The Menopause Mindset
Sally Garozzo
I’m Sally Garozzo, The Menopause Mindset Coach and Rapid Transformational Therapist. This is the place to be to get some answers and to feel supported along this often bumpy journey. It’s my mission to help peri to post menopausal women go from feel...
- 31 minutes 19 seconds215 Why We Resist The Inner Work And How To Make It Feel Less Overwhelming
Often times, clients will see me for an assessment, they'll read their treatment plan and then quietly disappear. It's like their mind convinces them that this is going to open up a whole world of trouble. Of course your mind does that! It's standard. It's doing exactly what it’s designed to do. Protect you. It wants to keep things predictable and contained. So when the invitation to go deeper starts to become a possibility, it makes sense that your mind wants to pull you back. It believes "this inner work malarky might be too much" And yet, there’s another part of you which is quieter and deeper but just as important. It's the part of you that knows an intervention is needed because it wants to release something, it wants to come home to itself. In this week’s episode, I gently demystify what “doing the inner work” actually looks like in reality and why it doesn’t have to be as intense or overwhelming as you might imagine
Work with me 121: www.sallygarozzo.com
Join Becoming Waitlist: www.sallygarozzo.com/becoming
21 March 2026, 11:00 am - 29 minutes 25 seconds214 Beyond Hormonal Determinism: Hormones Influence the System, They Don't Build It
Most menopause conversations focus almost entirely on hormones. But what if that’s only part of the story? In this episode, Sally Garozzo explores emerging neuroscience on estradiol, fear circuitry, and trauma exposure, including a 2025 study suggesting that estrogen interacts differently with the brain’s threat regulation system depending on prior stress and trauma history. We unpack why HRT helps many women but isn’t always the whole answer, how the nervous system shapes our menopausal experience, and why understanding the intersection of menopause, trauma, and nervous system regulation can offer a more complete picture of midlife wellbeing.
Research referenced in this episode
- Stevens JS et al. (2025). Estradiol modulation of threat circuitry and PTSD vulnerability.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12745815/ - Sartin-Tarm A et al. (2020). Estradiol Modulates Neural and Behavioral Arousal in Women With PTSD.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7606348/ - Glover EM et al. Estrogen and extinction of fear memories.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25796471/ - Wegerer M et al. (2014). Low estradiol and fear extinction responses.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4256064/ - Zeidan MA et al. (2011). Estradiol enhances fear extinction recall via vmPFC–amygdala interaction.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3197763/
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Work with me 121: www.sallygarozzo.com
Join Becoming Waitlist: www.sallygarozzo.com/becoming
13 March 2026, 6:00 am - Stevens JS et al. (2025). Estradiol modulation of threat circuitry and PTSD vulnerability.
- 34 minutes 55 seconds213 The Trauma of Emotional Invalidation
In this episode we explore what it's like when your 'felt sense' isn't believed especially in childhood and how this impacts our health and our menopause. We look at how subtle, repeated invalidation shapes the quality of our attachments, why women often become the emotional regulators of their families, how functional freeze develops, and why menopause can feel like all of this unravels at once. We also examine the difference between attunement and optimisation — and why healing begins with being met, not fixed.
It's a good one for anyone who feels there's more to menopause than 'just' hormones.
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Work with me 121: www.sallygarozzo.com
Join Becoming Waitlist: www.sallygarozzo.com/becoming
6 March 2026, 6:00 am - 23 minutes 39 seconds212 Menopause as Art: Trusting The Design
I currently have six paint samples on my living room wall. They are all technically blue. None of them are the same. Which feels… symbolic. In this episode, I’m thinking about menopause not as art and refinement. As the shift from fluorescent to tonal. From performance to composition. There’s a turtle. There’s London. There’s a river that looks like it’s meandering but absolutely knows where it’s going. And somewhere in the middle of all that: the quiet realisation that midlife might not be demolition, it might be editing.
If you’ve ever stood in front of a wall thinking, “This one almost works… but not quite,” this conversation might feel familiar.
Bring your undertones :)
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✅T o put your name down on the waitlist for Becoming, here's the link: www.sallygarozzo.com/becoming
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📲 Connect with Sally:
Email: [email protected]
[On-Demand Masterclass] How To Heal The Trauma Underlying Your Menopause Symptom Severity [£17]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/healingtrauma
[Online Practitioners Diploma - Self Paced] Menopause Wellbeing Practitioner [£127]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/meno
[One to One] Bespoke Transformational Hypnotherapy & Coaching: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/rapid-transformational-therapist
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sallygarozzomindmentor
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sallygarozzo/
Send me a WhatsApp: https://wa.me/message/FTARBMO7CRLEL1
27 February 2026, 6:00 am - 30 minutes 2 seconds211 The Dutch Test vs The Medical Model: Why They Disagree
The DUTCH test has become one of the most talked-about hormone assessments in the menopause space. Some women describe it as illuminating and empowering. Some medical professionals describe it as unnecessary, over-interpreted, or a waste of money.
So why the disagreement?
In this episode, I step back from the noise and explore what’s actually being argued. What assumptions sit underneath functional hormone testing? What assumptions sit underneath conventional medicine? And why does this debate feel so emotionally charged?
Rather than taking sides, we look at the psychological and structural differences between these two paradigms — and what happens when menopausal women find themselves caught in the middle.
If you’ve ever felt validated by testing… dismissed by medicine… or confused by the intensity of the conversation online, this episode is for you.
Join the waitlist for BECOMING
🔗 Join the waitlist:
https://www.sallygarozzo.com/becoming*********************************************
📲 Connect with Sally:
Email: [email protected]
[On-Demand Masterclass] How To Heal The Trauma Underlying Your Menopause Symptom Severity [£17]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/healingtrauma
[Online Practitioners Diploma - Self Paced] Menopause Wellbeing Practitioner [£127]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/meno
[One to One] Bespoke Transformational Hypnotherapy & Coaching: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/rapid-transformational-therapist
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sallygarozzomindmentor
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sallygarozzo/
Send me a WhatsApp: https://wa.me/message/FTARBMO7CRLEL1
20 February 2026, 6:00 am - 24 minutes 53 seconds210 Moral Outrage in Midlife: Why Certainty Feels Safe
We live in a culture that rewards certainty. In this episode, I reflect on the energy surrounding recent public controversies and ask a different question: what if moral outrage is sometimes a nervous system strategy rather than moral clarity? Drawing on anxiety physiology, childhood conditioning, and midlife change, I explore how certainty can feel like safety, and why building capacity for uncertainty might be the real work as we step into midlife.
Join the waitlist for BECOMING
🔗 Join the waitlist:
https://www.sallygarozzo.com/becoming*********************************************
📲 Connect with Sally:
Email: [email protected]
[On-Demand Masterclass] How To Heal The Trauma Underlying Your Menopause Symptom Severity [£17]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/healingtrauma
[Online Practitioners Diploma - Self Paced] Menopause Wellbeing Practitioner [£127]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/meno
[One to One] Bespoke Transformational Hypnotherapy & Coaching: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/rapid-transformational-therapist
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sallygarozzomindmentor
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sallygarozzo/
Send me a WhatsApp: https://wa.me/message/FTARBMO7CRLEL1
13 February 2026, 6:00 am - 23 minutes 29 seconds209 The Discipline of Not Intervening
There’s a kind of care that looks loving on the surface, yet somehow leaves both the receiver and giver more tense than before. This episode delves into this often unexplored territory. It’s called ‘the discipline of not intervening’. Of course I'm not talking about neglectfulness, but I am talking about healthy restraint. And what becomes possible when silence and space are allowed to make room for the natural order of things to emerge. If you’ve ever noticed yourself holding everything together, or sensed the quiet cost of always stepping in, this episode may be for you.
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Join the waitlist for BECOMING
🔗 Join the waitlist:
https://www.sallygarozzo.com/becoming*********************************************
📲 Connect with Sally:
Email: [email protected]
[On-Demand Masterclass] How To Heal The Trauma Underlying Your Menopause Symptom Severity [£17]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/healingtrauma
[Online Practitioners Diploma - Self Paced] Menopause Wellbeing Practitioner [£127]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/meno
[One to One] Bespoke Transformational Hypnotherapy & Coaching: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/rapid-transformational-therapist
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sallygarozzomindmentor
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sallygarozzo/
Send me a WhatsApp: https://wa.me/message/FTARBMO7CRLEL1
6 February 2026, 11:00 am - 21 minutes 18 seconds208 Pausing without a Plan
We talk a lot about slowing down and how it's really good for us, but we talk much less about what it means to stay. Like really stay.... without doing it for productivity gains.
This episode explores holding space for yourself, not as a technique, but as a way of inhabiting yourself, experiencing yourself without the need to learn from it yet (and why that's really good for your HPA axis!)
Join me for this short but profound episode.
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‘Becoming’ is the new membership I’ve created for this phase
Becoming is a space for women in this in-between phase where old identities no longer fit, and new ones haven’t fully arrived yet.
The waitlist is now open.
🔗 Join the waitlist:
https://www.sallygarozzo.com/becoming*********************************************
📲 Connect with Sally:
Email: [email protected]
[On-Demand Masterclass] How To Heal The Trauma Underlying Your Menopause Symptom Severity [£17]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/healingtrauma
[Online Practitioners Diploma - Self Paced] Menopause Wellbeing Practitioner [£127]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/meno
[One to One] Bespoke Transformational Hypnotherapy & Coaching: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/rapid-transformational-therapist
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sallygarozzomindmentor
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sallygarozzo/
Send me a WhatsApp: https://wa.me/message/FTARBMO7CRLEL1
30 January 2026, 6:00 am - 34 minutes 39 seconds207 Attunement: The Thing You Didn't Know You Needed
If you’re tired in a way rest doesn’t touch…
If you’ve done the work but still feel slightly on edge…
If being “strong” or “capable” no longer feels like something you want to keep doing…This episode is for you.
This is a quiet, spacious fireside conversation about something that sits underneath anxiety, exhaustion, relationship strain, and the sense of feeling subtly disconnected from yourself, especially in midlife and menopause.
This is about attunement and what happens in the body when it’s missing.
If you want to feel:
- less braced against life
- more settled inside yourself
- understood without having to explain
- calmer without being told to “relax”
- a sense of warmth, steadiness, and inner permission
…this episode is an invitation to listen.
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‘Becoming’ is the new membership I’ve created for this phase
Becoming is a space for women in this in-between phase where old identities no longer fit, and new ones haven’t fully arrived yet.
The waitlist is now open.
🔗 Join the waitlist:
https://www.sallygarozzo.com/becoming*********************************************
📲 Connect with Sally:
Email: [email protected]
[On-Demand Masterclass] How To Heal The Trauma Underlying Your Menopause Symptom Severity [£17]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/healingtrauma
[Online Practitioners Diploma - Self Paced] Menopause Wellbeing Practitioner [£127]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/meno
[One to One] Bespoke Transformational Hypnotherapy & Coaching: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/rapid-transformational-therapist
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sallygarozzomindmentor
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sallygarozzo/
Send me a WhatsApp: https://wa.me/message/FTARBMO7CRLEL1
23 January 2026, 6:00 am - 29 minutes 30 seconds206 The Great Brain Rewiring of Menopause
What if menopause isn’t a breakdown, but a house renovation you’re living inside?
In this episode, I reframe menopause in a way I wish someone had offered me. Not as decline. Not as loss. Not as something to “push through.”
But as a neurological remodel happening in real time, while I’m still expected to function, work, parent, decide what cheese to buy, and hold everything together.No wonder it feels chaotic.
What I share in this episode:
- Why menopause is not just hormonal, but deeply neurological
- How fluctuating estrogen affects mood, memory, focus, and emotional regulation
- Why brain fog, emotional sensitivity, and slower thinking are not failures, but signs of reorganization
- What’s really happening when my tolerance for noise, pressure, people-pleasing, and nonsense disappears
- How the amygdala shifts and threat sensitivity gradually dials down
- Why decisions feel slower, more embodied, and less driven by urgency
- How identity itself begins to shift during menopause, not collapse
- The grief, the disorientation, and the unexpected clarity that emerges on the other side
- Why post-menopause often brings deeper contentment, discernment, and grounded leadership
If you’re like me and feeling:
- Less sharp but more sensitive
- Slower but more discerning
- Less tolerant of bullshit
- Less available for emotional labour
- More interested in depth than surface-level busyness
Nothing has gone wrong.
Something is reorganizing with intent.Join me!
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‘Becoming’ is the new membership I’ve created for this phase
Becoming is a space for women in this in-between phase where old identities no longer fit, and new ones haven’t fully arrived yet.
The waitlist is now open.
🔗 Join the waitlist:
https://www.sallygarozzo.com/becoming*********************************************
📲 Connect with Sally:
Email: [email protected]
[On-Demand Masterclass] How To Heal The Trauma Underlying Your Menopause Symptom Severity [£17]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/healingtrauma
[Online Practitioners Diploma - Self Paced] Menopause Wellbeing Practitioner [£127]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/meno
[One to One] Bespoke Transformational Hypnotherapy & Coaching: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/rapid-transformational-therapist
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sallygarozzomindmentor
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sallygarozzo/
Send me a WhatsApp: https://wa.me/message/FTARBMO7CRLEL1
16 January 2026, 6:00 am - 46 minutes 18 seconds205 Why I’m Speaking Differently about Menopause & Mindset Now
What if menopause isn’t something to manage…
What if it’s something to participate in?In this deeply reflective solo episode, I return after time away with a radical reframe of what “mindset” actually means in menopause, and why the phrase has become so triggering, misunderstood, and frankly, unhelpful.
Fresh from turning 50 and beginning my Clinical Hypnotherapy diploma, I share what it’s like to be in the middle of a personal and professional unlearning. Long-held beliefs are being questioned. Identities are softening. Certainty is giving way to curiosity.
This isn’t a how-to episode.
It’s a fireside conversation for women who feel something deeper is happening beneath the surface.In this episode, I explore:
🧠 Why “just change your mindset” can feel dismissive and where that conversation breaks down
🔍 What mindset actually means (and why it’s not positive thinking)
🫀 How perception, nervous system safety, and hormones are in constant dialogue
🌡️ Why you can’t think your way into more estrogen — but can influence how symptoms land in the body
🔥 The biology behind hot flushes, stress, adrenaline, and the feedback loops that intensify symptoms
🌀 What hypnotherapy really is (and no, it’s not stage hypnosis or mind control)
🪞 Why menopause is a transition of identity, not just hormones
🧳 How stress can exist even when life looks “fine” on paper
🧩 Why perfectionism is often a trauma response — and why menopause dismantles it
🌱 Menopause as compost: decay and renewal happening at the same time
🤝 Why this stage of life asks for collaboration, not controlThis episode is for you if:
😮💨 You’re tired of oversimplified menopause advice
😬 You bristle at mindset talk but still feel drawn to something deeper
🐢 You sense menopause is asking you to slow down, not push harder
🤍 You want compassion, nuance, and honesty — not fixes
🧬 You’re curious about the mind–body relationship without bypassing biologyA quiet announcement
I introduce Becoming, a new membership space I’m creating, not to fix or optimize women in menopause, but to offer somewhere to be while identity, nervous system, and meaning are reorganizing.
This is not a course.
This is not a program.
It’s a space for women who feel the shift and don’t want to rush through it.The waitlist is now open. No urgency. No pressure. Just an invitation.
👉 Join the Becoming waitlist:
https://www.sallygarozzo.com/becomingIf this episode felt like relief rather than effort… if something in your body quietly said yes… trust that.
Menopause isn’t a problem to solve.
It’s a process you’re allowed to be in.You’re not broken.
You’re becoming.*************************************************************************************
📲 Connect with Sally:
Email: [email protected]
[On-Demand Masterclass] How To Heal The Trauma Underlying Your Menopause Symptom Severity [£17]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/healingtrauma
[Online Practitioners Diploma - Self Paced] Menopause Wellbeing Practitioner [£127]: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/meno
[One to One] Bespoke Transformational Hypnotherapy & Coaching: https://www.sallygarozzo.com/rapid-transformational-ther
9 January 2026, 3:00 pm - More Episodes? Get the App