Sparks of Change: Redefining Career and Calling through Menopause with Jillian Shiers

In this deeply personal episode, we explore the often-overlooked emotional and invisible symptoms of menopause, especially how they impact those in demanding careers like teaching. Jillian shares her journey of navigating menopause beyond traditional medical advice, shedding light on the feelings of disconnection, anxiety and self-doubt that can accompany this life stage.

After nearly 30 years in teaching, Jillian left her career in education to focus on her calling of becoming a healer. She candidly reflects on the challenge of transitioning careers and discovering new ways to support herself emotionally and physically through holistic healing modalities.

From transformational belief coding, an evidence-backed process rewiring limiting subconscious beliefs, to energy healing techniques like quantum flame healing, angelic reiki and silent counselling, she reveals how these practices helped ease her menopause symptoms when conventional treatments weren’t an option.

This episode dives into the powerful intersection of mind, body, and energy healing, showing how ancient practices combined with modern science can offer women natural and supportive tools for managing menopause. If you’ve ever felt lost in the physical and emotional storm of menopause or wondered about alternative healing paths, this episode is a must-listen.

You can find out more and connect with Jillian on; (1) Jillian Shiers | LinkedIn, (1) Facebook, Jillian Shiers Healing.

I'd love to connect with you on LinkedIn;

www.linkedin.com/in/⭐alison-allen-chartered-mcipd

Transcript

Sparks of Change: Redefining Career and Calling through Menopause with Jillian Shiers.

[00:00:00] Are you or someone you know and love going through the menopause? If this is you low and welcome to find your Spark, real life menopause moments. I'm Alison and I'm excited to guide you through all things menopause. In this empowering podcast, we'll dive into honest conversations, share real life stories, and bringing guest insight to help you feel supported through every stage of the menopause transition.

Welcome to today's episode of Find Your Spark, Real Life Menopause Moments, and I'm delighted to welcome Jillian along today of Jill Shear's Healing, and Jill is a transformational healer who specializes in menopause support. Now, we met a few weeks ago at a networking event, and then we realized we had a lot in common.

So we met for a coffee and talked all things menopause. So let's dive in and [00:01:00] talk about your menopause story, Jillian. Well, yes, it's, um, quite a complex one. So I've gone through the menopause now. Um, I am on post menopause, obviously still in it, but I've gone through the, the hardest part. Um, and it, and it was hard.

It was difficult, uh, but possibly not in the way that people would think. Um, just because I didn't have a lot of the symptoms, but I had one of the symptoms quite badly, which was anxiety. Um, it seemed to exacerbate my, already, I already had anxiety and depression and had done from kind of my early twenties and it, uh, really, uh, brought them to the fore during that time.

But to begin with, I, menopause for me was always. It was off in the distance, and I knew, obviously knew about it, but then I [00:02:00] lost my mom at age 27 to breast cancer and was subsequently tested. Everybody in the family was tested and I, I carried the BRCA two gene, so I knew from, I, I probably my roundabout age 30, that hormones were a no-no for me.

So even though I didn't actually realize. How that would affect me in the future. Um, I knew I knew that fact. So it was kind of there. And then obviously people that have grown up without a mom at that time in their life will realize that you haven't got that person to turn to, to ask questions about it.

And I mean, yes, I had loads of wonderful women around me. I mean, I was, I was a teacher, so I had, you know, a plethora of women. Some of whom were older than me, but that genetic link, like how did your mom go through menopause? What was her menopause journey and her hormone journey through her life? [00:03:00] That bit is the missing part.

So by the time I got to the, when I was nearing menopause, I didn't even have that question of, oh, when did you, when did your cycle started changing? Start changing? Because she, I didn't have her to ask, so I was. Going into it with some precise information about the fact I couldn't use any synthetic hormones, but then I had a big gap of knowledge about how it had gone for her and therefore how it might go for me.

Um, and I couldn't remember. You don't really remember. Do you back to when your mom was going through those things? My big memory of anything to do with menopause from, like I said, the women that were, I have worked with in the past who were older than me was a lot of fanning, you know, and a lot of using a fan and going, oh, you know, a bit of a senior moment, and all of that sort of thing.

That's the only [00:04:00] thing that came out for, for me. That's what the messaging was to me, I think from those people around me. I think that is so typical for many people because as you say, we, especially on TV or people that you, you talk to, all you really hear about until you start digging deeper and finding more outies, the hot flushes, and maybe, you know, she's being a bit moody.

Yeah. You don't know all the, the symptoms. So it's, it's understandable. How people sometimes don't realize that they're going through their, their menopause journey. Yeah. Um, and, and I mean, I certainly didn't know that anxiety is one of the biggest percentages of, of symptom. Um. And actually since, um, my, I lost my dad a couple of years ago as well, and after going through things in the house, I found some of my [00:05:00] mom's diaries.

Um, and some of them I was flicking when we were, when I actually found 'em, I started flicking through and there were things like when she was on shift at work and when she had to change, but then it started being a bit more of a, she was jotting things down and then I saw my name because she was talking about what I was up to.

And I, and I put them away 'cause I couldn't look at them at that time. But then I got them out a few weeks ago and reading through them, my mom really struggled with anxiety and I think I was oblivious. I, I, I always knew she was quite a nervous person. She didn't like things like she didn't drive because she found that too stressful.

So she, she, she'd passed a test but had never driven, she didn't like speaking on the phone to people. All of the kind of surface level things that you might think. But reading through the diaries was like, it absolutely opened my eye to the fact that she was really struggling, re to the point she was going to her GP [00:06:00] to talk about it and possibly taking.

Um, medication for it. And in my youthful ignorance and probably self-centeredness, I hadn't realized that at all. But then that made so much sense because I too would, had struggled and was continuing to struggle. And so probably that was the main symptom that would've come up. And if I'd have known that.

I might have dealt with it a bit better at the time as I was going through those peak perimenopause moments, but it is so odd, isn't it? That, that because we don't talk about it because it's, I mean, it's a bit, it's funny to see a woman fanning herself, and you might go about brain fog, but the things that actually are probably more serious to our own mental health.

Physical health aren't talked about. You don't go around saying, I'm feeling anxious, I'm going to the doctor. I've just been put on antidepressants or anti-anxiety [00:07:00] medication. You don't really talk about that. I think it's becoming more, um, absolutely fine to talk about that. And I, I do think you should talk about that if you want to, but no, that message never got to me because I don't think women felt like they could speak about it.

It is. Absolutely. It's so, just so needed, isn't it? You know, to, to raise awareness. A lot of the work that I do is work with organizations to raise awareness, but it's not just about raising awareness in organizations. It is raising awareness with individuals and having that knowledge of what could happen to us doesn't mean it will.

What symptoms we could experience. Absolutely. And, um, you know, I'm so sorry for you, you know, to go through losing him at such a young age, um, you know, it must have been horrific. And like you say, you haven't had your mum there to talk to her about all these, all these things that have gone on [00:08:00] for you. So, yeah.

Uh, like I say, I, I'm, you know, feel for, you really do. So let's have a look at you. You said that you were a teacher. Yeah. When you started going through your journey. So how did your menopause impact you as a teacher then? Well, I was. Notorious for having to have a fan. So, I mean, I'm not really saying that hot, hot flashes haven't, haven't impacted me massively.

Um, I don't, I didn't get night sweats or anything, but I do remember before COVID 'cause that the COVID was kind of the catalyst as well. Fanning myself, I think one of my teaching assistants bought me a little mobile fan to put on the desk, and the anxiety was, was one of the biggest things that now looking back I can appreciate at the time I probably didn't realize, but yeah, it was, it was becoming harder to, [00:09:00] I never liked being kind of watched, observed, so it was becoming seriously harder to be observed for as you have to have, um, for your sort of ongoing development.

Um, real panic and. The feeling of dread every year when that kind of staff meeting came up where they said, right, so we've just come up with the, um, the observation timetable and the, the meetings and all of this so that you go in and speak to your kind of line manager or whatever about it. As soon as we got to that point in the year, it, my heart just used to sink and felt really stressed out by it all.

It was, it was tough. There was a point in my teaching career where I was quite confident. I mean, I, I was actually a deputy, uh, head teacher at a very small school because I worked there and I loved it, and I want, I could have stayed there forever and, um. They couldn't employ a deputy. They [00:10:00] tried a couple of times and then people within school going, oh, you go, you go for it.

'cause I'd been there a while and so I actually put myself forward for things like that. I was, you know, I had to make a presentation. All the things that I didn't really, I wasn't really into. Um, I, I would, would've been happy being a classroom teacher all of my life. I think I never sought out leadership and management.

But I did it and I was, you know, I, I changed the, my, uh, my specialism. So I was like humanities. I went into English and I was, I really did enjoy it and I was feeling quite proud of myself and confident. And then I think as I got closer to that time when my hormone started to deplete, that just started to wash away and fade away as.

I got closer to perimenopause, the peak of perimenopause to the point where it was, yeah, I was being, I was getting [00:11:00] tearful if things were said at school. Um, put a brave face on because in teaching a quite a lot of it is, is performance, um, when you're in front of the children and everything. But it was getting to the point where I couldn't really hide that.

And then a few different things happened during lockdown. I think we were, obviously we were teaching online, so that was, that was different. 'cause you can manage stuff at home. You know, if you are in your little home, you can manage how you're feeling because that moment on the screen is very limited and you're not under that scrutiny of everybody.

Um, but there were, there were things where I'd get an email saying, oh, can you make sure you da, da da? And, and I was, wasn't dealing with it well at all to the point where it was becoming, like, it was becoming apparent to me that I was. Nearing some sort of emotional like exhaustion or breakdown, but like you do as a teacher, you carry on and teachers and [00:12:00] lots of other jobs.

You're very good. It's been in place all the time. Um. Home plates, things that are happening at home, they get switched off. When you get into the classroom, you're spinning all those plates, the demands from leadership, spinning those plates, demands from the government, spinning those plates. And then your 35 children, you're spinning all of those individual plates at the same time.

And I was quite good at that until I wasn't very good at that anymore. And that was. That was menopause. And I'm, I'm not saying that teachers are special and they've got it any harder, but I think because you are front facing all the time, you know, children, all the other staff that are within your classroom, parents, your management team, everything, it, it's, it's hard to keep that together.

There are, there's no hiding really. Uh, if you're a classroom based teacher. And I'm sure there are other jobs where you [00:13:00] might be in your own office, you might be doing things, and you can have those moments where you just feel like you don't want to do anything, but you can't really hide when you're a teacher.

So it, it was a recipe that was getting, uh, very close to disaster, probably pre-COVID, during COVID. And then when we went back, it wasn't good. So what, what happened to, for you to make that decision to, to leave your teaching career? So I, I sound like I'm just coming out with all this tragedy, but it, honestly, it wasn't like that at the time.

So it started to fall a bit apart when my daughter started having, uh, issues with her anxiety, because a few things had happened, uh, in, in our, like her close, her childhood best friend's dad had suddenly died. It wasn't expected. He wa he had an illness, but they thought he probably might come out of it.

He didn't. Um, so she was. What in year [00:14:00] 10? So it was quite young. Um, and then there were a few other things. And then my dad was diagnosed, uh, with liver cancer and I remember the day that. I was in the classroom and we had connecting phones, uh, into the classrooms from the office, and the phone rang and I answered it, and the secretary said, oh, I've got your dad on the phone.

He wants to speak to you if he can. And so if it had been anything else, I would've normally you just kind of speak very quickly on the phone. The children are getting on the ta, you know, the TAs are there like looking after them, and something in me just told me, no, don't answer this phone call in the classroom.

So I went to the office and long story short, he was, he was going to have to go into hospital 'cause he'd been to the doctor and they needed to do some tests. And that was the start of him being diagnosed with, um, liver cancer. And basically they'd told him that he could, we could manage it with medication and with chemo or whatever.

I think that was the point [00:15:00] where everything broke and the plates absolutely crashed down. Um, because I was managing my feelings, his feelings. My daughter who was struggling and at this point, um, wasn't going into school every day. There was a lot of driving her to school. She couldn't get out of the car.

Driving her back, or I think one of the days at least I had to bring her with me to work, um, because there wasn't enough time to get back. And I think that was the catalyst then. And I wasn't coping very well with that because of everything that was going on inside me with the anxiety and the hormones and everything like that.

So I went off on long-term sick. The relief when I was off and I knew I didn't have to call in at the end of the, the day to say, we'll be back tomorrow. 'cause you, when you were [00:16:00] off as a teacher, you never get, so you might ring in in the morning or can't go, or can you let us know before about two o'clock whether you're gonna be in the next day.

So you don't even ever get that chance to be ill and then think. I'll just go in when I'm ready. There's always this kind of, will I be ready? Will I be ready? Oh, well I could be ready. So as soon as I got like off for a week and then, and two weeks, then it was a month and the, my body just totally relaxed and I was able to then manage my daughter and what she was going through my dad.

So that was the beginning of the year. I obviously very luckily had full pay for six months, but I'd crossed over the financial year. So then that. I couldn't carry that on. It went down to half pay. So I knew that I had to go back to work in the September, and by this time, HR were involved and I, I was having to have meetings because there would've to be a phase return, and my [00:17:00] union was involved, and the plan then in my head was Right.

I'll go back, I will do the phase return and then I'll put my resignation in. So that I would finish at the Christmas, um, end of, end of the autumn term and had meetings to that effect. And then I just remember being at home and just going, I can't do it. And breaking down saying, I can't, I can't even imagine being back in the classroom at full strength or even though it was phased and coping still with these emotions that were running through me.

Tried CBT. That didn't really work because the things that I was struggling with weren't going away. So sometimes with when you're doing the behaviour stuff, you change your behaviour and you are like rewiring your brain, aren't you? And but those external things weren't going away for me, so I couldn't really rewire anything.[00:18:00] 

So then they said, oh, you probably need grief counselling because you hadn't grieved your mom, and then now you are in this living grief. 'cause you're grieving your dad already because she died of breast cancer, but it was secondary liver cancer. He was, he had liver cancer. So it was like, I've been in this journey before.

I've, I've seen this film before. I know what happens. Um, so in the end, so I can't do it. I can't go back. So I just craftily got my union to support me. Uh, and I just knew I had to do that and then figure everything out at that point. And a hope that, you know, a hope that whatever I decided to do was, was going to work.

But I just knew I couldn't go back. Um, at this point I was still in per, I was still, um, in perimenopause because I'd, and I was, it was, there were lot longer and longer gaps between my [00:19:00] cycles and I think I'd made it to about nine months maybe. And then the day after my dad died. I got my period again and it restarted the clock for another the year.

So, and it was obviously the stress and the, the way my body was reacting and everything, and it just set those, you know, gave those hormones, uh, something to do again and then boom, then I was back. So I haven't gone through actual the, you know, menopause bit. Then I was still in very peak peri so it wasn't a great time, but I'm absolutely glad it happened now for lots of reasons.

So I was doing some research before our chat, and 46.9% of England's teaching workforce are women over 40. And when you consider the findings from the Faucet [00:20:00] Society study that they did one in 10. Individuals leave their, their jobs, their careers because of menopause. So, you know, it's, it's scary, isn't it, if we think about the high proportion of women in the, the forties that are in the teaching workforce, you know, and hopefully, hopefully that they're, they're not having a, a tough time.

Yeah. I mean, I, I think when I started teaching. Early retirement was, was the target, you know, 50, just over 50. So you didn't have that long to be in the career. Um, if you didn't want to be and. As soon as the, they'd kind of changed the payment structure, uh, in teaching and kind of Ofsted came in and they had this accountability and, and you couldn't sit at a classroom teacher grade anymore.

You had to progress. Once you got to a certain, the, the ceiling of your level, you had to go up into, [00:21:00] um, it was kind of middle management basically. I mean, you weren't managing anything other than your subjects or whatever in school. A schoolwide issue, but people couldn't, people I think personally, that people in teaching would stay longer if they could have stayed at that classroom, that classroom teacher level, and never progressed.

Um, because the accountability that came then with having to move up. Into the next kind of pay grade is too much and teaching has changed. And you can see with the the re retention problems they've got, you know, it's not this amazing career that's rewarding because there's so much outside influence now that it takes away any reward.

That you have with children. Um, I'm speaking very cynically now and I'm sure there are people out there listening who don't agree with me, who are very rewarded in their job, but it's difficult. Um, and so you are gonna have this, [00:22:00] you are gonna get this mainstay of older women, mostly majority of staying in teaching who are hitting menopause, but don't really know how it's affecting them.

Because they're waiting for those signposts of the most common symptoms, which they think are the most common symptoms. And actually it might well be affecting them from much earlier on, um, because they don't realize what their symptoms are going to be. But yeah, I, I'm amazed. I couldn't imagine of be staying there and carrying on until I was late sixties towards 70.

Absolutely not. It's difficult, and I don't, I remember when I had my, one of my final meetings with HR and the head and my union and, and I said, oh, well, she said, have you got any questions? She said, is there a menopause policy in school? And she said, yes, yes, yes, there is. And I'm sure that there was, [00:23:00] because it ticked a box of having a menopause policy.

But how that actually took into account. The symptoms and the way it might affect you as a a teacher on a day-to-day basis? I'm not sure that would've been accounted for because it's so vast. And how can you account for somebody feeling disconnected and lacking in confidence or hating themselves and their bodies, or feeling anxious or.

All of those different things that aren't necessarily even symptoms you can see. Yeah. And, and it's, it's definitely going beyond the policy and bringing that, the supportive culture into, whether it's a school or whatever the workplace is, it's supporting the them as an individual and getting to understand what, what is impacting them and how that support can come about.

Absolutely. Um. So, so you found yourself [00:24:00] after COVID years, you know, out of your, your, what you thought you were going to do until you retired. Yeah. You know, you were out of your teaching career. So how did wi, how did you move from teaching to healing? Well, interesting because when I finished, um, obviously I had to come up with something to do and one of the.

One of the downsides of teaching I do sound very negative and I don't mean it, but I think that you do come out feeling a bit de-skilled. There are so many things a teacher does that you are actually very skilled, but you can't see how you would use that in the outside world. Um. I remember when I was at university and we had to choose whether we did a, a BAed, an educational, um, well, we were doing the same course, but at the end of it, you could either have a BA with QTS, with qualified teacher [00:25:00] status, or you could do it as a BAed, a Bachelor of Education.

And I remember them saying, if you take the BA and the QTS, well if you didn't want to stay in, in, uh, teaching, you could go into banking. So that was, that was what you were told you could probably do. If you didn't do teaching, you could probably get a job in a bank. So there wasn't any other thing, in my opinion, there wasn't any other thing I could do or that was qualified to do, and I did.

Look, I'm, I'm not, you know, I was looking, I wasn't necessarily looking for jobs in other schools. I was looking at what I could possibly diversify and do, and everything needed you to be. Already qualified in something or have expertise in something and I, I tried, I think I'd looked at civil service because I think they're very good at taking your skills and seeing how you can apply them in different situations.

But not properly. I hadn't really looked. So when it came to it, I just thought, oh, do you know what I really like art? I [00:26:00] can do, I could do some print design. And I was, I'd been looking on the internet and I'd seen people that were putting up things that could be prints, they could be on t-shirts. And I was quite good at art and I thought, and I loved art and I thought I could do that.

And then I had no idea. I had no idea what I needed to do because I've been on this treadmill of being told what to do and fitting into timetables and, uh, curriculum and all things like for all, for so many years. One week, short of 30 years was my final total. Didn't have a clue. So at the same time. I was obviously in a mess.

I was a total mess and I was looking for things in ways that I could help myself. So that's when the power of Facebook ads probably, uh, kept throwing, um, people up on my feed that were all about healing. And the first one was, [00:27:00] was a transformational healing, um, which was belief code in which, um, if you haven't heard of it.

A process where a lot of different techniques have been used, and you can find how a limiting belief has been embedded in your, um, subconscious from childhood, uh, and rewire it through doing different things. And it was calling to me. So I took some of that money that I'd got from my redundancy and invested in it.

Um, and really like, I really liked it and, and it was. It was almost like it renewed me again because here I was, I'd gone for, whilst I was off work on long-term sick, I'd not wanted to speak to people, really hadn't wanted to talk to even my friends. Um, I was very, I'd made myself a hermit really, just because I was desperately trying to cope with all this [00:28:00] emotion that was in me and feelings and everything.

So here I was on this course where the, after you'd done some of the training and you'd, you'd watched things on video. So a lot of it was zoom related. I could do it on at home. It was fine, but you had to go and then swap facilitations with other people. Training, which meant you had to get on a zoom with a stranger, delve into their inner beliefs and workings, and goodness knows what could come up about, happened to them when they were younger and they were doing the same for me.

And that person wouldn't have done that before. It was really strange. I was the teacher who got, could go to a course, meet random strangers, sit on the same table as them, make like casual chit chat and be fine, but at the same time feel very awkward, socially awkward. Um, but here I was like to kind of getting down [00:29:00] to the nitty gritty of emotions with total strangers.

They were strangers at the time. 'cause you just put in a call and say, no, anybody wants to swap a facilitation. And they were just random people, uh, who were doing the same course. And, and that was, that was fine. And I suppose some of the skills I learned communicating as a teacher helped COVID and being on.

Zoom or it was teams that we used, but that helped because it wasn't totally alien. Um, yeah. And then once I tried that more came into my world because when you are in that, as soon as you get into Facebook community, then you start kind of seeing other things that are linked to it. And I really enjoyed working on myself because I hadn't really put myself first for a very long time.

I'd been managing everything, managing everybody. And um, so that was really good. And at this point now, by this [00:30:00] time I'm going, I'm into just before crossing over into post menopause. So I was, without knowing it, I was working on myself and my menopause through that, but I didn't realize that at the time.

And then some of my physical symptoms kind of faded and. It was only when I was listening to somebody else talk about menopause on a group zoom using, and it was all about, um, healing, a different healing approach modality that I was doing when I just in my head thought, oh my God, I have that, but it's gone.

So I was getting real, I was really struggling with, um, a dead arm and tingling arm in bed. And I know shoulder is, shoulder issues are quite big in menopause, but we don't really realize that. And, and kind of every, I couldn't, I had to change the way I was sleeping for after, you know, years of, this was my favourite way to lie.

I couldn't anymore because it was really affecting my arm. [00:31:00] And then I thought, well, that I haven't had that issue for a while. And then a few other things and, and it was like the work I'm doing on myself and the. Allowing my energy system to flow. He's helping those symptoms. And going back to the, the before with the HRT and uh, having the BRCA two gene, so I knew, I knew it didn't matter how many times I asked her.

And it, I have to have like mammogram annual mammograms. And I, I was under Christie, uh, Christie's Hospital in Manchester before they kind of regionalized, um, all the screening and everything. So I had to go once a year to Manchester. Um, and I was under Professor Evans at the Family History Clinic. And I remember every time I sort of went, I, and I was getting to that point, I was asking.

So can, you know, as it changed, can you take anything? And they were still like, well, let's look at the risk. And they said, well, the risk [00:32:00] is this. And it's up to you if you make that decision. But there's a lot of, of kind of paths that you could go because if you'd been on contra oral contraceptive up to this age and you'd take it and then this and that was better than if you hadn't and, or you, and, and at the end of the day it was, no, not really.

Um, it, it is not really, we don't, wouldn't advise you take anything. So fine. But I didn't, I also didn't go down the natural kind of way because it's too complicated. Uh, you know, there was things are being like, red clover, take this, take that Ash, Uganda, all these different things, but then you'll find that some of them actually have plant oestrogen in them.

So is that. Also, and then there was a study that'll say that that could be, it could encourage your actual oestrogen to, to multiply and, and whatever. So, no, so I, I couldn't be bothered to be honest. And so in [00:33:00] the end I just didn't, I just didn't take anything. Um, and. I'm quite amazed at even I'm amazed at how the things I did to help my own healing and to learn healing, give it to other people, how it helped calm a lot of those symptoms down.

If, if I'd have known about the anxiety as a symptom of menopause or perimenopause before I had got to that point where I wasn't controlling it very well, I probably would've done something about that. Possibly with up in my anti-anxiety meds or going to actually seek some counselling or some something, I probably would've done something which would've kept that under control a bit better.

But I can honestly say that. But the other things haven't, didn't really impact my life. Like I can, I'm reading about they're [00:34:00] impacting other women. To such an extent that they don't know who they are anymore and they don't know where to go from here. And that was the, that was the catalyst really to think, well, hang on.

I've found something that could help because it helped me, and I'd love to help all these other women who might want to take HRT might not be able to take HRT or might take HRT and find that actually it's not working well with their bodies. So what other ways are there that they could use to get their bodies back into some sort of flow so that it helps them?

Brilliant. So you started off with belief coding. Yeah. And then where have you gone from there? So the belief code is the, like I would say, the belief code is the more tangible one, and it's, since I started doing it, being accredited in it, [00:35:00] it's now become science backed, meaning that they've done studies and there's evidence that your brain is actually changing and the neurons are sparking in a different way after a session.

So by revisiting these things and. So telling you subconscious that actually no, we can sort that out even though it was in the past. We can, we can kind of heal that by how you feel about what happened in the past. And so there's been extensive. Like scientific investigation into it. And it's continuing because I think Jess Cunningham, who founded it as as seen, and there's all these people coming back with, well, I helped somebody with fibromyalgia, with menopause, with this, with that, with a DHD.

And so she's now that scientific stuff is spreading so that she can actually say, well, yes we can. We can show that it does. Even collagen, I think they've investigated collagen. By [00:36:00] having, uh, a session, your internal collagen levels can actually improve, um, even though they deplete like hormones. So it's amazing.

It's got, there are amazing possibilities out there, but that's quite a tangible approach. It's very process, uh, driven. So you follow a certain process. So I just, that was then thrown into these other. Healing modalities, one of which was created by, um, a sis, the sister of the person who did belief coding.

But then from them, uh, and through the people I've met, I've gone on to, so quantum flame energy healing, I've studied angelic reiki. Uh, and one of my favourites now is silent counselling, which the, the name is very. I think it's a little bit, it throws you off the, the trail. So basically in a lot of the work I've done recently is about meridians and the ancient Chinese kind of body system of [00:37:00] which of your organs are, um, controlling your emotions or which could be affected by blocked and stagnant energy.

Um, so you just use a lot of breath work and then touch on certain parts of your body that kind of. Activate that meridian and clear, clear the emotions out of it. Um, so it's gone from being quite a process to then, it was very much, I hate this phrase, but woo woo, that sort of, and I don't really like using it because I'm very into the fact that the spiritual.

And healing energy and source energy can be amazing. You just got to tap into it and know what you're asking for. Two old PR ancient practices that actually do they match up to parts of your body and um, can have real results. [00:38:00] And I, and I trained in one of the last, almost last things I've trained in is boost me, uh, which was created by somebody who'd done some of the courses I've done that she works with somebody else who does body and wellness.

And this is lots of different massage techniques, including reflexology type stuff. Uh, there's a tweener, uh, massage, but again using Chinese, um, stomach massage too. Kind of touch those points where you are clearing emotion from certain organs and people come out of it feeling boosted and energetic, but at the same time really calm.

Um, and they've just actually moved, they've just developed Boost Me Fertility and they've got people who medically have no reason why they can't conceive, but haven't, and they've got. One baby's been born, I think another one's on the way, and they've got four more who, [00:39:00] um, have just found out that they're pregnant just from using some of these approaches.

So they were planning to carry on and do boost me menopause, whereas I've kind of used a lot of the stuff I've done and I'm doing my own. Not as scientific, but more using chakras and energy balance to hit those hormone and those glands in your body that are in charge of your hormones to give you that balance so that you can function.

Because I, I do believe that some of the modalities that I learned and went through and had, had swapped treatments with other people when we were training, they helped my menopause symptoms. So I want to sort of build on that now and develop something so it's not intrusive. It's, it's natural, it's working with your own body's energy.

Um, doesn't require you to take X amount of supplements, um, [00:40:00] and can work alongside, or instead of HRT. Fantastic. So you've gone on, uh, a huge journey then, and you've sort of like taken your negative experience, you've moved that into a positive experience, changed your career, and not only have you positively impacted your own symptoms, you are working with individuals to positively impact those as well.

Mm, yeah. I mean. I, I've said, I think before, and I've, I have said this to other people, it is been the best thing that's happened to me. That all of that crisis and everything that happened, it happened to push me into this. I do believe that now I, I've felt like it pushed me into this, but now I actually believe I, it came into my life to kind of gi give me that kick and say, why are you still in this profession that you don't?

Love anymore and don't feel comfortable in, [00:41:00] and now I'm helping people in a different way. And so I do believe it from being one of the worst times in my life. It actually has become one of the best things that happened to me because, and, and I think one of the things that I've been working on recently is puberty is such a massive thing that happens in our lives.

You know, it's like a light, it's like a. Milestone in our development in schools. We teach, we teach children in ufa, and I've had to do that. I've had to teach kind of, uh, health education and, and puberty stuff to, um, like 10 and 11 year olds. We teach all of that. But menopause is the reverse of that. It has.

Possibly even a bigger impact because when you are young and you're learning and everything, it is a major change in your body. It changes you physically and it changes you mentally and you hormonally, you're changing. And the same thing happens in reverse, in [00:42:00] menopause, and to some extent, I think in men in a different way, but we don't give it.

That kind of, I don't know, like it's a, like a rite of passage for children, isn't it? Or they've reached menopause, you know, but we don't give it that honour at the other end of life when actually our bodies are changing massively again. But it's just something that we have to get over and, um, it'll be horrendous, but it could be life changing in a good way because it can be that catalyst to say, am I doing what I want to do?

Am I the person I wanted to be? Can I be somebody different? Can I find the person that I was before or can I find her new me? And I think that is the side of menopause that we don't often talk about. We should be celebrating it because it is, it's a different, just a different phase in our [00:43:00] life, but it can change our life as much as puberty did and all the other lifechanging things that happened.

You know, having children, whatever career it can be amazing. You just have to find the right approaches to it. Absolutely. And you know, I often say to people, you know, we, we focus on the doom, the gloom. You know, you don't hear people say, I can't wait to reach my menopause. But as you said, it doesn't have to be all negative.

We can find the positives there. You know, many people have horrific experiences and that's not to take that away from anybody, but many other people. Can find it transformative and have a really positive experience when they, when they look back and come to the other end of it. Oh, I've loved chatting to you today.

Thank you so much. So just before we finish, what, um, how could somebody work with you if they're listening to this and they, they really love everything that you're saying, [00:44:00] you know, how can somebody work with you? So I, I currently offer different treatments, I suppose you would call them. Um, but I, I'm actually.

Simple that down, simplifying that down. Now to sort of, if you want to return to yourself, we'll talk and we'll figure out the way that you will suit you best. Uh, I, I work online for a lot of my things because they are able to be done. Over a Zoom call, but I'm also, um, hoping to be in person as in having, um, a space where people can come because obviously some of the stuff I've talked about is, um, Meridian Touch and breathwork, so they can find me on Facebook.

Under Gillian, she's healing. I have a website, which is jillianshiers healing.com. And yeah, just have a chat. To be honest, we, you know, don't be kind of, oh, I don't know what, I don't know what, what I would do, and I don't know what she would do, [00:45:00] and I don't know where we would go. Just, just have a chat. Let's have a chat about what, how you're feeling and what might make you feel a bit better.

Thank you so much, and I'll put the details for, for your contact details in the show notes as well. Thank you so, so much for taking the time out to, to have this chat with me and um, and I'll see you soon. Thanks very much. Thank you. Thank you so much for listening to find your Spark, real life menopause moments.

If you'd like to learn more, visit www.sparkshr.co.uk. Please share this episode with others navigating their menopause journey or supporting someone through it. Don't forget to subscribe and leave a review. Your feedback helps us to spark, change and connect with more people. Let's keep the sparks alive and continue this journey together.