Menopause and Work Pressure: How to Cope When Symptoms Follow You to Work

Roberta Bass

What a Delivery Driver Taught Me About Workplace Pressure

Have you ever watched delivery drivers at work? The other day I was watching this one that decided to suddenly drive up onto the grass verge and suddenly stop and run into their house, chuck the post down, take a bit to run back into the van. Then they came onto the road, stopped in the middle of the road to look at their phone and then — looking at their phone still — driving around the corner, holding the phone in their hand, then suddenly stopping, blocking the road again, jumping out.

I thought, not only is this unsafe, but they must be under a lot of pressure and forced to work really hard. They'd probably get paid not very much per delivery, so they're having to do everything really quickly, not taking any breaks — probably need to learn to drive a little bit better and at least not look at their phone while they're driving, maybe be a bit safer.

But it's not just the fact that I think they're maybe not safe — it's the amount of pressure that they are under. And there's got to be thinking about the pressure that we all feel at work, and how if you're under pressure and you're struggling with peri or postmenopausal symptoms, it is not a fun time.

The Reality for Women at Work

Many women are balancing maybe high pressure, stressful careers and family and maybe children, older parents, everything else that you need to do in life, housework, whatever. Or even if you've got a slightly less high pressure job — you are not just working, you're doing everything else and you're feeling rubbish.

But menopause can really affect your work. You might be getting brain fog. You might be getting joint pain sitting at a desk all day or doing manual work. You might be anxious. And actually the feeling of going into work and having the pressure on you all day can make it really hard to even go in in the morning.

You might be getting panic attacks or having hot flushes because you're so stressed, and the stress is causing those hot flushes to come more often — and then you get stressed because you have hot flushes. It might be that you are expected to perform at the same level as all of those in their 20s and 30s who are not getting perimenopausal symptoms.

And there is a huge number of women who leave their jobs due to menopausal symptoms because they can't cope with that high level of pressure and all of the symptoms that go with it. And we know that stress will make those menopausal symptoms worse. And if the menopausal symptoms are worse, we're probably not coping as well, we're maybe not performing as well as we once were — and then that makes it more stressful. And then we get in this vicious cycle.

What's Changing in the Workplace

Up until recently, there was very limited understanding in most workplaces about perimenopausal symptoms. Particularly if it's a male dominated industry, they are not going to be aware of the symptoms, they're not going to make adjustments. And it's all about making money in most places — they're not necessarily as concerned about people's wellbeing. And therefore having any adjustments made at work was really difficult, and women either just pushed through doing their best or they ended up leaving.

Just recently, the UK has come up with some guidelines designed to increase the recognition of menopause in workplace wellbeing. And there have been some guidelines that encourage open conversations and reasonable adjustments to be made.

Many workplaces have equality, diversity and inclusion frameworks or policies so that anybody of a different race or religion, or that has any disabilities, is not discriminated against — so they have adjustments made if they need them. It's great to see that menopause is now starting to be considered in that same arena, because every single woman is going to go through perimenopause at some point. So that's 50% of the population that were expected just to get on with it, with no kind of adjustments being made. Whereas if you had some kind of disability or chronic health condition, you're more likely to get that support.

So now there has been some equality frameworks recognised, and the recognition that the impact of symptoms can sometimes be really significant. So what would that look like in practical terms?

It could be that you have some flexible working options — so it might be that you work shorter days or longer days, or maybe you need to work from home some of the time if you're feeling really unwell and can't travel. Making sure that you're having regular breaks.

Why Taking Breaks Actually Helps

Now, this isn't always about the employer. This is often about the person themselves. I have spoken to many women and one of the biggest things — maybe because they feel that they're not performing well and they don't want to be seen as less — is that they don't take breaks. They're just working through their breaks.

But it is not helping with their stress. And actually their focus and their productivity is going to be less if they don't have breaks. But they think that by taking their unpaid lunch break or regular breaks in the day, they're not going to get as much work done or they're not going to be able to finish what they need to — and they're going to be looked down upon, or maybe they will be performance managed, or other things that kind of keep them driving forward.

Taking regular breaks is going to help reduce our stress hormones. It's going to improve our focus — particularly if we can get away from the screen or whatever we're working on — and it's going to help us be more productive when we get back. We will have a fresher brain and we can do better work.

So it's not just about the employer. The employer needs to make sure that regular breaks are given, but it's also about the women themselves taking those breaks.

Other Workplace Adjustments Worth Asking For

Also looking at the environment within the workplace — making sure that the temperature is correct, that you are not too hot or too cold, and that you're having proper hydration. That you can go and have drink breaks, or make sure that you can have water available within the office or wherever you work.

And also it's making sure that there is open communication with your employer. If you are struggling, making it aware. If you work for a big company, there should be an HR department and they will look after wellbeing — then having steps put forward that you can work towards to perform at your optimum. If having breaks is the thing, or maybe you need more flexible working, maybe you need some external support — maybe having some workshops brought into the office to help manage stress or other menopausal symptoms, or educating everybody else, all the men in the department, on what menopause is and what happens.

So this hopefully will start rolling out more and more support for women at work. But it's also about the women doing the best for themselves at work. Yes, some employers may have been difficult in the past. Hopefully this will start to bring out more guidance and more policies. We will see — the government always takes a long time to push anything forward — but this is a good way to start so that menopause is considered more, and the wellbeing of menopausal women is considered more at work.

What You Can Do Right Now

So if you are struggling with work, you need to make a plan yourself of what you can do. I want you to think, right now, of two or three things that you could change at work that would help you feel better, improve your wellbeing, improve your menopause symptoms. You may not know what those things are, but I'm going to give you a few options.

Firstly: actually take your lunch break. And take a break — not just eating your lunch in front of a computer screen or in your work department. It might be that there's a canteen you can go to. It might be that if it's nice weather, you can sit outside and eat your lunch, maybe go for a walk at lunchtime — even if it's five minutes outside getting some fresh air. If you've got somewhere that's nature nearby, maybe it's a park or a wood — fantastic, that's even better. But even doing a walk around the block or around the building can be really beneficial.

If you are a desk worker, try and get up every hour. It could just be a walk to the photocopier, walk to get a cup of tea, walk to the toilet — or just stand up, sit down, have a wriggle around, do a few little stretches. That can really help just to relieve any tension in the body, but also give the mind a break.

It might be doing some breathing exercises. I often like to tie in things that you're trying to do with old habits. If you've ever read the book Atomic Habits, it's great about stacking the habits. So if there's something that you already do regularly through the day — maybe it's being on a phone call — I had one lady who said she was going to tie this in with every time she came off a Teams call, because she has lots of online meetings throughout the day. After each one, she does some breathing exercises.

That could be breathing in for four, hold for four, out for four, rest for four, then back in — so square breathing. It could be abdominal breathing, trying to get the air right down into the tummy. But anything where you focus on your breathing for 30 seconds to a minute helps just to calm down the nervous system. And if you can tie that into every time you finish a Teams call, or have a cup of tea, or something you do regularly throughout the day, that can just help to calm everything down.

It might be that you have a discussion with your boss about working from home on certain days, or changing your hours so that you can come in later and finish later if the commute is quite a stressful thing for you. It might be that you can do certain projects from somewhere else virtually. It's just looking at what are the things that really stress you out in a day — what things can you make adaptations to? What things could you offload to somebody else?

Maybe you are a manager and you're doing all the things because you feel that you should do all the things — but there are other people that you can delegate to. Or maybe there are automations or systems you can set up for tasks that get done on a regular basis, so that they can automatically get done rather than you being the one that has to do them all the time.

So it's just looking at what you could change in the day that could help you. Yes, outside of work you could do lots of things like exercise, eating properly, drinking enough fluids — but what could you do to change those biggest stresses in your day at work? And if you can't change them, speaking to your manager. Or if you're the manager, speaking to your team to offload some things — to make your working day better. Because if you're a worker, then generally work is a big chunk of our day, and what we do in that time can really affect how we feel the rest of the time.

Even if you just make one small change, it can make a massive difference.

Until next time, take care.