If you’ve hit perimenopause or menopause and suddenly feel more tired, overwhelmed, less resilient or simply less able to cope with things you used to manage easily, I think there’s another way to look at what might be happening.

I’ve been thinking about it as capacity.

Years ago, my friend Andrea used that word and it stuck in my mind.

She was talking about something in her own life, but the word pinged something, caught my attention, well not the word, but the concept. I filed it away without it really being clear what was important about it.

Lately, I've been thinking about the concept a lot.

You can get through a whole day and still have nothing left. You’ve done what needed doing, but by 9 pm you can’t think clearly, you don’t want anyone to touch you, and one more question from your family might tip you over the edge.

Our cells can't regenerate or repair, make collagen, effectively detox, have proper immune function unless they have a surplus. Our body looks after our survival first. So everything women think they want (skin, energy, clear thinking, a healthy libido, still being rational to your family at 9pm) it needs you to have surplus. You can't just be surviving.

I’ve been wondering whether things that we consider health problems, or motivation or procrastination problems, or even a “what’s wrong with me?” problem is actually problem with our capacity.

I noticed it in myself during menopause, a massive drop in capacity and I did not fucking like it.

Things I had always managed easily suddenly felt overwhelming. The school run. Emails. Dinner every night. A phone call I needed to make. None of it was new or particularly difficult, but all of it together felt like too damn much.

I remember thinking, I used to be able to do this. What the hell has happened to me?

The actual daily load hadn’t changed that much. My ability to handle it had.

What’s using up your capacity?

There are the obvious things. Poor sleep. Not eating enough. Being ill. Working too much.

Then there are the things you have managed for so long that you stop realising how many balls you are juggling, and how impossible it is for just one person to be able to do all of those things, all of the time. Even when you're on holidays. The mental load is just hectic!

We are not supposed to live like we are, especially as we get older, supposed to be slowing down and doing less.

Keeping track of our family, the school forms, the permission slips, who needs to be where, what's for dinner, if there are enough vegetables, and that's before you even include your aging parents, your business or job, a pet... Being the person who remembers everyone’s appointments, notices what’s running out, and works out what happens next. That is not less!

You can be getting through your days and have less than nothing left over for yourself at the end of the day.

I see this when women tell me they know what they need to do. I know they’ve read all the books. They’ve saved the recipes and researched all the supplements. They want to go for the walk, get to bed earlier, make the appointment to look after themselves, for that thing that has been bugging them for ages.

And then they don’t.

Sometimes the advice didn't exactly resonate. Sometimes daily life gets in the way. But more often than not, there simply wasn’t enough of her left over to do one more thing, even if it was exactly what she needed..

Then we think, “Why can’t I stick to it?” we go straight into self blame. “Why can't I do anything right?" But there is a better question...

Our body is talking to us

When I began feeling overwhelmed, I knew I couldn’t think my way through the whole thing. My body was screaming for attention.

Menopausal differences were part of the picture. But so was a lack of sleep, a different sensitivity to stress and coffee, damn it. The food I ate effected me differently, my stress levels never seemed to drop, even on holidays, my complicated health history, and the day to day demands of my busy life. I needed to look at what was happening for me, rather than think that what worked for other women would work for me.

Getting help with the physical side of things has been crucial. But so has looking at the behavioural patterns that kept me on edge. I didn't even realise that I was "on", all the time.

That’s why my work looks at the physical, energetic and ancestral layers. They aren’t three separate things. We are all of those things.

A pattern you learned as a child could be affecting how you respond to events on an ordinary Tuesday afternoon. You might be physically home, sitting on the sofa, while some part of you is preparing for the next day, or the next hit to your nervous system.

It's worth assessing for yourself, can you really fully relax?

What gives you capacity back?

I wish there were a easy answer.

Sometimes it’s looking at a symptom that has been hanging around for a while. Sometimes it’s going to bed earlier diligently, getting someone in the family to take on just one of the regular household tasks and not having to remind them of it, or finally having the conversation you’ve spent six months dreading.

It might be seeing if you go into a mild state of panic when something changes on a whim, and then work with the way your nervous system has responded instead of judging yourself for it.

I’ve found that the small, unglamorous changes are the ones that build into real lasting shifts.

Can I make my way through boring paperwork snd not get distracted? Can I be with my family at 6 pm and be fully present? Can I say no without spending the next three hours feeling guilty or justifying it to myself?

At 51 my boundaries have become rock solid. And in the last few years, I think I've grown into myself more than over the last couple of decades.

I’m still working out everything I am thinking about capacity and Andrea probably has no idea what she set in motion with that one word.

For now, this is the question I’d leave you to ponder:

Has your ability to handle things changed?

Just notice what comes up. That may be the first honest piece of information you’ve received in a while.

Cress xx