Menopause Is a Portal: Reclaiming the Body, the Story, and the Second Half with Dr. Hillary McBride

In this episode of unPAUSED, Dr. Mary Claire Haver sits down with Dr. Hillary McBride, a psychologist, researcher, and author whose work focuses on women's lived experience of embodiment across the lifespan, and particularly what happens during the perimenopausal and menopausal transition. She brings a feminist, biopsychosocial lens to the work, looking at the intersection of biology and culture and how the stories we are handed about aging as women can shape what we actually feel, right down to measurable health outcomes.

Dr. McBride opens by naming what the research literature has gotten wrong. Women's voices have been largely absent from the empirical conversation about perimenopause and menopause, and what women are actually saying when asked about their experience is strikingly different from what the medical literature reflects. They are describing not just difficulty but clarity, not just loss but a deepening sense of self, not just symptoms but a portal.

Guest links:

Hillary L. McBride 

Hillary L. McBride (Instagram)

Hillary McBride (Facebook)

Hillary McBride (X)

Books:

Hillary L. McBride

For full show notes, please click here.