051 Navigating Marriage and Menopause: A Journey of Insight and Growth

Hello, and welcome back to Beyond the Words with me, Dimple Thakrar. Today's episode unfolds organically, just like the messages I trust will guide us.

Summary:
In this candid episode, I delve into the intertwined realms of marriage and menopause, drawing from my personal journey of navigating through both. Reflecting on my own experiences, I explore the profound impact of menopause on relationships, particularly marriage. From the upheaval of hormonal imbalances to the challenges of maintaining connection and understanding, I share insights garnered from my own journey.

Key Takeaways:

1. Embracing Honesty: Acknowledge the real root of your emotions and reactions, whether it's hormonal imbalances or genuine concerns.
2. Prioritise Education: Equip yourself with knowledge about menopause and its effects, and actively seek solutions to alleviate symptoms and maintain balance.
3. Conscious Communication: Practice articulating your feelings with clarity and compassion, fostering understanding and connection in your relationship.
4. Resolve with Grace: Release resentment and tension by letting go of grudges and embracing forgiveness and understanding.
5. Embrace Playfulness: Experiment with new approaches and patterns in your relationship, fostering joy, laughter, and intimacy.

Remember, amidst the whirlwind of menopause and the complexities of marriage, you hold the power to shape your narrative. Embrace each moment with grace, honesty, and love, and watch as your journey unfolds with beauty and resilience. Thank you for joining me today. Until next time, take care and stay blessed.

Dimple Thakrar Resource Links:

Website: https://dimpleglobal.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dimple.thakrar
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dimplethakrar/

Transcript

Beyond the Words EP51

[00:00:00] Dimple Thakrar: Hello, and welcome back to Beyond the Words with me, Dimple Thakra. Today, I had no clue what I wanted to say, and as usual, I trusted that a message would come through minutes before this podcast, I got asked the other day, just as a side note, I got asked the other day about whether I actually.

[00:00:22] Dimple Thakrar: Plan out my content and it's wild. I just don't because I trust that whatever message is coming through is going to be the right message. And even like I have an event next week, Abundant You, and I've got an outline of slides, but. Will I follow them? Who knows? It really depends on the energy and it really depends on who I'm speaking to.

[00:00:46] Dimple Thakrar: And even as I record this podcast now I tap in and tune in to the listeners. Now you're probably wondering, how the hell can she do that? How does she know who's Because in the quantum, there is no time. So whether you're listening to it today, tomorrow, next week, next year, next month, because there's no time, the future is now and the past is now.

[00:01:10] Dimple Thakrar: Whether you realize it or not, you've actually asked for this information and you'll receive it at exactly the right time that you're meant to receive it. And I'm supposed to record this at exactly the right time. And I know for some of you, this is going to sound very crazy. It's okay. And for some of you, you'll get it and that's okay.

[00:01:30] Dimple Thakrar: The conversation that I want to talk about today is marriage and menopause. Drum roll please. Why? Let me tell you. I'm a woman who has been through menopause, I would say now, for 13 years. And I can say that, hand on my heart, because at age 38, I had surgery induced menopause. Scientifically proven, I was in the menopause because of my ovaries were removed, so there was no other way of me producing oestrogen, right?

[00:02:04] Dimple Thakrar: It dropped overnight. I literally went from being able to run up hills, nine, ten miles, to being in a wheelchair. and to having zero oestrogen in my body. So I understand that for a lot of women who go through an actual menopause, you don't have an actual moment when you go into menopause, right?

[00:02:25] Dimple Thakrar: So I am speaking on behalf of my experience. of menopause and marriage. So that was at 38. And then I feel like I had another menopause at 50. I feel like that was my real one. So I'm, I just celebrated my 51st birthday. And so I want to talk to you about the impact it's had on my marriage. For those of you who have listened to some of my other podcasts, you'll know that in my 40s, we were heading for a divorce and when I look back, I often feel like my hormones had a lot to do with it.

 I often look back now and think, was it my hormones that caused me to plummet into wanting a divorce? Was it my hormones that caused me into becoming more masculine in my energy and my balance?

[00:03:25] Dimple Thakrar: Because I remember feeling so scared. and so alien when I was not only recovering from the surgery but actually like feeling like there was something missing, feeling like there was something not right. And so I tried to compensate Protecting myself. And when you're in protection mode, you're often in your masculine.

[00:03:54] Dimple Thakrar: Because the masculine is all about protecting and providing. So I suddenly went into this protection mode and there was no room for my husband to protect me. Because everything he did or didn't do wasn't right. And I was agitated with myself. It was like I had this out of body experience where I was behaving not aligned to me.

[00:04:18] Dimple Thakrar: I was going to say badly and it was badly. Misaligned to me. Shouty. Crazy lady. Screaming. And then having this out of body experience going, This is not you Dimple. Why are you behaving like this? And I remember thinking, what the hell is going on here? But feeling as though I had no control over it.

[00:04:42] Dimple Thakrar: Feeling as though that's the menopause, right? I can blame it on the menopause. And yes, there are some significant things that happen, changes, that happen in the menopause. The menopause is real. One I've come to realise recently is that once my hormones were balanced, There was not only clarity in my ability to see what was going on, but also clarity in my ability to choose whether I behave that way or not, right?

[00:05:16] Dimple Thakrar: I get to choose whether it's okay for me to be the shouty lady, or do I choose to live by a higher standard for me? Irrespective of my husband and marriage, but for me, was I happy with being that shouty lady? The crazy lady who it was okay to shout and scream at your husband. I'll give you an example.

[00:05:42] Dimple Thakrar: There was one time where he had all the family over and he'd stripped the beds after they'd left and he'd put them in the washer and, put the bedding in the washer and taken it out of the dryer and folded it and was in the utility right? And Sometimes we we have our own room together and I also have my own room separate, which has, it's, I call it my goddess room.

[00:06:06] Dimple Thakrar: And it has all my crystals and my dresser and my clothes and my own bathroom. So it's like my own suite, right? And it's really been an, I would say since I turned 50 that I got this room, it's primarily it was my daughter's room and she moved out and so it gave me my husband more space and so from time to time if he's working, like sometimes he does a night shift, so he'll work all day and then if he's on He won't go to bed.

[00:06:36] Dimple Thakrar: He might come to bed at 3, 4 in the morning. And so it was one of these nights where he was doing an all nighter. I get really poor sleep, or I did, when my hormones weren't balanced, because this is another sign of the menopause, and I get palpitations in the night, and then I'm cranky as hell the next day, and I'm sleepy.

[00:06:57] Dimple Thakrar: I'm really sleepy. I said, I'm going to sleep in my room, but the bedding, the duvet cover needed to be done right. So I went and got the duvet cover out of the bed, out of the utility and I'm putting, and I hate putting bedding on. It's one of my things that I just hate it. I know. I, it's, it just is. I haven't got long arms or legs and I hate getting all wrapped up in the duvet and I end up being inside the bloody cover and all the rest of it.

[00:07:26] Dimple Thakrar: But anyway, I was tired and cranky and I thought I need clean bedding and I've got to put it on, right? So I get it, and he's only buttoned up every single button. The cover without the duvet in it. So in order for me to put the cover on, I have to unbutton all the buttons, of a king size duvet.

[00:07:48] Dimple Thakrar: So I'm like, this is such a pain in the ass. And then I started going into story, oh, this is like his shirts. He likes his shirts in on the same hanger all buttoned up. What is the point of that? When you wanna wear it, you have to unbutton it again and it's like going off into this whole story, right?

[00:08:06] Dimple Thakrar: And before I know it, I'm screaming at him. Why have you done this? And what is the point of that? And can I just say my preference is, and I, in a really hoity toity kind of way, my preference is, That you don't button this up and it's my duvet cover anyway. Oh my God, what bullshit was coming out of my mouth?

[00:08:31] Dimple Thakrar: And he turned around and of course he felt attacked. So he's going to, he's going to defend himself. He said, I do it because I don't want the pillowcases to get stuck in the duvet cover and be wet. That's why I do it, right? There was a split moment where the feminine side of me went Fucking hell, excuse my French.

[00:08:54] Dimple Thakrar: That is genius. Genius! Who who thinks of that as such a good idea? Because the pillowcases get all screwed up and wet and they never dry properly. But the menopausal witch was not gonna let up. She had full power in her What? Righteousness. That doesn't make it easier for me and I have to sit here and unbutton them all and I'm not going to button them all back again.

[00:09:19] Dimple Thakrar: And, oh my God, it was like verbal diarrhea. Now, the point of this story is, even in those moments I had insight and I could have chosen to zip it and deal with my own emotions first. That would have been the mature thing to do. Instead, I behaved like a screaming banshee. That's okay if that's your standard.

[00:09:47] Dimple Thakrar: Brilliant. But what if it's not? What if the standard that you live by is higher than that? What if the standard you live by is conscious communication? Is respectful? Is kind? Is loving? And so even in the menopause, you can have standards. And here's the piece. It actually requires you to be really aware of your actions and your behavior.

[00:10:14] Dimple Thakrar: It requires you to take care of yourself. It requires you to Be okay with taking care of yourself because then when you take care of yourself, the rest of the houses can take care of themselves. Nobody's stepping on eggshells, right? And so I've come to realize that a lot of the problems that I've had in my marriage stemmed from the menopause.

[00:10:40] Dimple Thakrar: And yes, it's real. And yes, we have a choice. And I had a choice that day. And then when I made that mistake, I also had a choice to learn from it. Not to beat myself up about it, but to learn from it and to, apologies are great and they are valuable. They're not valuable when you don't learn and you keep making the same mistake.

[00:11:09] Dimple Thakrar: And what I've come to realize is that for a long time, I certainly blame the menopause for my bad behavior. And the truth is I get to choose how I behave. And if the menopause is causing me to be angry and agitated and sleep deprived, then I need to sort that out by looking after myself, not blaming or shaming anybody else.

[00:11:34] Dimple Thakrar: Because at the same time, my beautiful beloved was going through a massive thing in his life, and he was very sleep deprived, and had many battles he was facing, and all I could think about was the bed sheet,

[00:11:50] Dimple Thakrar: while he was then going to do, at half past ten at night, another all nighter. So the moral of this story is, and the truth about this story is, that marriage and menopause is hard. It's not easy. But I'm telling you, it's going to be the biggest game changer if you can get through it. There's, I don't know the exact figures, but I have read somewhere that there is a higher divorce rate in couples in their 40s and 50s, around about the same time as the menopause, around about the same time as the man's going through the tunnel.

[00:12:30] Dimple Thakrar: This is tough, but if you can have the foundations. of your relationship sorted, you'll get through it. And there's something called the heart model that I teach, and I'm going to explain a little bit of it today in brief. And it's heart. It basically starts with H for being honest. Just be honest with yourself.

[00:12:55] Dimple Thakrar: Is it that he's irritating you or is it that you're just menopausal and you're tired? And if that's the case, that's the real problem. Deal with that. It's not okay to take it out on them even though they let you off. Even though there's no consequences to your behavior. Because that's the thing, right? We misbehave with the people we love the most.

[00:13:17] Dimple Thakrar: But what if your best friend was a fly on the wall? Or what if somebody who you care about deeply was a fly on the wall? Would you behave like that? What if your school teacher was a fly on the wall? What if your coach was a fly on the wall? How would you behave? I know that my standard is not that.

[00:13:32] Dimple Thakrar: I know that I was ashamed, but I didn't bring myself down and wallow in the shame. I decided that I was going to learn from that. So the first piece is be honest. The second piece is e education. Get yourself educated. I have educated myself with the menopause now. I have sought out the best that I can afford for my hormones to be right.

[00:14:01] Dimple Thakrar: I have looked at lifestyle things. I've shifted from running to yoga. I've shifted from sleeping late to making sure I'm in bed before 10. I've shifted from allowing myself to rest in the day to from feeling guilty about that to allowing myself to rest, right? Education. The third piece.

[00:14:27] Dimple Thakrar: A. Can you articulate how you are feeling? Conscious communication. In that moment, instead of screaming like a banshee, I could have easily have said, I am so tired right now. And, I would really love it if you didn't unbutton, if you didn't button it all up because when I'm tired it's just another step for me, right?

[00:14:51] Dimple Thakrar: Or I could have said, babe why is it that you button it up? And then he had the opportunity to tell me, and then I could have said, that is genius! So many different ways that could have panned out. And then R is for resolve. Let it go. Let it go. If you hold it in your body, it's going to sit there and rot like disease.

[00:15:18] Dimple Thakrar: It's going to cause you to be bloated, constipated, and in pain. Let it go. And then T. T is for test the waters, try new things, play a little, laugh a little. There's something that's been a game changer that me and my husband are doing right now and we're always experimenting. In fact, he feels like a guinea pig, like a walking guinea pig, bless him.

[00:15:43] Dimple Thakrar: And the experiment that we're running right now is, it was Gottman's research, the relationship experts. And they, so the research they showed was that if you do this thing, this is what is going to make your man live four years longer, right? This was the research and it's that every time you leave your woman, if you kiss her for longer than six seconds, what happens is, You end up raising your oxytocin in you and him and that prolongs life.

[00:16:27] Dimple Thakrar: Me being the super high achiever that I am, I interpreted that and I said to my husband, every time we kiss each other, I would love it for it to be six seconds or longer. I'd be like, yes, I'm winning at life. So he's alright then. So we play this game now, where every time we're kissing, and what's the most funniest thing is that at first he was like, six seconds seems a long time, right?

[00:16:58] Dimple Thakrar: So at first he was kissing me. And I could hear him in my head almost, like telepathically counting. And as we're kissing it's making us laugh because I can hear him going 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. It's a long time, right? So then we ended up laughing. So every time we kissed in the day we were laughing, right? That's the oxytocin.

[00:17:27] Dimple Thakrar: So just that little pattern break has made such a difference. How we feel about each other. Try something new. Test the waters, right? There's no harm in it. Let me know if you try that one. Let me know. And yeah, these things keep playing. Life is too short. One of my mentors just this last week, she said to me, Dimple, there's a reason your name is Dimple.

[00:17:59] Dimple Thakrar: I said, what do you mean? She said you only see dimples when you smile. She said, maybe it's time for you to smile a bit more and laugh a bit more. Don't take life too seriously. Menopause is menopause. Marriage is marriage. As long as you are living your life to your highest standard, you get to decide what that is.

[00:18:20] Dimple Thakrar: Mine is excellence. and love. So as long as every decision I'm making is of the highest excellence with love through kindness and caring, then I know I'm aligned. I would love for you to comment on what your standards are. How are you choosing to live your life today? Thank you so much, it's been an absolute privilege having you with me today.

[00:18:51] Dimple Thakrar: God bless.