In this episode of Wild, Wise & Curious, we sit down with Jody for a powerful conversation about perimenopause, brain fog, identity and rebuilding your life when everything feels like it’s falling apart.

Jody shares how her perimenopause symptoms collided with a difficult chapter - the end of her marriage, caring for three children with additional needs, losing her father and leaving her teaching career of 23 years. Brain fog became her biggest challenge, impacting her confidence, clarity and ability to function in the classroom.

Together, we explore:

It’s an episode about self‑compassion, survival and slowly finding your way back to yourself.

Listen wherever you get your podcasts or head to YouTube to see all our faces.

☕ Support the show: https://buymeacoffee.com/wildwiseandcurious

To find out more about Jody’s offerings, see below:

https://thereclamation.my.canva.site

Insta: Jody_r66

FB: https://www.facebook.com/jody.ruston

FB Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/thereclaimedcollective

ADHD, Perimenopause & Reclaiming Our Own Story

This week on Wild, Wise & Curious, we dive into a powerful conversation about ADHD, perimenopause, identity and the emotional weight so many women carry without language for it.

Our guest, Claudia, returns to the show and shares her recent ADHD diagnosis and how perimenopause has amplified everything - anxiety, focus, PMS, overwhelm. She talks openly about the shame she held around career choices, money decisions and struggling in traditional work environments and how finally having a diagnosis has reframed her entire story.

Together, we explore:

It’s an episode about self‑understanding, good old midlife unravelling and the courage to rewrite your own story.

Listen here or head to YouTube to see all our faces.

Find out more about Claudia’s offerings:

FB - Claudia De Silva Reiki and Coaching

Insta: @Claudiadesilvareiki

Website: www.claudiadesilvacoaching.co.uk

Clare’s story is one of those rare conversations that stays with you long after you’ve heard it. She didn’t know she was in perimenopause - not until a colleague gently suggested she might want to get checked after noticing she was a little 'shouty'. A women’s‑health specialist confirmed she was already well into menopause, and because of her stage, HRT back then - just wasn’t an option.

What followed was a natural, cold‑turkey transition layered with complexity: Clare has BPES, a genetic eye condition linked to early ovarian failure, and shortly after her diagnosis she was hit with something even bigger - salivary gland cancer. Radiotherapy to her neck, mouth and pituitary gland changed everything. She describes becoming a 'non‑person', with cancer treatment overshadowing every menopause symptom.

Through all of this, Clare was raising young children, working in not‑for‑profits, training people in psychosocial support, and serving as a community first aider. After 20 years of listening to her mind, she realised she needed to listen to her body too.

Meditation, breathwork, EFT, nature, walking her dog, and spiritual practice became her anchors. The cancer treatment meant she lost her voice - devastating for a trainer and speaker - but she found new ways to be with herself. She trained at a spiritual college, met her spiritual centre co‑founder and together they founded; Talking Spirit, and now offer emotional‑baggage clearing, soul‑led therapy, mediumship, past‑life work, retreats and more. And over time Clare also reclaimed her voice.

Clare is calm, full of quiet magic and absolutely infectious. Her story is one of resilience, intuition and deep listening. And we wanted to listen to her all day - we're sure you will too x

To find out more about Clare's offerings:

https://www.talkingspirit.co.uk/

Insta: clare.liza36

Clare's daughter also has a podcast called: Two Chocolate Cakes & Their Mistakes - where two friends talk about their mistakes and their imperfections. We'll be checking that out too x

The Frequency of Becoming: Perimenopause and the Path Back to Self

In this week’s episode, our guest, Diane, joins us to share the extraordinary, unexpected path that began with subtle but unsettling shifts in her body - changes she didn’t yet recognise as perimenopause. What followed was a deep journey into intuition, holistic wellness and the kind of midlife awakening that reshapes everything.

Diane talks us through discovering bioresonance, sound healing, kinesiology and the personal development work that helped her heal trauma, panic attacks and long‑held emotional patterns. After experiencing profound benefits, she invested in her own bioresonance equipment, opened a wellness clinic and began training in Reiki, sound healing, and now breathwork.

We explore the courage it takes to follow your body’s signals, the messy truth of midlife reinvention, the challenges she’s facing and her vision for corporate wellbeing programmes - as well as a future foundation offering holistic support to those who need it most.

This is an episode about listening - to your body, your intuition and the quiet frequency of becoming who you were always meant to be.

This episode is an honest, funny and deeply relatable conversation about navigating perimenopause, ADHD and the big identity shifts that often arrive in midlife. Louisa shares how she discovered she was in perimenopause after months of unexplained symptoms, how hormonal changes intensified her ADHD, and how she’s learning to be kinder to herself as life evolves.

We explore alternative lifestyle dreams, community building, the longing for real‑life connection and the pressure to stay visible online. From compost toilets to Cornwall callings, from creative work to parenting through all the chaos - this is a conversation about women finding clarity, courage and connection in the middle of everything.

And woven through it all is the reminder that midlife isn’t a collapse - it’s a recalibration. A reawakening. A moment to question old expectations, soften into what really matters and imagine new ways of living that feel more grounded, more spacious and more true to who we are. If you’ve ever felt stretched thin, pulled in every which way or quietly craved something just a little bit different, this episode will feel like that exhale you didn't even realise you'd been waiting for!

As Louisa steps into this next chapter, she’s also honouring a huge milestone - Barefoot’s twentieth year - a testament to two decades of community, creativity and connection. A legacy still evolving, just like the women who built it.

Find out more about Louisa and the beautiful Barefoot Festival:

For more info on Barefoot Festival or to buy tickets head to https://barefootfestival.com/

Facebook: @Barefoot Festival

Instagram: @barefootfestival

Stage Lights & Surgical Menopause: A Musician’s 0-60 Midlife Shift

This week we sit down with Tara, a woman who has lived her entire life under stage lights - a guitarist and vocalist who has travelled the world, taken thousands of requests on the fly and kept entire rooms dancing while her brain works at lightning speed.

But behind the music is a story of grit and humour - and a body that has thrown her many different curve-balls.

We talk about Tara's kidney transplant, the massive fibroid that changed everything and the moment she went from being 'possibly perimenopausal' to being in full surgical menopause. No tapering. No easing in. Just hormones off, overnight.

It’s honest, funny, raw and full of the kind of midlife truth you only get from women who’ve really lived.

To find out more about Tara, visit her website below - or follow on her socials:

Claire opens up about the early signs of perimenopause:

the heat - the anxiety - the confusion - and the small, steady shifts that helped her find her footing again.

She talks about the moment things began to make sense - the point where she could finally understand what her body and mind had been trying to tell her.

And she reflects on how moving through this chapter reshaped her life in grounded, meaningful ways - not a return to who she was before, but a gentle shift into who she is now.

Her journey also led her to support other women navigating their own midlife transitions, offering understanding, menopause advocacy and mindful nutrition for this time in our lives.

What happens when your body shifts pace long before you expect it to?

At 32, Kerry was working in the makeup industry - long days spent on her feet, standing behind counters, raising three children and trying to keep up with life. But her body began sending signals she couldn’t ignore: brain fog so strong she’d forget why she walked into a room, mood changes that didn’t feel like the anxiety she had experienced before, aches and pains and two years of relentless bleeding before a polyp was finally removed.

Exhaustion became constant - and not the 'normal' kind that comes from work or parenting.

In this episode, Kerry shares how she slowly realised she was navigating early perimenopause, years before she imagined it was possible. Now a marathon runner, she reflects on endurance, identity and the emotional load of motherhood, managing her own business and how perimenopause can feel like a race you never trained for.

A grounded, powerful story about listening to your body and finding your pace in a season of unexpected change.

To find out more about Kerry please see below:

In this return conversation, Emily steps back into the circle to share the profound shifts that have unfolded since her last visit. Her journey has been one of returning to herself - through creativity, earth‑based practice, bardic study and the unexpected alchemy of perimenopause.

She speaks about writing her second novel, The Dandelion Chronicles, a mystical, shamanic musical adventure for children and inner children, and how her creative life has deepened as she’s learned to live more authentically and in rhythm with nature.

Emily also performs her beautiful Beltane song, A Prayer for Beltane and reflects on how singing in circles has helped her soften perfectionism, dissolve imposter syndrome and trust the imperfect, human truth of her own voice.

We close with a look at her upcoming offerings over the summer - from chanting and singing circles to sound‑healing workshops - and the ways she’s weaving creativity, intuition and self‑returning into a life that feels wholly her own.

To find out more about Emily's books and other offerings, please visit her website below or follow her on her socials:

https://emilydoe.com/

Insta - @emilydoe.dandelionstories

FB - @emily.doe.9

For our 50th episode, we’re diving into The Midlife Pivot - the moment so many women hit during perimenopause when symptoms, identity and daily life start shifting in ways that just can’t be ignored. Our guest, Zo, shares how her journey began during lockdown with dry mouth, 3am wake‑ups and hot flushes, and how not being able to take HRT pushed her to explore other forms of support. She talks about using her background in nutrition and going back to basics with nutrient‑dense foods, the power of nervous system regulation, and how EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique) became a lifeline.

We also explore the importance of community, why workplaces need to understand menopause better and how Zo now supports women through groups, 1:1 work and corporate consulting - see below to find out more. A grounded, practical and deeply human conversation - and the perfect way to mark 50 episodes of honest, real‑life storytelling.

Show Notes:

To follow Zo on socials:

Insta - @nourishher_menopause

FB - NourishHer-Menopause

Or subscribe to receive Zo's Nourish Her free guide, Feel Better Through Menopause: https://bit.ly/42EqQU2