Menopause Across Cultures

Hi and welcome to Healthy Life Hacks, I'm Jennifer Jeffries, the present day wise woman, a realistic naturopath coming to you from the surfing beaches of Australia. This podcast is for those of you who are wanting to really rock your life and health and loot from a place of prevention. Let's get into today's episode. In Japan, menopause isn't seen as the end, it's called Konenki. The renewal years, not decline, renewal and definitely not old decrepit and ready to go into the oldies home. When I first heard that in Japan, menopause is called Konenki. The renewal years, it stopped me in my tracks because renewal, not decline means, imagine every woman you knew entering this stage of our lives, believed and lived into the fact that it was the beginning and not an ending, which is totally how I see it. I've lived this way for decades knowing this and yet the majority of Western women have no idea. They see it as the end and yet in so many cultures around the world, women are honored for stepping into their wise phase. Symptoms, seen as transitions, not disorders and their everyday foods, things like miso and seaweed and nato naturally help to keep hormones steady. They live close to nature instead of away from it and they relish in the fact that this is a natural transition in life and for me to the most epic third chapter of my life and it should be for all women. So yeah, in the West, like menopause, just too often has been wrapped up in whispers and shame and it's medicalised, empathologised and it's so back to us as something to be managed and fixed. But when we look across other cultures, we find different stories being told about this time of our lives and these stories shape how women experience it. You know, I do a lot of work up in Asia, so I'm regularly in places like China, back to China again next week, China and Korea and Taiwan and Singapore. All of the East Asian countries, I've got a charity that runs in Thailand and I see the matriarch of the village is revered by like even like 70 year old boys, they sit there and listen to the woman, the woman owns this time where she is and it's so different to the Western world. So I thought we'd do a bit of a player and look at a few cultures and how it's different. So in Japan, like I said, Konenki and I'm saying that very wrong and I apologise to the Japanese people. I'm not, I don't have a pronunciation right, but that's the word for menopause and it literally translates as the years of change or the renewal years and women are celebrated for entering this wise phase. Symptoms are recognised but they're not framed as something bad, not a disorder and like you need all these drugs, it's like this is a natural transition in life. So does their diet naturally contain more phytoestrogen rich kind of foods? Yes. So phytoestrogen is a plant compounds that mimic estrogen in the body and there's a naturopath that I've prescribed these to women for years. So I've eaten them for decades, things like miso and tofu and nato. So along with the different seaweeds and green tea. And research shows us that Japanese women, like most Asian women, historically reported fewer things like hot flashes and severe symptoms compared to women in the West. And it's not just the data, the language, it's a cultural expectation that's there for them as well. So it's like when society names this stage as renewal. Women step into it with pride instead of dread and it's like a normal right to passage. And I know that what we think about we bring about. So I've always said women in the West think menopause is going to be this horror time and they literally live into it. And so mindset and that supporting culture and environment around us makes such a difference to how our body experiences things like menopause. So think about some other indigenous cultures, menopause is seen as freedom. It's just not hidden, you know, it's honored in some Native American tribes. The women who no longer bleed are considered powerful because they hold their blood inside and it's seen as their strength, their wisdom and a spiritual authority. The older women step into roles as advisors and storytellers and guides for the community. Gosh, I miss that in the West. The transition is less about biology and more about stepping into that new social and spiritual identity, which is what you find in ethnic and indigenous cultures. And there's a freedom here. No longer tied to fertility, women gain status, not lose it. And the contrast is with the Western culture is that aging here equals invisibility. And it's like you've got nothing to share your old, like so opposite. Thinking about Africa, Africa, menopause is all about respect. So across so many African cultures, the elder women are respected again for their wisdom and their life experience. In Ghana, for example, menopause women often take on more leadership roles in the family and the community and they're considered advisors and decision makers. The symptoms exist in some cases, sure, but they're not the center of the story. They're not the focus of what's going on, like this is wrong. It's like, okay, cool, my body is changing, my body is growing, my body is moving into its next chapter. And all the part of that is what gives us the life experience, the authority and the freedom and guidance to be that wise woman in the village, rather than what it takes away from us. It's seen as part of the journey, part of that transition. In the West, we're medicalizing and minimizing. So think about here, menopause is so often framed as being the decline, the change, the end of womanhood, the emptiness, even the medical models call it a syndrome. It's not in the rest of the world. Symptoms are pathologized and women are left feeling broken and invisible and thinking, these are my what the fuck years. The media feeds that conversation and rarely celebrates menopause of women, unless it's to a joke about hot flashes and mood swings. That just pisses me off to the max. This framing matters and when we're told that our best years behind us, women carry that belief in their body and studies show that Western women report more severe symptoms than their counterparts in China, Japan, Africa, those countries. And yes, diet plays a part, lifestyle, the culture that we have to hustle, hustle, hustle, many women arrive at this time, it's really tired, that's part of it. Have you ever wondered how your life could have been different if you'd had access to this type of content at a younger age? Look, this is why I need your help. I'm working to build the number one platform that gives real and easy to integrate healthy life hacks and mindset to help you get well and stay well. This show only grows by word of mouth and new subscribers. It would mean the world to me if you could click the subscribe button right now, leave a five star written review or drop a comment below. Share this episode with a friend and I would be forever grateful. Now let's get back to this week's episode. And also absolutely, the Western diet is not traditionally close to nature. It's more inflammatory, it's more a hormone disruptive because it's taxing the adrenal glands. But the other thing is mindset. Mindset plays a part. And in the other countries, other than like your four or five main Western countries, it's a totally different story. So what's a common thread? Language and cultural framing make a difference. In Japan, women enter their renewal years. And in indigenous cultures, they step into that spiritual authority position. In Africa, they gain social respect and in the West, too many of us, too many, I see so many women stepping into shame and invisibility. The invisibility cloak comes on and women own it. They own it. The biology, what's happening with women is the same. The hormone shift, the periods end, we go from can bleed to can't bleed, can breed to can't breed. That's all it is. It's a natural transition to say we're no longer going to make babies. The hot flushes come, the hot flushes go, but the meaning that we attach to those changes, that's where the culture empowers or diminishes us. What do we need to do? I want to invite you, that at this stage of our lives, what if we borrowed the best from the other cultures and reshaped Western society? You think, "Gen. Who are you? One person to say this?" Well, guess what? All of the ones add up. And we can start a revolution. We really can. We can empower the women who come behind us. These young women who have been buying into these stories that we've bought into for decades, it's not cool. What if we said these are our renewal years? This is our time of power. We are not invisible. We are inevitable. And what if we did? Yes, look at food. Start eating things like more soy, yes, non-GMO, but more soy. Things like the seaweed, the fiber rich whole foods that help to support hormones naturally. More of the fermented foods, but more than that, we need to shift the story. It's not just diet. Because when we enter menopause, believing it's a decline, that's what we live. And when we enter it, believing it's renewal, that's what we live in. That's what I've lived. I learned this stuff back in my late 20s. Remember sending my mum a card when I was 28 and she hit 50, salivating that she came into her cronel time, the most wonderful time of her life. She was so deeply insulted. She didn't get it because she'd swallowed this narrative for years as well. So menopause isn't the end. It's not about fading out. It's the threshold. We cross the threshold into our wise woman years. And I'm just going to get louder about this because it's time. We need this wisdom back in the women, but we need the women to own it first before we can live into it. These are the years that we stop caring about what the world thinks and start living unapologetically. Here to serve and to share our wisdom. You know, I say nowadays, and I feel it to the core of my being, I care less and you know, I care deeper than I ever have in my life. I care less about the people who are going to knock me and ridicule me and try to put me down like, no, I'm not going to hold my life back for them. And if Japan calls it Kanenki, there are new years, then maybe it's time for each of us to name our own transition. Not as something to endure, but as something to celebrate. It's time to bring back the cronel, it's time to own our wise woman years because community needs it. The heart of the Western world has been ripped out of our community because we killed the cronel. It's time to take a stand and get that these are the coolest years of your life. Welcome. I look forward to doing this journey with you. I want to thank you for being here today. If you enjoyed my podcast, please let me know by leaving a review on Apple Podcast. Every month I draw one lucky person who leaves a review, have a free one hour consultation with me. Be sure to subscribe to the show wherever you're tuning in from so that you always catch the next episode. I welcome your emails and you can write to me at [email protected]. Until next time, remember, when it comes to life, live it, love it and get on with it.