The Menopause Revolution: Why Medical Experts Are Changing Their Minds About HRT with Dr Cat Brown

Introduction

'I thought life would be good until you turned 50' - even board-certified gynecologists get surprised by menopause!

In this eye-opening episode, Dr. Cat Brown challenges everything you thought you knew about hormones, aging, and women's health.

Discover why leading doctors are embracing HRT, learn the subtle signs of perimenopause you might be missing, and find out why the 'dangerous hormone therapy' story of the past has been completely rewritten.

Whether you're 35 or 55, this conversation about modern menopause care could change how you think about your hormonal health forever. Hit play to learn why women doctors are choosing HRT for themselves and why the second half of life might just be your best yet! 💪

Three core ideas from the podcast:

- Menopause is a gradual transition that can begin up to a decade before the final period, with subtle symptoms like brain fog, mood changes, and sleep disruption often being dismissed as stress or fatigue.
- The medical community's stance on HRT has evolved significantly, with new research showing that bioidentical hormones, when started at the right time (before 60), can protect against heart disease, dementia, and other age-related conditions.
- Women shouldn't view menopause as a decline but rather as an opportunity to pause, reflect, and prioritize self-care, potentially making the second half of life even better than the first.

Connect with Dr Cat

IG: https://www.instagram.com/drcatobgyn/
Winona website: https://bywinona.com/resources

Mentioned in the Podcast

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Full Transcript

Dr Orlena (00:01.702)
Hello, hello, hello. Welcome to Fit and Fabulous with me, Dr. Orlena. Super excited today because we are going to be talking menopause and HRT and all of those exciting things. And I'm very excited to welcome Dr. Kat Brown, Dr. Kathleen Brown. Welcome, welcome.

Dr. Cat Brown (00:19.495)
Thank you so much for having me.

Dr Orlena (00:22.162)
It's an absolute pleasure. Thank you very much for spending some time with us. Would you like to just start off by telling people a little bit about you and what you do?

Dr. Cat Brown (00:30.323)
Sure, sure. I am a board certified OBGYN in the States. I'm in the Philadelphia area.

And I practice kind of two pronged. I work in a hospital doing OB-GYN laborist medicine, meaning that I just work as an inpatient physician, covering deliveries, covering emergencies, things like that. But then I'm also the medical director of an online GYN telemedicine company called Winona, where we provide care for women in midlife, specifically through the perimenopause and menopause transition. So we do online HRT for patients that are struggling

symptoms and that maybe don't have access to a doctor who's willing to prescribe and to help them.

Dr Orlena (01:12.978)
Perfect, perfect. And that's what we're going to talk about. You definitely have lots of things going on, juggling lots of balls. I'm just going to translate for our English. we don't call it OBGYN. What do you call it? OBGYN. So in England, we call it obs and gyny. And I think people might just, yeah, obs and gyny I think is the...

Dr. Cat Brown (01:29.235)
Obstetrics and gynecology. and I guess yeah, everyone has their own abbreviation. Yeah

Dr Orlena (01:34.916)
Yeah, exactly. So let's dive in and you're absolutely right about HRT. And I think in some places people actually find it really difficult to get like, I know I've got friends in France and they're just like, I don't know how to get hold of it. Like I can't just go to my GP and get it. But before we get there, let's backtrack a little bit. Let's just think about menopause, which we love to think about.

you just give us a quick overview of menopause and why it is such a big important time with women and you know what kind of symptoms and things because I think a lot of people just are busy getting on with their lives they're not really thinking about menopause and then suddenly they kind of find themselves feeling a bit like not the normal selves and thinking wait could it be menopause or is it I don't know just something else

Dr. Cat Brown (02:28.997)
Yeah, and I think menopause is kind of the lady of the hour that a lot of people are talking about right now, but it's a huge transition in our lives and it's just as big as going through puberty, coming into our own infertility. It's just a change in our reproductive life cycle, but it's when we near the end of our fertility phase, and there's not been a lot of focus put on it. And I think that a lot of women don't realize

when they're starting the process of perimenopause. And perimenopause, that term refers to all of the time leading up to the final period. Like menopause itself.

is just the name for when you have your final menstrual cycle and the official end of ovulation and producing eggs and being able to reproduce. But it's actually a long period of time that we spend more time in perimenopause because women can have symptoms for up to a decade before they actually go through that final period. And the symptoms are very subtle. Sometimes we just kind of incorporate them into our life and we write it off as stress or fatigue.

But often some of the early symptoms women experience are brain fog and mood swings, sometimes changes in libido. Often I hear early on a lot of women start to struggle with their sleep quality. You may have had no problem with sleep and getting restorative sleep and do fine, then all of sudden you're not staying asleep all night, waking up in the middle of the night, or having trouble, difficulty falling asleep. And then we start to see more of the vasomotor or physical symptoms where women start to

get hot flashes, night sweats, sometimes vaginal dryness, loss of lubrication when it comes to sexual activity, and changes in the skin, the hair. Women may notice changes where their hair may start thinning more, the skin gets more dry. We start to develop a loss of like turgor and suppleness of the skin with the loss of estrogen. And all of these changes are fundamentally linked to the decreasing hormone production in our body.

Dr. Cat Brown (04:34.373)
You know as women we primarily, you know function with estrogen and progesterone, but also we have testosterone too And as those levels are declining we start to see these symptoms happen. They start manifesting in different ways throughout our body So every woman's complex of symptoms is unique But I would say that early on most women notice that the symptoms are very vague often they might get put on And then they might go to the doctor saying I just don't feel like myself. I'm having mood swings. I'm less tolerant of

of my family, I'm yelling at my kids more, my partner is annoying me more, and then they end up getting put on an antidepressant.

And often that may help temporarily, but often that's like the beginning of symptoms. And even for me as well, I I, as a board certified gynecologist, I thought that life would be good until you turned 50. I think a lot of us had this impression that it's gonna be this like overnight transition that all of a sudden we'll notice symptoms and something will happen, but it's a much more gradual, much more like it creeps into your life a little bit more subtly.

symptoms do and as they build over time. And I think that that's something to be aware of. And for many of us as women, we're so very busy in our careers. We have so many other things going on at this particular time in our life that it's hard to recognize those early symptoms very clearly.

Dr Orlena (05:58.63)
and it's easy to just ignore them and just go, I feel tired because I haven't slept and then brush it under the carpet and get on and not really think about things. And another thing that comes to my mind as well is, you when I was at med school and learned about changing of eyes and things like this, like obviously I was in my twenties when I was at med school, but it was like, well, that happens when you're old, you know, like that's when you're super, super old.

Dr. Cat Brown (06:08.7)
Exactly.

Dr. Cat Brown (06:21.863)
Right.

Dr Orlena (06:23.682)
Now I've arrived there and I'm like, wait a minute, I'm not super old, but in my brain it was, yeah, that's like the next stage, that's the second half of your life. But now that I've arrived here, I'm like, wait, but I'm still energetic, I can still do these things, I've still got loads of stuff that needs to be done. It's not like, okay, it's downwards from here. It's like, well, actually, how can we keep women healthy and fit and doing all the things that they want to do?

Dr. Cat Brown (06:51.762)
Exactly.

Dr Orlena (06:52.944)
feeling in top peak performance I think is really...

Dr. Cat Brown (06:56.243)
Yes, and keep your vitality, you know, I think is so key. Absolutely. Yeah, because it doesn't have to be a decline. mean, even even 20, 30 years ago, when we look at women that were in this age range, if you look back in time, even on the television and movies, know, pop culture showed 40s and 50s women as like, you know, AARP, like elderly, you know, the Golden Girls, for instance. I mean, their average age in that television show was was 40s, like late 40s, early 50s.

Dr Orlena (07:00.57)
Yeah. Yeah.

Dr Orlena (07:26.15)
kidding!

Dr. Cat Brown (07:26.471)
Yes! Except for the mother, you know?

Dr Orlena (07:29.714)
You were all in their 80s, I'm sure.

Dr. Cat Brown (07:32.39)
Hahaha!

But yeah, comparatively now, women in their 40s are not going gently into older age, like we're taking care of ourselves better. And I think that for me, and talking to my patients especially, I think that menopause is a time where I like the word itself, because I think it forces women to pause and to kind of reevaluate their lives. And it is a wake up call. For many of us that are so used to multitasking

Dr Orlena (07:56.679)
Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cat Brown (08:05.017)
and juggling and doing all these things. It's a big change in our bodies that really forces us to look inward and really bring the attention back to ourselves and our self-care. And I think it's an impetus for that, that we need to start turning things inward again and focusing on ourselves, which I think is so very important.

Dr Orlena (08:20.786)
Yeah, yeah, I love that. I love that because I think so many people that I see just put themselves at the bottom of the pile and a lot of people I work with or chat with...

Dr. Cat Brown (08:31.495)
Especially women, yeah.

Dr Orlena (08:33.602)
Yeah, exactly. They know what they need to do. They just haven't allocated time in their busy week to actually make it happen. And they aren't complicated things. You know, for me, I'm talking about healthy eating and a bit of exercise. And once you get into the habit of doing it, it's easy. But there is that change of, I'm not doing anything to now I have to implement it and make it work.

One thing we haven't talked about in menopause is weight loss or weight gain, I should say. And I know that this is one of those controversial topics, but it does always seem to women that, you know, they hit this hodgepodge of hormones. And as a side note, I love that you talked about teenagers and puberty because I have sons who are kids who are going, you know, they're in their teens and I look at my 16 year old son and

Dr. Cat Brown (09:01.138)
Yeah.

Dr Orlena (09:23.29)
He is working out and super strong and so strong. And I'm like, what's the difference between him and me? And obviously it's that little hormone, testosterone. And I really think that we underestimate hormones. And I think, but hang on, wait a minute. There's not much difference between him and me, but obviously he has a lot more testosterone than me, which is why he doesn't do much, but he's actually super strong. And really, I guess we can talk about the differences between men and women. And that's why men are so much stronger than women.

Dr. Cat Brown (09:32.275)
Right?

Dr Orlena (09:51.996)
But I think we do underestimate hormones. But this time of hormonal change seems to be, for a lot of women, a time of frustration in terms of weight gain, because it feels like they've come through perhaps childbirth and then they want to get back to pre-childbirth weight, yet somehow, along with...

menopause and everything else that's going on. They find themselves with, normally it's extra belly fat that they really want to get rid of and it just feels really frustrating. But before they knew what to do and they would, I don't know, skip lunch for, not that I'm recommending skipping lunch, but that was the method that they used in their 20s. I'll skip lunch for two weeks and I'll get back to my normal self. And that doesn't work anymore for a lot of people and it just leads them to feeling really frustrated. So what's going on there in terms of weight gain?

Dr. Cat Brown (10:39.313)
Right.

Dr. Cat Brown (10:45.307)
I mean, I think the biggest thing is in this timeframe, we're in this like fight or flight stress response, right? So we're not sleeping well, we're not optimizing our health in many other ways. And so when you're in that sympathetic or fight or flight mode, your body is unconsciously holding onto every possible calorie and your stress hormone, the cortisol levels are high. And so it is this fight or flight response. And when you're not...

in a state where you can optimize your metabolism. If you're in that constant stress state, you are holding on to every possible calorie no matter how much you work. And I think the hardest thing is too, is that you have to work on balancing, optimizing your sleep, optimizing your hydration, making your nutrition the best it can be, and trying to get that hormonal environment optimal as well so that your body can get out of that high stress state and start actually using your food for fuel.

and not trying to reserve everything in that menopelly that we call it, you know, that midsection is where a lot of women gain weight. And I think that's the hardest challenge because as human beings, we want instant gratification, we want instant results, we want to be able to make a change and see the results yesterday. But this is a long haul, like this is something that we have to work on, you know.

Little changes that can be incorporated into your lifestyle. This is lifestyle modification, not necessarily like fad dieting anymore. You can't do that. Like those things don't work anymore for lasting, you know, healthy weight loss, you know, to optimize your best body shape and your best health.

Dr Orlena (12:26.012)
Yeah, absolutely. And so thinking about this hodgepodge of things that are going on, before we talk about HRT, and I love you talking about it's the long-term that we really want. And I think for me, when I think about, why should people bother to make changes? Like, you know, it's actually quite a big ask to get people to make changes and think, well, what's the benefits for them? Now, obviously, feeling good and leading a long and healthy life are up there. What can people do?

Dr. Cat Brown (12:53.437)
Great.

Dr Orlena (12:55.708)
when they're going through menopause to lead a long and healthy and vibrant life? What are the sort of main pieces of the puzzle that you would advocate?

Dr. Cat Brown (13:03.399)
I mean, think the biggest thing is movement. If you're not someone who's a gym goer, you wouldn't play sports, it doesn't have to be that complicated. It's just incorporating daily movement and exercise into your life. And I think that's so very important for us to maintain our strength, but also our flexibility and really our independence too. Because as our strength is declining in age as women, we need to try to combat that and stay as strong as we can, keep our bones healthy.

exercise not only will help with your heart health and cardiovascular fitness, but also with your bone strength too. And so having weight resistance or...

even walking, weight lifting if you can, but even doing anything to move your body. Parking farther away from the store when you go shopping. Taking the stairs instead of taking the elevator. It's like these little changes that you add five minutes here, five minutes there, whereas you weren't doing it before, those periods of activity add up and help with overall, improving your overall fitness and your heart health as well.

Dr Orlena (14:09.008)
Yes. And you know, you were talking about stress beforehand, stress being one of the really big components. And I think in my mind, one of the best things we can do for stress is to go and get physical and do some exercise. And it really helps reduce stress. I mean, I think the other big piece is how we think about things, but exercise is just, I don't know, for me, I love exercise. I swim a lot.

Dr. Cat Brown (14:21.809)
Yes.

Dr Orlena (14:32.118)
People who listen to podcast regularly know that I swim a lot in the sea and I've just started going to the gym actually because I found it with little windows that I can fit into going to the gym and I would say to people it's actually really enjoyable in a way that cardiovascular like I love cardiovascular exercise but going to the gym just feels actually more relaxed than cardiovascular exercise perhaps I'm not doing it right but I always feel like I've I've done some work I don't know about gyms

where you're listening, where they are. But our gym is actually full of women and, excitingly, older women as well. And obviously there are men there. My son who's 16, he goes, I have to make sure I don't go at the same time as him because he doesn't want to be embarrassed by his mum going there. But the gentlemen who are there, they're super...

Dr. Cat Brown (15:16.307)
you

Dr Orlena (15:20.848)
you know, kind and helpful. And if they see me doing something wrong, they'll come and help me and correct me in a really lovely way. Not in a, my goodness, you're doing it all wrong way, but just like, look, I can help you do this. And so actually I would say the biggest bit about going to the gym is the first couple of times. And you know, I made sure I went with some friends the first couple of times and then they stopped to go, well, they didn't stop going, but we go at different times now. But now I have the confidence just to go in by myself and...

As I say, it's fun and I really noticed that it helps me. have very closed hips and I really noticed that it helps me with my hips in a way that swimming doesn't because swimming and cycling, you're doing everything face on and you're not doing the flexibility. Now obviously there are other ways that you can do that, but my message really is don't be scared of the gym. It's not as scary as you think it is going to be. It's becoming far more acceptable for women to go to the gym because we know that we have to keep up our muscle bulk.

Dr. Cat Brown (16:09.363)
Yeah.

Dr Orlena (16:19.282)
So moving on to HRT and before we were recording I was saying to you like in my brain I did train as a pediatric doctor on the side but in my brain HRT is sort of bad and something to avoid and something that I hope that I don't have to take like obviously I would if my doctor said you know I really recommend you take it but in my brain I'm kind of thinking yeah I don't really want to take HRT

Dr. Cat Brown (16:20.573)
Absolutely.

Dr Orlena (16:46.746)
And that was, you know, up until a few years ago where I started thinking about HRT and then listening to what lifestyle medicine doctors were saying and what other people were saying. And actually it turns out that it's not as bad as I thought it was. And in fact, actually perhaps everyone should be on it. So can you just talk a little bit about the history of what has happened and why people have changed their minds about HRT?

Dr. Cat Brown (17:04.563)
Yeah.

Dr. Cat Brown (17:09.043)
I mean, think years ago it was a mainstay of treatment. I think that a lot of women were placed on HRT, but we really, the pendulum swung so far in the other direction after the Women's Health Initiative study was published and after we started seeing news articles and things even on publication on TV that HRT is bad and HRT will cause breast cancer. And it just was so much fear-mongering. And there were some really good things in that study, but there was also some bad.

parts to that study and that they were giving HRT not to an ideal population, to a population of women who are already well beyond their menopausal transition, you know, after the age of 65 starting women on hormones and it was much more risky to start it in a patient who was so much older. And what we're learning now too is that if we give bioidentical hormones, meaning that we give a hormone that has the same structural, you know, the structure of what our bodies are making on their own,

compared to a synthetically lab-made hormone, like we used in birth control pills, for instance, that the body incorporates these hormones much more naturally. We can use lower doses to help with symptom control and to achieve the results that we want with less side effects. And so we're able to use lower doses, also using more transdermal methods, meaning that they're absorbed through the skin. So we're bypassing the GI tract a lot of the times too, because when we have to take a pill, by the time you swallow the pill,

like it's broken down and processed by your stomach and then processed by your liver, it has to be a much higher dose so that the dose that's finally getting delivered to your intended tissues is high enough to do its work. But what happens is then you end up getting a lot of the side effects on the journey for it to be processed. So a lot of, you know, gastrointestinal side effects, things like that. But I think that what we're really realizing is that the other part of this too is that not a lot of research was actually done on women. Like women were not actually

included in research trials on medications because we had too many variables with our hormones and with pregnancy and with postpartum and so many changes and so it wasn't until recently that women were actually being studied and being research subjects on medications and so I think now more and more information is coming out more and more research is being done and we're seeing the benefits and and how much estrogen can benefit really every tissue in our body optimal brain functioning with HRT.

Dr. Cat Brown (19:39.334)
We're seeing that adding estrogen into a woman's plan can actually help offset the onset of dementia and help prevent Alzheimer's disease. There's some great neuroscience research being done and there's been books that have been published, like one of the ones I'm reading right now is The Metapause Brain. I don't know if you've seen that book out by Dr. Moscone. So there's a lot more information coming out now on the benefits.

Dr Orlena (19:48.432)
Wow.

Dr. Cat Brown (20:08.229)
but also all the fear that we had of HRT causing breast cancer, what was really neglected in the big talk about women and what are women actually dying of? More women die each year from heart disease and heart attack than ever die from breast cancer. But we have this like unfounded fear that we're all gonna get breast cancer from this particular medication when we're much more likely to have a cardiovascular event if we don't take care of ourselves. Yes.

Dr Orlena (20:33.872)
and the oestrogen going to protect us from having a cardiovascular event.

Dr. Cat Brown (20:37.179)
Right, estrogen is cardio protective. It helps protect those blood vessels around our heart, helps keep the heart muscle healthy. So yeah, I think that now more information is being released about how beneficial these hormones are to our overall health and wellbeing. And I think that if you look at the trends themselves, for women OBGYNs and women gynecologists that are actually going through this transition themselves, we're all on HRT and we don't wanna stop because we're seeing the benefits and the...

Dr Orlena (21:05.873)
me.

Dr. Cat Brown (21:07.123)
evidence. So I think that's kind of proof in the pudding, like for the people reading the research and seeing the benefits out there, we're actually taking the medication that we're recommending to our patients, which I think is says a lot. Yeah.

Dr Orlena (21:18.428)
Perfect. Yes, absolutely. And you talked about an ideal target of women. Who would that ideal population be?

Dr. Cat Brown (21:27.121)
Really, whenever your symptoms become bothersome enough that they are interfering with your day-to-day life, that's an okay time to start having the conversation to start HRT. You don't have to wait until your final period. In fact, I you can start getting the benefits of adding low-dose estrogen in before that final period happens. for most patients, that means you could start in your mid-40s. Now, if you're one of the lucky few that don't have any symptoms at all until your 50s, you start then. But really, the ideal time to start HRT is before the age of 60.

So the average age of menopause in the US is 52. I think it varies around the world depending on race and ethnicity, but roughly around that time frame most of us will hit that transition. So I think late 40s, early 50s is a great time, but really the safety is to start it before the age of 60 because after age 60 there can be a slight increase in your cardiovascular risk when you first start a hormone. It's temporary.

It's not something that's long lasting, but that's why that's kind of our window of time that we'd like to begin therapy before that age, if possible.

Dr Orlena (22:35.484)
And so most people presumably they go and talk to their family doctor or their GP and talk to them about it. That's their first port of call is in.

Dr. Cat Brown (22:43.239)
right.

Yeah, I think it is. And a lot of women, especially in the US, maybe don't go to a primary care doctor. A lot of women use their gynecologist as their primary care. They go once a year for their annual exam, well, woman exam, and breast exam. And often they may go over routine health things and get blood work then too for other things, checking their thyroid and such. But yeah, going to your family doctor or your GP or going to your gynecologist would be ideal.

to the conversation and I really like to encourage patients to try to start tracking their symptoms. Like when you start to feel off, when you start to notice things creeping in, start making a note of it. And there's a lot of good information out there. We actually have a free symptom tracker available on our website for patients that they could download for free. Just to kind of help you gauge and keep a log of like how much is this really affecting because if we don't pay attention to these small subtle changes, sometimes all of a sudden we're overwhelmed.

by so many changes and it's hard to quantify like how long has it been happening, what's going on and that's great information to bring to your doctor. know, when someone comes to me and says you know I've been having these symptoms, that symptom and they have some kind of record-keeping whether it's on their phone or on a calendar or something, it just gives me so much more information about how much they have been suffering with symptoms, what the length of time has been but also the specific symptoms will tell me what hormones they're deficient in.

and what I think I can help them with the most with treatment.

Dr Orlena (24:16.882)
And if people want to go the internet route and take advantage of your online telehealth company, how do they do that?

Dr. Cat Brown (24:24.945)
It's really easy. So the website is winona.com. So W-I-N-O-N-A dot com.

We're right now in 34 states in the United States and hopefully expanding to all of them soon. you would put in your information. There is free information and we do have a medical journal part of our page too that even if you're not quite ready or you're not quite sure if you need treatment yet, you don't want to start that process. There are plenty of educational articles that you can go on to read about common symptoms of perimenopause and menopause because our other foundation is we just want to make sure that we have education available for patients because knowledge

is powerful and the more we empower ourselves to learn more about what's happening in our bodies, the best we can be equipped to help deal with those changes and make the best decisions for ourselves, I think.

Dr Orlena (25:13.394)
And so you have an online appointment. Is it only for people in the US or is it worldwide?

Dr. Cat Brown (25:18.331)
Right now we're just in the United States, yeah. And there's several other telemedicine companies in the United States as well. I'm not sure if something is similar in Europe just because I don't practice there so I'm not as familiar, but yeah.

Dr Orlena (25:21.094)
Okay.

Dr Orlena (25:32.348)
So, just available in the US and then they have an online consultation or do you go to one of your clinics in one of those states?

Dr. Cat Brown (25:42.307)
Everything is online. So everything is through the internet and we do, it's an asynchronous telemedicine platform, meaning that patients can message us 24-7. They don't have to wait for a scheduled appointment time or a video visit or anything like that. So if at two o'clock in the morning they're waking up with night sweats and they're thinking, God, I really need to talk to my doctor about this, they can hop on their phone or on their computer and message us then. And then the next time I log in, I get their message and respond, which is nice because it's a lot more

You're not having to wait and save up all your questions for an appointment time like a month down the road, which is great.

Dr Orlena (26:18.844)
Perfect, perfect. Well, what a shame that you don't do it in Europe because I know that I've got friends who are in France who would love to have an appointment with you. so that's a shame, but I will definitely leave a link in the show notes so that anyone who's in the US can take advantage and get some of your information and potentially book an appointment if they want to. So presumably is the first appointment paid or do you do like a...

Dr. Cat Brown (26:42.375)
So right now, in order to discuss things with a doctor and review your medical history, there is no charge for that. There's no platform fee or like a membership fee. The only thing that patients pay for is the actual prescriptions when it's time that we come to a decision together to make a treatment plan. And so they pay for the prescriptions and that's the only cost to patients is for the medications themselves.

Dr Orlena (26:55.44)
Okay.

Dr Orlena (27:06.866)
What a shame that you aren't in Europe.

Dr. Cat Brown (27:09.063)
I know, I know. Well, I mean, the other thing is, mean, those people can certainly take advantage of the educational material that we have on the website and empower themselves with knowledge. You know, that's something that they can use.

Dr Orlena (27:21.778)
Perfect, perfect. Any last words of wisdom for people who are listening?

Dr. Cat Brown (27:26.289)
think biggest thing is to learn about your body, really pay attention to how you feel your best based on what you're eating and how well you feel after you move your body, but learn as much as you can about your own menstrual cycle so that when things start to change and you start to notice these symptoms that you can be empowered to make the right decisions and the best thing for you because truly knowledge is power and I think that really it really helps us to take the best care of ourselves. And I think that you

Omenopause is not a death sentence. It's not the end. I want women to reframe their thinking about this and I really want them to think, this is a time to really focus on yourself and make this second half of your life even better than the first. Without the stress of unwanted pregnancies and without the stress of having to deal with a lot of those other things, now it's about maintaining our health, maintaining our vitality and our wellness. And I want women to feel empowered to do that.

Dr Orlena (28:25.458)
Perfect, fabulous. And I will just end by praising one of my clients who is 70 and she is amazing. She goes surfing and she goes SUP boarding. I don't think she realizes what an inspiration she is, but I think that's what we all want. Yeah, we want to be 70 and into our eighties and being active and doing these things that we wanted to do, but we didn't have time to do when we were younger. And now we do have time to do them and we still have the energy and the muscles and the ability to be able to do them.

Dr. Cat Brown (28:54.483)
Absolutely, that's great.

Dr Orlena (28:56.53)
Perfect. Thank you so much for spending some time with us. It was absolutely wonderful chatting to you.

Dr. Cat Brown (29:01.457)
Well, thank you so much for having me.