Practices for women
in midlife
A growing collection of free resources - guided practices, reflective tools, and audio guides - created for women navigating the second half of life.
The Magnifying Glass
There is a voice that shows up in the mirror. It does not wait to be invited - it arrives the moment you look, and it goes straight to what is wrong. This practice is for the woman who can say all the right things about self-acceptance - and still flinch at the mirror.
- What the Magnifying Glass is and how it works
- Four reflective questions to trace your own pattern
- Why midlife adds a particular layer to the way women see themselves
- A short guided audio: the Mindful Mirror Practice
What Are You Actually Feeling?
For the feelings that keep returning, in the same situations, with more force than the situation seems to call for. The one parent. The one colleague. The kind of conversation where you can already feel yourself bracing before it begins. This guide gives you the framework I would offer in a first session, written down.
- The four kinds of emotion in plain language
- Two worksheets to apply the framework to your own life
- Why insight alone often does not change a feeling
- A short guided audio practice
Meet Your Inner Critic
For most of your life you have probably thought the voice in your head was you. The one that arrives first thing in the morning, catalogues every small mistake, scolds you for resting, for asking, for needing. This guide is a clinical introduction to who it is, why silencing it does not work, and what does.
- Part 1: a two-day Noticing Diary - catch the voice in the act, in its own words
- Part 2: the clinical guide - what the critic actually is, the four types, why silencing it does not work
- A short grounding and naming practice
- The first step toward the inner ally
Looking for a symptom-focused assessment?
My reflection tool above focuses on the existential and identity dimensions of midlife transition. For physical, cognitive, and mood symptoms specifically related to the perimenopausal transition, there are several validated clinical questionnaires used in research worldwide. These are not designed by me - they are established tools you can complete on your own:
- Menopause Rating Scale (MRS) - 11 items, widely validated. Covers psychological, somatic, and urogenital symptoms. Official MRS PDF (Berlin Centre for Epidemiology)
- Greene Climacteric Scale - 21 items, UK standard. Covers psychological, somatic, vasomotor, and sexual symptoms. PDF copy
- Australasian Menopause Society symptom checker - quick, accessible self-check. menopause.org.au
- The Menopause Charity - UK-based, evidence-led information and resources. themenopausecharity.org
If your scores on any of these are concerning, the next step is a conversation with your GP or a menopause specialist - not a self-managed plan from a website.