Earlier this week I posted on LinkedIn about watching Ladies First on Netflix, a comedy that's absurd, and yet I recognised almost everything in it.

The quiet question underneath all the laughs: What would it actually look like if women's experience was the default, not the footnote?

This newsletter is the other side of that question. The more personal side.

This week, on a coaching call, I sat with a fear I recognised from a long time ago, which wasn’t the fear of the stage, writing the newsletter or generally being visible. 

It was the fear of reaching out to one person and saying: I think we should talk.

And then I caught myself, because I know what happens when women stay silent about something that's affecting them deeply. I lived it.

I was 42. In perimenopause. And I said nothing. To anyone.

The workplace had no language for it, so I took up less space. Got quieter. Performed fine.

The question I had to ask myself this week, and maybe it's worth sitting with yourself too:

What does it cost the people who need this, when I hold back what I know helps?

The ego says: what if they're not interested? What if nobody wants to talk about this?

And yet, somewhere out there is a woman in a meeting right now, pushing through the fog, convinced she's losing her edge. She's not. She's overloaded and unsupported. And she hasn't yet found the language for it.

That matters more than my discomfort.

So I'm asking for conversations. Real ones.

With women: What is it actually like, day to day? What are you carrying that nobody at work can see?

With people leaders and HR directors: What does menopause support actually look like in your organisation? Not on paper. In practice.

I'm especially thinking of women in maritime. I know that world. I know how invisible this can feel in an industry that was never built with us in mind.

I'm also close to launching two things I've been building carefully -  the Pause Effect Menopause Readiness Index for organisations, aligned with the incoming reporting requirements, and the Pause Effect Menopause Reflection for individual women navigating this. Both are ready at the beginning of next week.

Whether we have a conversation or not, I'd love to send them to you. One is an effective way to take stock of where you are as an organisation. The other holds space for the lived experience within it.

Reply here, or send me a message. Because I still believe the best workplaces haven't been built yet. And I don't want to be the one who stays quiet.