Oprah and Dr. Sharon Malone on Everything You Need to Know About Menopause

Dr. Sharon Malone, menopause expert, Chief Medical Advisor Alloy Women's Health, and author of the New York Times bestseller, "Grown Woman Talk," joins “The Oprah Podcast” to explain everything you need to know about this natural stage of life that impacts 1 billion women worldwide. Actress Naomi Watts, who writes about her menopausal journey in "Dare I Say It," will also join the conversation to share how she has learned to navigate her marriage, career and motherhood while also dealing with perimenopause. Dr. Malone will give you a greater understanding of the science behind menopause including what it is, why it happens, when it starts and how long it lasts. She will also discuss why women experience such a wide range of symptoms, why hormone fluctuations happen and why hormone replacement therapy can help. Dr. Malone answers questions from women in the throes of menopause including how to deal with workplace bias, how to manage drenching night sweats, what causes those unpredictable mood swings and what we can do to prevent dementia and Alzheimer’s as we age. Alloy Women's Health is a direct to consumer digital healthcare company revolutionizing the way women age by offering education, expertise, and safe, science-backed solutions for perimenopause & menopause symptoms, skincare, sexual health, gut health and more. Treatment plans are customized and everything is delivered with free shipping. Alloy customers receive unlimited follow-up care with their menopause-trained physician through the duration of their active prescription and access to community through member support groups and more all from the convenience of their home. BUY THE BOOK! “Grown Woman Talk” by Dr. Sharon Malone, published by Crown Publishing, is now available wherever books are sold. The paperback version will be available on April 8, 2025. https://amzn.to/4z4KHLm Alloy offers a fast, easy, and 100% digital solution to help women find guidance and treatments wherever they are. Being with Alloy is like having a menopause doctor in one's pocket. https://www.myalloy.com/ https://www.myalloy.com/%20 Follow Oprah Winfrey on Social: https://www.instagram.com/oprah/ https://www.facebook.com/oprahwinfrey/ Listen to the full podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/0tEVrfNp92a7lbjDe6GMLI https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-oprah-podcast/id1782960381

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Oprah Winfrey?

  Thank you all for joining the Oprah Podcast and for watching us on YouTube. I appreciate you taking the time to spend it here with me. And I am just so appreciative of the conversations we're having about things that impact all of our lives. And I'm guessing you all have been hearing a lot about menopause these days. But the more I talk about it, the more I realize we need a menopause 101 because there's still so much, there's so much confusion still out there. And we need reliable information and we need facts. Menopause is not a disease or a disorder, but a natural part of aging that all women born with ovaries will eventually experience. Menopause occurs when a woman has gone 12 months without a period,

• 0:44Oprah Winfrey?

  which means her ovaries have stopped producing hormones and her body is no longer capable of reproduction. For most women, menopause occurs between the ages of 45 and 55. But before you enter menopause, your body will go through a transitional period known as paramenopause, which can begin as early as your mid-30s. Paramenopause can last anywhere from four to 10 years and may include symptoms like hot flashes, fatigue, mood swings, dry skin, dry everything, and low libido. To help us understand more about the menopausal journey, I invited Dr. Sharon Malone to the podcast. Dr. Malone has been a pioneer and nationally renowned expert in menopause

• 1:29Oprah Winfrey?

  for over three decades. She is the chief medical advisor for Alloy Women's Health and the New York Times bestselling author, A Grown Woman Talk.

• 1:41Oprah Winfrey?

  So happy to have you here, Dr. Malone.

• 1:43Speaker 01

  Thank you so much for having me, Oprah.

• 1:45Oprah Winfrey?

  You know, it's what we were saying before, that I feel like I've been talking about it and talking about it and talking about it. And you say you talk about it. It's every day. And then there's still all these people who... Have never heard about menopause and what it means for all of our lives.

• 2:02Speaker 01

  Right, you know, even for the women who are out there who are currently going through menopause, they haven't heard this conversation.

• 2:08Oprah Winfrey?

  I know.

• 2:09Speaker 01

  And there's another 6,000 women every day going into menopause. And so the backfill is constant because there are people that just haven't had this conversation, not with their doctors, not with their mothers, and not even with their friends.

• 2:23Oprah Winfrey?

  So I'm hoping those of you who are seeing this, if you're watching for yourself, that you pass it on to somebody who you also know needs it. Let's start by you explaining the four stages of women's reproductive and post-reproductive lives. Can you walk us through what they are?

• 2:41Speaker 01

  Yes, the first-

• 2:41Oprah Winfrey?

  You do that very well in Grown Talk, but I want you to share it with people who haven't read the book yet.

• 2:45Speaker 01

  I would love to. The first stage that we're all familiar with is your pre-menopausal phase, and that really starts at puberty. And that encompasses the, your reproductive life, your, the peak reproductive years, which start somewhere at 12, 13, and it goes to women when they're early 30s. That's pre-menopause. So when we're talking about that, that's the concern. Then when you become perimenopausal, that is that amorphous phase between being your peak reproductive years and the end of your reproductive years. And the end of reproduction really starts at menopause. So there's this great space in between the perimenopausal years where you start to

• 3:29Speaker 01

  have some of the symptoms of menopause, but you're still having your periods, sometimes regularly, sometimes not. But all of the things that we normally associate-

• 3:41Oprah Winfrey?

  Isn't the sometimes regularly and sometimes not a real indication that you're in peri?

• 3:45Speaker 01

  Yes, because sometimes for women, that's the-

• 3:48Oprah Winfrey?

  So you're not in menopause until it has stopped?

• 3:50Speaker 01

  You are not in menopause officially until you have had your last period. And how do you know when you've had your last period? Well, you know you're in menopause when it's, you've gone 12 full months and you've not had another period. Then it's official, you are menopausal. But what's confusing for women is that in-between state because it can start as early as your mid-30s. And it can go on until you've had your last period. And that can go on from anywhere from four to 10 years for women. And that's where I think a lot of the confusion comes in. Because if you're having your period and having hot flashes, well, then, and you go to your doctor, or you're having sleeplessness or mood disturbances, and you go to your doctor,

• 4:35Speaker 01

  and the first question they ask you is, well, when was your last period? And if it was last month, they immediately get off the conversation of perimenopause or menopause. So all of the symptoms that we typically associate with menopause that people are familiar with, like hot flashes, mood swings, sleeplessness, painful sex, can start in perimenopause. And women think of menopause as something that happens to old ladies.

• 5:02Oprah Winfrey?

  Exactly.

• 5:03Speaker 01

  The average age is 51. But a 35-year-old having these symptoms is very much in that menopausal transition, that in-between state.

• 5:13Oprah Winfrey?

  That could go on for another 10, 15 years.

• 5:15Speaker 01

  It can go on for another 10 years. And I think what is also confusing is that when women say, all right, so we've got pre-menopause, perimenopause, menopause, and post-menopause. And I don't really like the term post-menopause because it implies that at some point you're over it.

• 5:33Oprah Winfrey?

  You're done.

• 5:34Speaker 01

  You're not over it.

• 5:35Oprah Winfrey?

  You're never over it.

• 5:35Speaker 01

  You're never over it. And people think that because your hot flashes stopped, or you didn't have hot flashes, that you didn't have menopause. And I'm saying, yes, you did.

• 5:46Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes, you did.

• 5:46Speaker 01

  Yes, you did.

• 5:47Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes, because menopause is, what I've learned, it is, it is losing the eggs. So you no longer have eggs. You have automatically gone into menopause.

• 5:59Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 5:59Oprah Winfrey?

  That's right.

• 6:00Speaker 01

  But there are other ways that women can go through menopause other than just the natural process that happens.

• 6:06Oprah Winfrey?

  But the natural process is losing your eggs. Which means you are no longer able to produce a child.

• 6:11Speaker 01

  Absolutely no longer fertile. And sometimes it's not just the complete loss of eggs, it's the loss of function of your eggs. Because the other thing that happens that people don't talk enough about during perimenopause is that there's a change in your fertility. Because when you're perimenopausal, when you're 40, you still have eggs, you're still having your period, but your fertility is not what it was at 20. It's not what it was at 25.

• 6:37Oprah Winfrey?

  Because you've already lost eggs.

• 6:39Speaker 01

  It's not because you've lost them. It's because they are less responsive.

• 6:43Oprah Winfrey?

  Oh, they're less functional.

• 6:44Speaker 01

  They're less functional. And I'll give you an example. I like to say for you're born with all the eggs you're ever going to have. You don't get any more, you don't make any more. And then over time, you ovulate some, but you're not losing them because you've run out of them. You only ovulate about 500 times in your lifetime, but you had a million when you were born. Those eggs become less functional. And every woman has a different expiration date stamped on your eggs. So you don't know, are my eggs going to last until I'm 45? Or are they going to expire when I'm 35? And that's why we start to see the fertility changes.

• 7:26Speaker 01

  And for each individual, when you reach the end of that road, it's going to be different from person to person.

• 7:34Oprah Winfrey?

  I thank you for taking the time out of your busy day to listen to this episode about our health and well-being. We'll have more of my conversation about menopause with the author of Grown Woman Talk, Dr. Sharon Malone, after these messages. Welcome back to more of my conversation with Dr. Sharon Malone about the latest science on menopause. I want to bring in actress and activist Naomi Watts to this conversation. She too has a new book, Dare I Say It: Everything I Wish I'd Known About Menopause. It's a New York Times bestseller. Naomi, I hear you're on set. Thank you for joining us.

• 8:07Speaker 01

  Thank you for having me, Oprah.

• 8:09Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes, what was the inspiration for you to write it? Because you were going through it or had been through it?

• 8:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was told at 36, when I was trying to start a family, that I was going to be going into early menopause and that I was close to it and probably wouldn't be able to have children naturally. So it sent panic through me. I had heard from my mother long ago. I remember that she had said I went into menopause at 45, but I

• 8:36Speaker 02

  I didn't know she had a multitude of symptoms that carried for years and years. So again, to Dr. Malone's point, hi Sharon. Um, it, there's just was no conversations anywhere, not, um, no preparation with your doctor. No real details from your mother and certainly friends weren't talking about it.

• 8:59Oprah Winfrey?

  And which symptoms were the most frustrating for you?

• 9:05Speaker 02

  Well, I, I had been having night sweats and ticking those medical questions, those boxes. Um, for night sweats for several years before the doctor told me that. Um, so that meant I had disrupted sleep, uh, which can lead to all kinds of things, anxiety, depression. Um, I had, I certainly had brain fog, um, and I had, um, migraines. And then the worst one that was kind of intolerable was dry skin. Because I was on camera all the time and it wasn't just dry. But it was itchy and aggravated and red and sensitive all the time and. Being, um, under hot lights and makeup, everything aggravated it. So.

• 9:50Speaker 02

  And I didn't know that was connected to menopause at all. I went to multiple dermatologists who gave me ointments. Which worked for a day or two, but then the same thing would just keep cycling.

• 10:01Oprah Winfrey?

  Was HRT hormone replacement therapy recommended to you?

• 10:06Speaker 02

  Yes, it was and very early on and I mercifully because my doctor understood it. Um, and he gave me the full, um, education. You know, as I understand it, still to this day, doctors are gatekeeping, um, that because of the bad studies. In two thousand and two, um, but I, my doctor was ahead of the curve and this, I've been on. HRT successfully and safely for over ten years.

• 10:36Oprah Winfrey?

  I know we're going to talk about HRTs with Dr. Malone because there is so much confusion, misconception about HRTs. I've been on them for, I think, now, well, for, whenever I was 54, is when I went on HRT. So I, I, I believe them. What is HRT? Can you explain that, Dr. Malone?

• 10:56Speaker 01

  Yes. Hormone replacement therapy, typically, it, it is comprised of estrogen, which is the secret sauce in hormone replacement therapy, and progestin, which is the second hormone that you take when you have an intact uterus. Now, for women who've had hysterectomies and don't need to have the progestin, you can just take estrogen alone. But most of what we associate with the symptomatic relief really comes from the estrogen component of HRT.

• 11:24Oprah Winfrey?

  And I hear some women are also now taking a little bit of testosterone also.

• 11:27Speaker 01

  Yes, they are. And, you know, but all of the studies that have been done, really, basically, are with estrogen and progestin. We are sort of behind the curve. We're finding out a lot more about testosterone because women make testosterone, too. And I think that that's sort of the, the misconception, is that, well, estrogen is a female hormone and testosterone is a male hormone. And that is not true. Women make almost as much testosterone in the course of our reproductive lives as we make estrogen. That's really responsible for, that's sex drive that you get right around mid-cycle. So, we're coming back around to understanding that maybe there should be more to hormone replacement therapy than just estrogen and progestin. But we need a lot more studies about that.

• 12:12Oprah Winfrey?

  Okay, we're going to talk more about that. But in your book, I think this is really an interesting aspect, Naomi, because in your book, Chapter 12 is titled "Men o' Boss", and "How to Deal with Ageism in the Workplace". What advice would you give menopausal women who... I think in many cases, start to feel invisible at work and also feel a level of embarrassment and shame about going through this change because there is no understood that, number one, they don't understand it and the culture doesn't understand it.

• 12:50Speaker 02

  I would say the first step is communication and then education, like owning your story and sharing it with those around you. We come with experience. The workplace needs us there, whatever industry we're talking about. So it's important to own your story and say what it is that you're going through so people know how to behave and help. I find most of the time, people want to be, they're curious and they want to act with compassion. So for me, it certainly felt like a big risk to tell my story. But once I named it and owned

• 13:32Speaker 02

  it, I feel nothing but embrace, actually, for my industry, despite the fact that I was told I should conceal my secret.

• 13:42Oprah Winfrey?

  Yeah, I'm so happy to hear that's changing. We all know your husband is actor and producer Billy Crudup. In the book, you write about honest conversations you've had with him. I'm not going into details today, but what's your advice for women who have not talked to the men in their lives about this? I mean,

• 13:59Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 14:00Oprah Winfrey?

  It was one of your earlier conversations with him.

• 14:03Speaker 02

  Yes, I think that is the real sign of intimacy, to be able to share your truth, no matter how vulnerable it makes you feel. And as I said before, even not just in the workplace, but your partner, your life partner. And obviously, I had to share this with Billy at a very, very early stage, much more earlier, early than I was prepared for. But I just was like, ah, what am I going to do? Like, am I going to hide? No. And it was met with compassion and curiosity. And, you know, he wanted to help. And that sort of opened up me in ways that led me To start a company, um, Stripes Beauty,

• 14:46Speaker 02

  which is creating hydration from scalp to vag. And then led me to having the confidence to write the book. Um, and then the book I did, um, I wrote because it was the the manual, the guide that I wished I'd had when I was flailing around trying to navigate bits of information from wherever I'd go.

• 15:09Oprah Winfrey?

  So tell us a bit about this wellness brand you created, Stripes Beauty, from scalp to vag. What, what has been the response?

• 15:16Speaker 02

  It's been amazing, Oprah. Honestly, um, I've been, you know, out on the streets and, and stopped by people who I think they're gonna ask me, um, for a selfie because they've seen me in King Kong or the ring or something. And they, in fact, are coming at me with tears in their eyes and joy, saying, thank you for giving me the dialogue, the permission to speak with my partner, my family, and making it easier by sharing your story. So, and also, thanks for the vag of honor because now the walls of my vagina are, um, are not so, um, dry and sensitive and.

• 16:01Oprah Winfrey?

  Can you tell me what has been the most delightful surprise for you about sex post age 50? And how does your company Stripes play into that?

• 16:11Speaker 02

  Well, I think we're more experienced at everything and we know what we want and what we like and don't like. And I think at this age, you just are more, you know, leaning into that truth and, and more authentic and just say, able to say, you know, sorry, I've just got to get the lube. Um, or, you know, let's, let's do it this way, you know? And I think, um, there's something very sexy about a woman who knows what she wants. And we still have desire. We just need to get a little bit more organized.

• 16:47Oprah Winfrey?

  Well, dare I say, thank you for joining us again. Okay, Naomi, I know you have to get back to work. Thank you for joining us. This is one of the many reasons I love Zoom. Thank you for taking the time out of your workday schedule to be with us. Thank you. All right. Well, I just want to make sure that everyone understands that this is a natural cycle of life.

• 17:07Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 17:08Oprah Winfrey?

  You say this in Grown Women Talk. Not a disease, and the hormonal changes during perimenopause are as significant as those in puberty and in pregnancy. So imagine going into puberty and not knowing anything about what's going to happen to your body, which a lot of us women did. Nobody had said anything about what a period is and what the hormones were going to do and all of that. And so many women are experiencing the same going into menopause because their doctors don't even know. There's a lack of an awareness and information from doctors. From what I've learned from you and other doctors, it's not even taught in medical school.

• 17:45Speaker 01

  You know, it used to be. And let me say, because, you know, I'm in the old group of people. And, you know, the study that really changed everything in 2002, the Women's Health Initiative, really did an about-face on the conversation about menopause. Because, let me just say, women have been going through menopause for as long as we've been alive.

• 18:05Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes.

• 18:06Speaker 01

  The only thing that's changed historically is that more of us are living long enough to get to this phase of life. But women have complained about menopause forever. But it was thought to be, you know, women just being hysterical with the symptoms, or you're losing your mind. Women would go to sanitariums at that point.

• 18:27Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes, yes, yes.

• 18:28Speaker 01

  Where, because of the mental illness and the distress that it caused women. But we have known how to treat the symptoms of menopause since 1942. That was when the first estrogen product was introduced. That was Primorin. And so women have been using hormones since 1942, those who had access and the awareness of it. But it really changed everything in 2002.

• 18:57Oprah Winfrey?

  In 2002.

• 18:58Speaker 01

  In 2002.

• 18:59Oprah Winfrey?

  Okay.

• 18:59Speaker 01

  I was taught about menopause and what to do about it. And then from 2002 on, doctors who were trained didn't really get that information because...

• 19:08Oprah Winfrey?

  Yeah, I was talking to doctors. Dr. Haver, who was saying she had an hour of training about it, a discussion about it, and was in another session that lasted six hours. So you come out of medical school with seven hours of training. So since 2002, doctors have been trained about it. And obviously, so many doctors even, I think, are still confused about the Women's Health Initiative study done in 2002, which said, can you, can you clear that up for us?

• 19:37Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 19:37Oprah Winfrey?

  To understand what actually happened.

• 19:39Speaker 01

  You know, it's a...

• 19:41Oprah Winfrey?

  This is one of the reasons. The reason why this is so important is because this 2002 study is the reason why so many people are afraid of hormone replacement therapy.

• 19:53Speaker 01

  Exactly. In a nutshell, you know, as I told you, 1942, we've been treating women who had, who were symptomatic during menopause, typically the hot flashes and the mood swings, with an estrogen product. It worked. So when, as we sort of got more women who were taking hormones, we found that there were some tweaks that need to be made along the way and added the progestin component to it. Because remember, estrogen and progestin go together.

• 20:18Oprah Winfrey?

  Have to go together if you have a uterus, yeah.

• 20:20Speaker 01

  So we knew that it treated the symptoms of menopause. That wasn't, that wasn't new news. But what we found was that there was a nurses' study where they just looked at a group of healthy nurses, young women, and watched them through menopause. And what they found is that the women who took estrogen therapy or HRT had half the risk of heart disease than women who didn't, the nurses who didn't take hormones. So imagine, now the thought was, okay, we're not only relieving the symptoms, but we are actually decreasing the risk of cardiovascular disease by 50%. Well, that would be a blockbuster, right? But you couldn't prove it because it was just an observational study.

• 21:03Speaker 01

  So the Women's Health Initiative that was really initiated in 1991, the purpose of it was to sort of solidify that finding. Does hormone therapy really reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease by 50%? That was the central question. So we do a study, largest study ever in the history of NIH, specifically for women. So they recruited women in the study that were anywhere from 50 to 79 years old. The majority of the women, 90% of the women, were over age 55. So it's not surprising that when they looked at the women, they said, well, there's really no difference here.

• 21:46Speaker 01

  We don't see any improvement in the cardiovascular. It was like the same whether you took it or not, because they were starting it on women who were too old. So that was problem number one with the study design. The second part was that when they were looking, they said, well, let's have some safety stops. Let's make sure that women aren't having an increase in breast cancer because of this estrogen. Because that was the thought.

• 22:10Oprah Winfrey?

  This is the point that got everybody, made everybody nuts.

• 22:14Speaker 01

  So when they got to about five years in the study and they looked into the data to see, how is this coming? There was this dramatic press conference that they held because not only did they not see the expected decrease in cardiovascular disease, but they saw a slight increased risk in breast cancer.

• 22:33Oprah Winfrey?

  From these 60 to 79-year-old women.

• 22:35Speaker 01

  From these women who were on average 63 years old, more than 10 years after menopause. So when you hold a press conference, and it's dramatic, and they stop the study, hold the presses, and they say, not only does hormone therapy not improve your cardiac profile, it increases the risk of breast cancer. And when they said that, I mean, women who were taking hormones happily.

• 23:05Oprah Winfrey?

  Abandoned them.

• 23:06Speaker 01

  Overnight.

• 23:07Oprah Winfrey?

  Well, I would understand why. Because I remember, I was doing the Oprah Show when this happened, and it was a big announcement, and everybody was like, oh, that's it.

• 23:16Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 23:17Oprah Winfrey?

  Uh, hormone replacement therapy is dangerous, it causes cancer. And now what we're hearing, what I hear you saying, and I've heard other doctors say, this was a flawed study.

• 23:28Speaker 01

  It was a very much misinterpreted study. Because if you had said, I don't disagree. Okay, your data is your data. If you start women on hormone therapy later in life, you're not going to prevent their heart disease. I think that's probably true. The problem is that they generalize that data to everybody. Well, what about a 50-year-old? Well, what about if I start it when I'm 45? Whenever I'm menopausal, because that's when we clinically would start it. That's a very different outcome. And that was the misinterpretation of taking very limited findings and applying it to everyone.

• 24:09Oprah Winfrey?

  But it became the narrative. It's what people believe. It's the reason why my best friend still won't do an HRT, because she's like, she wrote about her in the book, still won't do an HRT because she's like, I don't know. I think it causes cancer.

• 24:24Speaker 01

  It has been, when you say the words breast cancer to women, I think that is their number one fear, is breast cancer. Despite the fact that the number one cause of death in women is cardiovascular disease. It is more than all cancers combined and all accidental causes of death for women.

• 24:45Oprah Winfrey?

  And do we know for sure that HRT, that hormone replacement therapy, helps now cardiovascular issues with women?

• 24:52Speaker 01

  There is everything. When you take that same data, the largest study ever done, and you exclude the women who are older and only apply it to the women who are under 60,

• 25:05Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes.

• 25:06Speaker 01

  and within 10 years of menopause, guess what they find? The same findings that we had from the observational study, that the cumulative data says that if you start hormone therapy within 10 years of your last period or before age 60, you decrease the risk of cardiovascular disease by anywhere from 30 to 50%.

• 25:27Oprah Winfrey?

  Wow.

• 25:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, wow.

• 25:31Oprah Winfrey?

  Wow. We've got people joining us on Zoom with questions. Tricia and her husband Stephen are joining us from Edina, Minnesota. What's going on with you, Trish?

• 25:41Speaker 03

  I would say my perimenopausal symptoms started about two years ago. I was 47. I didn't know that that's what was happening. But I had a 90-day period that was so heavy, I really thought I might have uterine cancer. I was really freaked out. Went to my doctor, got checked out, and she said, I think this might be the beginning of perimenopause, and suggested I try an IUD, which I did, which was great for a while. But then I started experiencing the most intense night sweats. I mean, really, just waking up, feeling like I had 104 fever, whole-body shakes, soaked

• 26:23Speaker 03

  through to the mattress pad, trying not to wake up my husband, you know, putting a towel down. And then, you know, consequently, having tons of daytime fog the next day and just feeling really, really bad about that. So I went to my doctor, who is great and who I love, and she just kind of said to me, yeah, well, that's perimenopause. And I remember saying to her, well, okay, is there, what should I do? And at the time, she said, well, this is just kind of, it's kind of to gut through it. And I said, are there blood tests or, you know, anything that could measure this for me? And she said, no, your hormones really fluctuate a lot, so we can't really do those tests. So I left feeling like, oh, my God, I guess this is just my future.

• 27:06Speaker 03

  It just all felt so haphazard to me and sort of nebulous, especially as someone who gets their physical every year, gets their mammogram, you know, colonoscopies right on schedule. This, this issue, to me, felt like, oh, my gosh, it doesn't feel like there's a rulebook here.

• 27:22Oprah Winfrey?

  Yeah, that's, I think, how so many women feel. And I'm so happy to see Stephen standing or sitting by your side in support of, I know, I know you told the producers, Stephen, that if men went through menopause, things would be much different. How do you think?

• 27:40Speaker 04

  I mean, it's ridiculous when you get into it because, you know, I don't know anything about it. My mom didn't talk to me about it. When Tricia started describing her symptoms to me, I know that if there was symptoms anywhere from really annoying to, you know, debilitating over a course of, you know, there's tens of millions of women in the United States alone who are going through this, there would be a pill. There would be some kind of salve or poultice, something would be available.

• 28:07Oprah Winfrey?

  They would have figured it out.

• 28:08Speaker 04

  Yeah, if it was a men's problem, we'd have this solved already. So it was really hard to, you know, again, just support Tricia as she went through it just to figure it out.

• 28:16Oprah Winfrey?

  What did you think was happening? What did you think was happening? Since Trish didn't know what was happening, and I know, I don't know many men who've been raised with any idea of what it is.

• 28:25Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, it's really, well, and a lot of it's hidden from us, right? So, you know, Trisha's, Trisha's a strong mother. She's doing things all the time. She's super energetic. Um, and so a lot of it's hidden. She's, you know, she kept her symptoms to herself. When we started to talk about it, the thing that kind of triggered for me is she goes through periods of, I would call it weariness. She's not tired. She's weary. Like, we get to the end of the day, and that's it.

• 28:49Oprah Winfrey?

  So she has to shut it down, right? She just has to shut it down, is what I heard you say.

• 28:54Speaker 04

  It's, it's over. Um, and so that's really the thing that struck me the most about it. But as Trisha, and she's really open with me about it, which has been great, just to understand her and see if I can support her some way. But it's really, it's, it's hidden to, to men, for sure. I mean, you know, and I assume I'm like, I just.

• 29:11Oprah Winfrey?

  So what is your question for Dr. Malone, Trish?

• 29:13Speaker 03

  My question is, I understand that the absence of a period for 12 months or longer is sort of the definition of, okay, you've been through menopause. But my question is, now that I have an IUD and I don't have a, a period every month, how is someone like me supposed to kind of know where they are in the process, especially because it's not like there are these blood tests that can sort of say, okay, here's your marker and here's where you are in this whole thing?

• 29:39Speaker 01

  That is an excellent question because as I said, that perimenopausal period is the part that is most confusing for women.

• 29:46Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes.

• 29:47Speaker 01

  Because, but I would say this as a rule of thumb, if you are between the ages of 35 and 45 and you are having any one or any combination of those 34 symptoms that we associate with menopause, hot flashes, mood swings, sleeplessness, painful sex, irregular heavy periods, brain fog, if you have any of those things, in no particular order.

• 30:11Oprah Winfrey?

  And you list the 34 symptoms in Grown Woman Talk, yes.

• 30:14Speaker 01

  Then you are perimenopausal. Now, the question then becomes, well, I'm still having my period, and this is the part that really makes my head explode, because there are still doctors out there who are saying, well, you're not menopausal yet because it hasn't been 12 months since your last period.

• 30:30Oprah Winfrey?

  Right.

• 30:31Speaker 01

  That's ridiculous. You should be treated when you are symptomatic. And no one can tell you when your symptoms are intolerable, but you know. And that's the point at which you should engage and ask someone to please fix this for me. And to be honest with you, we do know what the answer is. It's not like we're waiting to figure out for someone to discover something. It's hormone therapy in some form or fashion. And we may use different types and different dosages for women who are perimenopausal than when they are after, when they've had their 12 months of no period. The doses may change, the types may change, but the concept is still the same. You treat a hormonal issue with hormones.

• 31:16Speaker 01

  And you, and that's why we say hormone replacement. Some people don't like that phase, but I'm old, so I still say hormone replacement.

• 31:22Oprah Winfrey?

  You've been on hormones for 15 years.

• 31:24Speaker 01

  I've been on hormones for 15 years. And I knew exactly what was happening, and I was like, okay, well, that's enough of that. And just go right on.

• 31:31Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes.

• 31:32Speaker 01

  And I have no intention of stopping unless and until there's a reason, a medical reason, why I should stop hormone therapy. But...

• 31:38Oprah Winfrey?

  And I have read too, that the moment the symptoms start, that's when you start, you need to start getting help, therapy, assistance with it, the moment you get the first symptom.

• 31:50Speaker 01

  Right. When you are bothered, when you are either, you find out that it's either affecting the quality of your life, the quality of your work, the quality of your relationships. When you reach that level, then that is the time that you should seek care. But here's the reality, is as we said, I say it over and over again, there are not enough doctors who are out there who know how to treat menopause and perimenopause. So what's a woman to do when you have read everything that you need to read, and you are clear, and you know exactly what's happening to you, and it's not uncommon for you to go to a doctor's office, and the doctor will tell you, "No," or "I don't believe in hormones," which is not an uncommon thing.

• 32:31Oprah Winfrey?

  I've heard that too.

• 32:32Speaker 01

  "I don't believe in them."

• 32:33Oprah Winfrey?

  "I don't believe in them."

• 32:33Speaker 01

  And that is really why, when I left my private practice, that I, you know, joined the women that I work with at Alloy Women's Health.

• 32:42Oprah Winfrey?

  Aloy.

• 32:42Speaker 01

  Because what it is, is really giving women access, who don't have access to doctors who know what they're doing, or it's too expensive to go to those doctors.

• 32:53Oprah Winfrey?

  Yeah.

• 32:54Speaker 01

  Because you, you know, everyone should have access, in my mind, to the same quality care, whether you live in New York City, or whether you live in New Mexico. It shouldn't matter.

• 33:04Oprah Winfrey?

  Or in Dyma.

• 33:05Speaker 01

  Any Dyma, exactly.

• 33:07Oprah Winfrey?

  Or in Dyma. So are you on hormones?

• 33:10Speaker 03

  I did start the patch, the estradiol patch.

• 33:14Oprah Winfrey?

  Okay.

• 33:15Speaker 03

  I had to kind of go up a few notches, but it really has, is definitely helped with night sweats.

• 33:20Speaker 01

  Right.

• 33:20Speaker 03

  I've seen a big change there.

• 33:22Speaker 01

  And you know, and here's the other thing, is that for people who are just sort of getting into this hormone therapy.

• 33:29Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes.

• 33:30Speaker 01

  Game. A lot of them don't have the experience of knowing what to do. So they give you the answer based on, okay, well, this is what it's supposed to do. But every person's different.

• 33:41Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes. Thank you, Tricia. Thank you, Stephen. Thank you both for joining us. Thank you. I hope it gets better. I hope it gets better.

• 33:49Speaker 01

  Getting there. Thank you.

• 33:50Oprah Winfrey?

  You're getting there. Thank you. My hope is that this conversation with Dr. Sharon Malone will help you become more informed about your own body and menopause, which is a natural part of aging that 1 billion women all over the world are experiencing right now. Stay with us. We'll be back in a moment. I welcome you back to the Oprah Podcast. We're talking with guests who are in the throes of menopause and have questions for our renowned health expert, Dr. Sharon Malone. Kylie is a mom zooming in from Tampa, Florida. Kylie, you say you feel like an alien in your body, and I hear that from a lot of women when we're talking on this subject. An alien in your body. Tell us, what's going on with you?

• 34:29Speaker 05

  I do. Hi, Dr. Malone, thank you so much for your book. It is not just a guide, but it is a travel guide. It is a, you know, we're on a journey here through life, and it is just an incredible book. So, thank you.

• 34:43Oprah Winfrey?

  You were ready for some grown woman talk, right?

• 34:46Speaker 05

  Yes, grown woman talk. It is conversational. I feel like I'm in the room talking to you. So, thank you so much for that book.

• 34:52Oprah Winfrey?

  Yeah.

• 34:53Speaker 05

  This has been going on for a few years, obviously, and that's why I call it a journey, because it took a while to figure out, and you hear that from everyone that you talk to, right? You have these symptoms. You go to the doctor. You're not really getting any answers. And then, it was actually my girlfriends that mentioned to me, hey, you know, maybe you're going through perimenopause. And I was like, I'm not old enough to go through perimenopause. And so, that's kind of how it happened. But, you know, for me, it was dry skin, red skin, brittle hair, headaches, you know, all of those things. And the big thing for me was mood. Your mood, this can render you absolutely powerless.

• 35:38Speaker 05

  And the reason why is because it doesn't just affect you. But it affects the people around you. And so it's the one symptom that actually affects others. And so, you know, I'm constantly asking my family for grace all the time. Because I will say things that, you know, I'm like, did I just really say that? And so it does, it leaves you feeling powerless. So why does menopause impact your mood so much? And, you know, what is it that causes the more anger prone part of the mood?

• 36:10Oprah Winfrey?

  That's a great question.

• 36:12Speaker 01

  You know, that's, you know, when we talk mood, mood encompasses a lot of things. It's anxiety, sometimes it's depression, sometimes it's just mental fatigue or brain fog. And sometimes, weariness.

• 36:27Oprah Winfrey?

  We're hearing with Tricia.

• 36:28Speaker 01

  And sometimes it is irrepressible rage. You can see and hear yourself and say, now, I know that that should not be my response. It is inappropriate for the situation at hand. But you really, what I think is worrisome for women is that they feel out of control.

• 36:46Oprah Winfrey?

  Yeah.

• 36:46Speaker 01

  In that situation. But here's the connection. We think of estrogen and our reproductive hormones as just having to do with reproduction. It's only about our breasts and ovulating and being pregnant. But the reality is our reproductive hormones affect most major organ systems in our body. And what's the one that needs estrogen the most? Our brains. So the areas of our brains that really are responsible for mood, for sleep regulation, for temperature regulation, all of those areas are responsive to estrogen or lack thereof. And when you're in perimenopause, it's not so much that on any one given day,

• 37:30Speaker 01

  you have too little estrogen, some days you have too much, some days you have too little. So it is the wild fluctuations that is really scrambling your brain about how to react to situations. And every woman, every perimenopausal woman I know, has had that feeling where you're talking.

• 37:49Speaker 01

  And right in the middle is just out of your head. And it's very distressing because women think, am I going crazy? And is Alzheimer's on the horizon for me?

• 37:58Oprah Winfrey?

  Yeah.

• 37:59Speaker 01

  And it's just your brain trying to adjust. It's used to regular hormones in a cyclical fashion.

• 38:05Oprah Winfrey?

  Well, it's why a lot of women are put on antidepressants.

• 38:07Speaker 01

  Exactly. That is exactly right.

• 38:09Oprah Winfrey?

  When they really need hormones.

• 38:11Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 38:12Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes.

• 38:12Speaker 01

  Because, you know, if you have never had depression in your life or anxiety in your life, or, and now all of a sudden you have it, that should be the first, second, and third thoughts about what could be causing this.

• 38:25Oprah Winfrey?

  I was depressed and didn't even know it. I was just, I would just reach to, first of all, I could no longer read. I could no longer concentrate on reading. Uh, and I felt like, whatever. Just, I just, I, I was just, my, my, my life went into like a flat line. I just felt like, okay, so what? Whatever. And I now realize that that was a form of depression. Yes.

• 38:49Speaker 01

  Absolutely. And when you add to that, the fact that most women who are perimenopausal are also having other symptoms. It's not just in isolation because you're having hot flashes, you're having night sweats, your sleep is disturbed. All of those things affect your mood as well. Because I can tell you, if you haven't slept in three months, you're not going to be in a good mood the next day. Nor are you going to have any sort of tolerance for that. Or, you know, the fatigue factor comes in. So it's all interrelated. And it is something that we don't really pay enough attention to. And women, a lot of times, will suffer in silence about this because you're afraid to say something. And if your expectation is that this is just what part of being a woman is about.

• 39:35Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes.

• 39:35Speaker 01

  That you're just supposed to suffer. And then as I get older, yes, I'm tired. Yes, I'm fatigued. If you accept that as normal, then you won't seek care. And that, to me, is probably the most heartbreaking thing that women suffer silently.

• 39:50Oprah Winfrey?

  Well, thank you so much. Thank you for joining us and sharing your story. Thank you, Kylie.

• 39:54Speaker 01

  Thank you so much.

• 39:55Oprah Winfrey?

  Thank you. Amina, as a mom of two, joining us from Lawrenceville, Georgia. Hello, Amina. What's going on with you? Hello. Hi. Hi, nice to meet you. Nice to see you.

• 40:06Speaker 06

  Uh, I guess the main thing that I had a big problem with was work. Um, and actually going through the symptoms at work, but my male manager not understanding. Um, like I actually got written up at work for not being in compliance, uniform compliance, because I had my sweater off or unzipped and

• 40:33Oprah Winfrey?

  Your sweater's off because you're hot, right? You're flashing.

• 40:37Speaker 06

  Well, yes, like, I mean, it was, it was ridiculous and it kind of got me because I'm like, um, hello, I'm 54. I had to remind this person like how old I am and it, it still didn't matter. Um, so my family says I'm in denial of, of being in menopause because my symptoms have been all over the place or up and down or not have, like, I don't wake up wet or

• 41:05Oprah Winfrey?

  So you think it's because you don't have that, you're not going through it?

• 41:09Speaker 06

  I don't, well, I don't have that and, and a couple of other things, right? But then I just heard you say

• 41:14Oprah Winfrey?

  You sit at work with a fan on your phone. Girl, you sit at work with a fan on your phone and taking your sweater off because you can't be in a uniform and you don't think you're going through it?

• 41:23Speaker 06

  Because it lasts like five minutes. The other people are like, oh, my God, this is so much.

• 41:28Oprah Winfrey?

  Okay, let, let, okay, we need some grown woman talk with you right now. All right.

• 41:32Speaker 06

  I know, I need to read that book.

• 41:34Oprah Winfrey?

  Have at it, have at it.

• 41:36Speaker 01

  Every woman is going to experience these symptoms, maybe differently. Someone has drenching night sweats, someone has none, someone has a hundred a day, someone has two. That, but once you start to realize that this is a problem, I'm hot and no one else is in the room that's hot or it's 50 degrees outside, then you must say, hmm, maybe this is perimenopause. But let me just say that you said you're in denial because there is also the stigma and shame

• 42:05Oprah Winfrey?

  Yeah, I was gonna ask that too.

• 42:07Speaker 01

  You know, like you're afraid

• 42:09Oprah Winfrey?

  The reason why your family is telling you and you don't want to admit it is because you think there's, you are attached to the stigma around it, that it means something.

• 42:17Speaker 06

  It's true.

• 42:18Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes.

• 42:18Speaker 06

  Because I actually, I actually hate the word, oh, I'm flashing. Oh, I just, it just makes me feel so old.

• 42:26Speaker 01

  Well, see, and that's ageism, and then that's just shame around women's bodily functions. But let me say something, because I think it's really important when it comes to women in the workplace. First off, menopause is not a disability. You know, we don't need special dispensations for menopause. What you do need is access to treatment when you are having these symptoms and you are bothered by them. Now, can the workplace be more sensitive and be more aware of the fact that if you are a woman and you are within a certain amount of, you know, certain age range, 100% of your workforce, if they stay there from 45 to 55, we'll go through this, of your female population.

• 43:11Speaker 01

  I mean, that is just taking into account. Think about the things that have changed in the past 20, 25 years. Women, you have breastfeeding rooms now, where you can come in. You could, 50 years ago, you couldn't even be pregnant in the workplace. It is just acknowledging the fact that women, our bodily functions, our physiology is different. It doesn't mean that it's worse.

• 43:35Oprah Winfrey?

  It's a natural phase of growing and maturing.

• 43:38Speaker 01

  It doesn't make you inferior. It doesn't make, because you are having hot flashes, it does not mean that you're old. Because remember, I told you, some women will have symptoms as early as 35. It's just a matter of not allowing yourself to suffer. And once you realize that, again, this is affecting the quality of your work, then this is the time at which you should really engage and get treatment for these things. And don't be embarrassed about it. As a matter of fact, don't be embarrassed. Once you feel better, you should tell your friends. I do that all the time. When I see people, I don't even know them, and I see them and they're like, whoo, and they're fanning. And I will just go up to them and say, girl, you know, we have something for that, right? You don't have to do this for 10 years.

• 44:23Speaker 01

  I don't know, I don't know why we think that suffering is what we should be doing.

• 44:27Oprah Winfrey?

  When, as also, you were mentioning black women. I started, after I started HRT, I started to notice other women in particular who had this, like, they were three notches down from normal. There's this, like, this dullness that comes over. A lot of women who are going through this and don't even recognize that that's what it is. There's a lifelessness, a lack of vitality, a lack of feeling like, you know, I can take on anything in the world. It is, it's a dullness.

• 44:59Speaker 01

  Right, and you don't feel like yourself.

• 45:01Oprah Winfrey?

  And you don't feel like yourself.

• 45:02Speaker 01

  You don't feel like yourself.

• 45:03Oprah Winfrey?

  Or you've been that way so long that that now becomes yourself.

• 45:06Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 45:07Oprah Winfrey?

  Yes.

• 45:07Speaker 01

  You know, but one of the things that we found out too, from the study of women across the nation, just observing women as they go through this process, is that they did break it down by ethnic groups and they looked at white women, black women, and Asian women, and what they found is that black women go through menopause on average about a year, almost a year earlier than white women do. Their symptoms start sooner and that transition, as I told you, that perimenopausal phase can last anywhere from four to 10 years. For black women, it's on the 10-year end of that spectrum. So can you imagine for 10 years before you've had your last menstrual period, hot flashes, mood swings, all of these things that you talked about,

• 45:51Speaker 01

  and then you get to menopause and you're like, ooh, had my last period. Well, no one told your body that, okay, well, we're done with that now. Then you can still have hot flashes and all those things for another decade after that. And let me tell you, that has, that has huge.

• 46:08Oprah Winfrey?

  Get your fan or get your hormones, okay?

• 46:12Speaker 01

  But let me say, hot flashes, the thing that I want to say, hot flashes are not benign. It's not just annoying, and they're not funny. They actually are harbingers sometimes of long-term health implications of menopause, such as increased risk for cardiovascular disease, such as increased risk for weight gain, for hypertension, for, you know, all of these long-term things that we talk about. A hot flash is sometimes the first signal to saying, hey, maybe you're at risk for these things, which again will affect not just the quality of your life in the short term, but in the long term.

• 46:49Oprah Winfrey?

  In the long term.

• 46:49Speaker 01

  So that's why I say, if you have them, treat them. And you don't get any bonus points for having endured them. You're not going to say, oh, well, guess what?

• 46:58Oprah Winfrey?

  You get no bonus points, Amina, for having endured it. All right?

• 47:03Speaker 06

  I get it now. I get it. I mean, everything you have talked about.

• 47:06Oprah Winfrey?

  Tell your family. They were right.

• 47:08Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 47:09Oprah Winfrey?

  Yeah. Thank you so much, Amina. Thank you.

• 47:12Speaker 06

  Thank you for having me.

• 47:13Oprah Winfrey?

  Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for listening. I'm glad you joined me here on the Oprah Podcast. We'll be back. There are some common questions for menopause expert and Alloy Chief Medical Advisor, Dr. Sharon Malone, after this. Hi, and welcome back. So glad to be with you here. I'm with New York Times bestselling author, Dr. Sharon Malone, talking with people who have questions about their menopause symptoms. Esther is a mom of two, zooming in from one of my favorite places, Maui. Hello, welcome.

• 47:43Speaker 07

  Thank you. Thank you both for your continued discussion on this topic. I have learned so much about menopause, just listening to all this information. My mom is in her late stages of Alzheimer's, so I can't talk to her about her experience with menopause. I can't help but feel like when I walk into a room and forget why I walked in, or a word doesn't roll off the tip of my tongue, that this is the start of dementia. Or will this brain fog improve? So my question is, what can I do now in menopause to be preventative?

• 48:25Speaker 01

  Okay. I think that is very important. When we talk about Alzheimer's, what we know and what we think we know. And what we do know is that women are twice as likely to be diagnosed with Alzheimer's in their lifetime than men are. And the women who are more likely are women who have a female relative with Alzheimer's. It's not to mean that you will, because it's a very much a multifactorial process. What we also know is that the same things that we tell you to do that decrease your risk of cardiovascular disease, decrease your risk of Alzheimer's. So regular exercise, good night's sleep, cutting back on alcohol, don't smoke, and for goodness sake, watch your diet.

• 49:10Speaker 01

  Weight is important. All of these things, just lifestyle, whether we're talking about heart disease prevention or Alzheimer's prevention, or whether we're talking about just the rules that you need to observe for healthy living and aging. So all of that. But what we do know, and I'll tell you what we know and what I think. There's a brilliant neuroscientist by the name of Dr. Lisa Moscone, who has written a book called The Menopause Brain. And what we know is that for women who have an early menopause, and early means you have had your last period before age 45, or it's a premature menopause if you've had your last period before 40, those women who do not get hormone replacement

• 49:54Speaker 01

  because they are so young are at increased risk for cardiovascular disease and Alzheimer's. Now, do we know for a fact that estrogen therapy is a preventive measure for Alzheimer's? Maybe. That's where we need a lot more data on that.

• 50:12Oprah Winfrey?

  We certainly know it helps you with brain fog.

• 50:14Speaker 01

  It certainly does.

• 50:14Oprah Winfrey?

  But you can't take HRTs because of...

• 50:18Speaker 07

  I had a hysterectomy seven years ago because I had a history of adenomyosis and endometriosis. So the doctor has been a little wary of giving me HRT because of the estrogen.

• 50:32Speaker 01

  No, ma'am. No, ma'am. That is not a contraindication to HRT. It is not. And as a matter of fact, not only is it not a contraindication to HRT, to estrogen therapy, I should say, because you've had a hysterectomy. Remember I said...

• 50:47Oprah Winfrey?

  You don't need progesterone.

• 50:48Speaker 01

  You don't need the progesterone. All you need is the estrogen. So, yes, you can have estrogen. The only reasons, the only contraindications that we have for HRT are if you personally have breast cancer or an estrogen-dependent cancer, such as endometrial cancer. If you have undiagnosed vaginal bleeding. If you currently have a heart attack. You, not a family history of a heart attack or a stroke. Or you have active liver disease. And the issue about blood clots is debatable. But we'll leave that aside for now. But that's it. Those are the only contraindications. So you might go back to your doctor and say, well...

• 51:25Oprah Winfrey?

  Or go to another doctor.

• 51:27Speaker 01

  Yeah. I honestly don't think that doctors are trying to do a bad job. I really don't. Because I worked for...

• 51:33Oprah Winfrey?

  I don't think that they're trying to do a bad job. I think that they just don't know.

• 51:36Speaker 01

  They don't know. And they don't even know what they don't know.

• 51:38Oprah Winfrey?

  And they don't know what they don't know.

• 51:39Speaker 01

  And that's the problem, is that you've got to keep current. And that's why I really would advocate that menopausal care and care of women in midlife should be separate and apart. From the, all the other things that OB-GYNs have to do. It's a lot to keep up with. You know, you've got to do surgery and you've got to deliver babies and you've got to, you know, get birth control. But this phase of our life that we will spend anywhere from 30 to 40% of the rest of our lives in this menopausal phase deserves its own area of inquiry.

• 52:13Oprah Winfrey?

  Absolutely.

• 52:14Speaker 01

  We need more research. We meet more doctors who are knowledgeable about it because that's what they do. We deserve, as women in midlife.

• 52:22Oprah Winfrey?

  I was just going to say, we deserve better.

• 52:24Speaker 01

  We deserve better and we deserve to have the attention paid to the issues that have historically not been paid attention to.

• 52:32Oprah Winfrey?

  Esther, thank you. Thank you for zooming in from Maui. Have a beautiful day out there. Beautiful day. Dr. Malone, I know you believe that perimenopause should actually be thought of as a time for celebration. Tell us why.

• 52:48Speaker 01

  Because, you know, it is a celebration of a time of life where I think we should all look forward to. And I do say this in my book, Oprah. I said, when people have a different vision of what that time of life is like, people think of it as, you know, oh, I'm getting old or dread. But I mean this sincerely. I mean, for people like Michelle Obama, Naomi Watts, you, Halle Berry, all the people, Gail, who are out here showing young women what this phase of life looks like. It should be something that we look forward to because I don't know about you, but I am happier now at 66.

• 53:29Oprah Winfrey?

  For sure.

• 53:29Speaker 01

  Than I was at 46. So I look at people sometimes like, oh, don't feel sorry for me.

• 53:35Oprah Winfrey?

  I know. When all the women are complaining about turning 40 and 45, I just go, oh, honey, if you only knew, it gets better. It gets better.

• 53:43Speaker 01

  We deserve a celebration.

• 53:45Oprah Winfrey?

  We do, we do. Thank you, Dr. Malone. Thank you for writing this really profound book, Grown Woman Talk. And thank you to all of my guests for joining us today. Naomi Watts from SAG, Trishin Stephen, Kylie, Amina, and Esther. Dr. Malone's book, Grown Woman Talk, is available anywhere you buy your books and it's filled with just, um...

• 54:06Oprah Winfrey?

  I would say essential information and more insights on what it means to grow and age beautifully. Dr. Malone and I are talking again in a few weeks about treatments for menopause in a new study that showed that more than half of women aged 30 to 35 are experiencing moderate to severe symptoms of para-menopause. We'll be talking with women in their early 30s about their questions and concerns. So keep an eye out for that on the Oprah Podcast. Go well, everybody. Thank you. You can subscribe to the Oprah Podcast on YouTube and follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen. I'll see you next week. Thanks, everybody.