From Hustle to Harmony with Sarah Thomson

In this episode, Sharon sits down with Sarah Thomson, multi award winning digital business coach, and founder of Online Social Butterfly, to talk about what happens when a life built on achievement meets the messy middle of midlife.

Sarah’s story is one of evolution — from corporate high-flyer to entrepreneur, from people-pleasing perfectionist to woman learning the art of rest, and from the hustle of “doing it all” to embracing compassion and crone energy.

They chat about career pivots, perimenopause brain fog, the realities of parenting when it doesn’t come naturally, and the courage it takes to stop soldiering on.

If you’ve ever asked yourself, “Who am I without my work?” or felt scared that slowing down might mean losing yourself — this conversation is for you.Takeaways

Self-compassion is crucial during challenging times.
It's important to allow others to help and support you.
Navigating motherhood can be overwhelming, but it's okay to seek help.
Finding balance between work and family is essential for well-being.
Health challenges can lead to important life changes and self-discovery.
Women often feel pressured to conform to societal expectations.
Embracing change and being open to new routines can be liberating.
Confidence in one's abilities can fluctuate throughout life.
It's okay to prioritize personal happiness over societal norms.
Learning to say no is a powerful act of self-care.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Unraveling the Midlife Mess
02:03 Exploring Teenage Diaries and Early Influences
05:54 Navigating Career Choices and Early Success
11:58 The Evolution of Self-Confidence
17:46 Motherhood: Challenges and Realizations
23:50 Finding Balance in Work and Family Life
29:57 Turning Points and Life Changes
35:55 Health Challenges and Self-Compassion
41:57 Embracing Change and New Routines
47:48 Lessons Learned and Advice for Women
53:52 Conclusion and Reflections on the Journey

You can find Sarah over at @onlinesocialbutterfly or tune in to her excellent podcast The Social Circus

Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Unravelling: The Diary of a Midlife Mess.

If something resonated with you today, I’d love to hear your thoughts, come join the conversation on Facebook and Instagram @themessymiddlelife or visit sharonwilkesburt.com
for more resources and support.

💌 Freebie: Grab Mirror Mirror : A simple self-reflection tool to shift how you see the woman in the mirror, observing her with kindness (instead of criticism)

✨ Unravelling: A journalling course for midlife women
A self-paced course to help you get clear, feel more like you again, and find solid ground in the messy bits of midlife.

🌱 New Beginnings Session
Curious about coaching but not sure if it’s for you? This one-off 90-minute coaching conversation is designed to give you a taste of what’s possible, with an easy introductory offer to help you begin.

Don’t forget to subscribe and leave a review if you’re enjoying the journey so far!

Let’s Begin | You’re not too late, too much, or too lost. This is just the middle ... and there’s gold in here.

Transcript

Hi Sarah, I am just so excited to have this conversation with you. Thank you for joining me this morning. So obviously this is called Unraveling the Dire of a Midlife Mess and the the premise being that

Sarah Thomson (01:18.511)
thanks.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (01:29.866)
there were, I mean many, very many women as they are today, but I, there's very, there were kind of versions of us that became before the women that we meet today. And I'm always so much more interested, not so much as in who she was, but kind of how the, how all the layers came together, all fell apart or whatever it was. So.

I'm going to start with your teenage diary because it is the diary of a midlife mess and diary, my own journal has been such a key part in my own unraveling that I can't not ask the first questions about the diary. So if I were to peek into your teenage diary, what kind of girl would I meet?

Sarah Thomson (02:03.144)
Go for it. Yes.

Sarah Thomson (02:12.434)
Ooh, probably parts that we still see today and parts that are completely, I have grown and evolved out of. So the parts that you would still see today, so just as a little background for people who don't know me, my parents are immigrants, they're British, so my dad's Irish, my mum's English, and they immigrated out here with big dreams of what...

what life here would look like. so growing up, my parents separated when I was very young and my mum was a single mum in the true sense that the only other family we had in Australia was my dad who was, we didn't have a good relationship with. So my mum was a single mum. In those days, you couldn't even make international calls. So she did it all on her own. And she, after she left my father when I was five, she went back to college and retrained as a teacher. And then my whole childhood, my mum was studying. So she went on to do her teaching degree.

And then when I was at university, she did her master's. She was a very inspirational woman. And I have the benefit of her because she was a school teacher. She was at my school growing up and she always made me feel like I could do anything. So the Sarah you would have met in my diary was I can do whatever I want, which is a pretty nice place to be for our generation of Gen X's, because that wasn't always what our parents wanted. My mom was a big advocate for further education like university. And so if you read my diary, I would be...

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (03:09.122)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (03:22.797)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (03:33.874)
The go-getter kind of girl that you see today, she's still around. The things that you wouldn't see anymore is the lack of confidence in myself. That's well gone.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (03:43.288)
Right, yeah. I mean, that's a great starting point as well, because as you say, it's not something that all of us grew up with, that kind of believing that anything's available to you. So I think that's such a, you lost a mum, basically. mean, for the younger you, there any fears or pressures that shaped her choices?

Sarah Thomson (03:56.158)
Mm.

Sarah Thomson (03:59.816)
Yes!

Sarah Thomson (04:07.216)
Yes, so my mum, because of her journey, my mum wanted me to have a very traditional, solid career. And if you understand anything about higher education, higher education is not accessible to everybody. So when you have someone that's called first in family, so my mum was a first in family, so she was the first person to go to university and first in families almost always do teaching or nursing. So my mum did teaching. And so the next generation...

We then have a broader choice and then our children have even bigger choices. So my mum opened that door. And so I definitely had more choices as to what I would study at university, but it had to have a sensible career path. So I was doing a business degree and my mum wanted me to be an accountant, which is very linear. Everyone knows what you do. It's, you know, it's a very logical path.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (04:48.493)
Right.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (04:58.127)
Hmm.

Sarah Thomson (04:58.144)
And so that seemed like a good thing to do. I was great at study. I was a great kid. I was a great student. All of those things. But I sort of realized when I did work experience in my degree that, and you'll laugh at this because you know what the 90s was like, it was full of people in grey suits and I'm not a grey suit kind of girl. And so I was like, my gosh, what am I? I can't be this person. They're very sensible and very, they're just not who I wanted to be. And so

bless my mom, I had such big rouse with her towards the of my second year of my three year degree and said to her, I'm not gonna finish because I don't wanna be an accountant. And which must have been devastating knowing what her own journey was. And so she sort of said off-handedly, go and speak to her career's counselor at the university, I can't deal with you, I can't do this. So they suggested I should switch to marketing because I had done at one marketing elective and loved it and got a high distinction. And so I spent my summer changing majors and...

went into marketing. And so that was my big wobble before I even got into the workplace of like, I don't want to do something for the rest of my life that doesn't light me up and marketing always lit me up. So I was very lucky to have stumbled on that at university.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (06:07.616)
Yeah, I mean it's often the way isn't it that you kind of find out what you don't want to do only by doing it. You know it's very difficult when you are and obviously you know I've said this a few times kids are kind of sort of...

Sarah Thomson (06:13.159)
Correct.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (06:20.622)
not coerced, kind of led down a path from the age of about 14 of what is it, know, pick your subjects, what do you want to do? And, and very often we find ourselves kind of, you know, on, on, on, you know, somewhere along this path before we discover that actually, this isn't what I want to do at all. So when you were growing up, and obviously you've got this mum who's a real inspiration in terms of kind of study and education, was there anything that you really wanted to be when you grew up? And is she still in there somewhere? I mean, like, I can't imagine many sort of

Sarah Thomson (06:49.049)
Sorry.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (06:50.576)
10 year olds are kind of going I want to be able to market it.

Sarah Thomson (06:53.583)
No, absolutely not, because you didn't know that was a thing. So I wanted to be a writer and a journalist. And I'm glad I didn't go on to that, because obviously journalism is a dead career now, because we have, you know, there's no. And I remember being in high school and a teacher saying to me, I wasn't a talent enough writer to be a journalist, which now is fascinating because it was such a high bar to be a journalist with such a high bar. But when I was very young and I think you were similar age, Sharon, you would have had

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (07:15.406)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (07:23.321)
So obviously being English family, my family had given me a girl's world head, which I think is a Barbie head. And she had blue eyeshadow and you could do her hair. And I did her hair every single way. I taught myself how to braid hair. And so all I wanted to be was a hairdresser, which my mom was not excited about, which to be fair is a pretty good career, especially if you want to balance parenthood. And my mom told me behind closed doors, only stupid girls are hairdressers. So being a small child, I parroted that back to that hairdresser.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (07:28.174)
Absolutely.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (07:37.516)
you

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (07:48.93)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (07:52.846)
She'd love that.

Sarah Thomson (07:54.085)
And she said, are you gonna be a hairdresser? I said, no, mum said only stupid girls do hairdressing.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (07:57.354)
Hahaha

Sarah Thomson (08:00.733)
which is, I kind of know why she wanted more for me. However, that was still her, but her passionate belief in education was what was driving that, not that she looked down on hairdressers. But I think she thought I was, and obviously I was capable of much more, but yeah, so yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (08:00.876)
You

Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (08:12.65)
No, no.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (08:16.822)
Yes, yeah, yeah.

It's an interesting thing because obviously as somebody who's had a career in hairdressing for 30 odd years, know, it's interesting because that's for hairdressers, there's so much unraveling to do in terms of our own belief around that because of course that is like, you know, that's a common sort of preconception about hairdressers that we're all pretty dumb really. And we kind of believe it ourselves to start with. There's so many years of unraveling that narrative that actually,

Sarah Thomson (08:33.1)
I know.

Sarah Thomson (08:42.384)
Sharon Wilkes-Burt (08:47.306)
We're just, you know, we're not that dumb.

Sarah Thomson (08:49.147)
I know and my older cousin in the UK was, as our generation, was trained as a hairdresser and beautician, which I think it was a very common thing. And I thought she was a goddess and I wanted to do all of those cool things like that. I now, like my hairdresser I go to now, works from home, has very, very young children. And I think of how easy that is for her to balance and how hard it was for me to balance a young family.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (09:11.69)
Mmm, yes.

Sarah Thomson (09:13.807)
And I feel like maybe we should give a little bit more credit to careers that our family friend or like she works from home whenever she wants. And I think hairdressers, like I love my hair. It's kind of part of my persona and having great hair and someone's style that makes you feel so much better. is an important job.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (09:19.758)
Hmm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (09:29.262)
Mmm.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. It's interesting actually how many women when I've had these conversations, how many women wanted to be or ended up being hairdressers. And I don't think it's not always the fact that obviously I'm, I mean, there's some of them I know because I'm in the industry, but actually quite a few of them have been a surprise. I had no idea that they wanted to be hairdressers or started out as hairdressers. But then I was saying that there were very few options available. you know what mean? Unless you were the creme de la creme, you weren't going to uni and there were only a few

Sarah Thomson (09:30.83)
haha

Sarah Thomson (09:48.659)
Ha

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (09:59.85)
trades beneath that that would that girls girls could do or that was on the girls list of things that girls can do so it was yes yes yeah fantastic so then for 20 something so Sarah I mean obviously you were coming out of university what did success look like to you back then

Sarah Thomson (10:01.384)
Mm.

Absolutely. It was very limited. So I guess my mum was gunning for university and she got her wish. So we did do that.

Sarah Thomson (10:24.307)
Ooh, that's such a juicy question. So when I graduated from university, it was 1995 with my undergraduate degree and we were in the middle of a recession. And so there was no work. And in those days used to get the newspaper and you would look for jobs and you would send off applications. And I remember just applying for literally hundreds of jobs. Anything as a graduate, particularly in marketing as a graduate, it's not a lot of work in marketing in Perth. And so my first level of success was actually to get a job. And I remember, cause this is, I'm so showing my age.

you used to send off an application in the mail and then it would come back to you with a rejection letter. And I remember this so vividly that I remember getting home one day, I was working casually and mum said, oh, there's some mail for you. And I was like, I can't even open it in front of her because I can't face another rejection letter. So I went into the toilet and thought can just cry. And it was a letter asking me to go in for some screening because I had been shortlisted for a marketing analyst job.

and so I kind of, I obviously got that job and did the four years at, a pharmaceutical slash, consumer goods company, which was an amazing start. and so success looked like finding out what I wanted to do as a grownup. So I wanted to be in marketing and then taking it, taking that first step into your career of like, is this what I want to do? And I bloody loved it from the first minute I was in there. I was like, this is exactly what I want to be doing. It's so fun. It's so interesting. It suits my personality. Like marketing is.

fast-paced, very heavy deadlines, lots of diversity and work that I've always enjoyed. So I kind of found my success very early in my career because I was doing what I love.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (12:01.078)
Yeah, yeah, that's amazing. of course, you you hear that people have gone about on so many different paths trying to sort of find themselves. So to be able to kind of find yourself in your first job, essentially, you know, doing the job of your dreams is just, you know, what a thing. So obviously, through the years, have been many versions of you along the way. And how would you describe some of them?

Sarah Thomson (12:16.059)
I know.

Sarah Thomson (12:29.171)
Ooh, I think the young Sarah, that one that I just described to you as a graduate, I still remember this is, now I'm an actual adult, not baby adulting, which is what I tell my kids they are. I remember when I was 25, I managed such a large team, most of whom were older than me. And I remember thinking, I've got this nailed and very selfish, old and confident in a business context.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (12:39.886)
I'm still waiting.

Sarah Thomson (12:57.939)
without any awareness that I actually had very little life skills. so she, being confident in my work is something that I have always done because I like to be good at what I do and I will always study and learn and all those kinds of things. So that's been a common thread from when I was young, that confidence in myself, but liking myself for who I was behind the scenes was something that I always struggled with. And that's, that's been, I've been very late to the party in terms of liking Sarah.

and liking all of Sarah. So the different versions of her along the way have seen me like myself less and then kind of like myself and then maybe actually listen to my husband when he says, I love you and I think you're awesome. And so that's been a very big journey to get to the point now where I like who I am and I like what I like the physical vessel that I come in, like my body and my face and all of what that looks like.

And that's probably been the biggest change because I feel like I've wasted a bunch of time worrying about stuff like what do I look like and I wish I hadn't.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (14:04.044)
Yeah, yeah. I think that would be so common for so many women though, know, we kind of, you know, when I do my makeup shakeup workshops and we do this kind of mirror work and we kind of, and I get people to look at the woman in the mirror and just say something nice to the woman in the mirror and they find it so hard. So I think it's just, it's so, you know, the whole kind of...

Sarah Thomson (14:22.163)
Mm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (14:27.534)
being nice to ourselves is still work that so many women have to do, through all the versions of ourselves.

Sarah Thomson (14:34.547)
and it's... And I think one of the things I kind of wonder why I was such a slow learner. So I've been with my husband for over 20 years and we're happily married, we work together. And there's not many days that go past that he doesn't tell me like, you're beautiful, you're brilliant, you're clever. I love hanging out with you. And I feel the same about him. I think he is incredibly wise man whose company I enjoy.

And I wonder why it took me so long to actually respect his opinion when he says to me, you're a beautiful woman. Why my head did I dismiss that? Like for years, I just let him say that and just sort of sure he just, he has to say that. You know, that stuff, it's dreadful. And now I, now I actually respect him and say, he sees all of me and I am beautiful. And that's been a very long, slow journey. And he's been very patient.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (15:15.128)
Yeah. Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (15:22.817)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, I mean what a wonderful thing though, what a lovely guy, what a lovely man!

Sarah Thomson (15:31.283)
Definitely, I'm very lucky. He's a keeper.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (15:35.742)
So then if you look at these like versions of you, so how then did corporate Sarah differ from business owner Sarah or young mum Sarah? I mean obviously you've had this kind of running thing of kind of not seeing yourself as being the beautiful woman that you are, but there were versions of you within those. How did those all differ from one another?

Sarah Thomson (15:52.232)
Mm.

Sarah Thomson (15:56.371)
Oh, so mum Sarah, young mum Sarah did not go very well. So I didn't cope very well with parenting. So was 30 and 32 when I had my boys. I'm still quite young, but at the time I thought quite old. And so up until that point, anything that I had tried at, particularly in a work capacity, I could nail. I was a high achiever.

And then when it came to parenting, I still remember my great aunt saying to me, said like, Matthew won't sleep and he won't do this. And I've read this and she goes, what a shame he hasn't read the books. It's the wisdom of age, isn't it? cause, no, can he read the how to sleep book? So,

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (16:20.738)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (16:29.422)
It's so true. See, that's what they need to read books. That's the thing. Get the kids onto the books. Get the babies reading the books. Yes.

Sarah Thomson (16:43.955)
I struggled so much with that. I struggled with the fact that my days were just a blur. I didn't feel like I was doing it well. Like it all felt uncomfortable and unnatural. I wasn't a natural breastfeeder. My kids were terrible sleepers. And all of that made it seem like, wow, this is really hard. And I used to see people, like, I still remember this. And neither of my children took a dummy, like a pacifier.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (17:10.338)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (17:10.455)
And I would really have loved that because it would have made my life a lot easier. And I didn't even with my oldest son, I tried for so, so long. bought every dummy that was available. And then when I had James, my youngest son, I tried for a little while and I used to hate it so much. He would cry and make himself sick. And that's quite, I was like, I'm never going to do that. And I remember walking around the shops and thinking, all these people have nailed this child having a dummy.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (17:27.437)
right.

you

Sarah Thomson (17:35.579)
And I can't get this to, I can't get either of them to take it. But then you come into your own, because then when they're about two and people are getting rid of them and you can be really self-righteous to go, no, my child never had a dummy.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (17:41.645)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (17:50.567)
Like as if that was your plan all along. So I didn't, I wouldn't say that I was in my zone of genius. And when we had Matthew, when he was about six months old, Grant, my husband and I reversed jobs and I went back to work full-time and Grant was a full-time stay at home dad. And that was great.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (17:51.263)
Yes, love that. Like you had any say in that whatsoever.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (18:12.568)
Right.

Yes.

Sarah Thomson (18:16.563)
I'm very natural at being in a business corporate context, Sarah, and I have to say Grant's a very natural dad. And I know that him and our older son, Matthew, have a very strong relationship because he stayed at home with him for a year. And I miss out on stuff as all working parents do, but it was definitely, and this is something again, I've only got comfortable talking about as I've got older because there's so much judgment.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (18:34.903)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (18:42.195)
I struggled being a stay at home mum, it wasn't my default setting, I wasn't a natural mum. I found it all quite mundane and really hard because of the sleep. So my younger one didn't sleep through the night till he was three. So it was a lot of years without much sleep. And so that kind of takes away some of your joy. And so it was only once I could start walking and talking that I was like, these little people that give something back. So that was a really hard part for me. I didn't.

I love now, one of the things I really love about social media, and there's not many, I feel like we get to share more authentically and I see a lot more women talking about these challenges that I know I had that I felt really embarrassed to talk about because I felt like I was a bad mother. And I'm a wonderful mother and I have two wonderful sons, we have a beautiful family, but I just wasn't doing it how I thought we were supposed to do it. So that was tough.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (19:21.099)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (19:27.822)
Mmm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (19:36.578)
Yeah, I think it's possibly almost even worse for mums today because of course they have social media telling them all the things that they're doing wrong and all the things that you should be doing. So whilst there was probably, when you were bringing up your boys, there was that kind of more...

Sarah Thomson (19:49.907)
Mm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (19:54.818)
general social opinion or judgment on what you did. You know, it wasn't constantly in your inbox or on your phone telling you how you're doing it wrong and how you should be bringing up your kids and you know, all the things. So I kind of feel more sorry for mums today because I think they've got a lot more to live up to, for sure.

Sarah Thomson (19:57.359)
Yes!

Sarah Thomson (20:13.619)
live up to but but I feel like there's more authenticity around it so there's still more conversations around things like breastfeeding and um sleep and those things and I kind of look back now and think I wish I'd been for myself more grace to kind of go it's going to be okay we're going to get through this because now I look at my children and they're like I call them baby adults they're 17 and 20 and I just think that went so fast and I don't feel like I enjoyed it which I'm sure is common of

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (20:18.209)
Hmm, good.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (20:28.545)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (20:36.759)
Yep.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (20:40.426)
Yeah, yeah, I often feel like that, know, and I've been doing brides for years and I used to kind of look at the mums and get all kind of emotional in the day because I was the same age as the brides, so I'd be going, cute, and now I look at the mums and I've also been the same age as the mums, I'm kind of going, my god, I know you just had a right, it just feels like so, I totally get it, it's a blink, you know, it's gone so fast, but yeah, no, it's tough.

Sarah Thomson (20:52.083)
Ha ha ha!

Sarah Thomson (21:00.164)
Hahahaha

Sarah Thomson (21:06.512)
Yes.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (21:10.32)
So when we think them, so obviously, you know, we pick up all these roles and these identities along the way of kind of whether we are, you know, corporate career woman or student or mother or whatever it is, which ones have felt most like you?

Sarah Thomson (21:18.301)
Mm.

Sarah Thomson (21:26.739)
Ooh, that's a really tough question because they're all you aren't they? I feel very comfortable in my role as a mum now.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (21:31.138)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (21:34.958)
Hmm.

Sarah Thomson (21:35.079)
very comfortable in motherhood and very comfortable as a mother and a wife. And I guess that's just to do with time, isn't it? Because we get better at things and we get more comfortable. And once you've got through, I always like call it in the trenches when they're under five and you've had to, you're basically keeping people alive, little humans, right? Once you've done that and you've got them off to school, it all gets a lot easier. And there's still parts, particularly with teenagers that you're...

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (21:41.868)
Hmm, for sure.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (21:52.874)
Yes, yes, absolutely. Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (22:01.969)
giving red hot guesses too, but I think I feel very comfortable as a mother and a wife, but I've always felt very comfortable with my identity as Sarah as a marketer, Sarah as a business coach or digital coach or whatever my title is. And she's probably a big part of my persona, but she, think the thing that I like about that the most is that when I left corporate 14 odd years ago, who Sarah was then and who I thought I was is not who I am. And

that has been the biggest growth in terms of I am very like when you're in corporate, you're trying to be what a company wants you to be. And so you fit into this mold. And after you've done it for a long time, you kind of not sure is this me or is this who they want me to be? And I now know the Sarah that I am and particularly my professional persona is very authentic to me. And again, back to my beautiful husband.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (22:33.314)
Mmm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (22:47.415)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (22:54.444)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (22:58.099)
He actually had a business when I started mine, he his own IT business. And he was really kind of, I don't know how to say it. He was really clear with me to pursue clients that I liked working with. So I remember in the very early days I'd worked with someone and I was like, oh, I came home and I they just picked my brains for an hour. Like I used to go to coffee and let people do that. And I said, everything about it feels wrong. And he goes, well, just say no, give them a BS reasons to why you can't work with them. So he was very keen on.

aligning yourself with clients who felt good. very much our view when we started our business was because I was in corporate roles that were very high, high pressure, high demand, high hours. I wanted to be more present in my family with my husband and my children. And so we built my business around that. And so I got to see, I got to learn very early in my business journey, what was important, like being home, walking my kids to school was important.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (23:30.21)
Yes.

Sarah Thomson (23:54.771)
going to all of their events was important. And so I then built this, I guess, public persona that is very much, I'm just Sarah and she is so close, like business Sarah is so close to personal Sarah, whereas when I was in corporate, there were two very different personalities. Whereas now like the Sarah you've met, Sharon, it may be networking events, that's just who I am. But I've got very comfortable with her the more time that I work for myself.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (24:16.429)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (24:22.649)
Yeah, yeah. And that's, yeah, it's such a lovely, yeah, it is so nice. And actually say, you know, in a way, like I know that you were saying, obviously, you know, this idea of hairdressers, we're able to kind of do, you know, have these roles that kind of fit in with family. Actually, the fact that you've kind of be able to sort of move away from corporate Sarah into kind of business coach Sarah that actually encompasses.

Sarah Thomson (24:23.229)
Which is nice.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (24:44.534)
that part of your family life as well is authentic and it is such a beautiful kind of combo of like, know, ideals really, or just kind of, just yeah, just bringing all the kind of parts of you together really.

Sarah Thomson (24:53.99)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (24:58.609)
I know and I guess because I had struggled so much with balance that that was very front and centre in my mind about what was important. I remember saying to my husband when I quit my job, I don't care what I do, I'm just not doing this because it wasn't working. He and I weren't working. I was never seeing the boys and I was not showing up as my best. Well, what I thought was high achieving Sarah at work because I wasn't doing anything well, which for a high achiever does not feel good. So.

I was very clear on why I started my business in terms of what my personal goals were. And so they were entrenched in my business from day one. And I'm so glad I had a beautiful coach who I'm still friends with now. She's actually in the UK and she was my first business coach and she had a daughter the same age as my son and her daughter also didn't sleep. And so we were starting businesses around this kind of sleep-deprived world. She also had a background in marketing and...

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (25:33.474)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (25:50.915)
She was very clear about setting those boundaries. And I don't know if I would have had the confidence if she wasn't doing the same thing, because at the time my youngest was only in kindy and she was home two days a week. And she goes, you just book those days out and you don't take meetings on them. You don't tell people I'm having a day off to spend it with my son. You just say, I'm fully booked on Tuesdays and Thursdays or whatever that was. And so I guess having that really well aligned business coach from the start was really instrumental because she gave me the confidence.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (26:10.594)
Yeah. Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (26:15.724)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (26:20.593)
to set my business up and I still watch her now. haven't worked with her for quite a long time, but I love what she does. And I watch her cause her daughter is moving to the next stage, like my son, and she's kind of moved to, she lives in Yorkshire in England and she's moved into property and like rural property and like lots of her adventures, think, that's, I can see myself doing that next. So if you can find the right person who has similar values to you, I think that really helps you grow into your business. now, and it was just luck. I saw her on a Facebook ad.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (26:40.118)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (26:49.078)
Yeah. wow. That's amazing, isn't it? Because you're absolutely right, you know, to have somebody who's kind of modeling to you what's possible, I guess, and also aligns with you on so many other levels is so valuable. So obviously, for you, for all of us, life often has many forks in the road. What were some of the big turning points that shaped you?

Sarah Thomson (26:56.781)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (27:13.427)
Ooh, there's some big moments. So when I was 25, like I was four years into my career, I was made redundant from my job. And I was like on my third kind of promotion and I was killing it. And I kind of knew that it was coming because of a restructure in our supermarkets here. And I knew that my role was not going to exist here in Perth and it would be based in Sydney. And so was made redundant and I moved to Sydney when I was 25 and been married before. So I moved with my first husband.

and we moved just before the Olympics in Sydney. So that was quite a big thing because you're upheaving your life and trying something new. And that was such an exciting adventure to be in Sydney. Like I work for Nestle, he worked for AMP. So we're all up in the Sydney Olympics and that was a really fun journey. So that was probably, it's quite a crisis of confidence to be made redundant at a young age, but it also gave him the opportunity to leap over to Sydney where all the marketing work was. And so that was kind of big because it allowed me to take on roles I would never have got here in Perth. And I probably would never have.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (28:07.502)
Thanks.

Sarah Thomson (28:13.331)
moved because I liked Perth. I would never have moved because I was very comfortable here. So that was a kind of big turning point and we were there for about four years and when he and I separated and that was another big moment because I realized when you move somewhere and you're with a partner all of your friends are each other's friends and suddenly Sydney became very very small and my brother was in America so I remember visiting him.

And I made a decision when I was there that I was going to come back and quit my job, which was my dream job. I just like to say I was doing marketing for Nest, like for Nest Cafe, like it doesn't, it's the best kind of job you can have in marketing. And I went home and quit. And I thought, I'm just going to move to London because Sydney is too small and I'm not moving back to bed, I'm just going to move to London. I had lots of friends there. So that was like another big fork in the road because when I moved there, I thought this is great. Three of my girlfriends were all working as marketing contractors there. There was so much work. was...

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (28:46.424)
Right. Wow.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (28:52.397)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (29:09.743)
pre-GFC. And so it was really fun and really exciting. And within a few months of me being there, all my friends left. And suddenly you're, you know, people just make different life choices and they move on and things. And I remember it was kind of Valentine's day and one of my mates from Sydney, he was working in London, but he had kind of decided he wanted to have a break from corporate life and was working in a pub.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (29:10.787)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (29:15.756)
I reckon. Nothing personal. For sure, yeah.

Sarah Thomson (29:33.715)
And he said, let's all go out on Valentine's day. I was like, I just can't, I can't date any idiots. I'm so done. And he brought along Grant, my husband. So that was my moment was I met my husband on Valentine's day, which I can make sounds super romantic, but we met in a pub called the Slug and Lettuce, which is a chain in the UK. And as you know, it's mostly called the Slut and Legless. and to be fair, it was, I quite like rugby. So I was watching a rugby game with some friends when he arrived and he's a Kiwi.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (29:50.871)
It is,

Yeah

you

Sarah Thomson (30:02.429)
horse he likes rugby. So that's our like our meet cute story. So meeting him was quite a big fork in the road I guess and we got pregnant with our son Matthew, we had met in February and we had him less than 18 months later.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (30:03.862)
Right.

Yeah, it is a meet-cute, I love that!

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (30:23.96)
right, okay, yes, yeah.

Sarah Thomson (30:24.761)
Yes, which obviously was exciting, but very new in our relationship and I don't think anyone thought we would make it. So we moved back to Perth when I was pregnant with him and sort of started our life here. And so we had a child together and got to know each other at the same time, which was a lot. But here we are.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (30:44.546)
Yeah. Yeah. Well, it is. It is a lot because obviously, you know, it's like trial and and a fire, isn't it? Basically, when you are trying to get to know each other around, know, particularly a baby that doesn't sleep at night. That was fun, no doubt.

Sarah Thomson (30:58.565)
Yes, yeah, so that I suppose there's been quite a bit few big faults in the road, but I guess they've all led me to here. So they've hoping they've been the right sliding door.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (31:09.966)
Well, yeah. I mean, were there any moments through all those periods where you hit pause or completely reinvented yourself?

Sarah Thomson (31:21.427)
Oh, I think when I moved to London, I definitely did because I wanted to find out who I was because I'd been with my ex since I was 16. And so you don't have all of those exciting years single. so I really decided then that I would be less of a workaholic because I'm very bad workaholic tendencies. So leaving working for a company like Nestle, they just want all the workaholics and they have a culture of that. And so

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (31:46.498)
Yes.

Sarah Thomson (31:49.683)
When I moved to London, I was like, great, so I'm going to get a contract job. This is what it looks like. You employed by an agency, they give you hours. Like, what is that? Like in marketing, you just work 60 hours a week or whatever. So I kind of decided that I didn't want to be like this insane overachiever. I just was going to do contract work, was going to show up, my job, and then I would change jobs every sort of three or six months. And that was a very big change for me. And I very much focused on

you know, going out, having adventures, finding myself and finding out who Sarah as a single woman was and what did Sarah as a single woman want to do apart from be successful in her career. And so, yeah, I kind of like, started to write my first book, which I've never finished, but obviously I think it was a moment to help me through that process. And I really started to do things like, if you're going to learn who you are, London's a great place to do that because you can try lots of things out.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (32:36.718)
Mmm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (32:45.644)
Yeah. Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (32:46.131)
And so I think that was a very big moment. And when I met Grant, I think I probably radiated a bit more confident in who I am than maybe I would have 18 months before. So I guess maybe that work paid off because I was more confident in who I wanted to be and who Sarah was as a single woman, which is hard.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (32:56.984)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (33:05.866)
Yeah, yeah, do you know, think, I do think it's such an important thing for, I mean, I'd say women, but actually guys as well, you know, go and find out who you are before you go and find the one as it were, it's really important to know who you are and to kind of go and do that exploring to go on those adventures to go and, you know, I mean, write a book, that'd be great, but you know, but just

Sarah Thomson (33:18.492)
Mmm.

Sarah Thomson (33:27.301)
Yeah, but even small things, like I remember when I visited my brother in America, I'd never driven overseas because my ex had always done those kind of things. He was quite, he would kind of take the literal driver's seat. But and so when I was traveling, I like traveled on my own for the first time. I went and visited my girlfriend in Canada and I did all these really fun things on my own. And I remember my flatmate when I left Sydney said to me, this is your time to be selfish. And I remember thinking, that's awful.

wants to be selfish and that what she meant was it's your time to put yourself first and it stuck with me because I really liked her I'm still friends with her to this day and she definitely knew how to put herself first she had traveled like she worked for Nestle as well and she had traveled a lot with them overseas she'd worked for them in Europe and so she understood the importance of putting herself first and valuing herself and so she was a great flatmate to have when I'd separated.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (33:59.886)
Yeah. 100%. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (34:12.087)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (34:23.872)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (34:24.851)
and put stuff in my head to make me think, if I'm gonna go traveling, what am I gonna do? And what will that look like? And I remember when I was living in London, everything is two minutes from London. And I remember I'd been to Turkey before with my ex and I always wanted to go for Anzac Day. And so I just booked and went on my own and a guided tour, which is really brave to go to a country with quite conservative values as a female. And so I went and did Anzac Day. I ended up of course, because it's...

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (34:34.732)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (34:43.884)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (34:50.835)
because it is, you've met, I met one of my mates over there. He had, didn't realize he was traveling till the day before we left. we did Anzac Day together, but I did it on my own because that's what I really wanted to experience. And I'd compromised before. And so I thought, what are the things that I really want to do? And so I kind of made an effort to do the things that were important to me. And luckily Grant is also, we've done a lot of traveling together, but also of that view that

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (35:02.114)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (35:11.789)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (35:18.747)
If we go somewhere and he was really good about this, we don't have to do what's in the tour book or what it says. If we want to go to Scotland and just sit by Loch Ness and drink wine and have chats, that's your experience. It doesn't have to be whatever the tourist experience was. And that was really, that was part of my big journey, I think, finding out what do I like doing as opposed to what do I think I should do.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (35:42.626)
Yeah, love that. And I love that messaging around being selfish as well because I think it's something that women are only just beginning to understand what that actually means. That it's actually not being about selfish, being selfish. It's just about kind of like, know, putting yourself first, literally just that.

Sarah Thomson (36:00.017)
And asking yourself, do you want to do? Like if I'm going to go out, do I want to go out or do I not want to do that? Do I? Because I was very, very, I'm lots of good girl conditioning as our generation does. I'm very good at saying yes, very good at showing up when I didn't want to, doing what I didn't necessarily want to, conforming all of those things. And I remember, because my mum still struggles with this about me, because obviously for many years I was very compliant. And she goes, well, we need to do this. And I said, no, we actually don't.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (36:12.418)
Mmm. Mmm.

Sarah Thomson (36:29.713)
Like she said to me the other day, what are we doing for Christmas? went, I don't know. I said, I don't really care. I'll fit in. We've got family coming over, but she wants to get everything locked down. like, we actually don't have to mom. It'll be okay. And she, I think she finds that Sarah very hard to cope with, but she's getting, she's used to it because she's been around for a good chunk of time. But I'm not as compliant as I used to be because I'm mindful, especially now being in perimenopause, I have to protect my energy and I can't say yes to everything.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (36:56.55)
Yeah. Yeah. No, no, absolutely. Yeah. And I mean, perineal pause is an interesting one, isn't it? Because you're right, your energy does change and kind of how you're, and it's not so much that we don't care, it's just that we are more, we care about less things that we used to care about before, you know, or, or.

Sarah Thomson (37:05.533)
Mm.

Sarah Thomson (37:17.319)
I don't have enough cares to give out to all the things that need it. And so things have to drop off. to be fair, because I've always worked, there are a lot of things in my personal life that probably dropped off. Like I don't care if my bed is made. I don't care if my house is completely tidy. I don't care if my kids eat left, like I'm a big batch cook. I love that it's called batch cooking. That used to be just leftovers. My kids, it...

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (37:20.302)
No. No. Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (37:40.584)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (37:41.425)
If my kids didn't eat leftovers, they would have literally starved to death. So I did, I have let go of a lot of things I think women are constrained by to make them a good wife or a good mother or whatever that is. But the more I get on and this year it's been really tough for me with my energy and I'm still battling in the middle of perimenopause. I'm still battling active endometriosis as well. And so that's been really hard to kind of deal with.

I didn't know that was a thing. I didn't know you could have endometriosis and be in perimenopause. I thought that at some point this pain that I live with was going to stop. So this year I've really battled my health and prioritizing myself. And because of that, I have been forced to slow down. And my wonderful assistant, Claire, who I know has been on the show, helping me manage my diaries so that I can cope better and show up as my best self and then just rest. I've...

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (38:34.786)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (38:36.243)
I feel like we've done that really well this year and last week was my non-contact week when I need to rest. I thought, I actually asked ChatGBT, because I've got my mastermind launching for next year soon. And I was like, I actually said to how can I show up more? Like and give more, but show up. No, what did say? How can I give more and show up less? Which is really challenging because one of the important parts when you run a mastermind is you, like me as the leader of that being visible and present. And then I have to juggle

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (38:56.034)
Hmm, yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (39:03.235)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (39:05.639)
that with my energy and my health. And so it came up with some very cool suggestions, which I was like, thank you. That's exactly what I need. So I've kind of decided this is the new Sarah 5.0 or whatever she is in her fifties. And this is what it looks like. And I have to be kind to her because I need to keep working. So that's been like going to be my new norm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (39:12.983)
Yeah.

Hmm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (39:22.508)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, I love that. is so much about the... I think one of the things I found hardest in version 5.0 was it was the slowing down. Just the literally just not having the energy to keep pushing forward. And, you know, my default previously would always been, you know, if something's hard, work harder. You know, just get in there, get stuck in more. You just go faster, you know? Yeah, so that...

Sarah Thomson (39:51.247)
my gosh, that's how good girls.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (39:56.052)
learning to kind of step back from that and actually learning to slow down and learning to respect my energy has probably been one of the most challenging lessons for me in the last sort of four five years, I would say. Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (40:08.399)
Absolutely. And we fight against it because we feel like, I'm getting old, that must be because I'm getting old. And we're actually super judgy. And in kind of societies of kind of, you know, centuries gone by, as that woman transitioned from the mother to crone as those terms that we have for women, as we made that transition, there was an acknowledgement of wisdom and

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (40:14.914)
Mmm, yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (40:26.382)
Mmm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (40:32.119)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (40:32.851)
that Crone figure used to be a wise woman who would do less and would sit around and talk more, which totally floats my boat. But we're so judgy and I've been, in years gone by, been super critical of people who don't have high energy like myself, because I'm an energizer bunny. I just wind up and I go, and now I wind up and I will stop. And I would just run out of steam and that's been...

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (40:39.436)
Yes.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (40:52.088)
Yeah.

Yes.

Sarah Thomson (40:58.557)
It's quite hard to look at yourself because then you're sort of faced with your mortality of this is me growing older. But this year I have been so kind and compassionate through my health challenges and I feel really like, no, this is okay. This can be the new norm. I can still be an amazing coach and show up in my business and I can still be really kind to myself.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (41:00.236)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (41:17.922)
Yeah, and I think that's the key, you know, I mean, like it's the being kind to yourself and it's not it's not natural for us to be kind to ourselves. And I saying earlier about the things that people say about themselves, but we're not we're just not kind to ourselves in so many, you know, like if you're tired, go and have a nap.

Sarah Thomson (41:32.465)
Mm-hmm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (41:33.056)
down it's fine it's okay you know the world's not going to end and it can be something as simple as that it doesn't need to be you know kind of I'm gonna be kind to myself I'm gonna put myself in for the spa weekend it's it's just the small things you know it's just the you know just slowing down the having a nap you know

Sarah Thomson (41:44.691)
Mmm.

Sarah Thomson (41:49.127)
I can't nap. That is not, I'm not a good sleeper. Menopause has not helped that. So I don't nap, but I will go and sit and have a cup of tea and I will put my feet up on the couch and I would just take a minute or half an hour. And that has been a very big evolution for Sarah, like for who I am and how I normally run. And I feel like now, you know, we're coming to the back end of the year. I feel like I've been a lot more compassionate with myself than I ever have been.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (41:54.018)
Ha ha ha

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (42:01.655)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (42:06.432)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (42:18.353)
And it's, I really want to continue that because that feels good.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (42:21.612)
Yeah, yeah, I love that. So, sorry, knocking my mic there. So obviously it's slowed you, it's not forced you, but it has kind of obviously having the double whammy of the endometriosis and the perimetropause and it's kind of, it's helped you to slow down. Are there any...

Sarah Thomson (42:25.107)
That's okay

Sarah Thomson (42:42.845)
Mm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (42:45.25)
Are there any unexpected ways in which you've kind of slowed down or pivoted or is there anything that's kind of come from that that has been as a surprise to you?

Sarah Thomson (42:54.918)
Hmm. I think, and I talked about this already, the saying no. And so I will get things and go, and what I used to do before is I'd say yes, and then I would go, I don't want to do that. And then I would want to, I'll be trying to work out how I can pedal out of it. And I'm a very reliable person, it's my good girl. And now I'm like, I'll look at something, I'm like, oh, that's not for me, thanks. And someone will go, oh, it should be really fun. It will be really good. And I'm like, I don't think it is for me.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (43:13.133)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (43:23.539)
And so that's kind of nice to just go, I'm not doing that. And then I look at it in my diary and the things that are in there are things that I want to do and things that I'm thinking, yep, I'm excited about that. And I often get to the weekend and it's not very busy, which is intentional because the week can be busy. And it feels nice to kind of have that slowness and that grace and kind of just go, like one of my favorite things to do. So I hate cooking, but I love baking.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (43:25.794)
Yeah, love that.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (43:29.815)
Yes.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (43:42.274)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (43:48.11)
Okay yeah yeah. Good yes I'm a for that I'll come round. Totally here for cake.

Sarah Thomson (43:49.839)
If I am so I'm so Mary Antoinette if everyone could eat cake for every meal, my life would be complete. Absolutely. So I always bake and there will always be fresh baked goods. If you come to my house, there will always be some cakes and cookies. There's not at the moment because it was a long weekend and my children have had friends over and they've eaten every stitch of food. But I really like allowing myself to do things like that that I enjoy that it's not very corporatey business, Sarah, to enjoy baking and.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (44:07.999)
Okay, and it's boys, so yeah.

Sarah Thomson (44:19.251)
And like this is the thing Sharon, as we get older is you just go, I just who I am. I'm completely fine with being like this powerful woman. And then at home, I'm into baking. I'm good with that. I've always quite liked baking, but now I just, there isn't a weekend that goes past where I don't bake. my husband always says to me, you're so, you so enjoy that. You always look relaxed when I walk in and you're baking. It's very Zen and it's very mindful and present baking. And you, it's something, it's very satisfying. Like cooking dinner is not satisfying because you have to do it again next day.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (44:24.364)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (44:37.463)
Yeah

Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (44:45.24)
God no, absolutely not, yeah, that's 100%. yeah, I can absolutely, yeah, I can totally agree with that. I mean, I do, yeah, I do love, I do love to bake. I'm a good Victoria sponge, I have to say. But cooking, I know, go and bake. I'm so Nigella.

Sarah Thomson (44:57.071)
Ooh, look at you with all the skills.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (45:04.684)
But actually, I know that a lot of women will kind of get to this point in life and there's that sense of they'll have got where they want to get in their career or they'll have reached this point in life and they're trying to kind of find, not find who they were, but the layers start to peel away, know, all the kind of the versions of you start to peel away and it can feel very exposing and there's that sense of like, you know, who do you want to become? Who do you want to be? And I think it's always worth taking a moment to kind of look at those threats.

Sarah Thomson (45:23.187)
Mmm.

Sarah Thomson (45:28.275)
Absolutely.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (45:34.608)
in your life, what are the things that bring you joy? And it can often be something that you did as a child or something that kind of like, for you it's great that you found baking because it's not going to be your new career but at the same time it's a lovely thing that you like to do and it kind of creates this sense of zen and enjoyment and all the rest of it. Are there any threads that have run through all the versions of you?

Sarah Thomson (45:37.574)
Mmm.

Sarah Thomson (46:05.043)
That's a tough one. Gosh, I'm not actually sure if I can answer. I think the confidence in my abilities in a business or corporate context have always been there. And I think that thread of I'm...

See, even now I'm reluctant to say, I'm good at what I do. Okay. And even that feels very braggy. That's terrible to think that I am good at what I do. You're allowed to say that. And so I think, I know, I think I've always been confident in my ability to be successful in a work or business context. And I think that thread has been consistently there. Like I could always put my head down, work hard.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (46:23.79)
Mmm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (46:27.308)
that you're allowed to brag. Absolutely. You're allowed to that.

Sarah Thomson (46:42.339)
learn and achieve and I think one of the hardest things about perimenopause is the brain not working. Beginning of this year I said to my husband I think we might have to look at closing the business because my brain fog was so bad that I wondered if I had early dementia. I spoke to my doctor about that, do not. I just have normal brain fog but it undermined and my menopause nurse prac that I see recommended a book it was written by an English GP.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (46:43.822)
Mmm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (46:48.398)
you

Sarah Thomson (47:11.869)
who actually quit her job as a GP because she thought there was something wrong with her brain because of perimenopause. And this is the thing that now I'm on hormones, I can only take so many hormones because of my endo. And so I can't take estrogen because that's like fertilizer for my endo. So I can't take that, but I can take testosterone which helps your brain fog. And so...

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (47:18.232)
Bye.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (47:24.642)
Mmm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (47:31.244)
Right.

Sarah Thomson (47:33.459)
The hardest thing about that perimenopause is if you, like me, have had this thread of confidence in my ability to be successful in a business or corporate context. Suddenly she was gone at the beginning of this year and I was like, who am I if I'm not online social butterfly? Who is Sarah without that? And it's quite hard to look at that. And it kind of made me think about what will the next version of Sarah look like and what will that be?

I realized I still had a while until that next version. And so I had to work out how did I negotiate this new landscape? And that's what we did in terms of reducing how much contact to have, allowing me that space to rest because she's always been who I am. The ability to be successful and to be a high achiever has always been there. That is probably the common thread. I've never noticed that before. Thank you, Sharon. But when you suddenly are faced with something like perimenopause and that sort of

ruggies pulled out from under you that was quite tough at the beginning of this it was quite tough time.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (48:29.666)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

It's a shocker. Mine was exactly that. I have loved what I've done for years and years. I was a bridal hair and makeup artist. I was an educator. I was a mentor. They all kind of gelled together. Absolutely loved it, loved it, loved it. And I think it was during lockdown, obviously, as many of these things are, and you have to stop because obviously you're a non-essential worker. What do you mean I'm not essential? And there was this, the first time it hit me that if I didn't do this, what else would I do?

Sarah Thomson (48:53.925)
Hahaha

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (49:03.274)
it was almost like a switch went off and it was like who are you without this and it was actually quite it actually gives me goosebumps now when I think about it because it was so kind of like I didn't know who I was without it I'd built my whole identity had been built up around this this role this business this you know the success that I'd built in these so when you take all that away it's like it's really

Sarah Thomson (49:08.819)
Mm.

Sarah Thomson (49:17.331)
Mm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (49:27.766)
It's a real mission to go and find who you are without all that and then how you want to adapt your business or run your life or move forward. So yes, it is a complete rug pull. I mean, like they're unraveling. It was an unraveling. Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (49:38.899)
Absolutely and I felt that but I feel like I've come through the other side and I'm like I like who I am and I will always have that success and that achievement to look back on but I don't have to have that define me. I'm still successful and it's not that I'm not but it's being well and being happy in myself has become more important.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (49:54.466)
Yes, no, no.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (50:02.38)
Yes. And do you have any sort of any rituals or routines that support you? I mean, I know that obviously you've created more of this white space in your diary with the help of wonderful Claire, but is there any kind of anything outside of those things?

Sarah Thomson (50:13.672)
Mm-hmm.

Sarah Thomson (50:19.347)
I'm very habit driven and which is silly because we have so much flexibility when we work for ourselves but I really value and I'm not a natural lover of exercise I just want to say that that's not my default setting whereas now I know with aging it's very important I also have the possibility because of all my hormone treatment have very strong possibility of weak bones I have to have a bone density scan every 12 months so

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (50:22.583)
Mm-hmm.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (50:33.72)
Same. Yes.

Sarah Thomson (50:48.827)
Exercise and weight-bearing exercise is really important to me. So I go to the gym twice with my beautiful son who's 20 and does weights with me. So they are really, really important. It's beautiful to hang out with him and it's beautiful to do stuff. I don't know how to do any of those things. So I really look forward to that because I get to hang with him, but it's really good for me. I go walking every day with my husband and our doggies. And so those taking time out to exercise was not something I ever prioritized. And now I do it every single day.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (50:56.362)
Okay.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (51:05.889)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (51:16.779)
and I can't miss it because I realise how good it makes me feel, how grounded in myself I feel and how it's really nice to prioritise taking care of yourself. Feels nice.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (51:27.98)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. I'd say the same thing. not, I don't love exercise, but it's become very apparent. It's become very apparent when I go to put my washing machine and I have to bend down to do it that I actually can't just leap back up again because I have to do some, get an all-force crouch and then do a bridge.

Sarah Thomson (51:46.931)
and your hip clicks and all sorts.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (51:50.786)
There's a lot of crunching and clicking. So that's what I think that was the point of me that I kind of went I need to go to the gym and yes, they do weight bearing. So yeah, so I hear you on that one. For women navigating their messy middle today, whether it be perimenopause or pain or any sort of big life transitions, what's something that you've learned that you wish more women knew?

Sarah Thomson (51:52.539)
Yes, I feel you.

Sarah Thomson (52:00.936)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (52:16.307)
I think, and this is particularly our generation, that good girl conditioning, I think that soldering on and putting a brave face on it is a huge disservice to ourselves and to the people around us. And my husband really made me understand that with, obviously he's been through most of my endo journey over the last 20 years. And I'm very honest now about how I'm coping and what my pain is. Whereas before I used to be like,

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (52:29.164)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (52:43.603)
I'm just stoic and I can just soldier on. then next thing, I've had eight surgeries. I've not been a well person, you know? But I used to, like I'd just go to my mum, I've just booked in for surgery in a couple of weeks. And she would say to me, I didn't know you weren't going very well. And I now realize that that's crappy. As a mother, that's so crappy to not allow people to take care of you.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (52:49.705)
Sarah yeah

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (52:58.702)
Yes.

Mmm.

Sarah Thomson (53:08.635)
and to not allow yourself to be honest with people. And so now I'm very honest and I allow people to help me and I allow people to be kind to me and I'm kind to myself. And I wish if I could go back and tell young Sarah anything, it would be you don't have to be brave all the time and you don't have to shut people out because you think that that shows that you're strong and brave. You actually isolate yourself and you make it hard.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (53:18.252)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (53:35.699)
So I wish I could tell myself that to be kinder to myself and to let people around me be kind to me. Because everybody loves you, around you, they want to take care of you and I don't think I allowed that. Stupid, because I could have had lots of home cooked dinners coming my way.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (53:41.313)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (53:47.102)
No, no. But we're not taught to. And actually I was talking to somebody last week and we were talking about it like even when, because I had a baby that didn't sleep as well. And you know, there was never a time that we asked for help around that. There was never a time you asked for help. It's just around so many things, you know, and as you say, the kind of fact that, you you've, you've had all these operations and it's kind of, you're not going so well. mean, that's quite an understatement.

Sarah Thomson (54:06.067)
Mm.

Sarah Thomson (54:11.475)
It's offensive and I'm ashamed that I did that. I wish I had been kinder to myself. wish, and I think this is one of the things I think we talked about Sharon, is that there's more talk, I know the internet's good and bad, but there's more talk of endometriosis now. There's more talk of understanding what it is as a disease. I remember being very embarrassed, like when I had to take time off work to have surgery, that it was women's problems. Like it's a disease, but.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (54:16.11)
Yeah

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (54:40.61)
Yes.

Sarah Thomson (54:40.819)
again that awareness wasn't there and it wasn't talked about and so now that is helpful like if you mentioned something like endometriosis most people know what it is and they understand it's not bad periods it's an actual disease and so that's helped and so that's made me more comfortable but I wish I hadn't been so silly about it and just been honest and said I'm actually

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (54:51.693)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (54:55.319)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (55:05.543)
I remember when I met Grant quite early on in our relationship I'd said to him I'm kind of sick and I kind of might be a bit of an albatross. Bless him, I know.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (55:12.428)
Right. But again, mean, again, it's like, God, could be this terrible weight around your neck because I'm sick, you know. I mean, it's a terrible way that we talk about ourselves. And again, I guess perhaps coming from that very corporate world, which is obviously very, very male, that, you know, the mentioning of any kind of women's problems would be almost kind of, well, I've got to play this down because I've got this, you know, this big role.

Sarah Thomson (55:21.809)
I'm

Sarah Thomson (55:33.107)
Mm.

Sarah Thomson (55:40.441)
I know and and but do you know I had this wonderful boss when I was at Nestle when I was first diagnosed in Sydney and he was a beautiful man he had like a wife with young children and he could not have been more kind and compassionate. It was me feeling like I had to if I wanted to get promoted again he needs he needs to see me as like a high achiever and high achievers don't take sick days and all of that rubbish like it's silly like it's so we're so unreasonable with ourselves if we were

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (56:02.851)
Yeah.

Sarah Thomson (56:07.523)
a boss and our employee would never treat ourselves like that. And we would never treat our friends the way we treat ourselves. I think that's the biggest learning is that the compassion starts here and radiates out. And I've always been a compassionate person, but now I'm actually compassionate and kind to myself.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (56:11.31)
Oh god, no. No. No.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (56:19.554)
Yeah.

Sharon Wilkes-Burt (56:25.184)
Yeah, love that. Love that. Sarah, it's been absolutely wonderful talking to you and going, I think we could. God, no, honestly. Some of these have been quite, you know, sort of two and a half hours later, but no, think you're doing quite well today. But thank you so much for spending time with me today and having this conversation. I think it was really important and yeah, so lovely. Thank you.

Sarah Thomson (56:29.499)
I feel like we talk all day, which is not unusual for me.

Sarah Thomson (56:41.145)
we've done well.

Sarah Thomson (56:48.339)
Pleasure.

Sarah Thomson (56:52.675)
my absolute pleasure. It's been delightful being here.