Unraveling full transcript

ALLISON BEHRINGER: Hey everyone. Before we start, I wanna tell you about a podcast called Unladylike. It’s hosted by the hilarious and brilliant Cristen Conger & Caroline Ervin. It’s about gender rules and the people who break them. Cristen and Caroline interviewed me for an upcoming episode of theirs called “How to Diagnose Gaslighting Doctors”. They also brought on a doctor who talks about changing the way that doctors listen to women and she gives some great advice for your next appointment. The episode comes out Oct 23rd and you can find Unladylike wherever you get your podcasts!

So, this is the last episode of season one of Bodies. I hope you’ll stick around till the end of the episode to hear what’s next for Bodies.

We’ve been getting a lot of requests to do a story about menopause. Besides hot flashes and your period ending, I didn’t really know anything about menopause. In a lot of ways, it’s like puberty. Your hormones are changing – setting off a whole host of bodily changes.

It’s something that happens to half the population, but still, it is full of mysteries. In solving any body mysteries, I think we like to look for neat lines, simple explanations, cause and effect. But once we start digging for answers, each layer we peel back reveals even more layers. Every story has made me reconsider my own life, my own body. And the bodies of the people I’m connected to. This one, even more so.

We have two stories today. The first story is about a woman named Lisa. Then second, well, you’ll find out. This is Bodies, a podcast about people solving the mysteries of their bodies. I’m Allison Behringer.

2008 was a hard year for Lisa Renee Hartman. That summer, in the wake of the financial crisis, her husband, Steven’s pay had been cut by a third. Steven was the breadwinner; she homeschooled their 4 children. They were a paycheck to paycheck kind of family. And so to make up the gap, Lisa started picking up catering shifts, as many as she could fit into her nights and weekends.

And on one particular day that summer, her husband was out of town, and her mom was in town visiting. And that night, she had taken two of her kids and their friends to the fair. After the kids went to bed, she and her mom drank pomegranate cosmopolitans, commiserating about their stressed out lives.

LISA RENEE HARTMAN: 4:00 in the morning. I get up to pee and I feel you know not great and I come back to go to bed and my mom is calling me. I go into her room and I'm standing at the foot of her bed.

ALLISON: And then Lisa fainted, she went down like a tree.

LISA: The next thing I remember is waking up. My mom's on the floor and she's holding me and she's very upset. She's yelling and calling and the boys get up and call 911.

All the kids wake up. The ambulance comes. And they take her to the hospital.

ALLISON: Lisa had fainted a half dozen times over the course of her life, normally at the sight of blood. But this was different. She hadn’t seen blood. Lisa felt like it was out of the blue.

And in the past, she’d always bounced back to her tough, high energy self. But this time fainting, she didn’t bounce back. Something inside of her was changing. And after the fall, her world never quite righted itself.

LISA: It was very very very clear very quickly that things had shifted. I'd be sitting at the dining room table having a cup of tea and I'd suddenly be just consumed with anxiety that I didn't understand. 

ALLISON: At first, she attributed it to stress. Then other things started happening.

LISA: I felt sorta unstable. Sometimes it felt like pretty pure anxiety, sometimes it manifested as you know panic, sometimes it was just odd dizzy spells, sometimes it was vertigo. Sometimes it was just days where I was exhausted and I just felt like shit all day with no real explanation. That actually just makes you feel like you're dying.

Because I think I've said that probably a thousand times to Steven. I think I might be dying. How else could we explain this. It's utter madness. I'm probably dying.

ALLISON: It was Steven who thought maybe she was starting to approach menopause. She was 45, so it was a possibility. Officially, menopause is​​ ​​when a person has gone one full year without a period. Their ovaries are no longer producing estrogen. Perimenopause is the transition time that comes before that, when the hormones are starting to change.

She made an appointment with her doctor and told her her symptoms. And the doctor was like, yeah, that’s possible.

LISA: But then she said, are your periods still regular? And I said yeah. I still get a period every month and she said oh now well then it can't be perimenopause.

ALLISON: But Lisa didn’t totally believe her. And the symptoms kept coming.

LISA: I was having wild hot flashes. I was having cold flashes which I never even knew was a thing. But I would wake up in the middle of night absolutely freezing and unable to even manage that I'd wrap myself. I've had a lot of blankets and it just would not go away. It was like ice water in my veins. I was just having terrible insomnia. I was having vision problems. I was having all sorts of joint issues.

ALLISON: She was different. And the world was different.

LISA: Like if we were eating dinner and somebody was scraping their silverware on their plate, sometimes that would just be more than I could deal with. It's like suddenly these aural levels of stimulation were so apparent to me, when they had not been before.

The worst parts of it for me though were the anxiety and the panic. Absolutely unequivocally. Because they made me feel like I couldn't live my life in the world the way I always have.

ALLISON: Pretty soon, Lisa wasn't going to the grocery store anymore. Sometimes she couldn't even make it to the mailbox. She’d be driving, and suddenly be hit with surging panic and would have to pull over and wait for it to pass. Then she stopped driving. Which was a big problem because her approach to homeschooling involved driving the kids into different activities and classes and internships.

LISA: If I couldn't get someone somewhere then I couldn't get someone somewhere. I mean it's hard not to feel like a loser​ ​​when you start to experience the world that way because you've experienced the world in a completely different way for so long and functioned well in that world and suddenly this world that you've been so comfortable with. It's not the same.

ALLISON: Lisa was desperately trying to right her world. To get back to herself. 

LISA: I have to fix this. This has to be fixed. I sort of felt like I had to be Sherlock Holmes about this thing like it was this constant seeking the correct answer for each issue because you've got this constellation of symptoms. You don't seek answers to these questions in your 30s. You seek answers to these questions at 3:00 in the morning when the room is spinning and you think you've lost your mind. That's when you start looking for the answers.

ALLISON: One of the places that Lisa found answers was an online forum for women in perimenopause and menopause. It had a very pronounced blue background.

LISA: It became a joke in my family if anybody walked into the room and my computer was blue. It was oh she's on the blue screen. It's the blue screen again.

ALLISON: Lisa would laugh along with them, but the blue screen was no joke – it was saving her. She was talking with women with the exact same constellation of symptoms that she had. She spent a lot of time on the discussion boards about anxiety. It’s where her experience was validated.

Eventually, she finally got validation from the medical establishment too. The gynecologist examined her, And she told Lisa that she was really healthy, there was nothing wrong, per se.

LISA: She actually took both of my hands in hers and she leaned forward and looked at me and my eyes and she said “You are not crazy. This is perimenopause. And everyone does it and you're going to get through it.” What I was describing, was well within the normal range for perimenopausal experience.

ALLISON: As Lisa started to name and make sense of her experience, as she learned more about the wide range of peri and menopause experiences, the conversations with her mom started changing too. And I know when I went to my mom when I started having all these problems and I went to my mom I was like what happened. I think this is what's going on with me. What happened for you?

LISA: She was always very supportive but she was always saying you know it wasn't really that hard for me. I mean I remember a few things. But then as time went by, I started struggling and talking about it more. More, and more, and more would come out from her.

She said something at one point about how you know now that you mention it I do remember hiding in a room upstairs often and just crying like a lot, which like what? Really? Now you remember that there was a period in your life where you just wept alone daily for a long time?

It's one of the things that has become really important to me is that why – I always find myself feeling like why didn't anybody talk to me about this?

You know I spent my whole adult life just completely dismissing the concept of menopause but no idea I just had no idea.

ALLISON: Lisa has tried to prepare her daughter, trying to walk the line of not scaring her. But just saying, your body is going to change, and how you care for it is gonna to matter.

It’s been 10 years since Lisa fainted and her life got turned upside down. Over those years she’s learned how to care for herself, and how to say no. How to call upon her friends for help driving her kids. Also on her list: Walks, acupuncture, progesterone cream, supplements – these are the things that have helped Lisa.

And in doing those things, the good days have slowly started to outweigh the bad. The other big thing: Lisa started writing – at first about homeschooling, and then, about her experience with menopause.

And that writing was how we found Lisa. And how I started to wrap my head around this life transition that is not openly discussed. And then the more I learned, and the more stories I heard, the more I found myself wondering about my mom’s experience with menopause.

The thing about menopause is that there’s not really one standard experience. It can be loud and violent like Lisa’s or barely noticeable. But mostly, it’s all kinds of in between with ups and downs that vary a lot from one person to the next. It is at once a very individual and very collective experience.

And then further complicating all this is that menopause often coincides with big life changes: kids leaving for school, or maybe divorce, or caring for an elderly parent. And I think maybe ​​It ​​catches us off guard because, by and large, our parents don't talk to us about it. And I guess, I wonder if that's because they don't wanna burden us... or, because they can sense that we don't want them to talk to us about it.

And so I keep wondering, like what did my mom go through during those years? Mid-life change hit her hard. And so did her life get turned upside down while I was away at college, going to classes and parties, totally oblivious. Was there a chaos at home that she kept quiet? Or something that I shied away from seeing?

ALLISON: Hello!

MOM: Hi, can you hear me?

ALLISON: Yeah can you hear me?

MOM: I can.

ALLISON: So, I had something I wanted to ask you about. I’ve been reporting on this last episode and it keeps leading me back to some questions I never asked you. And so, what i’ve done is booked an Amtrak to Maryland tomorrow morning.

MOM: What?!

ALLISON: In hopes that you might have a recorded conversation with me.

MOM: Sure, that sounds fantastic. I’m like i’m in shock, this is so cool and a super surprise

ALLISON: On the train ride down to Maryland, I start bringing myself back in time, back to where my mom was in her life in her late 40s and early 50s. And to set the stage for this conversation that my mom and I are about to have, I realize that this last minute trip to see my mom is going to require me to tell you a few more things about myself.

Growing up, my family – me, my younger brother, my mom, my dad – we were really close.

Like even though we were only semi-good Catholics, every night, before we ate the meal my mom made us, the four of us would fold our hands and pray a rushed “Bless us Oh Lord.” Looking back, I think the ritual was mostly about togetherness.

And then, when I was seventeen, my dad got cancer. Six months later, just after Christmas, he passed away. Our friends and family swooped in, the funeral happened, and then I had to go back to school, I graduated, and the summer was very quiet.

That fall, I went to college. And then it was my mom and my younger brother at home. And then he went away to college. I spent my summers during school abroad – sophomore year, I went to India. My junior year, I taught in South Africa. I felt myself being pulled in two directions: my desire to expand my world and take advantage of every opportunity. And the need to be home and be there for my mom.

I worried about her a lot. Grief seemed to have morphed into a constant anxiety for her that went way beyond typical parental worry. But I also didn’t see myself moving back to Maryland anytime soon. And I pushed hard against any attempt of hers to keep me around. Home felt different, it wasn’t the same. Three people felt too small to call a family.

I remember one time senior year my brother and I were home for Christmas, and I was setting the table for a family dinner. And I – out of habit – grabbed four forks and four knives. I finally understood what people meant when they said “Holidays are hard.”

After graduation, I moved to Thailand for a year. While I was gone, I know my mom had some kind of surgery. I think it was a hysterectomy. But even as I’ve learned more about women's bodies, I haven’t really talked to her about it.

MOM: Ohhhh. Okay.

ALLISON: Are you ready?

MOM: Yeah.

ALLISON: Are you nervous?

MOM: Of course. I won’t cry this time.

ALLISON: I might cry. Who knows.

So I’ve been working on this story about menopause​​ ​​and it made me realize, like, I don’t know anything about your experience. Like thinking back, I know some about what you were going through at the time... I'm really curious what your experience with perimenopause and menopause was like.

MOM: Well I think for me it gets a little muddled because, of course, Dad passed away when I was 45.

You know the grief of losing my husband and then the grief of – not losing you, but it's you leaving for college and that is really a grief because you're not in my daily life again. And then two years later losing David. So I went from you know a family of four to just me in three years.

And so that whole empty nest syndrome I'm not sharing that with somebody. And just by myself and thank God I had amazing neighbors because I definitely cried a lot. But it was like I cried because you know just worrying about you when you were in Thailand and driving. You know, taking a bus in the middle of the night when it's all foggy. I don't even know all the stories I don't want to know all the stories or losing your phone in South Africa and then not contacting me when you get home and just the worry would just overwhelm me. That would turn me into anxiety and tears.

So many times there's so much going on in our life that we can't say. This is perimenopausal No this is my life right in my face right now. And that's how my perimenopausal menopausal times manifested itself, through grief.

There was a point where I was just crying all the time and a friend of mine finally convinced me. You have to go to your doctor. You have to go and just tell them that you're crying and I remember I don't want to go because I don't want to cry at the doctors. And so I finally made an appointment. And I went and I cried. And she listened and she ended up prescribing me Lexapro

ALLISON: What’s that?

MOM: Lexapro I guess is like an antidepressant. It was just a low dose. And it definitely helped. And I was probably on it for about a year.

ALLISON: I don’t think I knew that story.

MOM: You probably didn’t. I probably didn't tell you. Didn't want you to worry.

ALLISON: Did you have other perimenopausal symptoms?

MOM: Well physically I mean my periods were just like heavy and clotty and I thought well this is just normal like because I'm you know perimenopausal moving to menopause like oh this is normal. And I finally went to a specialist.

And she's like why did you wait so long and I said I didn't know it was abnormal.

ALLISON: The doctor told her that she had a prolapsed uterus, which is when the pelvic floor weakens and isn’t able to hold the uterus. As a result, the uterus slips down into the vagina. Which for my mom was the thing causing the heavy periods as well as incontinence. And she ​​did​​ have a hysterectomy to remove her uterus.

That happened when I was living in Thailand. I remember talking to her on the phone, 12 hours apart, right before surgery. I know she was scared, I was scared. And then I remember getting an email from her friend saying she was out of surgery and ok.

MOM: Lynette and Mary took me to the hospital so I had them and they would check on me. So I had this amazing group of friends that helped me through that since I didn't really have anybody here. But yeah, it's not easy going through surgery by yourself.

ALLISON: I like opened this whole Bodies series with this question like why didn't you – Why didn’t you tell me more about my body like why didn’t we have this like open line of communication about our health and our mental health and and I've just been thinking about how like that question was very much like about how our lack of communication affected me. But I've been thinking more about how like that you know lack of communication affected you and the ways in which I wasn't there for you.

And the awareness of what your body was doing and it kind of all how all the things were converging. Yes, so yeah. I’ve just been reflecting on that.

MOM: That's pretty cool. I think that our mother daughter relationship has definitely improved. And sometimes you tell me too it’s TMI. Sometimes you tell me too much.

ALLISON: Yeah. Like over the course of making this podcast I've been forced to reconsider a lot of things that I just never even thought about, even breastfeeding when I called you the other day and I was like "What was that like?" I don't know anything about that.

MOM: But you're not supposed to – 

ALLISON: What?

MOM: You're not supposed to like – That's part of your journey. You're not there in that journey yet. So like you can't be mad at yourself that you don't know anything about breastfeeding or menopause because you're not there yet.

B​ut when you get there you're going to have all this knowledge you're going to have your mother right by your side and then you're going to have your cousins and you're going to have your friends and that have been through that experience. But you shouldn't feel guilty or anything that you don't know anything about. ‘Cause they haven't been there yet and that's ok that's ok.

ALLISON: Yeah I guess too, this is like dark but I'm just grateful that we're having this conversation now because I know how a parent can be taken away from and you know, I have friends who don't have moms anymore or don't have a good relationship with their mom and yeah I'm just really grateful for you.

MOM: Well, I appreciate that.

ALLISON: Why are these conversations between generations so hard, so rare? I think part of it is parents not wanting to scare us about the things that can happen to our bodies. And from the younger generation's end, I think we're a little afraid of these conversations. They require a major adjustment in the way we look at our parents. Not just as caregivers who are there for us, but as people – messy and mortal, with their own needs and vulnerabilities. Because talking about our bodies ​​is​​ about reckoning with our most vulnerable selves. But something happens in that reckoning:

If making Bodies and hearing from you all has taught me anything, it’s that conversation is powerful. Not just for the person going through the thing, but for everyone who gets to witness them and understand themselves better through their story.

And in the context of menopause, conversation makes space to share the joys of this transition, of this new chapter in life: freedom from child rearing, time for creative pursuits, sexual discoveries. And, from what I hear, the joys of not giving a fuck.

And I should tell you the next chapter of my mom’s story – At 51, she fell in love again. Two years later she married her now-husband. Sometimes, I read, menopause can mean a drop in libido… in talking to her, I’ve learned, not so for my mom! And so there’s a lot to look forward to as our bodies age.

In all of these body-related conversations with each other, across generations, between friends, with strangers on the internet, we participate in the project of collective knowledge building. Knocking down old structures that isolate us and hurt us. And building a new reality, one with no dark corners and plenty of room for our full bodies, our many layered selves.

So, as I mentioned, this is the last episode of season one of Bodies. I am so grateful for you and I hope you’ll keep in touch. Keep sharing your stories and stay connected with us in the Bodies Facebook group. When we have news about what's next for Bodies, you'll be the first to know.

Definitely check out Lisa’s writing about Menopause on Medium. It’ll come right up if you google Lisa Renee, “The Long Middle.” We’ll also share links on the website and facebook group.

And seriously, the Facebook group, like speaking of collective knowledge. Wow. You all have been incredible. Like someone will post a question and right away there’s comments of support, resources and doctor recommendations. Can’t wait to see what we’ll continue to build here.
You can find a link to the Bodies facebook group in the show notes or by going to KCRW.com/bodies. You can also email me ​allison@bodiespodcast.com​ or tweet the show @bodiespodcast and me at @albtweetin. A L B T W E E T I N. You can find me on instagram at @ A L B 19 19.

I read every one of your tweets, emails, and messages and I will be responding to each one of them in the coming weeks. I can’t tell you how much your words have sustained and encouraged me. You can find episode transcripts and resources at bodiespodcast.com. Thanks to Sarah Schoengold for your help with the website. Finally, if you like Bodies, ​please​ leave a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps other people find the show.

This episode was produced and edited by me, Allison Behringer. This podcast has only been possible because of the incredible Bodies team: Sharon Mashihi is the editorial advisor. Sharon is a narrative genius, whose mentorship has shaped me as a storyteller. Camila Kerwin provides additional editorial advising. She is a brilliant writer with a knack for structuring beginnings. Camila also served as a producer on this episode. Dara Hirsch is the incredibly talented composer, musician, mixer and sound engineer. Dara creates each piece of music, from scratch, just for Bodies. Kristen Lepore is managing editor of Bodies and of KCRW’s Independent producer project. She is the glue that holds all the parts together, she who keeps us organized, keeps me sane and does a tremendous amount of work behind the scenes. Sarah Bachman created our cover art, painting, ripping, arranging and rearranging all of those layers. Kathy Farthing creates our episode art. Kathy is actually my aunt. The artwork for today’s episode is a portrait of four generations of women in my family. This episode had additional advice by Karen Michel. Look out for her forthcoming podcast called Venus Over 50, which she describes as “a podcast for and about women of a certain age, looking in the front view mirror from a somewhat raunchy perspective.” Reporting help from Liz Charky. Thank you Katy for your feedback. Special thanks to Kaitlin Prest and Abigail Keel who advised in the beginning of the season and to Caitlin Pierce for your consistent support. Thank you to my roommates who were cool with my bedroom doubling as a recording studio. Thank you Hannah, thank you Margot and everyone else who has supported me and this project. Finally, a huge thank you to KCRW. and the Independent Producer Project who provided the financial support for this show and tremendous support in distribution and helping me turn this idea into a real show. Thank you to Jen Ferro, Gary Scott, Caitlin Shamberg, Connie Alvarez, Adria Kloke, Jay Ferrand, Alex Cerilla, JC Swiatek, Chris Ho, Rachel Gertz and Andrea Bautista. And a huge thank you to Nick White, who took a chance on this project, got the greenlight and the resources, then stepped into the wings and gave this project creative space to thrive. I’m Allison Behringer. Thank you for listening to Bodies.

ALLISON: What was that like putting yourself out there on a dating app at 51?

MOM: Terrible like to put yourself out there and you don't feel that you know physically it's the best you​. Because I had gained a lot of weight through the time Dad was sick and I had never really lost it. So in my mind I'm big, heavy and fat​. ​It was hard for me to say but I'm nice inside and to try to put myself out there was just way too scary until you forced me to do it.

ALLISON: What I've been reading about peri/meno is that sexual desire can plummet. And I’m curious about how that worked out for you.

MOM: Well it hasn't waned because – not having that human touch for so many years that like having a second chance like I'm not going to let – like together we're not going to let that happen. And so we definitely make time for each other. We have a very healthy sex life but that was an effort. We both know what it feels like to lose a spouse. So we're going to basically make the best of it. So yes we're doing just fine in that department.

ALLISON: Thanks Mama! Love you!

MOM: Is that thing off yet? You trickster.