The Menstruality Podcast - 170. How the Five Phases of Menopause Transform your Relationships (Autumn Saunders)

Episode Date: October 31, 2024

Through their decades of sitting with women and people undergoing the menopause initiation, Alexandra and Sjanie have seen that no part of your life remains untouched by menopause, including your relationships with your loved ones and community. Everything needs to undergo a shift, however subtle, as you move into a greater sense of authority with clearer parameters about yourself. As Alexandra says, it’s called The Change for a reason.Today we’re speaking to a guest who knows this to be true firsthand, and is generously sharing her experiences with us. Autumn Saunders is post-menopausal Menstruality and Menopause mentor at Red School and holds space on our Menopause: The Great Awakener course. Autumn is a mother, a healing artist, and embodied feminine leadership guide and the creatrix behind the Rhythmic Life Circle & MotherArts Sanctuary for Creativity & Wellbeing. Today we walk through the five phases of menopause that Alexandra and Sjanie teach in the Menopause: The Great Awakener course, exploring how all of her relationships transformed during her menopause. We explore:The hardest parts of the first phase of menopause, Betrayal, in her intimate relationship, the cognitive dissonance of simultaneously deeply questioning her relationship whilst also enjoying it, and the core practice that saved her relationshipHow old traumas resurfaced throughout her menopause process, including understanding how Autumn’s relationship with her partner reflected her relationship with her father, and how they found her way back to trusting him, receiving his support and allowing him to protect her. Autumn’s keys to creating flow between her and her kids through menopause. ---Join us for a our Menopause: The Great Awakener course - www.redschool.net/menopause---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email [e-mail]---Social media:Red School: @redschool - https://www.instagram.com/red.schoolSophie Jane Hardy: @sophie.jane.hardy - https://www.instagram.com/sophie.jane.hardyAutumn Saunders: @wisewomanspirit - https://www.instagram.com/wisewomanspirit

Welcome to the Menstruality Podcast, where we share inspiring conversations about the power of menstrual cycle awareness and conscious menopause. This podcast is brought to you by Red School, where we're training the menstruality leaders of the future. I'm your host, Sophie Jane Hardy, and I'll be joined often by Red School's founders, Alexandra and Sharni, as well as an inspiring group of pioneers, activists, changemakers and creatives to explore how you can unashamedly claim the power of the menstrual cycle to activate your unique form of leadership for yourself, your community and the world. Hey, welcome back to the podcast. So through their decades of sitting with women and people undergoing the menopause initiation, Alexandra and Sharni have seen that no part of your life remains untouched by menopause, including your relationships with your loved ones and community, everything

undergoes a shift, however subtle, as you move into a greater sense of authority with clearer parameters and boundaries around yourself. As Alexandra says, it's called the change for a reason. Today, I'm speaking with a guest who knows this to be true firsthand and she is generously sharing her experiences with us. Autumn Saunders is a post-menopausal menstruality and menopause mentor at Red School and she holds space on our Menopause The Great Awakener course which is starting tomorrow. Autumn is a mother, a healing artist, an embodied feminine leadership guide and the creatrix behind the rhythmic life circle and mother arts sanctuary for creativity and well-being, which sounds so delicious, a home for women to thrive and shine through the seasons and

transitions of life. Today we're walking through the five phases of menopause that Alexandra and Sharni teach on the course, exploring how all of Autumn's relationships transformed during her menopause. Autumn, it's absolutely wonderful to be here with you. Thank you so much for joining us on the Menstruality Podcast. Thank you. Hi, Sophie. It's so wonderful to be here. I just feel so, so grateful for this opportunity. Thank you. I can't wait to get into an exploration of your menopause journey. But before we do, I'd love to start with our cycle check-in. And I'm really curious about what cycles you're closest to in your life these days. That's a great question. So today is September 25th, and I follow the moon cycle. So that would make it around day about 23. So I definitely feel the

autumn. Of course, it's the autumn season here in the northern hemisphere so that makes it a little easier I today I would say I feel this definite push to get things done and to bring some things into culmination there's there's the harvesting kind of feeling I will note that a couple of days ago, so I think this is significant in terms of tracking with the menopause, with tracking with the moon, I had an experience where I was feeling very flat. When I say flat, I don't mean in a depressed kind of way, but more just kind of like a one note. And when we gathered with some of the other postmenopausal women in the hive, in the Red School hive, I wasn't the only one who had experienced that before.

And one of the sisters mentioned that she had had that feeling as well. And it was like, she gave an analogy when she used to live in Los Angeles and the weather was like sunny weather all the time, really nice, didn't really rain much, all of that. And it was kind of like, wait a minute, it's just the same all the time. And so that's one of the things when I do the cycle check-in, I really have to kind of consider I'm with the moon in a very nuanced way, but also in myself, there can be kind of a one note at times without having the cycle. And I'm noticing that more and more. Yeah. It's something I've noticed with Alexandra that whenever she does a cycle checking at the beginning of the podcast, she'll say a few

different things and she basically always comes back to, and there's just a fundamental thread of goodness here, you know, something like that. And it feels like that might be similar to what you're referencing. Like there's a note that's always present. Yes, that's such a great way to describe it. It's a note that's always present because the cycle can bring such turbulence, you know, but in a regular rhythm. So we expect it but yeah it's more like the one note instead of the ride in the waves all the time so life's good in the inner LA sunshine that you're experiencing yeah I feel you because I'm on day 14 and it's the part of my cycle where I feel most just like humming along you know I'm just humming along

yeah and I'm so intrigued to hear about your experience of menopause and particularly to look through the lens of these five phases of menopause that Alessandra and Shani name in their book Wise Power and in the Menopause, The Great Awakener course, and how much your relationships have shifted and changed. Yeah, that sounds great. Great. I hear it all the time from the women and people in our community that, whoa, relationships are all over in so many different ways. So how did you know you were entering into menopause? What were the first kind of signs for you? Oh, it's hard to say exactly the exact moment, but I felt that the relationship with my body shifting, I had some trauma come up, unresolved trauma that was becoming very symptomatic

in ways where I was in a kind of extreme fight or flight, different kinds of reactions and behaviors. And I started to go, what the hell is going on here? Because I really didn't understand all of that yet. How the energy really stays kind of trapped in your body. And I found myself literally physically responding to things in this very heightened state where I would be like running or, you know, like, wait, my legs are running and my head is going, wait, why are you running? You know, there's, there is no tiger. I see there's no tiger, but my legs are running as if I'm in the Olympics. And I, I started to register a bit of a disconnect that wanted to be reconnected. And even though I had already been dancing and doing all kinds of yoga, all of these somatic practices for a long time. I just hadn't, I didn't connect the dots. And there were also some

symptoms of inflammation, some kind of autoimmune things. And it was like a call to make peace with things. And so those were some of the things that were starting to be different. And my periods were regular though. So it wasn't, it wasn't so much that they stayed regular up until the end almost. So yeah, I would say definitely more of the extreme responses and reactions and knowing that I needed to do something to re-relate to my relationships. Yeah. When you did Menopause, the great awakener, or maybe it was first when you read the book, whenever you first discovered about betrayal being the first phase, what was your sense of, you know, that makes sense because I felt betrayed in this way. Yeah. Yeah. Well, by the time that I really learned about the menopause phases. I think I had been through the betrayal.

I had first come across wild power and really started deepening my cycle awareness practice, which was huge because I had been already doing that more for fertility reasons or birth control, but it just brought everything to a whole deeper level. And when I learned about betrayal, I was like, oh, I was able to cast back at what was very obvious at the time, places where I was struggling. It's almost hard to recall it now because it was so intense and I feel the intensity of it, but it was so many things. It wasn't like one thing. And in it, when I look back, it was really me not listening to myself. And I think that goes with that disconnect of the body. It was like there were things that just were out of alignment.

And because of that, I would be making decisions and choices that weren't aligned. And I would kind of convince myself that they were. I would override. I guess that's the best way to say it. I would override the signals coming from my body. And so because of that, it was a cascade effect, kind of like, wait a minute, how did I get here? Yes. I want to make sure I say this because I think it can appear that things are normal on the outside. So there wasn't like there was something in my life that was one big thing that I could pinpoint as the thing, like a divorce or this or that. It's nothing dramatic actually on the outside but the internal turbulence was huge and I I think

there's a lot of women that there's a lot going on inside and there isn't some big dramatic thing outside necessarily and so we think that nothing's going on but it was huge what was going on yeah yeah yeah and that's so often the nature of initiation, like life doesn't stop while we go through our initiation process. Life carries on and we have to somehow find a way to keep moving, even as like tectonic plates are shifting inside us. And did you have moments then of this thing that I hear all the time from our community of I'm losing it. I'm losing my mind. I don't know who I am. I don't know what's going on. I don't know what I'm about. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. It made me question everything, the choices that I had made,

the life I was living, the work I was doing, even though I also felt deeply connected to what I was doing and my family and my children and my relationship with my partner. And it was just wild. I don't even know how to describe it because it was like two things going on at the same time. I was simultaneously starting to have everything in my life that I'd always wanted. And it's almost like I wasn't ready for it. Like this at the same time, everywhere where I was out of alignment or needed to be broken down and reformed

to move into the next stage of maturity, like everything had to reconfigure itself. And so it was, it was hard. Like I finally, I had a relationship that I absolutely loved. So we've been together for almost 13 years. And so we met and got together a few years before, but when that hit, it was like, okay, I have to leave. I can't stay. I was leaving. Then I was like, no, this is the best thing ever. You know, it was just the kind of opposites all the time. Yeah. Like, oh, I love being a mother. Oh my God, what are they doing? You know, I gotta be free. You know, like every kind of thing, but I knew that inside the menopause was going on. I knew

about, thank God. I mean, that's the thing that I'm so grateful for. And even before I took the menopause course and before I came into contact with Red School, I had from herbalist Susan Weed, I had her wisdom of the wise woman way. And I think she calls it like grandmother wisdom. I don't know, but I knew there was something there. I didn't know all the details, but I trusted that I was going to come out the other end, like after this wash cycle was going to spin me around for a while. Wow. I wish for every single woman in person going through menopause to have that context and knowing so that there can be some trust, particularly in this betrayal phase when everything feels like, I haven't been through it yet, but I keep hearing from our community when everything just feels like it's being turned

upside down and inside out. I'm not sure which word you used. You used a really good word back there. So with your partnership, if we can just look at that a little bit, because in the betrayal phases, when a lot of people seem to have the burn the house sometimes, which I think is a feature actually of menopause. And I'm recognizing that my memory is shifting into a different kind of realm that feels more liminal. And so just to say that, you know, I'm speaking more from there than actual this happened happened that day, sort of a thing. I would say the hardest, messiest parts were me coming to, and both of us at times, but a lot of times triggered by me, I would say, of feeling up against the wall, feeling absolutely trapped that I had nowhere to go. And that was an embodied state, definitely related to past trauma. I had childhood trauma growing up. I had domestic violence and emotional abuse in my family, which I have made peace with.

So just to, that's been a big part of this journey as well. But my relationship with men in general, definitely reflected my relationship with my father. And I think that that is always the case. And I really needed to make peace with trusting a man to stay, to protect, to provide, to actually be there and create that safety. And we finally came to a trusting and a knowing. It's trusting in ourselves, trusting in the relationship,

trusting in our bodies, trusting in our communication. The communication I think has been, was one of the hardest parts. So the more that I healed myself and was able to communicate in an embodied way where I was in my body, breathing, not dissociated, then my resonance shifted and I could stand my ground and say what I needed to say without making up stories or

without all the fear. And I think this is significant also is feeling dependent, feeling financially dependent at times as a woman with three children and living in the home the house that belonged to my partner so it's like okay if we're not together then what happens and also being angry at myself for that like well how did I get so dependent yes so that then kind of rubbed off on resentment against him. And also, can I trust that I can receive, that I can allow this man to hold me and love me and protect me and be genuine and stay through all of the things that I am and all of the craziness, you know, and he won't leave or he is genuine that he does this from

his heart, and he does. And so it has taken a long time to really go through that and having to do with the different ways I have betrayed myself, not listening to my body or my heart. So all of those things along the way were infused into the relationships I have including my partner my children all of those things yeah trauma and it seems like it inherently involves betrayal and so perhaps the betrayal phase is always going to bring up whatever traumatic experiences we've had, just because perhaps they were our first experiences of betrayal. And then the quest to not abandon'd love to hear maybe more of the detail from your animal body felt sense not that not the actual details but the of of this trauma repair what that looked like for you what that involved for you yeah I love that what you just said

about the betrayal and that trauma starts with betrayal and that is huge and it makes so much sense yeah in the repair there was these trusting myself I guess now that I'm now that I'm speaking of it it's it's coming to me live that I trusted my I trust trust my body. I had a lot of trust in my body and myself, but it's in the relationships that I was not trusting. I had two home births that, my first birth was in the hospital and my second two were at home. And the third one was almost unassisted because I was just in such a space that I was like, yeah, you don't need to come. You don't need to come. You don't need to come. And then they were like, we're coming.

And they got there and he was born five minutes later. And the reason I'm mentioning that is because I just felt so connected to my body. But then in the relationship, an intimate relationship, that felt so threatening, I guess, to be intimate with another person. And so in the repair, what I started doing more of was what I was already doing, writing, singing, dancing, moving, all of the creative arts, embodied arts, healing arts. But the difference is that I was doing it inside of the context of understanding that I was healing in a very specific way, that I had issues with trust, that I had a desire to be more intimate and that there were blockers to that. I wasn't getting that before because

it's just easier when you're by yourself. You don't kind of need to know. It's like, oh, it's all fine. And I do remember years ago when I was in my twenties, I had a therapist for a very short time and I stopped seeing her when I moved and I was like, okay, I'm good. And then I got into a relationship and I was calling her within three months, like, oh my God, I need your help. And she said, oh yeah, well, when you get into a relationship, that's when the rubber meets the road. So in the repair,

I needed to rest. I would say that was the main thing. And I realized that I was just exhausted in my body. It wasn't always because I was doing too much. And that's something that was a new understanding for me. And that's the emotional exhaustion. And so the many, the years of the childhood abuse and the everything that cascaded after that, and I won't get into details, but there was a lot of very dramatic things and manipulation and things, and also grief. My mother passed away when I was 31. She was 52. She had breast cancer. And so mothering without my mother and the kind of fallout from what was just stuck there that

I'd just been overriding because I was surviving all of those years. And it wasn't like I didn't do any healing at all, but you need the safety in order to heal. And so that's actually, interestingly enough, the thing I was trying to get away from the relationship that was so scary. And, you know, I was like, no, I don't need you. And, you know, it's too, it's too much. And that's the, that's the container that allowed me the safety to be able to heal. And it was through the staying, through the commitment to the repair that really gave me the spaciousness to kind of bounce off the walls. I discovered Yoga Nidra at that time. And then I started facilitating Yoga Nidra. I became a daring to rest Yoga Nidra facilitator. And it was really during the betrayal phase that I found daring to rest. And I think that really kind of saved me

through the whole rest of it. It's Yoga Nidra with self-discovery and specifically for women. And so it takes us through this whole journey of rest, release, and rise. And it's taking the yoga nidra, which just for the listeners, if you're not familiar with yoga nidra, it's like a rest meditation. It's like a yogic sleep. And we go through a process that goes through the different stages that you would go through in sleep and then beyond. And it's like a cleansing of your whole energetic body and your physical body. And so it brings deep, deep healing. And we bring our intention to it to plant the seeds that we want to cultivate and grow. And so doing the daring to rest gave me a sisterhood. And that was huge. So not only

was I resting, releasing and rising, and really recommitting to my own dreams, my own intentions, and to doing the work to filter out what was no longer needed. The Nidra itself was doing the recalibration on me, which was amazing. It does it while you sleep. And then being in a sisterhood was giving me the connection and the intimacy in a safe environment that I needed to practice. And that was huge. So even practice I would say that I was doing and it gave me the softening to be able to communicate better and I kind of think that saved my relationships wow that's a test for yoga nidra isn't it that's amazing i wanted to ask you what it was that enabled you to claim rest because it's one of the things that was one of the edges we bump up to up against so often particularly as women in this patriarchal setup that we most of us live in but it sounds like

it was having that sisterhood of like rest sisters around you and having that specific practice to hold you that those were two of the core things that enabled you to really claim, I am tired, I need rest that I am not an overachiever. I'm not a type A, I'm like a type B. And yet, even with that, the emotional weight that I had been carrying for my entire life. As a child, I was the chief secret keeper, the eldest. I felt this emotional responsibility, a lot of which wasn't mine. And I didn't really know how to manage my own because I couldn't even figure out what was mine and what was other people's. Yes. And so that's where the rest and the permission to rest and the permission to talk about I'm exhausted, even though on the outside, you could look at me and go, well, why are you tired? People here commute to New York City and they have big fancy jobs and they're

traveling and like, I'm not doing any of that. I'm like hanging out in the backyard. I mean, I was doing things. I'm mothering. I was certainly busy with things, but compared to the average person, to me, it seemed like, am I allowed to rest like publicly because I don't really do that much, but I'm still tired. Yes. I could just hear so many listeners relating to this. I often feel like I have to work really hard to earn my rest. Oh, it's just so, it's just toxic productivity. I need to hear this I imagine there are other listeners that need to hear this I also want to tell you that rest came to me right at the height of the betrayal I had decided to open this studio for my movement practice and it

was my dream and I had received some money through an inheritance when my grandparents passed away. So I had this seed money and I'm like, I'm going to do my thing. And I went all out. Well, I did it too fast. I started out small and then this opportunity came and then I went all in to this other place, bigger place. And it wasn't the right time. It wasn't the right connection. It wasn't the right, it wasn't right. And so that whole thing went on for about nine months. And then I finally realized like, I have to let this go. And I was getting ready to close the doors. And I started this practice of drawing with a freehand mandala. And it was to this very specific music and I would just draw. And this one day after I was just exasperated with this whole ordeal that I'd been through

and I drew the circle and I kept drawing and then I ended when the music ended and I looked down and it looked like a woman who was kind of curled up in a fetal position inside the circle. And she was like holding herself. And the word rest came to me. And it just came in and I wrote the letters in this kind of curvy letters inside her body. Rest. And literally like a few months later, I saw, I think it was a podcast. Yeah, it was a podcast. I heard Karen Brody talking about her book, Daring to Rest, that was about to come out.

And I was like, that's it, rest. So it came in this really intuitive, like a spirit guidance. And I feel like there's this wise woman that's there for us that is also kind of part of our future selves. And when I would do the Nidra and when I would do any of the creative practices that I do, I knew I needed rest. And then I, you know, obviously was attuned to the signal. So it came. And when I recognized it immediately and, and it's been like that throughout the whole repair phase, I would say, you know, like coming closer and closer throughout this journey to that wise woman spirit that, that I believe has always been in me, but it's like the other things needed to be stripped away so that she could, she could be heard and seen and, and felt. I'm going to pause my conversation with Autumn just for a couple of minutes to invite you to join us for our course that starts tomorrow, Menopause, The Great Awakener. It's for you if you'd like to be guided through the map of the five phases of menopause so that you can reclaim the power of the menopause initiation wherever you're at in the journey and whatever you're experiencing. You're totally

welcome as alexander and shani share they invite you to bring the fullness of who you are and the fullness of your menopause experience however messy complicated confusing uncertain unknown it might be as they say this is so beautiful all of your experiences hold at their heart a deeper story of power so you can find out all about the course and step in today we start tomorrow at redschoolmenopause.com I love everything you're sharing especially all of the nuance like that there's so much paradox in menopause and it's not black and white and this double-edged sword of oh this is good but it's also not and I feel this but I also feel this and really appreciate you naming that and with so with these phases of menopause it's not like it's like oh now I betrayal. Oh, and now I've finished that. And now I'm in repair and I finished that. It's not like that. It's like, it's a, it's such a

spiraling, twisting, emergent. Yeah. It's, it's not like that at all. It's, it's spiraling. Yeah. It is definitely. And really you see it when you look back. And I also feel like I've been feeling in the last, I don't know, a few months, like, am I in betrayal again? It's happening again, you know, because it's another layer. Yes. You know, I'm, it's more subtle, but I think that we're always kind of going through these, these phases in, in subtler ways, you know? Yes. So interesting. I was hearing hearing though as you were talking about the wise woman spirit she's so beautiful a kind of feeling of the phase of revelation a little like some insight was really being like the stripping away had happened and some something new was being revealed

to you could you share and maybe particularly through the lens of relationships and you might want to bring the mothering piece in here if that feels relevant but you're the revelation phase what some of what that looked like for you yeah well so much of the revelation I would say phase at this point because I was really in steeped in the menstruality awareness now and, and the awareness of the phases of menopause and having the context, which is just vital, so vital. And I think part of the revelation for me was how vital the context is because I really started to become much more clear in my own work that what was happening to me was universal, of course, for women, you know, we're going through this, but I also just felt such gratitude that I had the context.

I had the safety. I had the, I had all the things that would make it better, you know, that would give it a nest, that would put arms around it. And I felt so grateful to be held in this kindness. And in the safety, the softness, the kindness. And when I say safety, I really am referring to the safety that I learned to give to myself through the not abandoning myself, through loving myself anyway, through trusting myself anyway, through connecting with the humility that allows me to say, I don't know, and to ask for help and to trust that there are those beautiful humans and other unseen beings that are benevolent and caring and there for us,

including ancestors. Like I really connected deeply with my relationship with my mother during this time, very, very deeply, you know, really receiving messages from her that were really clear. Yeah. So with my mothering, so much really more with the softness in me, being able to allow me to receive my children with more empathy, more understanding, more grace, more patience. And if they're listening to this, they'd be like, really? No, because it's not like it's again, like the paradox. It's not like, it's not, none of this is a one and done. It's not like it's perfect, but it's softened the way between us. Cause when I think of relationships, it's like, it's me, it's you. And then there's like the conduit that allows something to flow between us. And so if I'm really closed and hard, and I feel like, you know, if my heart is closed because I'm

clenching, because I'm not loving myself or I'm, you know, feeling this, all this fear, then the flow that's like the nectar, you know, that's between us is not flowing because I'm gripping. And so the more I was able to open to receive and loosen my grip, the more that the nectar was able to flow. So it wasn't like I had all these answers and I still don't, but I've let go of needing to have the answers and allowed myself to focus more on, am I present with this person? Am I present in this space? Am I present with myself? And that has really shifted everything. And it's given me a lot of courage because when I'm present with myself I can say my truth instead of trying to be I don't know tough or it's like helping me have boundaries but boundaries out of self-compassion rather than out of trying to keep something out you know so I've been able to claim both my boundaries and be firm in my mothering, but not be hard, but just be more clear.

Wow. As you were talking, it was like you were usher were saying. Like that presence is bringing tears to my eyes now. That presence, it feels like that's everything. For mothering, for all relationships, for just being in relationship with this crazy wildlife that doesn't make any sense and does make every kind of sense. And yeah, wow. That's a theme that I've heard. I was talking to Shamali the creator the founder of the Awakening Women Institute and she said exactly pretty much exactly the same thing that there are new boundaries now and they're coming from a place of self-compassion that is gentle

and fierce at the same time amazing so much more I could ask you about revelation but just because time is real the next phase that Alexander and Shani describe is the vision phase. And you shared a poem with me that to me felt like it was an amazing encapsulation of the kind of visions that can come through menopausal women. And I wondered if you'd be willing to read it. Yes, it came in at the very beginning of, I don't know what to even call it. It's like the opening of the portal, I would say. And I didn't know that that's what it was. But it was right before my 49th birthday, right near the equinox. And seven years ago, it's funny, because actually, when I look back on it, it was right in the middle of that kind of big, the betrayal part where I'd gone for it with the big dream and all of that,

but I didn't know that it was gonna, you know, fall apart. Okay. But again, it was like that wise woman spirit, like giving me this medicine. And yeah, it was a very visionary thing that I didn't understand until later. The way that I receive writings, I just take dictation. I don't edit or think about it. It's just like a channel, you know. So this came in. Rise and return. The power I have is not false. The smaller I become, the more powerful I am. I am shrinking so fast. I am willing to walk away and leave everything behind. I am changing. I am becoming colorless like sacred water. I am flowing with the heart of God and creation. Sacred fire igniting from within.

I am dying to myself to be birthed anew. Whole. Pure. Ready. To take a stand for life. When you read that aloud now, what with you in this little cauldron that we've created right now in this meeting together. And it feels so mysterious. And when I look back on it just coming in and me just receiving it and trusting it

and just, okay, write it down. And then I like put it over there because I didn't understand really all that it meant and all that it would pretend. But I knew it was a call towards the future and an anchoring in the now at the same time yes and it was almost like I mean let me know if I'm getting this right it's almost like your visionary wise woman spirit self from the future visiting you in betrayal to give you a drop at like a homeopathic dose

or like a tincture of like a really potent medicine but just a drop to kind of give you something to hold on to so that you could get to be the woman who's envisioning the future oh yes that sounds that's perfect that's exactly what it is and that's what it felt like and yeah now I'm on the other side of the bridge you know or the other side of the portal and yeah I mean it really like it was like okay you're gonna go into this dark forest you know you're not going to be able to use the same sight that you had before you have to use this inner vision you have to be able to sense your way through the darkness which is what the

whole process felt like you know it's this you're you're out in the world in the light but in yourself you're fumbling in the dark but there's a voice that's calling you and and yeah that's like that was like a little a little voice voice, a little something to hold, to follow, follow that voice, follow that. That's what that poem felt like. And now that I'm on the other side and I read it from a different place, it's like, oh, yes. Like I've become that or and I'm still becoming it. It's not like I'm, you know, we're never there. We're always here.

I was just about to say that because we're always here what would you say to someone who's in the midst of betrayal right now and feels like they can't hear that voice or can't find that voice yeah that's a great question um be with the trees be with nature see if you can sit in in the stillness of a tree with the grass with the flowers and see if you can just get still for a moment and sense the rhythm of mother earth and the ground that's holding you because even when we don't feel like we can hold ourselves she is holding us and for me the way to know her has been literally just being very quiet um with the tree and that's something i've done since i was really a little girl like i was saying I grew up in a turbulent household,

which at times was very kind of normal. And then other times it was just mayhem. So I had this maple tree in the backyard and I had a swing under it and a hammock. And no, I would just sit out there. I would talk to things. I talked to the ladybugs and the ants and make things out of grass and flowers and just let that tree protect me. And so I feel like there's so much solace in nature. Also the water, if you can be near the water, even a shower, the bath, just so many simple things, I think that we can use to quiet ourselves, because really, that's the first part is getting quiet. And then sometimes, and I think this is important, too, is that sometimes we can't get to the quiet by getting still right away. So we need to move. We need to dance, maybe people run, or I love going for walks in a trail near my house that's underneath the canopy of trees. When I teach staring to rest, or when I facilitate,

I have us do a little bit of movement first. Because it's hard to go from the big world that's in such a frenzy of the time. And there's so much coming at us that we need a bridge for that. So yeah, I would say that also find some inspiring poetry that can be so, so enriching and come to Red School. I mean, I really think Wise Power is just one of the best books, you know, ever. I mean, it just gives you the sense of you're not alone, you know, ever. I mean, it just gives you the sense of, you're not alone, you know, read other stories of wise women or women who've been through the menopause and you're just not alone. You know, when you start to feel like, gosh, I'm not crazy. I'm not, you know, it's not just me. Rather than trying to fix things, I think that's a caution a bit is to, in our culture now, we, we kind of go to the, what's the thing I can take or what's the treatment I can do,

or what's the healing modality I can use. And, you know, even in the alternative medicine space, there's all of that. And I, I would say to first, uh, just try to be with yourself. And even, um, Susan Weed has this seven rivers of healing. And I just remembered that the first part is serenity. Serenity medicine. So that we can actually hear what our body is needing. And maybe that wise woman spirit will, you know, nudge you. You know, so it's really

to get to where you can listen. I often during the times it was very turbulent, I would get in my car and take a drive when I just felt really agitated. And sometimes I would just scream or roar in the car and just let it out let out sound just let out whatever's in there that feels constricting so that whatever's underneath it can start to give you a little bit of clarity yeah oh so beautiful um so we can give a little nod to the fifth phase emergence. I would love to be to play your song after this. Like what a great way to like usher in the second spring for everyone and to, you know, point to the beauty of your second spring experience. But could you share a bit about

what inspired the song and your emergence process? so in my emergence process I and I'm still in it and that's the thing it's kind of funny because it's like I've it's been about two years since my last bleed and it kind of feels like I'm just touching emergence in a way it's like I was there but then it's like I'm again it is a spiral It isn't like it's a linear process. I would say in my emergence, it's like, you know what? I'm just okay how I am. I'm accepting myself and I show up imperfect and I embrace that.

And I also have embraced that it's all a process. Like I had just said a few minutes ago that we're never finished. We're never really there because once you get there, it's, it becomes here. So once I started to get that a little bit more and embrace that, I really felt more open with my creativity in terms of sharing, in terms of being connected with others, in terms of accepting both the function and the dysfunction, you know, and, and being okay with that. Even though I have been prolifically creative and I

have all these writings and I have all these things, it's actually okay if I never get it together to publish this or, you know, put that out there, whatever. Like I, I wrote the poem, you know, somebody heard it. Like maybe it was just for me to hear, I can read it to myself or I can pull it out when I want to, or, you know, so this song, the song came from a prompt, which was something that in my emergence, I wanted to upgrade my creative practices. So I took a course and it was a songwriting, singing, and piano, all three things that I've done some, but never really had a lot of formal training in. And I had never written a song kind of on demand before. Usually it's, you know, things just come in when they come in, but I got in a state and I, and I learned some structure and the prompt was flow.

And little did I know what would come through and it came through in a flow. And I guess that I was just at the point of my menopause journey, right? That, that now, as I'm looking at it, it was like, that was sort of the window into emergence was actually in the song. It's like, I'm casting back to the beginning of the journey and I'm on the other side and I'm in this flow of life and it's life is flowing like a river and there's also the piece about safety in in some of the in the lyrics says you'll be safe with me and what I recognized is that it was me it was me that I needed to be safe with And it was me that's been holding me all along. And in doing that, I allowed myself to receive the holding and healing and safety of others. And yeah, and so that felt like a whole new portal opening that I had landed. I had been, you know, been through the,

the gristmill or the ringer or whatever. And it came back out as me carrying less. Talk about the medicine of menopause. Wow. Autumn, it's been such a restful, rejuvenating time for me. I feel soft in myself myself I feel present with myself I feel like you really are transmitting powerful medicine and I'm so grateful for this time with you and for our listeners to be able to spend this time with you and yeah for all that you are in the world thank you love if people want to connect with you what's the best way to do that? So the best way to do that is through wisewomanspirit.com. Yeah, I think that's the best way or wisewomanspirit on Instagram. So either of those two, wisewomanspirit.

And before we close, I just wanted to thank you, first of all, Sophie. It's just, it's always such a pleasure to connect with you. And I really appreciate this space to bring the transmission that I, it's like, I don't even know I'm carrying it at times. And I really, part of my work in the mission that came forth and the vision is to create the space for women in this stage of life to bring forth our stories because we just we don't have that and we need them the next generations need them and so it's a huge part of the reclaiming and that I feel like that's like my mission to create these circles and spaces so I'm looking forward to many more women having the opportunity to bring their stories forth and also to have the context where they can have more easement in their menopause journey. Because really, if we know what's going on, like when I went into that portal, because I had an idea that it was going to be okay. And I call it the long birth now. Like I knew I was going to birth, but it was like, I didn't know it was going to happen in there,

but I trusted. And so we need more women to know that they're going to be okay. And that there are women here to, to hold them. And in the song, picture us sitting down at the riverside, my sister friends, Tina and Melissa. Tina's playing the guitar and all three of us are singing. And we go down to the Delaware River and from time to time when we can get together and we bring our prayers, we have ceremony and we give homage to our Mother Earth and the waters of the river. So in that moment, it was really a prayer. And it was the first time that I had shared that song. And it was such a different experience in connection with the women, other women than just by myself. So it really confirmed for me the testament of the sisterhood that is so vital.

Oh, well, thank you for sharing that precious moment with us. And I will drop it in next for everyone to receive. And yeah, thank you so much for everything you've shared today autumn it's been gorgeous thank you love thank you thank you so much for being with autumn and i today i'm sending love and support to you if you're in menopause as you, whatever your menopause experience is bringing you. And if you'd appreciate some like-minded, like-hearted company, come over to RedSchoolMenopause.com and explore the Menopause The Great Awakener course, which is starting tomorrow. So Autumn is going to play us out today with her Menopause Emergence Flow song. And I will be with you again next week.

Until then, keep living life according to your own brilliant rhythm. And you can't hide When the pain inside Keeps you cold When you're in a dark night Looking for shelter that you just can't find The road ahead is unclear And all the doors are closed. Do you have reminders to show you who you are? Can you see yourself in the stars life is flowing

like a river wild and beautiful and free a flame is burning from within you I can't see let your river flow I'll be by your side.

Let your flame blow, it's all right. You'll be safe with me. When you've lost your wings And you can't move On the winding road Feeling all alone When you know that you can't hold The burdens that consume your soul The warmth is rising up

From your weary heart Do you have reminders To show you your own power Can you see yourself in a flower? Life is falling like a river, wild and beautiful and free. A flame is burning from within you, I can't see. Let your river flow I'll be by your side

Let your flame glow It's alright You'll be safe with me Cause life is flowing like a river Wild and beautiful and free A flame is burning from within you I can see Let your river flow I'll be by your side I'll be by your side.

I'll be by your side. Let your flame glow. It's all right. You'll be safe with me. Yay! Yay! All right. Wow. Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay!

Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay!

Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay!

Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay!