S3 Ep10: Womens Health and Gender Equality with Tina Backhouse

This week on the She Leads Collective Podcast, I'm joined by women's health advocate, senior leader and Co-Chair of Menopause Mandate, Tina Backhouse.

Tina's story is extraordinary. After losing both parents as a baby and growing up in care, she developed a resilience and self-belief that would later help her build a successful leadership career and become one of the UK's most passionate voices for women's health.

In this powerful conversation we explore:

• Tina's journey from a children's home to senior leadership

• Why she believes resilience is a leadership superpower

• The courageous decision to leave a highly successful career and follow her purpose

• Why women's health is still misunderstood, underfunded and under-prioritised

• The link between women's health, careers and gender equality

• What organisations can do to better support women at work

• The work of Menopause Mandate and the future of women's health advocacy

This is a conversation about leadership, purpose, inequality and creating a world where women no longer have to suffer in silence.

A must-listen for leaders, HR professionals, policy makers and anyone who cares about gender equity.

Connect with Tina on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/tina-backhouse/

Visit Menopause Mandate's website - https://www.menopausemandate.com/

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 ✨ Produced by Mary Gregory Leadership Coaching

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello and welcome to She Lee's Collective Podcast. I'm Mary Gregory, and I'm so glad you're here. This podcast is a space for honest conversations about what it really means to lead as a woman today and how we can all show up with more courage, care, and clarity. You'll hear from inspiring women, powerful allies, and bold truth tellers who are changing the game not by playing tougher, but by leading smarter, softer, and stronger. Hello and welcome to this week's episode of the She Lee's Collective Podcast. So what happens when half the population's health is still misunderstood, underfunded, and underprioritized, not just medically, but economically and professionally. Women's health is not a niche issue. It affects careers, it affects confidence, it affects attendance, progression, productivity, and quality of life as a whole. Yet despite progress, many women still struggle to access diagnosis, treatment, and support. We still hear stories of symptoms being dismissed, conditions overlooked, and life stages minimized. And I know I have my own stories to share around that too. Today's guest has spent years working in the intersection of women's health, policy, advocacy, and commercial leadership. Tina Backhouse is a senior leader and women's health advocate with extensive experience spanning pharma, policy, and government relations. She has worked closely with policymakers, clinicians, and industry leaders to improve health outcomes and access for women. She also is co-chair of Metapool's Mandate and is a passionate advocate for tackling inequality in women's health care. But this conversation goes beyond policy. Today we will explore Tina's own leadership journey from growing up in a children's home and developing fair self-reliance to leading major growth in business to making the courageous decision to step away and redefine what success means for her. Today we'll talk about women's health, inequality, leadership and purpose, and why investing in women's health may be one of the smartest decisions society can make. Tina, thank you so much for joining me and a warm welcome to you.

SPEAKER_01 2:27

Oh, thank you, Mary. Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_00 2:30

It's a real joy to have you here today, and there's so much we can talk about, I know. So you have a fascinating personal story because when we first met, you shared that you grew up in a children's home and to become very self-reliant from quite a young age. How do you think that has shaped you both as a leader and the woman you finally become?

SPEAKER_01 2:50

I think it's interesting, isn't it? Because I think when you're growing up, you just assume that everyone has the same kind of um struggles that you have. But in on reflection, I think my parents died when I was a baby, and I grew up for in care until I went to university. And I suppose what impact did that have on me? It made me very independent. Um, and and I also knew that there was no um there was no plan B. You know, the plan A was me. There was no one to bail me out of anything. Um, and I had to really focus on that and really educate myself to be able to move out of the situation I was in. I think it's also, I mean, clearly it makes you very resilient, you know, growing up in a in a children's home in the 70s is not for the faint-hearted, um, and probably still isn't now, to be honest with you. Um, but so, you know, it makes you very worldly, it makes you very aware that not everybody has the same opportunities. That I suppose it makes you aware of inequality at a very early age, because things aren't the same for everybody. Um, you know, you know that when you go to school and you're treated differently, um, and you know, you know when your own home circumstances are different, you are very well aware of inequality. And I suppose as I've got older and as I've become a leader, I think it's given me very, it's given me a lot of skills. I think it's given me very good emotional intelligence of understanding that we're all different and people have traumas and people have things that affect them on a daily basis, and we should treat people, you know, kindly and considerately to help support them through that. It's shown me that life can be tough, but you have to not be a victim and try and define that yourself. Um, and I suppose it's also shown me, you know, that women can be extremely strong and that can, you know, you can beat anything that really comes your way. Um, and you know, resilience is a really important skill. And I think it's a really important skill as a leader. I think it's really important in business, and I think it's really important for women generally. Um, so it definitely has shaped me for sure.

SPEAKER_00 5:30

Yes, I can hear that. It sounds to me like a classic example of the university of life, really. Yeah, I think it is the absolute strengths it's helped you develop and the insight and understanding and empathy for others as well.

SPEAKER_01 5:44

Yes, yeah, definitely. I always felt weirdly, because my parents had died when I was a baby. Obviously, there was a lot of other children in there who were there. I felt for much worse reasons. You know, they'd been abandoned, they'd been abused, their parents were addicts or um violent. Um, so I almost felt weirdly like I my parents hadn't chosen to leave me, they hadn't um put me up for adoption, they hadn't done all of those things. It was just a terrible um set of circumstances. So I always felt the the lucky one in that situation, which people find very hard to understand, but I did always feel that. Um, and so and I always felt that you know that gave me an edge in terms of, you know, I've I feel that, you know, that it was just unlucky that I was there rather than anything else.

SPEAKER_00 6:38

So I'm hearing it stopped you feel like a victim, it stopped you feeling.

SPEAKER_01 6:42

Yeah, I never felt like a victim. I've never felt like a victim at all. Um, and I feel that's one of the things I find hard if people get into that mindset, and I understand it completely, but you you can't really allow yourself to become, you know, to feel like that because it will derail you. Um, and I never felt like that. I never felt a victim. And I I just feel that, you know, life has a plan for you, and um, and sometimes it isn't very clear, but you know, that's just that's just how it has to be.

SPEAKER_00 7:15

So you grew up, you had developed this enormous resilience and self-reliance, amazing leadership capabilities of empathy and compassion and things and resourcefulness, and you then built a career for yourself, leading significant growth and navigating very highly commercial environments. When you look back on those days, what are you most proud of?

SPEAKER_01 7:38

I think it's I think it's always easy. And I was talking to someone this morning actually who was who uh is helping me do some work, and um, it's very easy to quickly say the commercial um success, you know, the building of a business at Theremex from nothing to you know almost a hundred million in five years. So all of those things are really easy to say. But I think if I think really deeply about what I'm most proud of, it's always to do with the people, and it's always to do with um, I've worked with some amazing people, I've recruited amazing people. I always felt that my secret was to recruit people that are much better than me. Um, and you know, and that would strengthen um the organization and strengthen my leadership. Um, and I'm most proud, you know, I I've worked with, I remember um having uh, when I was at Pfizer, having a junior sales manager work for me, who's now I think the global vice president of Pfizer, you know, and and I knew straight away, the day I met him, I knew he was real talent. And um, and I'm always really proud of people that I've worked with and who've gone on to do amazing things, whether that's in their career, whether they've decided to go on and write books or um dedicate themselves to something else. I just think those are the things I'm most proud of. And and you know, sometimes people write you notes or they write you messages and say, you know, you touched me and you helped me in this part of my leadership journey. And I think that's the most important thing to me.

SPEAKER_00 9:18

Sounds wonderful. It's really about supporting others to flourish, is what I'm hearing.

SPEAKER_01 9:22

Yes, definitely, definitely. And especially, you know, when I see other women um who perhaps don't have the self-confidence that some of their male counterparts can have, um, and it can be a very male-dominated world in in pharma um at senior level. And um, so when you see those women really flourish, I think that's immensely um, you know, and I'm also really proud of the fact that in the last six years, we have, and I'm just one of the cogs in this, we have changed um the way menopause is talked about.

SPEAKER_00 9:58

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 9:59

Um, you know, when I had my perimenopause, no one spoke about, no one used the word perimenopause six years ago, and people don't believe that, but that's absolutely true. And so for my daughter and other people's daughters, that will be different. We are changing the landscape for them. Um, and that to me is is hugely important.

SPEAKER_00 10:20

So, really making a difference on so many different levels, yeah as well. Um, so you made the decision to step away and create space for what comes next. How did you know it was time to do that?

SPEAKER_01 10:34

I I I guess I had been thinking about it for a while, and I kept thinking when this happens, and I then I will do this. And I had always um almost let the organization and you know, when it goes to organizational change, when it's resold, um, let that make the decision for me. And um and I went on um on a group, a noon group actually with Eleanor Mills to Egypt in November. And it's amazing with all these different women, different occupations, and all giving each other advice, and and I and I I suddenly thought I'm really missing um something connecting my values to to my work. I I I had felt that for a long time, and I no longer felt it. So something had changed. Um, and as I said, I'd always kind of thought, oh, when this happens at work, I will make the decision to do something different. And then I was actually working with a colleague from Menopause Mandate who happens to be a work and life coach, and she said, Oh, let me, you know, let me do some work with you. And um, and I was like, okay, and really the work I did with her really got me to a point where um I was saying, Okay, these are the things that are really important to me, and now I have to decide to I have to make this happen, and really what's the worst thing that can happen? And so I went to the organization and said, This is how I feel, and you know, I want to leave, and um they supported that, and they I think they were quite shocked, but they supported it, um, and it was done in a a very, very good way. And I because I felt very clearly that there was something else that I was meant to be doing, but I couldn't, I couldn't feel, I couldn't see what that was because when you're in the trenches, and you know this yourself, when you're in the trenches and you're working so hard and you're dealing with things on a day-to-day basis, you don't have the time to kind of look up and see what's around you and see what's possible. And um, so by giving myself that time, already, you know, I've sat down and you know, spoken to people and things that I didn't even know existed exist, you know, roles that I would never even have known about or even thought about. You're like, oh, I didn't know that was a job, or that people got paid for that. And um so um, but you know, you can't do that when you're in the trenches. So I felt that I had to do it for my own um my own kind of peace of mind and my own value set. And I suppose, as you know, as you get older, people start to have illnesses, you lose people, um, you lose friends, and you think life is very, very short. And um so you have to make the most of it. And the my background has always taught me that I, you know, rightly or wrongly, I have this innate belief that I will always be all right and I'll always make it right. Um, so I have that kind of, you know, I think bravery, some might think stupidity, of um, of feeling that I it's gonna be okay, I'll make it work.

SPEAKER_00 14:00

I it's a real fundamental life force, is what I hear. That whole thing of all everything will be all right, it's all gonna be fine. That is yeah, a really great motivating core self-belief, actually. Yes, yes, yes, yeah, very good. And that links in with the whole life is short, life is precious. You know, you you you review, you view life as precious. Yes, that's changed your relationship with ambition and success.

SPEAKER_01 14:25

Absolutely, absolutely. Certainly in my in my early part of my life, then you know, obviously getting to university, and it's hard to get to university when you know, I think at that time less than one percent of children from the care, um, you know, from care go to higher education. I don't actually think that 40 years later that is a different figure. I think it's pretty much the same, um, because everything is stacked against you. And look, it was easier in some ways because we got grants and um at that time. So I could afford to go to university because um, you know, I got grants and I didn't have to pay tuition fees and all of the other things that I feel quite strongly about. Um, and so I do think that in the early part of your career, you know, you're very ambitious. And certainly when, you know, I worked at Pfizer and and I was very ambitious. And then I think having children makes you re-evaluate things, you know, I'm a single parent, and I just didn't I didn't want this to be my last job. I felt really strongly about that. I didn't want this to be my last job, and I also didn't want to miss out on things with my children because I was always so working or tired or unhappy, really. Um, and I really felt that you know I had the opportunity to really show my daughter, especially what you can achieve, and um, and I believe that you have to that has to be outside of a corporation.

SPEAKER_00 16:05

And you say that you want to be a CEO of a women's health organization, you're already already co-chair of Menopause Mandate, so you're you you're halfway there in respect. What is the impact you most want to make?

SPEAKER_01 16:20

I think the impact I most want to make is to keep women's health, the women's health agenda really um up there. I think the first women's health strategy came out in 2022 by the by the previous government, and you know, there was a lot of excitement, there was a lot of fanfare. They obviously appointed Dame Leslie as women's health ambassador, who, you know, is amazing and is a very good friend of mine. And she and there was very little resource put behind it, um, but there was some resource, and you know, we'd started to make some inroads with things, but you know, the women's health hubs, and I've seen the impact of women's health hubs in the most deprived areas where they make the most impact. Um, and you know, things were starting, we'd started to talk about menopause much more, and then of course the government changed. Um, the new government felt they needed a rewrite of the women's health strategy, which again has been done and was published in the last few weeks. Um, but there's there's very little, there's a lot of very good sentiment and a lot of very good intent in the women's health strategy. But as ever, there is no resource, there is no money, there is no there is no um mandate telling um healthcare economies that they have to have women's health hubs, they have to provide um long-acting contraceptive services or any of these things. There's nothing mandated. And I think we have to um so I think the opportunity is to keep the focus on that, find innovative ways that we can deliver. And I think there is innovative ways, and I especially believe that there's um ways that we haven't thought of in terms of partnerships with um corporates and bigger businesses to help deliver on this women's health strategy. So I'd really like to be involved in making that happen. Um, and I also think that um there is a huge part of the women's health strategy that looks at inequity and how things are not equal for all women, and that is something that is very, very important to me. I think people often say to me, Oh, well, you know, it's all sorted with menopause. Well, maybe if you're white middle class and can afford to pay for a menopause specialist, then you know that might be the case. But as I said when we were in Antrophy in Cornwall, if you live in Cornwall, there is one registered menopause specialist for the whole of Cornwall. Um, so that is not the same for every woman. And I also believe that the biggest fight is yet to come. I believe that um politics is moving to the right and um and that women's health could regress under um a more right-wing um political vein um as it has in America. And you know, some of the backwards steps that we're seeing in the in America, people you really feel politics is gonna go in that direction. I I feel I feel there's a chance.

SPEAKER_00 19:39

Um I feel there's a chance, yes. But um, I suppose part I I live in this, maybe I live in this rose-tinted world where I think it we'll we'll see sense.

SPEAKER_01 19:49

I know, I know, and I hope that's the case, and I I really hope that's the case, though I did think that about other things, obviously. Um, but I I think there's a chance, and I think if there is a chance, then we have to be ready for that. I think we have to be, you know, we have to try and get as much momentum and to get as far as we can in the next few years, so that if the worst did happen and things started to regress, we would still be further on than we are now. Um, and you know, that's kind of you know, you can't control what everybody's gonna vote or what everyone's gonna decide to do, but we can control how much progress we make in these next three years. Um, so and I don't think we've got time to waste. So I definitely feel that. Um, and like you, I hope that's not the case, but I hoped that wasn't the case in America, and um, and yet what we're seeing is very, very damaging to women's the women's health agenda in America.

SPEAKER_00 20:47

It certainly is, and they do say what happens in America comes over here, but I don't think I think we we also it's within our gift to to break that pattern, actually. We don't have to we don't have to go down that direction. In fact, we can learn from what is happening over there and how it's gonna be.

SPEAKER_01 21:02

Exactly, exactly. And that's why you know you using the voice of 51% of the population, which women are, for women to really understand. I mean, I have this discussion with people all the time, they go, I don't think it will be that bad. And I go, Do you understand? Understand what's written in the manifesto, understand the impact that might have on you and your daughters and on healthcare. Um, so I think it is really important, and we've but we've got a lot of work to do in the next three years.

unknown 21:29

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 21:30

A lot of it's about education, isn't it, really, as well?

SPEAKER_01 21:32

A lot of it's about education and people understanding and you know, and also, you know, that you know, we know that there's, you know, you know, feminism has never been more needed than it is right now, I think. And that's what I think, you know, there's a lot of the rise of misogyny in lot in the younger generation, a lot of disenfranchised people, um, and you know, and a lot. Difficult living circumstances are all contributors to how people are feeling about their political opportunity, I guess.

SPEAKER_00 22:09

Well, thank goodness you and your colleagues are here to be taking a stand and campaigning to make a difference. You've talked a lot about the health about health being foundational to gender equality. Can you explain that link? How does women's health affect gender equality?

SPEAKER_01 22:28

Yeah. So I absolutely believe, having spent a lot of time, probably too much time, thinking about this very subject, I believe that you cannot have true gender equality if you do not have equality in healthcare. If you do not have a healthcare system that can support women through the, you know, we're the only creature that, you know, bleeds for, you know, 40 years of their life on a monthly basis and have different diseases that are and conditions that are linked to that. And we can only have equality in education and um equality in the workplace if we understand that. We know, for example, we know that girls when they're having heavy periods at school, they're, you know, that, and especially, you know, black girls are told, well, you, you know, heavy periods is just what you have to deal with. And it's not just what you have to deal with, actually. Um, so, and you know, girls are missing school because of that, girls are missing school because of, you know, um tampon um poverty and um sanitary poverty. And then when they go to um university, we know that girls, you know, who have it takes 10 years on average to be diagnosed with endometriosis in this country. We know that girls are dropping out of university and dropping out of education because of these conditions. We know that happens in the workplace, we know that fertility um issues can have a huge effect on women in the workplace as they carry on through their gynaecological um journey. And then, of course, they get to menopause, where we know that 10% of menopausal age women leave the workplace because they don't feel supported and they don't feel that they can be themselves, um, and you know, and it becomes very difficult for them. So, all of those things have to contribute to gender equity because if you're not in the boardroom, if you're not being given a job because um you might get pregnant, you might go on fertility treatment, you might have a condition like endometriosis, oh, now you're in menopause, you you might be more difficult as a woman. If you're not in the boardroom because of those um issues, then we can't have gender equity. We can't have gender equity unless we're there when decisions are being made. And, you know, if you think about the number of CEOs in in female CEOs in the in the UK, it's actually going backwards. You know, in the in the last year, I think, you know, two very significant women have bit have left and been replaced by men. So that is going backwards, and we can't have gender equity if we're not at the table. And if the if our conditions that we have to have, having babies, not having babies, having menopause, having all these other things, if that goes against us and is a reason for us not to be at a table, whether that's our own belief or whether that's because somebody has fundamentally made a positive decision not to employ us, then it's very difficult to have gender equity. I mean, one of the one of the terrible things about you know the Labour Party is they have never had a you know a female prime minister. You know, we've had what three three female prime ministers and um and they've all been from the Conservative Party, you know. So um, you know, I think of course there is more equality in lots of ways than there were, you know, in the 70s. Um, but at the same time, it's certainly not, you know, women's health is still seen as a niche. You know, people, um, you know, the the fact that GPs aren't always um that still, I think 40% of medical school schools are not training their doctors on menopause. I mean, can you imagine?

SPEAKER_00 26:43

Well, I have to say, my experience was I had to change doctors before I got the support that I needed.

SPEAKER_01 26:49

And that's what I always say to people. Yeah, and I always say that to people when they say, How can I change my doctor's mind? To say, You can't change doctors, find another doctor, um, because you won't change their mind. And yet, this is something we will all go through. I mean, one of the successes of Menopause mandate obviously was that we were able to um, with other people, um, a lot of other charities like Wellbeing of Women and Carolyn Harris, the MP, and lots of different organizations, we were able to ensure that in the over 40 check that they ask the questions about menopause. I mean, can you understand that, Mary? They are checking, they are doing a health check with women in their 40s. And the one thing that is definitely going to happen to you is the one thing they're not talking to you about. They're talking to you about diabetes, bone health, you know, exercise, all these things, but they're not preparing women who are going into their perimenopause that this is what's going to happen to them, you know. And um, I mean, we weren't prepared at all, you know, and hopefully we can change that. That is that it's beyond belief that that that happened. So, you know, so there is a huge amount, and none of those things mean that there is gender equity. If you if you um I heard someone recently, very senior, um, say on, you know, who was a gynecologist say on radio four, well, some GPs don't want to deal with women's health. Well, here's the thing: that's not a choice. Because you they never say we don't want to deal with children, or you know, we don't want to deal with your asthma. No GP's ever said to me, I don't know anything about asthma, go and see someone else. No one's ever said that to me. So why are you saying that about women's health? And you know, so I don't believe we can have proper gender equity without women's health equity. And I also feel that within women's health there are different levels, and we're seeing that in maternal health now, right? With all the inquiries into um black maternal health and um all the other things, that we are seeing that also within women's health itself there are differences.

SPEAKER_00 29:02

So I'm gonna bring you back slightly because we'll go into menopause separately in a moment. We'll go back to that. Um, I think what I'm picking up is that so many of women's conditions, particularly when it comes to being at work, are invisible, you know. They might be having awful stomach through menstruating, they might be or endrometriitis, you know, very painful conditions. Yeah, fibroid. Yeah, that are not visible and that it's difficult, therefore, for people to appreciate or understand the impact of. Yes. How can we engage men who are the ones that still hold the majority of the power in get in this conversation?

SPEAKER_01 29:47

I mean, to be fair, I do think every time we have engaged men in this conversation, we've have found a lot of male allies. And um, so and certainly when I've done talks in corporates and things, the questions that you get from men and um are the best questions, and and and men are very practical. Like, where can they go for help? Why, you know, what is available for them? My wife, my sister, my mother, um, lots of men when you're talking about menopause, um, suddenly think, oh my god, this is what happened to my mum when she went slightly loopy. People say that to me all the time. God, I remember my mum, like, you know, screaming and you know, throwing the dinner on the floor. And um, and they say that all, and then it's suddenly realization maybe this is what was happening to them. And uh so I think engaging and I think having that open conversation, and you know, that there obviously a lot of men have daughters and they want them. No, you know, it's not as I always say, it's not pie. Health equity for women doesn't mean less health equity for men, it just means the same. And um, so we're not asking for more, we're just asking, you know, that the NHS, which was you know, designed by men for men, um, is adapted to women's health. And so I think that having come open conversations about that. I mean, UTIs is a really good example. UTIs, you know, for lots of women, you know, well, can lead to death if they're uncontrolled and you know, people get sepsis, but they can be life-limiting for a lot of women, and you know, men understanding, you know, that menopause can have such a big effect on women's um um sex drive and libido and you know, and relationships not breaking down, these are all really open conversations to have. And I have always been really encouraged um by the participation of men in this conversation um and men being invited into the conversation and to understand. And that's why I think the the um workplace training that the Department of Work and Pensions is doing and um with the well-being of women and their meno kit, and really educating everybody around these things, um, in the same way that women want to know about you know, testicular cancer or BPH or any of the things that affect men, we should be talking about it. And my daughter, who is 16, came home from school recently, and she said, um, and she's very opinionated about this, obviously, because she's been in a lot of rooms with women talking about women's health, and she said that they'd had a discussion um with uh in an assembly, and um that they talked about breast cancer, and they'd all been in the room. Um, and then um then the girls had to leave, and then they went to talk to them about cervical cancer, and they talked to the boys about testicular cancer, and I just did not understand that and um why they had separated them. And um, and she said that she asked them, and they said, Oh, well, it's because men can get breast cancer as well, but you know, you can't you can't get testicular cancer and they can't get cervical cancer. But we should be talking to everybody about these things because unless we do, if we're making them secret that only women know about, or only men know about, then that is not equity in the healthcare.

SPEAKER_00 33:34

Yes, awareness is so important. So I want to bring us back to the organizational perspective. You talked about the training that the Department of Works and Pensions do, and that goes down well. But what else can organizations do to be more mindful, more sensitive, and more supportive of women and their health to make sure that they maximize their potential at work ultimately. It's going to benefit the organization.

SPEAKER_01 33:59

It hugely benefits the organization, and I think there's a lot of there's a lot of really good um workplace education and programs. Wellbeing of women, for example, run a lot of those programs, like I say, their meno kit, their menstrual health checker, and really, and they do a lot of education and you know, going into workplaces and talking um to workplaces about it. You know, the the idea that now everybody's got to, if you've got an organization of over 250, you've got to have a workplace policy on menopause. But you and I both know, Mary, that policies are policies, right? And they can just be not mean nothing. Um, so really you've got to look for guidance, like I say, uh people like Wellbeing of Women, all the different um women's charities out there, who can really make this come alive for people. And for, you know, it will make huge difference to you know, the brain drain. If you think about women leaving the workplace post-menopause, when they're, you know, they've got their most corporate knowledge, they're big tax um contributors, they're big pension contributors.

SPEAKER_00 35:10

They're also massively energized post-menopause.

SPEAKER_01 35:13

Massively energized, you know, and um why would you not want to keep those people in your organization? You know, if you've gone to the trouble of recruiting um younger women because you think they're talent um into the organisation, then why would you not want to support them if they're going through a fertility um process? So I think you know, there are lots of um, there are lots of um resources available. And one of the things I would really like to see with the Department of Work and Pension is that the work they've done on menopause does not stop with menopause, that it is about um women's health generally. And I think that's why they have asked Mariella, because she was originally the Department of Work and Pensions um ambassador for menopause, and they've asked her to be now the Department Department of Work and Pensions ambassador for um women's health. And I think that's really important because it means that they will be looking at other aspects of women's health within organisations.

SPEAKER_00 36:13

Yes. We're talking about Mariella Frostro. Yes, we are. Yes, sorry. Yeah, great. What a great advocate she is as well. Fantastic.

SPEAKER_01 36:20

Oh, yeah, brilliant advocate, and you know, just so energized and you know, and really, you know, takes the ball by the horns, and yeah, it's a fantastic advocate for women.

SPEAKER_00 36:32

Great. Let's move on then to um thinking more about menopause, and we've talked quite a bit of it about it already. But what's your advice to women who are really struggling to get help? Because I know from my perspective, it was a real personal struggle for some time to get the support and help that I needed.

SPEAKER_01 36:51

I think um so as ever, any issue in life is always about education, isn't it? And lots of women, I think, um struggled and still struggle because they just don't know what's happening to them. You know, that I never knew that I was in menopause because I didn't have a hot flush. I thought, because I no one had ever told me that in order to be in my menopause, my periods needed to stop and I needed to have hot flushes. Now, when those two things didn't happen to me. Um, my periods got very heavy, I had aching joints, I had heart palpitations, and I felt very anxious, but I didn't know that that was perimenopause. Um, so education is vital that women that we discuss this with um girls at school, that they they understand their menstrual, that you know, for start at the age of our, you know, our menstrual journey, that we really understand um what that looks like. And also, Mary, that we understand the impact of menopause and you know the impact it can have on our long-term health in terms of cardiovascular osteoporosis and probably dementia. So I think educating yourself, and there are some really, really good resources out there, like I would say obviously the NHS. We've worked really hard on working with the NHS about updating um the um their site, their um site on that, and go to places like well-being of women. Well-being of women are a charity and they have immense resources. Go to the menopause mandate website where you'll see um conversations between um, you know, um little cartoon conversations between a doctor and a patient describing symptoms, and it will talk about what different um treatments are available. Go on the British Menopause Society website, look at um is there a menopause specialist in your area? An NHS, they will have a list and you can look to see if there's an NHS specialist in your area, or go on to Louise Newsom's Balance app, and which has a whole host of information in lots of different languages about any subject around menopause that you would ever want to know. If women, if you go to your doctor and the statistics tell us that the average woman, whatever the average woman is, um, will visit the doctor between five and eight times before they're offered treatment for their menopause, which I mean, I mean, it's hard enough to get one appointment. So I don't, and you know, this is when you're feeling you're least resilient, right? And you're having to battle to get this. And um, this is why a lot of women end up um, you know, spending money, you know, on supplements that have no, you know, proven clinical efficacy or or or or spending money on seeing people privately that they can't afford. Um, so um so go and look at all those things and then um and also ask people, and this is what I say to people, um, I can tell you now, when if I'm in Winchester and people say to me, um, oh, I've had a brilliant experience with the menopause, I can tell you now which surgery they're at, because I know they have a menopause nurse there, um, and she's brilliant. And everyone I know who is at that surgery says, Oh, I've had a fantastic experience.

SPEAKER_00 40:26

And that and I find out where there's a menopause.

SPEAKER_01 40:30

Yes, ask the receptionist who's interested in women's health, who should I see about women's health or menopause? And there is usually, and this often it isn't the GP. So they're often nurses and often now pharmacists. A lot of pharmacists have been trained to run menopause clinic and you know, are brilliant out there in terms of menopause advocates as well. So, um, but you know, ask other women, but also look at these other resources to really educate yourself.

SPEAKER_00 40:56

I'm hearing not just what you're sharing. I mean, I feel like we need to put a list of resources at the bottom on the show notes for today's conversation, because you're sharing a real treasure chest of where people can get support, different resources that are on the internet. Um, I mean, I've I've been through my menopause, it's a bit late for me as well. Is it ever too late? And I still think that I'm contending with health-wise with regards to being post-menopausal. I hadn't realized just the plethora of choice that there was out there and resources that there are that can support women. So that is really, really encouraging and good to know. I would like to move on and talk about um menopause mandate because I think menopause mandate itself sounds like a really exciting organization that you are now co-chair of. And I love the way you describe yourselves as the coalition of campaigners with the goal to revolutionize and support women's health, the way they receive health, but also the way the wider society responds and reacts to women's health. Tell me more about your involvement and and what you hope for with being co-chair of this organization.

SPEAKER_01 42:12

Absolutely. So I first became involved with Menopause Mandate, I would think about four years ago, um, in my role as general manager at Thermex, um, as a um as a corporate partner, really. Um, so um Laura and Mariella had put this organization together along with Carolyn Harris, who's um just um a giant of a um women's health advocate um in the Labour Party, and um and they were starting to campaign around this um HRT1 prescription cost. So um, because um Carolyn, who's a Welsh MP, hadn't realized she got her HRT for free, and she hadn't realised that that was not the case in England, where women who are sometimes on, you know, maybe three or four different types of HRT were paying a lot in prescription charges. And for some women, that is prohibitive. Um, so they decided to get this group of women together and um very high-profile women. So Davina and um obviously Mariella was leading it, and then Lisa Snowden and Penny Lancaster, and lots of different women who were all going through their own menopause journey. Carol Vorderman is a great voice in it and is brilliant. Um all came together to really um use their platforms. Now there's been a lot of, it's interesting, isn't it? Because when women do this, they get a lot of backlash. So there's been a lot of backlash of people going, Oh, I don't think it's up to you know celebrities to talk about this. Absolutely, it is they have every right to use their platforms for good. You know, they're running um Instagram webinars with doctors talking about their own experiences. Menopause and really raising the awareness. And you know, let's be clear, Davina has done a huge amount for that in raising awareness for women. Um, so it started off like that. Um, we were a corporate funder, and we were um engaging with them to put resources together. So there's been like videos made, like I said, on their website that um that we helped fund and booklets for women, so resources that were available to women, and then we worked, um, and I became more and more involved because um, you know, I was obviously trying to influence politicians at the same time, and then we had the campaign around the 40 plus check and asking the questions in the 40 plus check, which we all campaigned very aggressively for um both as Menipour's mandate and as individuals with the health secretary. And I think in the end he just gave in and just said, Oh god, yeah, okay, I'll uh I'll do it. And um, and he got a lot of love for that. So I think it worked out for him. But um, and that's really how it started. And it is, you know, so our mandate is really to work on, you know, so now it's about how do we make the um how do we make that um 40 plus check happen for all women, and how do we make sure that the questions do happen and that women are given the right information. And the second part of our mandate, I think, is in the menopause um or in the women's new revised women's health strategy to look specifically at the actions around menopause and hold people to account. And whilst you're holding people to account, I think what we're very good at at Menopause mandate is working with other charities, like I say, well-being of women, with Leslie Regan, who's the women's health ambassador, and going, look, there is no money, there is, we're not going to be given a blank check. So, how do, and this is what women are brilliant at, how do we resourcefully make this happen together? You know, with the Royal College of Gynacologists and all these different groups, how do we really push to make sure that this has an impact? Because the women's health strategy is just a strategy. You and I've written strategies all our lives, right? It's meaningless unless somebody is actually going to deliver on that strategy and it has to deliver for all women, not just women that live in Wimbledon or Winchester or wherever you know you happen to live, has to deliver for all women. It has to look at different, you know. For example, no GPs know that Southeast Asian women go through menopause um earlier. Well, not many GPs know that unless they're specialists, that Southeast Asian women go through menopause earlier, or that black women present with very different menopausal symptoms. This is the nuances of being able to care for women as a huge population. And you know, Leslie Regan always talks about, you know, women hold up half the sky. And um, you know, it's really, really important that we continue to, as a group at Menopause Mandate, to continue to advocate um for menopause because people think it's the conversation's done. People say to me all the time, oh, we're sorted now, menopause. It's very far from sorted. You know, only 20% of women that could have treatment for menopause in this country in that age range choose or are offered it.

SPEAKER_00 47:32

Wow, that's quite a figure, isn't it? And that's much higher.

SPEAKER_01 47:38

It's higher than it was, and if you go to places like Spain and Italy and France, it's like three, four percent.

SPEAKER_00 47:45

Oh goodness me. So we should be grateful for small mercies, but it doesn't mean we got to be good to rest on our laurels, either.

SPEAKER_01 47:51

No, not at all.

SPEAKER_00 47:52

So um, so definitely making progress, which is really good to hear. And it's great to hear that you're looking at getting strategy into action and making it happen, which is really, really good.

SPEAKER_01 48:03

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 48:03

I want to fast forward 10 years. What would genuine progress in women's health equality look like for you in 10 years' time?

SPEAKER_01 48:13

I think we wouldn't need to have people like Menopause Mandate. Um, I think we would have women's health hubs um in the community where women, and I've seen this happen so successfully in some areas, where women can go and access all the um information and the tests that they need, where we have education, proper education in schools um by people that know what they're talking about. Again, you know, some of the stuff that my daughter's been told in schools is is nonsense, you know, and um and it's just inaccurate.

SPEAKER_00 48:51

So I think for the business world and the organization?

SPEAKER_01 48:55

For the business world, I think it would be again, it would be about having policies, but for those policies to really mean something. So that you had workplace training, um, that everyone went through workplace training on menopause, everyone knew how to support somebody through a fertility journey, everyone knew about, you know, and you know, that the Department of Work and Pensions perhaps had introduced menstrual health leave, as you know, they have in Spain for women that are suffering from um very severe um gynecological um issues like endometriosis or adenomyosis or any of those things, that there is an understanding of it and that there's no shame and that women are happy to talk about it, that they feel in a workplace that they're able to say, This is what I'm going through at the moment, and how can you support me? Whereas at the moment, there's still, you know, like when we were young and you used to hide your tampax up the sleeve, there's still an element of that, right? Where we're ashamed to talk about the things that happen to us and yet we have no control over them. So that's what utopia would look like from my point of view.

SPEAKER_00 50:05

Yes, well, let's keep working towards that. It's fantastic what you're doing. So, um, I mean, obviously, this podcast it we're talking about and undiscussable today because women's health doesn't get discussed enough and the impact it has on the workplace. But what do you hope women stop accepting and start asking for when it comes to their health careers and their lives?

SPEAKER_01 50:30

I think that I hope that women stop hiding their conditions and that they are much more feel that they can have much more discussion about it. You know, if obviously if a woman, if I was, you know, in a leadership position in organization, I would hope that, and they have, women could come and talk to me about it, but also that men could come and talk to you about um, you know, things that were going on in their lives with their partners or their wives or their daughters or their mothers, um, and that it would be much more open, where I think women feel that because, and this is where the inequity thing comes in, that you know, that we've got to be as good or better, we've got to be better than men, and we've got to show up more, and we've got to just put a brave face on it to be taken seriously. And you know, I have been very criticized in my career by male colleagues for being too empathetic, um, being, you know, and almost saying being too nice, right? Um, because you're the one that people talk to um about things. And yet we know that's not true because you know my results have always been better than theirs, and you know, and it's about doing things with people um and not to people. So I think I would like it if if you know, like to think that women could have those open conversations and that organizations would not see it as um as weakness that they would that they would go out of their way to say, we've taken the the time and the money to bring this woman into the organization. How can we support her through this part of her life?

SPEAKER_00 52:14

Tina, you are a real force to be reckoned with. I've thoroughly enjoyed talking to you. And I really what I've really loved is what a fascinating career journey and life journey you've had, but also the stand you are taking for women's health and equal and women's equality. I want to ask you one final question. Um, if a young girl growing up in today in the children's home, so remember yourself as a young girl growing up in the children's home, could see you now, the leader, the advocate that you are, and the woman you've become, what do you think she would say?

SPEAKER_01 52:49

I think she would say that was always what you were meant to do. I think that um, yeah, so I've always had an innate belief that when my parents died in a car crash and I was on the back seat, and don't forget this was in the 70s, right? We were in carry cots on the back seat, not in car seats, and I survived. I've always had a belief that I was meant to do something useful for women, and um, and yeah, and that's what got me through the tough years of being in a children's home and other tough parts of my life. So, yes, I think that's what she would think.

SPEAKER_00 53:30

Gosh, you are such a fantastic real model from that point of view because you are really demonstrating how belief can carry you through, but also having that very clear purpose and desire to make a difference. Um, equality, fantastic.

SPEAKER_01 53:47

Thank you, Mary. Thank you so much. It's been so lovely talking to you. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 53:52

Thank you so much for listening to the She Leads Collective podcast. If this episode resonated with you, follow the show or share it with a friend and leave a quick review below. Or leave us a comment. Change happens through conversation, so let's keep this one going. Listen out for the next episode and join me as we keep lifting the lid on the stories that matter. Take care and keep leading with heart.