When Everything Piles On At Once... Do This Anyways

Thank you for the replies on last week's newsletter. Truly. I read every one of them.

I'm still moving through grief. Some days feel more possible than others. And in the middle of it, life keeps going. Which brings me to what I want to talk about today.

No matter when grief strikes, life keeps lifing… Our house cleaner was dealing with a family emergency of her own; Our wonderful nanny was taking a well-deserved week off for her birthday; House renovations and redesign have been confirmed; The lease is up on my car; And I’m continuing to brainstorm plans to expand REwritten for more perimenopausal women.

Dealing with any of those one at a time? Doable. All of them at once, on top of everything else? That is the mental load spike I want to talk about today.

My Peri Journey Today

The old me would have pushed through. I would have gone back to work asap. I would’ve woken up at 5am to get ahead of the day. I would’ve moved forward with all of these things… Sacrificing the slow moments in order to feel "productive."

Because of the RE method that I built to help peri women go from surviving to thriving, I’m able to guage my needs instead of going from 0 to 100 and back to 0 again. I slept in for an extra 45 minutes. And, instead of working out while G was getting ready for school, I sat with her. I was present instead of rushing to get the same amount done in less time. That was the call I made. And honestly, it's the kind of call I couldn't have made a few years ago.

Because here's what I've learned.

Peri does not care that your kids just started school or that your dad just died. Your cortisol is already running hotter than it used to, and the second the mental load spikes, your body notices before you do.

So let's talk about what's actually happening under the surface, and why the same stressors that used to feel manageable are landing so much harder now.

The Biology Bit - Dr. Flora's Notes:

Fall is almost here. You know. When the calendar fills up, you have left zero free time, and now you're snapping at your kid for asking you what’s for dinner for the third time? Later that night

Here's what's happening. When mental load spikes, your body pumps out more cortisol. In a younger hormonal system, estrogen and progesterone act like a buffer, smoothing out that stress response.

In perimenopause, both of those hormones are declining and fluctuating. So the same stressors that used to feel manageable now hit a nervous system with no buffer left.

That's why the short fuse, the wired-but-tired feeling, and the "why am I crying in the school pickup line" moment all show up together.

That is not you falling apart. That is a peri nervous system with no shock absorbers.

This Week's Reset

One small thing I want you to do this week:

Pick ONE thing on your calendar this week and take it off. Not delegate it. Not reschedule it. Take it off.

The habit: 

Open your calendar right now, look at the next 7 days, and find one commitment that's optional. A meeting you could skip. A dinner you could postpone. A workout you could swap for a walk.

Anything. Then delete it. Don't replace it with something else.

Leave that block empty. Your nervous system needs the white space more than your to-do list needs the check mark.

Try it and pay attention to one thing: how you feel in the moment you would have been doing that thing. That's your data.

Hit reply and tell me what you took off. I'm curious what women are actually saying no to right now.

Ready to Get Yourself Back? 

If you haven't taken it yet, my free Perimenopause Pattern Check is the fastest way to figure out what's actually driving your symptoms. Whether it's burnout, hormones, or both, this gives you a starting point that isn't a Google spiral.

Take the free assessment HERE.

P.S. Next week I'm getting into something a lot of women whisper to me about but rarely ask out loud: what's actually going on with your period. Shorter, heavier, skipped, or just plain unpredictable.