For the final episode of season 10 of Period Story podcast, I’m so happy to share my conversation with Dr Juliet McGrattan, an international speaker, award winning author, educator and running expert.
In this episode, Dr Juliet shares:
- Her experience of perimenopause and why she’s happy not to know when she goes through the day of menopause
- Why imposter syndrome and anxiety were the main symptoms that told her she was perimenopausal
- Why stopping caffeine was helpful for her
- Why comparison is a trap when it comes to exercise
- How exercise can be very powerful in menopause
- Her tips for getting into running in midlife
- A sneak peek into her new book about running and menopause
- And of course, the story of her first period
Dr Juliet says it’s very easy to become resentful or fall out of love with your body at different times of life and that you can find yourself battling against it. She says that to feel more accepting of our bodies and to learn to work with them, we need to ask ourselves, “what can I do that will make things a little bit better?”.
Thank you, Dr Juliet!
Get in touch with Dr Juliet:
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SHOW TRANSCRIPT
Le’Nise Brothers: Hi Juliet. Thank you so much for coming onto the podcast today. Let’s start with, the question I always ask my guests, which is tell me the story of your very first period.
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Thank you very much for having me on. Nobody’s ever actually ever asked me that question before, which is maybe says a lot my, now I was really late starting my periods.
I was, just 16, I think so, so really quite late. And I remember it vividly. I don’t know whether that’s the same for everybody, but I was off school for the day. Because I had some stomach ache and didn’t really think very much of it, but then went to the loo and realised that there was some blood in my knickers.
And thought okay, right. That’s why I had stomach ache. And I remember my mum was downstairs and she was having some sort of, I don’t know whether it was a coffee morning or she played bridge, so I think it might have been a little bridge card game sort of thing. And I remember sort of shouting down to her and her , I remember, it’s so clearly, it’s funny. Remember coming to the bottom of the stairs. And just sort of telling me that she’d put some sanitary pads in a, in the drawer, in her bedroom. And I went and, and went to get them and, and that, that was it really, it was all quite uneventful.
I’ve always been terrified that, you know, it would start in a ballet lesson ’cause I was a dancer and it would be blood on my leotard and all of those things that you dread. But no, I was at home and it, yeah, it was quite uneventful.
Le’Nise Brothers: So you were 16 when you got it.
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Mm.
Le’Nise Brothers: Which is, if we think about the average age to start, menstruation is about like 11, 12.
What was going on in your head at that? Were you kind of thinking, when is it going to come? Were you concerned or had you spoken to anyone about it?
Dr Juliet McGrattan: I hadn’t spoken to anybody. I. I kind of think that I just knew it would happen eventually, so I wasn’t worrying that it hadn’t happened.
As I said, I was a dancer, so in some ways I was kind of relieved. I mean, I learned about periods when I was at primary school and I was age 10. So, you know, I’d had a lot of years of thinking, is it going to happen? When’s it going to happen? What’s, you know. How is it going to happen? So yeah, so I think probably there was a little sort of sense of relief that, oh, okay, it’s normal, but perhaps, yeah. Not being too worried that it hadn’t happened up until that point. I mean, I think maybe I was 15 and a half 16. I, but, you know, I had no information. I didn’t know. Now I know that, you know, delayed puberty can be a thing, and I was just sort of on the cusp, on the cusp of that really. But I didn’t know that at the time.
I just thought, well, it’s pretty cool that it hasn’t happened to me yet, but there was a lot of years of wondering when it was going to happen.
Le’Nise Brothers: And when your friends got their periods, did they talk about it with you? Was there a kind of element of feeling a bit left out of those conversations?
Dr Juliet McGrattan: A little bit, but I have to say it, it wasn’t really something that we all talked about.
Back in the day. I’m 53 now, so I’m quite old there. There wasn’t an awful lot of conversation. There might be a sort of a, a knowing look, or there was always girls trying to get out of PE because they had their period. So I guess in some way maybe I did feel a little bit sort of. Not able to, to join and those conversations and not be excluded.
But I don’t recall there being very many of them.
Le’Nise Brothers: And then when she got your period, what was your experience of your period like for the rest of your teenage years?
Dr Juliet McGrattan: I wouldn’t say it was great really, to be honest. My period was quite heavy. And again, you know, being a dancer, that was really an issue for me. I didn’t, my mum wasn’t, didn’t talk about periods. I think a lot of that comes from her upbringing. You know, she found it very difficult to talk about that kind of thing. Uh, so I didn’t really get support sort of from her. So I, I was very resilient and very independent really. And I just kind of managed it, figured it out myself.
It certainly did interfere with my dance. I remember an occasion when I went, I was dancing up in London, like at a Saturday school. I remember going up there and then just realising that my period was too heavy and, and just turning around and getting the train home again, and just saying I didn’t feel very well.
So I think it was, yeah, it was always, but I didn’t really understand. And I don’t know if anybody did at that point that it wasn’t just about bleeding. I didn’t have any concept that the hormones that caused the bleeding and those fluctuations affect would affect me in other ways. So I think I wasn’t very insightful about mood or any of the other sort of symptoms. Yeah, I think I knew that I was going to get sore breasts sort of every month, but I hadn’t linked anything else at all to, to my hormones, so I wasn’t able, they were fairly regular. I’ll give them that. I, I, I think that is one bonus that I was pretty much able to predict when they were going to happen.
But I was always embarrassed about it. I was never open. I never really talked to anybody about it. I just kind of cracked on, which I think is quite sad really when I think back about it.
Le’Nise Brothers: Yeah. Well I think it’s quite common back then. I think in some ways things have changed. Not as much as you would think but I wonder as you got older, did your relationship with your period change, especially as you went through medical training.
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Mm-hmm.
Le’Nise Brothers: Did the more insight you got about your body, did that change your relationship with your period at all?
Dr Juliet McGrattan: I think I just got better at dealing with it. I got better at it. I think it did get a little bit lighter as well. It’s obviously, you know, in the first few years it can sometimes be a little bit heavy.
So I, I got better at dealing with it. And then, I went on the contraceptive pill and then that helped me to, that really made a big difference to, managing them. And they become much, much less of a deal ’cause as you know, it’s not a natural period, it’s just a sort of a withdrawal bleed and that made them very predictable, very controllable.
So I was much less bothered by them. And then you go through that phase in life when you are, you are worried if you don’t have one because you don’t. Worried that you might be pregnant. So I think I think it changed from that point of view. Yeah. It became less of a, less of a nuisance. Um, and less of a, yeah, less of a bother, but then it became a bit more of a, gosh yeah. I hope I get one.
Le’Nise Brothers: Do you still get periods or are you on the other side?
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Yeah, so I haven’t had a period for a long time because I’ve used the Mirena coil for contraception and of course for not all women, but for me, a side effect of that has been that I haven’t had periods and my hobby is running, and that’s been really amazing.
And now I’m not really sure where I am. I know that I’m getting some sort of perimenopausal symptoms. I don’t know where I am, that’s, you know, that the, you reach menopause when you haven’t had a period for 12 months. But I have no way of knowing when my last one was. But I suspect that I’m probably not too far away from hitting that day of menopause and moving into post menopause.
But yeah, I don’t know, but I don’t have periods, so, and I, I know some women don’t like that but I am, I am more than happy with that.
Le’Nise Brothers: Is there any kind of feeling of uncertainty with that and like uncertainty that of where you are or you’ve just fine with not knowing where you are in that kind of perimenopause to menopause, the post menopause journey.
Dr Juliet McGrattan: You know, I’m fine with it because I don’t know that, that knowing the absolute day of when you reach that day of menopause and you haven’t had a period for 12 months, I don’t know that it really changes very much. I, I’m going much more by sort of how I feel and the symptoms that I’ve got.
I mean, it could be significant for some women if you’re thinking about when you need to when you can stop contraception. But I know, you can get tested, to see whether you’ve reached that point, if you’re thinking about sort of changing contraception and things.
So I kind of, I don’t know. It’s sort of spectrum menopause, isn’t it? You women just spend lots of years sort of being perimenopausal and, and those symptoms don’t switch off the minute you go into post menopause. So I feel absolutely fine. I was wondering about it the other day and thought, I wonder whereabouts I am, but I, it, it doesn’t really, and it may be because I’m not too badly affected.
Perhaps if I was really, you know, struggling with it, I would be like, I need to know where I am and how, like, long this is likely to go on for. But, uh, I’m, no, I’m okay with that.
Le’Nise Brothers: So you’re 53 now?
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Mm-hmm.
Le’Nise Brothers: And can you say a little bit more about how you are feeling? Because you know I’ve met you twice in person and you’re quite a vital individual.
You know, you have this vitality about you, but you know, saying that you’ve experienced a few symptoms, can you just say a bit more about how you are feeling as you kind of go towards menopause and, yeah.
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Yeah, yeah, sure. It’s difficult to know when things actually, perimenopause symptoms actually started, but I think the main symptom and the first thing for me was actually feelings of anxiety.
Not something I have ever really experienced before. I’ve always felt quite sort of confident and, in control of things and suddenly started to really get like lots of imposter syndrome and lacking in self-belief and then that horrible feeling of being on edge and anxious about things, about going to work at the time, that it sort of started happening.
Just that general feeling of unease when you can’t quite, sort of put your finger on it, but really unpleasant and that’s kind of come, come and gone over the last few years, sometimes worse than others. But I think when I sort of realised, oh, that this is probably sort of hormone related, that it actually made me feel a lot better about it.
And I was able to go, okay, right. What do I know is going to make me feel better? What, what can I do? What do I know is going to make the difference? So I stopped caffeine. I think probably about five years ago now, which really helped ’cause I think I was getting some sort of like palpitations things along with that sort of feelings of anxiety, cut down on alcohol.
I definitely know if I have more than a couple of glasses that, that I will feel horrible the next day in terms of that sort of on edge thing, trying to minimise stress. And also when I get that feeling, going out and doing some exercise and for me, those. Those things, but just being aware of that and learning to just focus a bit more on self-care has helped those symptoms to go away.
Now, I think if they hadn’t, and if they were much more prominent and I couldn’t sort of solve them myself, they would’ve been enough for me to think about whether I should use some HRT. But I’ve always been able to sort of, yeah manage it with lifestyle things. And apart from that, the odd sort of sore breasts, some hot flushes, but nothing major I can sometimes get, yeah I get a feeling that it’s coming and but nothing that’s been embarrassing or felt, put me in a position where I can’t do my job or anything like that. And some night sweats, they again, they really come and go. They’re often dependent on whether I’ve had, um, a glass of wine and but not, you know, not night sweats where I’ve had to get up and change the sheets, not drenched.
I’m just waking up feeling really hot and thinking, oh my goodness. And flicking the covers off and on and off. I think really those are the main things I’ve noticed other changes, like I noticed my skin is a little bit more, sort of looked at my forearms the other day and thought I look like my mum.
They just suddenly looked really sort of papery. Yeah, like old lady’s arms. I’m like, my goodness, what’s, what’s happening here? Yeah. Apart from that, I am fortunate but I do work hard to try to make my lifestyle as good as I can. And I think, but I do think that a lot of it is just that I am lucky and that it’s not being too difficult for me.
Le’Nise Brothers: It’s really interesting that you, the way that you’re talking about it, about perimenopause and your experience, because I really think there’s a narrative at the moment that this is supposed to be a time that kind of hits us like a freight train. It’s supposed to be really terrible, but really it’s a spectrum and some women, they just kind of sail through it.
Some do have symptoms like you’ve experienced and you’ve described, and then others do have a rough time. And I’m just really interested in, because women’s health was your focus as when you were working as a practicing GP. What would you say to women who are experiencing a really rough time during perimenopause and they’re kind of trying to figure things out.
What would your tips maybe for reassurance be to them?
Dr Juliet McGrattan: I mean, I do remember seeing, you know, many of those women when I was working as a GP and the ones I remember the most, are the ones that would come in and just say, they just didn’t know who they were anymore.
They just did not recognise themselves. Their moods were all over the place. It was affecting their relationship. It was affecting their work. It was awful, really awful. For some of them, they hadn’t identified that it was perimenopause and they, and they thought they were losing their mind or developing dementia or just be thought that it was all down to stress, high levels of sort of stress.
And, and I remember seeing some really desperate, desperate women. I think if you’re having a really bad time. Like you say, the narrative is very sort of mixed, but I do think it’s important to remember that this is a transition and it does end. That’s not necessarily helpful at the time, but just to know that this isn’t forever, also to know that it, it’s not you, it’s not your fault.
It’s not a reflection on you as a person, because a lot of women would say they, this was becoming really horrible, really grumpy and losing their rag really fast and, and then feeling like they were a bad person. So I think I would be really reassuring to say, it’s not your fault.
It’s not you, it’s the hormones that are changing and that is therefore having an effect on, on your brain and your brain chemicals, et cetera. But it’s nothing to do with you as a person. And I would just really say to get help. Some women want to use HRT, some women don’t.
Some women can, a few women can’t. But it can be a game changer and it’s not a case of having to wait until you are absolutely on the floor and you’ve done everything you can think of before you do go and access help. And there is much more education for healthcare professionals and for GPs now about menopause than there ever used to be.
I don’t remember anything at medical school and I remember seeing my first patient as a newly qualified GP and thinking, I don’t know what to do when someone comes in and says they want to start HRT, they think they’re menopausal. I didn’t have, I didn’t, didn’t know. So I had to go and learn, you know, and, and I did, and I went away and researched and, and sort of learned a lot.
But thankfully there is much more education now out there for GPs and also medical students as well. So I hope that, that is changing. It’s not, it’s far from perfect, but it’s better than it was. But yeah, so I would say don’t, don’t feel like you can’t ask for help early on, even if you’re just starting to struggle.
It doesn’t have to be, your world doesn’t have to be completely falling apart before you ask for help, but also just to be, just to learn as much as you can and read about all the different symptoms and the different ways that it can affect you so you don’t feel like you are the only one. Because you are most definitely sort of not alone.
Le’Nise Brothers: Yeah, I think that what you just said there about not being alone is really important because when you were talking earlier about that feeling of being on edge and that anxiety, that’s actually something that I’ve been experiencing a bit recently and knowing, you know, this is the field that I work in, so I’m very aware of what’s going on but I have been a bit surprised, like, oh, this is, oh, uh, oh, I’m being affected by this. Oh, okay. And it is really helpful to know that I’m not going through this by myself and there’s a reason that I’m going through this. And like you said, it’s a transition. It’s not permanent. But what I want to move on to is to talk about movement and exercise, because that, as we’ve talked about on the two panels that we’ve been on at the London Marathon Show, is really vital for women going through perimenopause and beyond.
But I think this kind of tying this into this feeling of anxiety and not knowing who you are, there can be this feeling of, oh, starting something new, especially reg exercise and movement isn’t a regular part of your routine and this intimidation factor. What would you say to someone who knows that movement is really important for bone strength, for muscle strength, but is nervous, is a bit intimidated by all of the gear, all of the gadgets.
What would you say?
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Yeah, I mean, I think the first thing to remember is that anybody who is exercising regularly and doing all the things that you think you should do. They were once like you. You know, I think about myself when I remember my first run, and I remember not knowing what a dumbbell was and you know, so the first thing to remember is that everyone’s gone through that journey. So again, don’t feel it. You are in inferior in any way. And to remember that any movement that you do is excellent and not to compare yourself to those people because they’ve been doing it for a long time and they’ve built up skills and fitness, et cetera, and the people they’ve actually got the most to gain from exercise are the people that are doing none and start doing some.
That, that’s the biggest sort of health gain is from going from doing nothing to doing something. Even if you’re not reaching those targets that the chief medical officers give you of 150 minutes of moderate exercise every week and two lots of strengthening exercises, even if you’re not there, that’s, that’s a goal.
That doesn’t have to be where you begin. You might be starting from five minutes of walking, but actually you’ve got more to gain than somebody who’s already doing quite a lot, doing a bit more. So it’s at its most impactful if you are not doing anything. The other thing I would say is amongst the chaos of menopause, exercise can be incredibly powerful for lots of reasons, like you said, for bone strength and for muscle strength, et cetera. But actually also I think in just helping you to feel a bit more in control. With menopause, you never know how each day is going to be. Your plans get upset because of symptoms, et cetera.
But if you just have something that is just for you, which is your exercise, that you can adapt, that you can change according to how you feel every day. It becomes something that you can look forward to and a constant and something that kind of keeps you grounded and it gives you, yeah, something that you can actually feel in control with amongst the chaos, which I think is really nice.
And as well, if you are a beginner and you’re starting new things, you’d be amazed how quickly you improve and that improvement and your discovery that you can do things that you didn’t think you could do, gives you so much self-confidence at a time when your self-confidence might just be rock bottom.
So I think being able to set little goals or little targets for yourself, again, not comparing to others, but just what’s right for you and meeting those. And then moving on to the next one. It really helps to build self-esteem and self-confidence, which is so important at this time of life.
Le’Nise Brothers: Yeah, definitely.
I definitely noticed this myself because so I have a dog now and he, as you know, ’cause you have a dog as well and he requires a lot of walks and because I work from home, I’m the one that does most of the walks and what I’ve, I was always an advocate of walking. I was never one of those people who said, oh, walking isn’t exercise.
But I have really noticed since I’ve started taking him on these walks, how, it’s not only the physical benefits, but it’s also the mental benefits where you are up. You’re getting that bright light in your eyes in the morning.
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Mm-hmm.
Le’Nise Brothers: It’s so amazing for your mood, that kind of mental health element where you’re out of the house and sometimes on those days, especially during winter, where you just want to lay in bed.
You can’t. So yeah, the benefits of just going for a walk if you have a dog, if you don’t, are just, are numerous. But I want to talk a little bit about running because you are the resident health expert for 2 6 1 Fearless, which is a global women’s running network, and you do a lot of running yourself, and this is something that has seen a lot, a big boom where you have all of these running clubs popping up and people on TikTok and Instagram
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Mm-hmm.
Le’Nise Brothers: Posting their runs and we’ve talked about the benefits of walking. What about running? Where in midlife, maybe you’re worried about your knees, maybe you’re worried about your hips. I laugh because I worry about my knees. How can a woman in midlife get into running?
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Mm-hmm. I think there’s always a risk when you are a runner that you bore everybody with running and there are plenty of people who don’t want to run, and I always think that’s fine.
You do, you find the thing that is right for you and you should never feel any pressure to run just because everybody around you is doing that. If you don’t want to, you don’t fancy it, you don’t have to do it. Although I would say question yourself. Why is it that you don’t want to do it? Is it because you think you don’t belong in that space?
Is it because you think you couldn’t do it? Because if it’s either of those questions, then actually, I don’t think that’s a good enough reason not to do it, because you will find that the running community is very broad and there is a space for people who really don’t think they can run, but just maybe want to have a bit of a try.
And for those who think that they can’t do it, but can soon very quickly discover that they can do it. And that’s when it can be really impactful in terms of building your confidence when you put yourself right out of your comfort zone and realise, oh, actually I can do this. I think it’s natural to, to worry about the health impacts of pounding the pavements and things. But I would say that it’s not really something you need to worry about at a recreational level. Running recreationally is very different to being sort of an elite runner covering hundreds of miles and things. You are more likely to have problems with your hips and your knees, in particular if you are inactive than if you are a runner.
And there are a lot, there’s a lot of myths about running being bad for your knees when actually very sound evidence says that for recreational runners, it’s actually really good for your knees. It can help to prevent and to treat osteoarthritis. It’s not going to give you osteoarthritis. There are always a few caveats.
If you’re a very elite runner and you’re covering hundreds of miles a week and you’re running with poor form or with injuries, et cetera, that you, you can sometimes cause damage to your knees, but for the majority of us, the kind of running that we are doing, it’s not an issue. And actually it’s going to be helpful to our needs in the future.
So I think always meet yourself where you are at. Start very, very slowly. The biggest mistake I see runners making is just going too quickly. Running a hundred meters and then thinking, oh my goodness, this is awful. I mean, I know this ’cause I’ve been there and I’ve done it. But actually, if you can find a friend and you can run at the speed of chat, and that may not be very much faster than a walk.
It doesn’t matter. It’s still running and gradually, gradually building up from there. And I think also in terms of protecting your joints, it’s always a good idea to make sure that you’re doing some strength and conditioning so that you’ve got strong muscles around your knees, getting fitted for some shoes that are right for you.
Giving yourself particularly in perimenopause and as you get older, enough recovery days, not setting yourself to run every day, you know, couple of times a week, three times a week, but especially at the beginning, lots and lots of time for recovery. But I would, yeah, I would say don’t, don’t be put off by thinking it’s going to be harmful for you.
It’s actually probably going to be completely the opposite.
Le’Nise Brothers: That’s interesting because what you said there about the evidence around running and the knees, I had always heard the opposite, so it’s really reassuring to hear that. It can, with some caveats, it can be beneficial for the knees.
You have just handed in your third book, and I really want to talk about your writing career. So you’ve released two books already, so Sorted, which is all about women’s health, and then Run Well. Talk a little bit about your first two books, and then tell us a little bit more if you can, about your third book.
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Sure. Yeah. I never thought I would write books. My English teacher at school would be amazed if she knew that was what I ended up doing. But the first one was really just came from a desire. I’m still working as a GP then, and I was really heavily into getting into running and, and, and really enjoying it.
Starting to write for Women’s Running magazine and things, and I just thought I just need to have all this general practice knowledge in my head and I can see how it relates to women who want to be active. All the barriers that come up and I just wanted to put it down somewhere on paper. And I hadn’t seen anything like that, at the time, this was 2017, it came out.
There was nothing really around at that time for normal women, so not athletic elite sort of women, but just for everyday women who wanted to be active, to encourage them, to help them overcome all the barriers. So that was Sorted: T he Active Women’s Guide to Health. And I’m so proud of that book because I’d never written a book before. I probably went about it. Well, I know I went about it all the wrong way. It took me much longer than it should. I wrote, ended up writing about twice as many words as I was allowed to put in it and having to cut it down by sort of half. But it really, it, it really was what I wanted to say.
It was really what was in my mind and, and I wanted it to be helpful. And so that was the first one in 2017. And then the next one was Run Well: Essential Health Questions and Answers for Runners. And that was 2021. I think I should, I’m terrible with dates. I think it’s 21. And that was, that was after I spent a lot of time in the running community.
I’d done a lot of talks, a lot of social media, a lot of blogs, et cetera, et cetera. And I was getting asked the same kind of questions over and over again. And it was interesting because it made me realise that even though I had been a GP. I didn’t know a lot of the health answers to the questions that runners had because I didn’t know those questions existed.
And it wasn’t until I went through the journey of becoming a runner and running, then I realised I had questions about health that, that I thought a doctor would be able to answer. But you, I’d asked friends who were doctors and they’d be like, oh, I don’t know. I wasn’t taught anything about that. So that book to me was trying to yeah, bring up every question I’d ever been asked or ever thought about myself about running, for men and women, and putting it all in one place. And a lot of that, obviously there’s a lot evidence for a lot of the answers, but for some of it, it was just trying to extrapolate what was known and put it into sort of a running context to, so people could learn more about their bodies, learn about the physiology and the anatomy and then all the common issues that sort of crop up.
So a lot of runners have said to me, they use it like a reference book and they just kind of have it on the side. And when things crop up, they know that, they’ll find, they’ll find the answer in there. So that was the second one, which is, yeah, purely for runners, but men and women, yeah, and kind of my I say gift makes it sound a bit, but yeah, just trying to create something useful for the running community.
And number three is yes, I’ve just handed it in and it should be out next spring. I can say a little bit about it, but it’s about running and menopause. So again, it’s me sort of using my own experience, my own journey, but also all the, the experience of women around me in the running groups I belong to in the people that are on my newsletter or the questions that all come up and trying to create something that’s useful for women who are either already runners or want to start running wherever you are in the running journey. And put that into the context of menopause because as we’ve sort of discussed, menopause throws up lots of symptoms that make exercise and running very, very difficult. And a lot of women stop running or reduce their running, at a time when I very passionately feel that they should be, that they need it the most.
So that’s what I’ve tried to do in this third book. So hopefully I’ve hit the mark. Let’s, let’s see. Yeah.
Le’Nise Brothers: Yeah. Congratulations, firstly. It’s a feat to write one book, but to now have written three books is, it’s a wonderful, amazing thing. And so you said that that’s coming out next spring?
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Yes. I’m not sure if it’s March or April 26. Okay. But I’ll get the date soon, I hope.
Le’Nise Brothers: Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay, great. So definitely check that out next, next spring. So for listeners who want to find out more about you and what you do, where can they get in touch with you?
Dr Juliet McGrattan: So I’ll just send you to my website.
Really, it does need like reworking, that’s on my to-do list. But anyway, it’s there at the moment, which is drjulietmcgrattan.com. And then I’ve got lots of tabs for the books and the blogs and the newsletter and all the different things that, that I do. So, I have a weekly newsletter for women that are in menopause who are active, particularly for runners, which I absolutely love writing every week. Just share things that I’ve learned or what I’m doing or things that I’ve read, things that I think would be useful. And I really, I really enjoy doing that. So if that, if you’re in that kind of space, then yeah head there.
Le’Nise Brothers: Okay, great. And then all the links will be in the show notes.
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Thank you.
Le’Nise Brothers: What’s the one thought that you’d like to leave listeners with today?
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Ooh, gosh. I would say it’s very easy to become resentful or to fall out of love with your body at different times in life, particularly when things get harder through periods, through pregnancy, through menopause, et cetera. And you can find yourself battling against your body and trying to, to fight it.
And I feel, and it’s been, a process that I’ve had to go through as well, but to feel much more accepting of it and to love it and to learn to work with it and be kind to it and think, what can I do that’s, what do I need? What can I do that will make things a little bit better rather than constantly feel like you’re battling it?
Which is easier to say than it is to do. But I think there are little steps that we can all do in terms of self-care and eating well and moving well and, and just trying to be grateful for what our body can do for us. And I think when it comes to running particularly, I’m amazed at at what it can do.
You know, I’m in my fifties and I can still run lots and recover well. And I’m so grateful to it for that. That’s on top of, of course, giving birth to children and all those incredible things. Our bodies really are completely amazing. And we need to always remember that they’re on our team.
Yeah. And battling against them isn’t always the best thing to do.
Le’Nise Brothers: Yeah. I love that. I love that. Thank you so much for coming onto the show. It’s been wonderful speaking to you today.
Dr Juliet McGrattan: Thank you very much for having me. Anytime. It’s lovely to chat.