Are Midlife Hormones Hijacking Your Relationship?

This episode is a deeply personal one. We’re lifting the lid on a topic that doesn’t get nearly enough airtime – what happens when both partners go through midlife hormonal changes at the same time.

That point where menopause and andropause collide, creating a perfect storm of symptoms, misunderstandings, and emotional strain. But also, an opportunity.

We’ll be sharing our own journey, the truth about how it’s affected our relationship, and the tools we’ve used to stay connected, resilient, and supportive through the messiness of midlife.

We hope you enjoy listening. 

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Transcript

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The Midlife Mentors: This will be an ibis celebrating one year. No beer are, you know.

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The Midlife Mentors: I want to talk about your women's thing as well.

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The Midlife Mentors: and I'll mention going to Camden Palace and being on this panel there, we mentioned going to breakfast this morning with creators and getting very excited.

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The Midlife Mentors: It's okay.

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The Midlife Mentors: Hello, and welcome to another episode of the midlife mentors with me James and me, Claire, we have to make another apology. We did skip a week. We skipped a week. Sorry, not sorry. The sun was shining. We were in Central London. It was sweltering. We escaped to the south coast to go and live in a shepherd's hut and cook over an open fire and swim in the sea for a couple of days. So we decompressed, and then the podcast kind of

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The Midlife Mentors: slid away from us. But but here we are. We're also very conscious that we've had a lot of amazing guests on, but it's been a while since it was just the 2 of us. So we're stepping back into that format today. We're going to be talking about the couple pause, something we're really, really excited to share with you where we're basically talking through what happens when one is going through the menopause and the other is going through the

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The Midlife Mentors: andropore. So we're going to talk about that. But 1st of all, let's just give you a little bit of an update about. Well, firstly, this will be going out just to make you really jealous. This will be going out when we have probably just stepped off a plane in Ibiza. Yes, baby, we're going back. So we've been once. We've been a bit greedy. We've been already this year. Well, seeing as we're running our amazing retreat out there in October, we have to keep popping back and just check the island is ready for us.

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The Midlife Mentors: It's never ready for us. It's never ready for us, either. You ain't ready for us.

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The Midlife Mentors: But the real reason we're going is, it will be Claire's celebration of one year alcohol free. So she's done an entire year. No booze. I'm so proud of her. It's a really, really amazing achievement.

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The Midlife Mentors: And selfishly, it's also helped me really cut back on drinking. Yeah, I will do a little podcast actually, because I think I was about 3 months in. And I said, This is it this is it. We actually sent it out, and I committed publicly to doing one year no alcohol. So I would love. If you are all okay with this listeners for me to come back on and share the things I've learned over the last

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The Midlife Mentors: year, I was going to say, Why don't I interview you about a year? Alcohol free? Yeah. Because you kind of interviewed me 3 months ago, didn't you? Yeah, I mean, it was funny. I just knew I was legit. People wrote in saying that I was an amazing interviewer. They were really amazed by me committing to one year alcohol free. So we've just been busy bees, and it's been amazing. We were on a panel, a longevity panel, talking about loneliness and disconnection and

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The Midlife Mentors: coco. In Camden. We were on a panel of 6 people, and that was just awesome to meet lots of new people and talk about the really really big, important issues of what can we do to stay more connected and really beat this epidemic of loneliness? So that was really beautiful. That was amazing. We were at a creator breakfast this morning. It's kind of like agency side, I guess people who

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The Midlife Mentors: create content professionally. And we're talking about what's happening in the space. And we're realizing how much we're leaving on the table and behind. But yeah, we only have so many hours in a day. And there's only the 2 of us. It really actually excited us, I think, with possibilities of what else could be out there for us. So especially with the podcast as well. But I don't know whether you know this people. We have got like 91,000 followers on tiktok.

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The Midlife Mentors: And so it's our biggest platform, but it went crazy. A few years ago it went from like a thousand followers to pretty much that number, and but it just got too much, and I stepped away from it for a year. I'm on there kind of dibble dabbling a bit now. But yeah, it's funny, isn't it? I've got a very different relationship with social media now. And

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The Midlife Mentors: yeah, I go on there when I want to. But it is a little bit of a cesspit. I have to say so for my mental health. I can only stretch myself so thin across different social media platforms, but we were discovering a little bit about how we could monetize that. So if anyone's listening out there and you do, you're an expert in Tiktok, and how we can monetize Tiktok. Do give us a shout, won't you team at the midlifementors.com, or, indeed, how we could turn on

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The Midlife Mentors: podcast. Into a video and get it on Youtube. And apparently apparently that is really, really important. And we're not currently doing it. We're so rubbish at this listeners we really really are. I'm not sure I want to be amazing at it, but I should be, and then we have obviously got our retreat. We are now half booked for our retreat. We take 10 people in October in Ibiza, and this is all about.

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The Midlife Mentors: I suppose, rediscovering your self identity at midlife. If you're feeling lost like you've given so much worn, so many different hats for all these years, and you're just like who the heck am I? What do I want for the rest of my life. This is it. It's very, very exciting times. We will be doing some exercise and moving our body, not too strenuous. But really it's a focus on us, using our years and years of mentoring and coaching you through a journey of what's not working

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The Midlife Mentors: and really focusing your energy and excitement and enthusiasm on what's coming up for you? Because it's a time of reinvention people. It's very. Also you have a little size project coming up, don't you? Yeah, it's going out on an email. Sorry we are going to get on with the podcast A second. Yes, I've been in very, very briefly. I've been kind of in a little bit of hibernation. For the last couple of years

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The Midlife Mentors: it's been amazing. It's been a real massive reinvention for me. I've learned a lot. I've healed a lot. I've grown a lot, found so much peace that surpasses all understanding. It really does. And I just I'm in a place where I just want to share some of that light with other people. Specifically, midlife women.

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The Midlife Mentors: So working with a group of women in person in London, it's called Come alive. And I just really want to share what didn't work. What did work? Some of my tools, some of my expertise, but mainly my immense passion for helping other women navigate this

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The Midlife Mentors: tricky time. I mean, I had burnout. I didn't know where I was going, what I wanted to do, and in a very gentle way I want to invite you. If there's any women out there to check out the email that's going out tonight, I'm just curious at the moment how many people would be would be keen to join me on that. I don't have all the details yet. I don't have the financial investment yet. I just. I'm putting feelers out.

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The Midlife Mentors: It's very gentle. I think it's really exciting. Yeah, yeah, really exciting. So that's that sorry we've been going on a little bit about what we've been up to. But I know that you yeah, I know that you follow us, and we just wanted to share what we've been up to. Apart from going on holidays. So let's talk the pauses. There's been a lot of talk about menopause. Obviously, I think probably most of us are are much more aware than we were

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The Midlife Mentors: 5 years ago about the menopause, what it entails, but how that can manifest

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The Midlife Mentors: what the female part of the relationship can be going through there. If you're a regular listener to this, podcast you'll understand a bit about the andropause which is men's age-related testosterone decline. And again, some of the symptoms there. But what you want to do in this is, look at something we come up against all the time when working with people is

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The Midlife Mentors: the real. I guess separation or barrier that can come when you've got a relationship. Where one person is going through menopause, one person is going through andropause. It can be a bit of a recipe for disaster

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The Midlife Mentors: if you don't have the tools to deal with it, because

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The Midlife Mentors: you're both feeling like strangers in your own skin. You're not really sure why you're feeling your way. You'll do. We have the things like, you know, anxiety, shorter temper all the rest. It is. Yeah, it can be a pressure cooker, and we've been there ourselves. Obviously, we're at that age. I'm 52. Claire's 45 near 50. Now, people we've been going through this ourselves. And I think we're very aware of when we have those hormonal neurosmity shifts when life feels a little bit

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The Midlife Mentors: heavy pressured that that can shift things in relationship, particularly with us working together. So we just wanted to kind of explore this topic with you, share some some personal experience, and then, as always give you a little bit of a toolkit to go away with, to maybe help your own relationship. Yeah, it really is about bringing some awareness. It's very much about empowering people with the understanding and the knowledge. What's going on for you, of course, but actually some sympathy and some compassion

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The Midlife Mentors: about what's going on for the other person as well, so that we we can take a step back. We can take a breath and actually think, okay, I know that this is the stuff going on for them as well. How can we deal with this together rather than separately? And, like James said, we've had? We've had to roll through this. We're going to share our experiences. We're going to share some of the struggles we've had, and actually the things that have worked for us. We're not. We're not just

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The Midlife Mentors: speaking this out there. We're not sitting on our high horses telling you stuff that hasn't worked for us. We've had to go through a lot of this ourselves. And so we're excited when we do share this with other couples, and that we are really honest and authentic about where we've been. And so we're excited to share it with you today as well. But just quickly. We're not going to go through very much just to share what menopause is just to set the scene.

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The Midlife Mentors: and then James will explain what Andropause is. But this is our primary sex. Hormone is estrogen. Perimenopause is what comes before menopause that can go on for years, unfortunately sadly, and has many, many symptoms. People can start perimenopause from the age of like 35. There are some pieces of research that says that women are actually

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The Midlife Mentors: getting perimenopausal symptoms earlier in their life. But there, there are kind of.

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The Midlife Mentors: There's a debate about how many symptoms. But it's between about 60 and 100 actually, menopausal symptoms and perimenopausal symptoms these days.

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The Midlife Mentors: And actually, I would argue that perimenopause can be even crazier and weirder, because there are so many weird symptoms going on. But they don't necessarily stick around for very long. They go on. They go off. You can feel like you're going a little bit mad, or you're making it up, or you feel quite lonely like you might be over exaggerating things. But then we get into menopause and menopause. You are

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The Midlife Mentors: officially in menopause. Once your periods have stopped for a year, but that's not to say that you can't go on something like Hrt. Before that time. Not at all. But that's when you're you're in menopause. And then the symptoms kind of shift and change a little bit. Actually, when we go from perimenopause into menopause.

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The Midlife Mentors: yeah. And it affects us physically, mentally, emotionally, very, very much so. And so we might get things like rage, we might get things that's obviously the 1st one that came into my head. I wonder why we might get things like rage. We might find ourselves just crying for no reason at all, we might find ourselves quite fearful. One of the really common thing is driving

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The Midlife Mentors: with women. I hear this a lot. Oh, I've lost my confidence driving. I don't like to drive on the motorway anymore.

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The Midlife Mentors: We feel a bit more fearful. And yeah, we lose our confidence even at work in the boardroom and all those sorts of things. And so that's just the psychology, let alone what's happening with us physically, where we're not sleeping. The hot flashes we're putting on weight. So we don't feel we feel like an alien in our own skin. All those sorts of things is what's going on for us. What a what a crazy thing that is just for us! And then put

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The Midlife Mentors: the guy into the situation, who's going through some very, very difficult times himself with low testosterone, yeah. Yeah. So for men, it was typically a start. You start noticing the symptoms, I guess, from your mid forties onwards, although, yeah, testosterone levels are dropping across the general population. So it's going to start earlier.

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The Midlife Mentors: But symptoms can include low energy libido issues, because this can be a thing for both genders, right low or fluctuating libido, emotional flatness, irritability, anxiety, confidence, drops. And of course, when you bring that into a relationship.

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The Midlife Mentors: You know, it could be a real, a real, powerful cocktail for for disruption. Yeah, yeah. And I think what what

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The Midlife Mentors: frequently happens is because we call this a second adolescence, right? So can you remember what it was like when you were a teenager? And you started like? Honestly, it was such a confusing time when we started having this influx of hormones. I certainly didn't know where I was. I was feeling so emotional. My body was changing, there was so much going on. And that's exactly you know what's going on almost like in reverse when we're hitting midlife. So it can be really

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The Midlife Mentors: can be very isolating for both sexes actually to feel like you are

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The Midlife Mentors: like, who am I like? My body doesn't feel the same. My psychology doesn't feel the same emotionally. I don't feel the same, and it can feel very isolating for a lot of women. I hear that they say that they feel irrelevant.

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The Midlife Mentors: and and they've lost that sense of self identity. They've put everyone first, st and they've prioritized so many other things. And now they're at this point in life, thinking hang on a minute like, what about me? Yeah. And they're also the physical changes for both men and women. Right? So you start losing muscle mass putting on more weight. You don't really like what you see in the mirror which leads to less confidence, being naked. Perhaps so again, that leads to a breakdown intimacy.

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The Midlife Mentors: So if you're going through the pauses, how can that mess with relationships? Well.

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The Midlife Mentors: the 1st 1st thing we look at is obviously misfired communication where your hormones and neurotransmitter levels are fluctuating. So you might be super emotional one day, or you might be like super high anxiety. You could be feeling really flat, kind of detached the next, and obviously that can be

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The Midlife Mentors: trying for you as an individual. But throw a partner, or even you know the rest of the family into the mix, and it can become really, really difficult, because, you know, do you not know where you stand with yourself? But you're not really sure where you stand with the other person. And if the other person is

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The Midlife Mentors: doing the same thing, you know, like one day, they're really flat, and you're needing reassurance. But you're not getting it. But the next day you're feeling detached. And they're like, Oh, I need you to see how this can really, unless we start talking about what's happening for us, and we are going to come on to tip our toolkit. You know how it can be so so divisive. And this is why we're seeing record numbers of divorce and midlife. I think one of the reasons

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The Midlife Mentors: and one of the things I would say just on this is, I talked about this actually, on Saturday on the workshop that we did in cocoa and Camden. We can presume so so much if we've been with someone for a while. Even if we haven't, actually, we can presume so much about that other person. You know what you've got to understand. There's never going to be another version of you that sees the world with your lens on it.

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The Midlife Mentors: And so but that doesn't always mean to say that your lens is right. It can feel very right, and we can feel very triggered, and that kind of like in a child that in a in a boy or any girl can get really triggered from like memories or unhealed places, and that creates a certain lens and a certain perspective that we have that's completely unique to us on the world. And so I think sometimes we have to have a lot of self-awareness. This is a perfect opportunity to start having some self awareness actually asking yourself. Am I projecting

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The Midlife Mentors: my my stuff or my presumptions on that person, rather than being curious rather than asking them what's going on? You know you've changed so so much. I mean, I've changed enormously in 2 years. I don't even recognize the person I was 2 years ago, so I expect James to also have changed enormously, which he has, and I'm it's really wonderful

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The Midlife Mentors: to be curious about what person he is becoming. So I just wanted to add that in as a layer of misfires communication that can happen sometimes because we're presuming. And we're projecting our own stuff onto that other person. Yeah. And I think that goes hand in hand with something that's quite common in midlife as well, which is, which is the identity crisis. Right? So we talk about a lot. And you just mentioned. There, you've gone so long in a particular role.

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The Midlife Mentors: and that's taken away. It's changed. And then you're like, Well, who am I now? And where do I go from here? Of course, you know, if you're questioning your own place in the world

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The Midlife Mentors: again, it can lead to you being withdrawn in relationship not showing up in the way you want to show up. So even blame even blame project onto someone else. Right? Oh, yeah, life hasn't panned out the way I wanted it to. But it's kind of your fault, because I don't want to take responsibility for it. So we have to be really careful around this type of stuff. Yeah, I mean, I did loads of projecting. We both. I'm speaking for myself here, and I don't want to speak for James.

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The Midlife Mentors: but I have done. I've done loads of projecting in this relationship, and it's been we will share in a second a little bit more about how we've overcome some of this stuff. But it's actually been a real joy.

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The Midlife Mentors: a real joy. It's really hard to look at yourself and take responsibility and do the healing that you need to to do and see where where you, where you haven't necessarily been as fair, where you might have been resentful, where

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The Midlife Mentors: you haven't been showing up as as your as your best self. And that's okay sometimes. But actually to understand and to take that responsibility can be quite hard. But that self-awareness piece is absolutely essential in order for you to move on as a couple.

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The Midlife Mentors: And the other big thing, of course, that come out come out of the woodwork at this summer. Life is intimacy breakdown right? Men will tend to confuse proximity with intimacy that won't hit the emotional buttons for the women. But also it's time when our libidos can be either fluctuating. So we're mismatched or they could disappear completely. Now then, we can start. There's a lot of

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The Midlife Mentors: I guess pressure in modern culture to think about a lot of sex as part of a normal relationship for many people. So worries can start to come in about. You know. What's the right amount, should I? Shouldn't I? But also one of our biggest human fears is rejection. So we get that thing like one person may try and initiate that that intimacy, and then the other person's not feeling it. So they rebuff them. But it's taken then

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The Midlife Mentors: very person. It's like a personal thing like, Oh, you don't. You don't love me. You don't fancy me anymore. So we have to be really careful. I think, around the intimacy part of this. And again, it's about breaking it down and have that communication. We'll talk about that. But you know it's just saying you know what

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The Midlife Mentors: I love you. I think you're amazing. You're super hot. But right now I don't think my hormones are going to allow me to respond to this in the way that I want to. But I still love you deeply. Something like that can really. Yeah, I mean, my libido dropped off like a ton of bummy like just just went poor James!

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The Midlife Mentors: And poor me! Actually, that was I just had a little voice in my head. Go! No, actually, this is not, you know. It impacts both of you for different reasons, of course. But and I do think that you know either sex men or women might feel a bit of guilt around that, and a bit of shame that all my libido's dropped, and I don't. I'm not craving the intimacy that I'm well, no, actually, again, I want to kind of correct myself there. I still crave the

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The Midlife Mentors: intimacy, but actually, sexually, my libido massively dropped, and we had again. We had to go through a real journey of being able to communicate that. And and here's the thing. If you love someone.

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The Midlife Mentors: if you love someone deeply. And and

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The Midlife Mentors: you you want to continue being married to that person. You are going to have to have very awkward conversations. And you're you're going to have to keep having them, probably over and over and over again, and also not quit just because it didn't work. The 1st time that conversation and things went got a bit fiery, and things got misunderstood. It's about

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The Midlife Mentors: for me. It's always been about wanting wanting to come back and have that conversation again and try it differently in a different way. Okay, so that didn't work. James didn't quite understand what I was trying to say. There, how can I reframe that, so that he might understand it a bit better. How can I choose a better time for to speak about that? And what environment might be better

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The Midlife Mentors: and more fruitful to speak about that. Not necessarily when he's trying to trying to initiate, says that might not be the best time to have a really really deep conversation. So so what I'm saying there is.

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The Midlife Mentors: It's just because it doesn't work right at the beginning, having those conversations that can be difficult and embarrassing, and all those sorts of things don't stop trying, because actually, it's in those moments that are the most difficult that you find the nuggets of joy and the deepest parts of your relationship. I would say, once you don't quit and you keep going and keep going. That's when you find the juicy bits of the relationship. I love that

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The Midlife Mentors: I just wanted to share that. Yeah, I think the other thing is like something we see a lot is what we call silent suffering, right? And this is on on both sides of relationship, because maybe you don't really understand what's going on for your partner.

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The Midlife Mentors: So you don't know how to approach it, or how to deal with them, so they think you don't care, or that you've stopped trying, and vice versa, when it's not the case you're like. I'm not really sure what's going on. I don't know how to approach it. Don't know how to deal with it so like, Claire said. It's about. I'd say it's about curiosity

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The Midlife Mentors: and communication and compassion. Yeah. And actually, Jones has written something here which I love. I'm going to read out and steal it. The storm isn't personal love, this. The storm isn't personal. It's psychological, physiological. Sorry. Wow! Honestly, menopause brain.

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The Midlife Mentors: It's physiological. But if you don't name it, you'll blame each other for it. So let me get that right again. I'm going to repeat that listeners. The storm isn't personal, it's physiological, but if you don't name it, you're going to blame each other for it. Yeah, it's really important. Yeah, like, I said, I felt like that was such an important thing to say is, if it doesn't work, keep

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The Midlife Mentors: trying it at different angles and like, if the intention there is strong enough, you will make it through. You will make it through, and you know it's always darkest before dawn. I think you know the light, the lightest bits of our life are often.

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The Midlife Mentors: you know the lightest bits of our life

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The Midlife Mentors: often before that at the darkest. And yeah, I just wanted to.

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The Midlife Mentors: We need to be a bit philosophical. There, we've talked quite a bit about about what can be going on there. And some of you might be identifying really strongly that and going. Oh, yeah, yeah, I do find this thing difficult, that thing difficult. I find the whole thing difficult.

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The Midlife Mentors: and we've certainly been there. We've shared some some personal stuff there. But you know, being on our own journey, I think working together as well puts extra pressure on X. You've got that blurring of of work and romantic boundaries.

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The Midlife Mentors: and one positive step we took was actually to go into couples counseling. So we see see a therapist regularly. And again, not because there are any issues in a relationship. But just because we wanted to make the relationship better, we wanted to invest in it, to make it as good as it can be, and from our personal experience, having that

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The Midlife Mentors: objective 3rd party, there really really helps. It can defuse a situation. It opens your eyes to see things in a new light, because you listen in a different way. You react in a different way. And it's, you know, I thoroughly recommend it to anyone. It's certainly, I think, probably

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The Midlife Mentors: even with the toolkit we had available to us, it's accelerated. Yeah, how well we're

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The Midlife Mentors: dealing with this stage of life. Yeah, I would agree, and I would also say, Listen, a lot of people don't necessarily have an opportunity to do this. I know that. So you might be listening and going, Claire. I just don't have enough time for that. But I really found going away last August. Actually I went away without any devices. I went away for 9 days. I didn't speak. Believe it or not. I know anyone that knows me or

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The Midlife Mentors: be like. Really, you kept your mouth shut for that long, pretty much. I kept my mouth shut for 9 days. Yeah. I mean, I asked someone for directions when I was going to a wild swimming spot in Devon. But yeah, for me, the reason I'm sharing that is, was because without all the noise and without all.

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The Midlife Mentors: Oh, my goodness! All of the information overload, I was actually able to just sit with myself. It was very, very frightening, and for, like quite a few days I was pacing around like

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The Midlife Mentors: you know, like a cat on a hot tin roof. I was just pacing around, wanting to get my dopamine hit from something wanting to get my distraction from something to distract myself really from the thoughts that needed to come up from the emotions that needed to come up from the healing that needed to come up. But really it was a massive turning point for my marriage, because I was able.

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The Midlife Mentors: and with a lot of compassion which is surprising, because I'm still very hard on myself. With a lot of compassion I was able to really join a lot of dots around how I was

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The Midlife Mentors: actually impacting James. And I was actually accelerating and creating some of the issues I was blaming him for. So it was very humbling, very, very humbling, and I remember coming out of that. And just things. Things made a lot more sense. And I was able to speak to James about that. And yeah, it was very, very healing. It's beautiful, I do think. Actually, that's something that time

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The Midlife Mentors: doing stuff together definitely. If you're struggling to do stuff together, it's fun. Definitely do that right. Get back into the date night. But not so. It feels forced. But it's so important to have time on your own as well, to process this, to go to be introspective, to think, how am I showing up in this? What are my behaviors that aren't as positive as they could be? And how can I be be a better person. How can I show up as a better version of myself? Yeah, absolutely.

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The Midlife Mentors: We talked there about therapy time on your own. But let's give you some some quicker tips that you can use. Right? So I think the 1st one that's been really really healthy for us is daily check-ins. So we've I guess we've always done this

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The Midlife Mentors: historically. We did it on our own. We had our own morning routine of getting up and doing our own thing. Now we do things together.

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The Midlife Mentors: when we 1st wake up, when you're still in that kind of Theta state when you're waking, and it's it's a really beautiful way to kind of connect and start the day having

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The Midlife Mentors: a shared experience. Yeah, it's really beautiful. Like we get up. We listen to something we pray together, and it's it's just it's it like connects like James was saying, about the difference between a man connecting into like in an intimate way, and a woman connecting in a different way. We are different, right? And I know every woman I speak to. We want to kind of. It's that emotional, that depth that.

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The Midlife Mentors: like their mind, we want to feel seen, heard, and understood. Men do, too. But like, when we're talking about intimacy, I definitely I've definitely grown in being open to intimacy with James. I feel a lot closer to him emotionally. I feel like he has opened his heart a lot more to me, and I do think it's very much to do with those shared moments where we check in with each other before we start the day.

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The Midlife Mentors: Know if you've got any concerns, any worries. Yeah, I think that's been a game changer for us. It's very, very beautiful before let the outside world in. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, so many of us. Right? We jump out of bed when the alarm goes off and straight to the, to the device for the emails, the socials, the TV, maybe just the time in the morning. But I'd say also, it doesn't.

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The Midlife Mentors: doesn't have to be just then right. You might get things that come along that disturb the equilibrium of your day. Then it's okay to ask your partner like, Can I have a check in with you? Yes, and this is really important. So I learned a really hard oh, my goodness! I'm smiling and laughing to myself, I would. When something comes up for me, ladies, you might recognize this when something comes up for you, and you want to talk about it. You want to talk about it now like we want to talk about it now.

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The Midlife Mentors: now yesterday, now now yesterday, now now and and actually for all of us that can be quite frustrating. But

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The Midlife Mentors: I know that that didn't work for James, but I didn't. I didn't appreciate that. It didn't work for James, and it was my agenda that I wanted to speak to James about and talk through. But actually, that's really disrespectful of his time and his energy, and he wasn't always in the right place to deal with my emotions at that moment in time. But my expectations were like

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The Midlife Mentors: that he had to. So that was a really really interesting thing for me to learn was to actually say, Look, I'm feeling something.

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The Midlife Mentors: James. Is it a good time for you to talk about this? And if James said no, he would then tell me a good time

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The Midlife Mentors: that we could talk about it. It would actually give me a time, so that I knew it was coming up. And the most important thing is for you not to forget. So for anyone listening to this, but for guys that might be using this, yeah, do give a time and stick to the time, even if you have to put a time in your alarm and set it. Do not forget to go back to that conversation, so it shows. Do not forget, guys.

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The Midlife Mentors: Ha, ha!

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The Midlife Mentors: So you know, like, we want to know that you give a shit, basically. So schedule a time later in the day, and make sure you stick to it and say, Hey, like I'm totally ready. Now, are you ready now to talk about it, let's you know. Let's set aside 15 min to have a chat about it. It's really important, this, this comes down basically like to vulnerability and communication. I think. So try try and learn to be more vulnerable and communicate

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The Midlife Mentors: more openly. But the check-ins are a really great way to do. Yeah. And on those times where you're speaking to that person. Make sure you listen. So I'm kind of going to some other tools. Here, make sure you actively listen. So you're not interrupting the person. You are actively listening.

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The Midlife Mentors: You are not doing anything else. Again, James tends to do this still, and this is okay, because I have a lot more tolerance for this, but and he also recognizes when he's doing it. He might have. We might have agreed to have a conversation, and he's looking at his laptop, or Lola walks in the room, our dog and he grabs her and starts playing with her, and I'm like, Hello! I feel like I've just been rejected and the door

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The Midlife Mentors: been slammed in my face. So make sure that you are completely centered on that person. Yeah, something we can do there is active listening. Right? So so this will actually make you listen harder. If, when the other person is speaking about what's going on for them, you can paraphrase it back to them. What I hear is, you're feeling this way because of XYZ. And then give them a chance to go. Yeah, well, that's right or no, you've slightly misunderstood. It's a really

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The Midlife Mentors: useful tool to give you the the mental reminder to pay attention, and it means you are really paying attention, you understand? So that so that's great. Yeah. So the next tip, be careful with it. I call it. Name the storm. So you know you can go. You know what this. This is, my hormones? This is menopause, this is andropause. But this is not a get out of jail card. This is not like.

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The Midlife Mentors: Why did you come home at one in the morning, pissed out your head, and you just go. Oh, and your calls in it. No, but it's just to say, you know, those situations will arise. You go look! Oh, I'm just. I'm just feeling it at the moment

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The Midlife Mentors: apologies going to come through, and also don't use it as a weapon against the other person, so don't go. Oh, this is just your menopause, or this is just your andropause. Just say, you know. Okay, a little bit of understanding. I'm curious about what's going on for you at the moment. You just having a, you know. Is it a difficult day for you. One of the other things I would say is,

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The Midlife Mentors: reclaim affection, you know, again talking about this intimacy piece. It doesn't need to just be sex, right? It doesn't actually have to be intercourse. You can have affection and intimacy in your relationship. That, actually, I would say, is even of a higher value. Necessarily, because you know.

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The Midlife Mentors: how often do we just hold a hand? Sit close, hug for 10 seconds. You don't have to

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The Midlife Mentors: wait to the bedroom to feel connected to your partner, and I would really, really encourage you again. It's vulnerable, it's vulnerability, and it's very hard to be vulnerable.

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The Midlife Mentors: But just give it a go like you've got nothing to lose. You really haven't got anything to lose. And actually, I would be very, very proud of myself if you're listening to this, and you're like, I'm not that intimate with my partner. I want to give you a massive high 5 and kudos. If you go off now, and just have a little cuddle with your partner.

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The Midlife Mentors: hold hands, or even just spend a bit of time looking in each other's eyes, and like smiling and laughing or sharing a memory that you have. Yeah, I agree. The other thing we could do is like, look at our shared values so like do a shared values reboot like? What matters to us now? Where do we still align? What are the things that are going to keep us driving forward together.

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The Midlife Mentors: And it's okay. If you've got some that diverge as long as you have got some that align. But how often do we check in on our values. So that can really matter and help you realize just how close you are and what you do have in common.

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The Midlife Mentors: Yeah, yeah, I agree with that again. Don't assume that you know the person. Stop being curious about getting to know that person again, like show that you actually want to know, get to know them and what they're going through.

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The Midlife Mentors: So I think, you know, we've covered a lot of grounds there. Hopefully, as always, you're listening to this knowing that hopefully walking away.

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The Midlife Mentors: knowing that you're not the only one like all couples are going to be struggling with this at our age. James and I have been through significant struggles with all of this because of these tools and techniques and the communication and everything that we've shared over the last year. Even our marriage is

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The Midlife Mentors: stronger, more resilient, more beautiful, more connected, more intimate, more understanding. I love this guy more every day. Because of every because of what we've been through.

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The Midlife Mentors: and I just want to say that there is that light at the end of the tunnel. Don't! Don't give up too easily

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The Midlife Mentors: have have some self-awareness, some self compassion. Arm yourself with information, and realize that the other person is human too. We all make mistakes. We're all muddling our way through, so, rather than battling against each other, see how you might be able to move forward together and come out into this amazing new place, this transformed, transitioned place, where your love

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The Midlife Mentors: is even deeper and stronger because you've got to know each other, and you've journeyed through this challenging time together. There is, there is so much more for you

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The Midlife Mentors: on the other side. Don't just presume because it's difficult. Now, it's always going to be this way. Yeah, just remember that you're both changing. That's normal. Yeah. And communication isn't about always agreeing or always having to be one. That's right. It's about staying in it and seeing it through. Yeah. So you don't need to go back to how things were. Yeah, you can create something better. Yeah. And I would just say, also, this is something I always think to myself.

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The Midlife Mentors: do I want to be happy, or do I want to be right?

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The Midlife Mentors: You want to be happy and right if you can have both listeners have both have your cake and eat it. But you know it's a really, do you know, it's a really really good thing to ask yourself for anything. Okay, when you're getting crossed with someone online, when you want to get on the keyboard warrior, and you want to make your point really, do you want to be happy? Or do you want to be right?

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The Midlife Mentors: and what's your goal? What's your goal here? So yeah, we would just invite you really to share this episode with your partner.

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The Midlife Mentors: if you found it helpful, which I hope you did with a friend, with a share it far and wide. We'd love to hear your thoughts, your experiences. Yeah, absolutely drop us a note team at themidlifementors.com. And just as a little teaser. We are going to be talking about this a lot

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The Midlife Mentors: more for certain reasons. I think we are, aren't we? But let's not say anymore about that. But yeah, it's something that we really feel passionate about. Really helping people navigate because relationships are

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The Midlife Mentors: is what we all seek. You know, harmonious relationships. We're built. We're built to be in relationship built to be connected. So when that's not right, everything else is off. So that's why we're on such a mission to make this stuff known and give you a toolkit to start making a bit of a difference. So, thanks for being here, and we are sending you so so much love till next time.