, what's happening is designed by nature, it's deliberate, it's intelligent, and it's here for good reason. So it's to help us grow, it's it's to almost remove us from the world as we know it, to have us change and recalibrate and compost and complete so that we can really transition into wise woman, a wise woman era, and that holds a different role in our culture, and that's not common. And we all know that powerful roles, powerful women, um, anything that's aligned with love basically gets trashed and flipped in this reality. So, yeah, we're gonna flip it back, basically. So I I think it's estrogen. I I'm not entirely sure on the hormones, I'm not sure anyone's entirely correct on these hormones, but yeah, I think it's estrogen anyway, has has been functioning as a veil basically in the first half of our life. So it's been moderating our subconscious in a way, it buffers stress, it oestrogen or our hormonal cocktail before about 44 encourages to encourages us to keep harmony, too, helps us sense uh babies, what babies' needs are and what other people's needs. And in a way, it's yeah, it serves us and the the greater collective, but when it comes off, it's it's great, it needs to come off. So the oestrogen veil lifts, and what happens is the subconscious starts to open, and whatever is unresolved and quietly sitting there, even when we've done shed loser work, it starts coming up. And it's it's not random, this is deliberate, this is designed by nature. So everything that that was not attended to, that needs to be attended to in order that we can grow into the next phase of life. It's not like we're going to become perfectly healed with no issues, no limiting beliefs. We're still in this reality. It's just it's bringing the stuff up that takes us into the next stage of life to be resolved, to be attended to. So the unresolved material, the unfelt feelings, the abandoned parts of self, the shadow parts, the you know, both light and dark, they come up. And at the same time, our dormant potential activates. So there's this love-based energy that's activating within us, and it's bringing up all the fear-based stuff. And it can be a lot. And we generally don't have a collective map for it. When I say map, I don't mean in the six stages of menopause. It's not linear, it's a felt thing. We have to move through it, we have to go through the not knowing. But really, we're one of the first generations to go through it where we've got communication with each other across the world with social media and technology, and the transmission basically from elders to pass this wisdom on has been broken because a lot of people just get old and clock out. So, and also our culture just does not support women to take a break at this point, and we really need to take a break. Um, I have been on Perimenopause retreat effectively for uh just over three years now, and that means I've not been interested in socializing. I just am not really interested in the things I used to be, and I've just basically been at home in my grey sweatpants and um doing my thing, doing some yoga, doing some strength training, doing whatever, but basically just really a very natural retreat. And I've had lots of space, lots of silence, and lots of stillness, uh, lots of support as well from friends. And it's really been great. I'm I'm coming out of it now, but our culture generally doesn't support that. So women often need that but don't take it or feel like they can't take it, and that amount of space is needed in order to let this stuff come up and be be attended to. Not fixed, it's not we're not broken, it's just we need the space to feel and move through it. And when we've got space, it doesn't feel like everything's coming up at once, we're not overwhelmed because there is space for it. But if we continue with our busy lives, then yeah, it's gonna feel overwhelming. So perimenopause doesn't actually create new problems or issues, it just removes our capacity to suppress what's already been there. Uh, and everything surfacing isn't new, it was was already there, as I've said. It this changing hormonal cocktail just ends suppression. So, yeah, that's my one practical suggestion for this phase of life is to cut out the noise um and take some time for yourself, basically. And we all have to go through it our way. Now there's there's a big split, HRT or no HRT or natural or whatever. It really doesn't matter, we

Make Space, Cut The Noise

Melanie Swan 9:08

all have to figure it out ourselves. And I started off kind of anti-HRT, and then I've kind of seen women taking it, and some friends are taking it, and we all have to get through it how we get through it, and there's enough opinion about women's bodies and who we are and what we do and what we don't do that I've come to just a place where I'm like we do what we do, and that is it, and it's none of anybody else's business how we go through it, how we choose to do that. Um, but we just just need to make our own choices. So, yeah, my practical suggestion is to cut out the noise, switch off social media, find your support systems, and just listen to your own body. What what do you need? That's what I did, and um, yeah, my intuition guided me through and slow down, slow down and listen. Because it's just uh it requires the space, it demands the space, actually. Okay. So, in summary, yeah, the hormonal shift is uh deliberate, it's our divine design, it opens our subconscious, and for that we need space. We need to listen to ourselves as to how we want to go through it. Don't listen to any shoulds. Um, just trust your body and trust what you need. Okay. So that is the hormonal shift. Uh, next is our old self is composting. So the first half of life is all about gathering our experiences, the roles we we try on, our relationships, our identities and patterns. We kind of build up a self, we build up an ego. And ego, I'm not using that in a negative term at all. We need

Composting The Old Self

Melanie Swan 11:08

ego to be here in a way, and we need that to be strong enough enough, I'd say it, in order for us to start to self self-destruct uh based on love. So the beginning of you know, the first half of life, sorry, not the beginning, the first half is is gathering and building, and let's let me just you know build all these illusions to play in. It's great. And up until about 42, 43, 44, the latest, it it serves us. And then perimenopause kicks in and it says, right, okay, you've been doing that, great. Now let's take it all down. None of it matters, it's all false anyway. It was just for your consciousness to play in. Now let's live more in truth without the need for these false constructs. So perimenopause is a literal pause to consolidate, to digest our experiences and to compost them, like to to find the wisdom in them, to come to peace with them. And what I hear from women is that that I work with is that at the 3 a.m. panic, the wake up uh happens and they're like whirring through things and mulling stuff over and thinking about all the terrible things that it might have said to someone, and it's okay. That's there's nothing wrong, it's your mind and your body are trying to complete and come to peace. So sometimes if you're waking up at three, like jot it down, uh, what's bothering you, and decide on a course of action. Maybe you need to apologize to an ex or adjust something in life or or do something else or speak up about something. But uh, it's got its purpose. Uh, I've experienced it once actually, um, only once, which is great. Um, but yeah, there was something I needed to attend to, and I just eventually I just got up at 3 a.m., sent the email that I needed to send. I went straight back to sleep, complete. So our psyche isn't uh dysfunctional, it's not glitching. Uh these things are here for a reason and they need listening to. So there is this composting process going on of completion and just real, that's all I can describe it as really just just really come into peace with where we've been, what we've experienced, what we've created, what we've not created, and identities we've carried for for years might fit start to feel like a like a weird costume, like we're wearing somebody else's clothes. Because there really is a detachment from our life. And you know, it can feel like something's seriously wrong, but there's nothing wrong at all. It's it's just a very strong experience. I liken it to like a dark night of the soul, but it lasts about three years, really. But I've I've really set myself up so I could go fully into it, fully experience it. I know if I go fully in, I'll come fully out. I want all the juice out of it. I want to fully, fully experience it. It's not been easy. Like, I feel destroyed in a way. Like just taken out by all that was false. It really needed to happen, but it's it's really it's really been challenging at times. It's been really great at times, just lots of space, taking over with work. And uh yeah, yeah. So I didn't, I don't want to paint this picture of this initiatory experience that's all mystical because it isn't its proper nose to the fire for three years, basically. But basically, what it does is the false self, the one that's built around copy mechanisms, um old patterns, limiting beliefs, approval, any any sort of anchoring outside of ourselves, uh, uh it just gets burnt. And that's a wonderful process. It's like being crafted, it's like polished, being it's like the diamond being ground down and polished, basically. Um, and what remains is more of the real us. That's how I feel, anyway. Um, yeah. So whilst it can feel like we're losing ourselves, we are, but we're at the same time really finding our truth. And there are parts of us or aspects of us that are sort of dying off in a way, um, that were only meant for the first half of life. And perimenopause makes space for our truth. It's the most incredible design and experience, and it needs supporting. I can't imagine going through this with children. Um I know women do, and it's often with teenagers, uh, just uh the the way we are living now, like we often have babies in our 30s, and so we've got teenagers in our mid-40s. So yeah, I am destroyed, and thankfully so. So yeah, the second my second point basically is our old self is composting, and I guess my one practical tip for this would be to speak to other women who are going through it in a similar way to you and and can respect your way, your way of going through it, and can just talk to you and listen to you. Uh, that's what's been very supportive for me. Um just want to say a massive thank you to the lovely women, my lovely friends, who uh without them I just would have been so kind of isolated in a way. And I'm not isolated in society or culture, you know. I live in a lovely place and I'm very happy with my setup, but isolated in terms of what I was going through and experiencing. Um, so yeah, thank you to Janelle in particular. And we've we've we've been pairing menopause or chatting. Uh Janelle lives on the other side of the world. We've been uh WhatsApp voice noting hilariously and in such a lovely way that we're just it's been quite a it's a it's a it's a an enduring and deep friendship. So thank you to Janelle and all my and all my lovely friends, really. Which is the third point I wanted to make, is that isolation, meaning isolation from other women who are going through it in a similar way, is one of the hardest things about perimenopause. Um, especially if you're going through it in maybe a non-traditional way, um, and the mainstream is does tend to be HRT and complaining

Sisters, Support, And A Missing Map

Melanie Swan 18:39

about physical um symptoms, and I I don't say that lightly, you know, some of those symptoms are cracking, some of those, like it's hard. Um, but for those of us going through it as as a rite of passage, and some women are taking HRT as well and doing it, but yeah, it's it it's nose to the fire. So we need our sisters. I can't emphasize this enough. If I hadn't had that, I'm not sure. I'm not sure what I've done. I'd have had to have had more therapy. Like I haven't had much therapy through it. I've processed with friends, and that's been great. But that's because I've got to a stage where I don't necessarily need therapy. I've had years and years and years of it and personal development, and so it's just a natural pathway in me now. But yeah, I've called upon friends when I need to process some stuff. So I would have found some support, but it's been much more joyful and uh fun in a way, and not fun and exploratory uh to do it alongside uh my sisters, basically. So that's what can have us feeling overwhelmed because we just don't know if what we're experiencing is normal, is there something wrong with me? Is there not? Am I okay? Am I not okay? It's really disorienting. And it's I I think women should take a couple of years out and go to Perry Menopause retreats. I want to see Perry Menopause retreats around the world. And it's not for now for me, but I would like to open one in a few years where women can just come and be together. And it's not like a hotel, it's more like a community where we all just share tasks, they get allocated. Can you imagine how organized that would be and how lovely and slick that would be? We just have an Excel spreadsheet. Monday one person does things, another Tuesday, like it was just it would just be great. It would just be great. So it's it's a little seed I'm working with at the moment. But so back to that's the that's the that solves the isolation problem in a way. Um, and we've just got a lack of a map. We don't know what to expect. I had done years of development and I knew perimenopause was coming, and I prepped for it and liver cleansed, but nothing prepares us for it, and I didn't have a map through. And there are a few books written on it, but I I didn't want to read them. I wanted to like I wanted to go through it with the support of my sisters and feel it all because it is part of my work, I knew it was part of my work. So I've dug and I've investigated and I've stayed present and I've documented it as well. I've been writing poetry as I've gone through it. So so that I can feel what it is, I have an energetic pattern of what it is, so that I can genuinely, authentically uh walk besides women as as they go through it too. So This is now part of my work because I'm almost out the other side, nice and shiny and new, somewhat destroyed. Um, so yeah, we we need our sisters, and it I think it's helpful to have some sort of map. I prefer like talking at like an oral transmission from someone who's really gone through it with nose to the fire. And that's you know, that's what I offer now as well. So I would prefer that our culture does change somewhat, and we have an increasing number of elders to uh really be living examples of this. But I can I can only change what I can change within myself. So please don't struggle in isolation or try and manage in silence, or your doctor doesn't have much training at all in it. Maybe about four hours in some some cases, uh, I believe. But please don't enjoy it alone. It makes it much, much harder. And there are books on it. Uh Hagitude, I read a little bit by Sharon Blackie. Uh, there are other books, but I'm I'd encourage you to seek them out and seek out the support you need, basically. Because when we meet it fully, we can move through it actually quicker. We need to slow down in order to go through it quicker, basically. Um, what I've seen consistently in my own journey and my work with women is that it can drag out the more we resist it. But if we go fully in or as fully in as we can given our circumstances, then it's actually quicker. So it's a paradox go slower to go quick. So there we go, that's it. Basically, Mother Nature is holding our face to the fire and say, We want you to mature, but this is all coming up, and there is support. Um, I hadn't planned to say this bit, but I I do want to say, I do want to put this in because there's support from nature. One thing that's been very supportive is I've been working with the sun and just having so much fresh orange juice, I've just craved it and drinking a litre a day. And again, Janelle, Janelle's trained in this, so she was able to guide me on it. I was feeling pretty crappy, and

Circadian Rhythm And Nature Support

Melanie Swan 24:33

um yeah, she told me about circadian rhythms, and I can quite believe I hadn't learned it till now, but I wasn't sleeping very well, and within a couple of days, my sleep, I was sleeping eight, nine hours straight, getting up at uh sunrise, waking up at sunrise, feeling a lot better. And uh yeah, I I wanted to put that in because I'm gonna bring her on the podcast to talk about it because we can't live without that. Like as this as our hormones stop buffering our experience, it's one of the things we need to attend to is living in tune with nature and specifically the circadian rhythm. So that has been really freaking helpful, and it's something that I'll just do for the rest of my life, really. So, in summary, uh, how to handle it is trust your body, cut out the noise, let the composting happen, even when it's uncomfortable and disorienting, and we feel like you're losing yourself. Find your sisters who are going through this the same way, keep them close, keep talking because the perimenopause arc, I can't even say it anymore. I'm so oh I don't know. I'll start again. The perimenopause arc takes around seven years, it's not going away quickly, it is something to embrace, and it's crafting us every single day, quietly, relentlessly, grinding down what's false, revealing what's true, and that's it. I really wouldn't change it for anything, but yeah, yeah, I'm glad I'm coming out of it. Okay. So if this is Landon, I've recorded a free guided practice to help you create more capacity and perimenopause. It's 10 to 15 minutes. It's just gonna help you be present with the sensations and kind of resource you in a way that these sensations and these emotions can move and move through. We don't necessarily need to do anything with them or anything about

Guided Practice, Workshops, Closing

Melanie Swan 26:46

them sometimes. Um, we just need to let them move and feel them and have the realization that comes with that. Um if you want to go deeper with other women who understand, I'm running regular workshops on navigating perimom. Oh my god. Perimenopause. Blah. I'm running workshops on navigating perimenopause as an initiation. It's a two-hour workshop, it's very peri-styled. I was going to be doing this six-week course and take you through the thing. I mean, I still might, but perimenopausal women want something quick. We want the information. Don't dilly-dally around, just give it to me. Tell me, tell me uh how to handle this better so we can find some ease. Uh, so that's the link is in the show notes as well. I'll be doing those regularly. Or if you want the depth and connection of 101 support, I am also here. Again, link in the show notes. Okay. I hope that was useful. I think I probably went off on tangents. I've got some bullet points here, but yeah, I I truly hope that was useful. This is an an integral part of my work now. And uh I'm writing a book, a poetry book, because poetry has helped me through and I've written through it, and it's helped me put words to and communicate what what I've never experienced before. And I've been in sweat lodges and vipassnas and all sorts of things. Nothing like this, but they they did prepare me. This is this is nature at work, and it's uncompromising. Okay. All right then. Well, I wish you lots of love wherever you are, and I will see you in the next episode, which will be about perimenopause as well. So, okay, see you later.