I Feel Like a Woman

What a time to be alive....

I don't mean the state of the world. I mean being a mid-life woman. One who has hit 50 and with it, met one of the major milestones - that of menopause. And if you're thinking "Oh for the love of Davina do we really need another blog post about this?", I'd like to assure you that this will be more about friendship than it is about hot flushes.

The thing is, I keep hearing "we never talk about menopause". But if you're a woman 'of a certain age', I'd put money on the fact that your WhatsApp chats are awash with conversations about who's on what HRT and the best time of the day to set aside for screaming. I'd also bet that it doesn't matter how many celebrities wang on about what worked for them, each woman will find her own experience to be different. Apart from two things:

1. The inconsistencies you experience in healthcare are WILD
2. You need your friends

First things first. This isn't just a menopause thing. This is a being a woman thing. As a teenager who only had a few months of horrendously heavy periods before things settled down, I got away pretty lightly. The pill seemed to sort me out but having raised a daughter of my own and spoken with friends who have long suffered with conditions such as endometriosis it would appear that women's bodies continue to be nothing short of a medical mystery. Bleeding for four weeks in a row? Buy more absorbent tampons. Cramping so badly you can't breathe? Take some ibuprofen. The way in which I have watched friends be pushed from pillar to post for years - or who simply just don't bother to go to the doctor - reinforces the long-held belief of many that this simply wouldn't be the case if these things happened to men.

And, given these things don't happen to men, we learn very early on how much we need our friends. In one such instance my daughter was saved by a friend giving her a jumper to tie around her waist after her period turned up unexpectedly on a shopping trip. Before I was a mother, I bought my much younger sister a mountain of tampons - triumphantly placing them out on the counter in Boots in a show of "this is nothing to be ashamed of". We will all have had a moment where a Good Samaritan has discreetly passed tissues or sanitary items under the divider in a toilet to help another woman who, by virtue of bad luck, had a situation they hadn't planned for.

And at the point in our lives when we're fretting about whether we can wear white trousers or not, we're obviously not talking about menopause. We're dealing with the situation at hand. You don't need to think forty years ahead if you're only just coming to terms with the fact that your body seems to be operating against you. And how it signals you're now open to the possibility of pregnancy...

If you do get pregnant (and if you try, and it doesn't happen for you), there's then the small matter of the new phase of absolute sorcery that's going on within your body and bloody hell did I find out that's not straightforward either. It feels again like there's a lot that doesn't get talked about but, again, sometimes we're just not at that stage in life. And sometimes there's things that we don't want to talk about. Or sometimes - as was my case - you've got a fixed idea in your head based on family history which doesn't quite pan out in the same way for you.

I come, you see, from a family of 'breeders'. I shared this recently with a nurse who hilariously (to me) thought that I meant my family were breeders of pedigree dogs. Not so. What I meant was the family on my mother's side are born to have babies. I'm the eldest of six, my mum was one of five, her dad was - wait for it - one of ELEVEN. Good god. And so, to my mind, childbearing and child birth was going to be an absolute walk in the park. I was my mum's birthing partner when she had my two youngest siblings but it turns out that watching a woman's fifth and sixth deliveries is not something by which you should judge your own endeavours. We are, as I came to learn, all made differently.

And how differently! At the time that I fell pregnant with my daughter, not only did I participate in National Childbirth Trust (NCT) classes, I worked with women of a similar age to me who were similarly pregnant and revelled in the fact our employer ran a 'Bump Club'. NCT was every bit as earnest as you might think (my husband quit our course early after being made to link arms with the other dads to pretend to 'be a uterus') and yet was a true sanity-saver as, like lots of my corporate compadres, I had moved to a place far removed from having family and school friends on the doorstep. The NCT and workplace friends were the ones with whom I could have deep and timely conversations about our birth stories, recovery, hallucinations caused by sleep deprivation and tortuous attempts at feeding. And throughout this extended friendship group, we experienced all facets of fertility and faced the reality of what can happen in pregnancy and childbirth. 

Despite the mediaeval horror I went through in having a placenta manually removed with only gas and air for pain relief (the anaesthetist was unavailable and there was the real risk I would bleed out) and the potentially life-threatening complication that is an ectopic pregnancy, I feel beyond fortunate that alongside these bumps in the road I delivered my two children. I know women who not only faced the devastation of their babies being stillborn but were treated appallingly by some healthcare professionals in their words and actions. Their stories are interwoven with my own and I will never forget receiving the text that my friend's daughter had been 'born sleeping' as I cradled my own newborn in my arms.

As women, we don't shout these stories aloud for good reason. We hold them gently and cradle the names of the babies and heartbreak of our friends. We wait to whisper the words that others may be scared to hear until the time is right. Our bodies are a serious business and yet so often we come up against what seems to be an ignorant approach to what's going on inside us - and the care that we need afterwards. We leave hospital with skimpy leaflets whose priority is being printed on recycled paper vs comprehensive information; face advice that, depending on the healthcare trust, is different to one just across the border. Prescriptions and procedures vary by postcode. We compare the sizes of our patches and stitches, and wonder whether the gynaecologist that's carrying out our laparoscopic salpingo-oophorectomy is the same one that did the hysteroscopy on our friend. We look for recommendations of active listening, careful thinking and delicate hands.

Skimpy leaflets...

And so, to menopause. Turns out that thanks to the surgery with a very long name, if there was any doubt about whether I'd actually gone through menopause before, I've now been through it medically. And I didn't even realise that would be the case (I know, I know). The consultant said "I think you need this surgery" to which my reply was "Sounds good". And whilst it was obvious in many ways that this would be the case (try ovulating when you haven't got ovaries), it wasn't explicitly spelled out. Neither was the recovery time required - there I was thinking I'd just shimmy off home after a bit of keyhole surgery but not so. I baulked at being told (post-surgery) that I couldn't drive for three weeks and felt stunned by my absolute exhaustion in the week that followed. That second part most certainly wasn't in the leaflets. And neither was the fact that there'd be no follow-up for three to four weeks until they had the biopsy results (all clear so all good!). Whilst I was prepared for the op (and very amused at being given hibiscrub to wash with for a few days pre-op as that's what we use on the dogs with when they cut their paws...) I was less than ready for the aftermath.

Turns out that post-operative care is a proactive thing on the patient's part. It seems strange when one call could set someone's mind at ease. Leaflet-based advice designed for a time when we would have 'convalesced' seems out of sync in an age when we're kicked straight out of hospital and likely to spend hours on Google shitting ourselves because we wouldn't want to 'bother' our overstretched health service unless we think we might actually be dying (which Google is very good at telling you that you probably are). 

It's been a tricky time for sure. One during which I've had to work hard to restrict myself from social media and search engines. To take time and slow down (easier said than done when you're self-employed and have two active dogs), to focus on getting true rest. 

And in amongst this all was a gift. It was the realisation that the very best source of information, comfort, encouragement and advice on navigating this milestone was to be found amongst the women I know and love. Throughout our lives, and the course of our friendship so far, our bodies have changed and adapted, amazed us and frustrated us. We don't know for sure what's in store but whatever the next phase of being a woman sends our way and however it may make us feel...it feels great to know that we're in it together!

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Like the sound of how I write? Why not book me to speak? I talk about all things social mobility, women in business, careers and much more :) You can check out my showreel below and book me to speak here Contact - Toni Kent – Speaker, Writer and Stand Up

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Soundtrack: Man! I Feel Like a Woman - Shania Twain

Go let it out

Well it would appear that returning to writing has opened the floodgates so let's ride that wave!

Alongside the recent rush of inspiration that has me reaching for the notebook, something that's been surprising is the absolute lightness that comes with hitting 'publish'. Turns out I could absolutely use a bit of writing for pleasure vs writing for an algorithm. 

Of course, I'm also writing this for you, lovely reader, but with the knowledge that you're here for the same reason as me - to catch a breath and perhaps a break from the ceaseless dopamine thieves that want to grab our attention and wallets.

It began, strangely enough, with signing up to a business growth course. Something designed to get my online directory of helpful organisations 'The Common Good' fully out into the world and, maybe, 'monetise' it - I like to get paid as much as the next person but there was something about trying to create a commercial model for a platform designed to help people that made me feel just a little bit...ugh. I'm still a bit stuck if I'm honest but I know the answer will come. There's no rush.

What did need urgent attention was the realisation - during a workshop session designed around business - that I hadn't taken a holiday during the previous 12 months. Not only had I not been away, I had nothing in the diary until November...double ugh!

I looked at the wall planner I'd bought for the workshop and felt my heart drop. There, in glorious A2 was cube after cube of work - or the hope of more. I was aiming for more speaking gigs, more 'community meet ups', more busy-ness, more stuff. Each red dot a reason to invoice, each blue dot a trip up to 'Town'. The energy that had been there at the start of the course sank in my stomach like a stone. 

And it's weird, isn't it? How we can begin something so full of energy and fire only for something to stop us and make us go "huh?". But maybe there's a lesson in that. Maybe it's ok to change your mind. Or, as we like to say in business, to 'pivot' from one thing to another.

Start-ups 'pivot' all the time. The thought of this reminds me of netball - the 'one-foot-on-the-floor' move while you decide where to pass. It's a vision I aim to keep in mind every time I think of a tech bro - just a dude in skorts and a bib with GA writ large on the front and back. Strange imagery aside we accept it's entirely normal for a small organisation to switch ideas, emphasis, products - so what about us? Can't we do the same too?

That moment of realisation provided fuel to an otherwise low-level fire (and made me book a weekend away with my husband). Probably something that's been there for a long time in amongst the vivid dreams that may or may not be influenced by progesterone. There since my body and mind got round to the idea of being fifty. In amongst the shifting sands of a family life that is changing from the clear line of parent:child to a house full of adults that must find a way to rub along with each other. There are times they still need you for sure, but you can't just waft about waiting to be wanted. 

The family dynamic is a topic that is coming under increasing scrutiny amongst my friendship groups. We are swapping stories of children flying the nest and making plans on whether we keep it feathered to welcome them home. What do you do when it's just the two of you again? What do you do if it's you on your own? Should you start early to establish new patterns that will provide you with a ramp up while they ramp off? What if they need to come back or (whisper it) never leave?

We look to those older than us with kids in their mid- to late- twenties. Those who have found their nests with too much echo to bear. They leave our village in waves, three or four houses at a time. Our former babysitters now building independent lives of their own. Their parents moving to places just a train ride away from their adult children rather than being stuck out in the sticks where they'd be less inclined to visit.

Others buy camper vans and spirit themselves away for weekends while their brood soak up university, they now have their own tales to tell and are not just waiting for news. Some are welcoming grandchildren and, others, as in our case, are taking pride in seeing their children flourish at work and adjusting to early adulthood. And, of course, there's the obstacles to navigate, the upset and anger and misunderstanding and mistakes. Compared to my own upbringing there is a remarkable amount of patience and candour in my household but - if you know me - you'll know how acutely aware I am that when you can raise your kids outside of the stresses of poverty you have a bit more mental and emotional bandwidth.

And the best part of it all is having people to share this with who don't live in your house. It's why I was pleased to share a room on a recent girls trip away. Whereas our solo sleepers had the blessing of peace and quiet and no-risk of another person snoring, my friend and I got an extra hour at the end of each night to talk frankly about what was on our minds. As she is a mother of two older boys I picked her brains endlessly on her experiences and knew I could share mine without fear of shock or judgement. A post I wrote about my son when he was four doesn't even offer the slightest hint of what it is to have an adult man as a child - this post is not the place to write about it but I will aim to do it justice soon.

As a group - and in that room - on our WhatsApp group, and the other ones that we're part of with our wider groups of friends, we absolutely have the chance to let it all out. When I speak to friends who are dads, there seems to be mostly a shrug of the shoulders or a "FML" expression. A "Christ it's a pain in the arse" or a sigh. The same struggles are there for sure but who are they (and do they need to?) letting it out to? It takes for my husband and I to get out of the house to properly talk and more often than not I'm the one in the minutiae - getting caught up in how the children are feeling and whether or not the decisions they make or things that they do are as clear cut as they appear. It's in those conversations that I get a good reminder that sometimes I don't need to tie myself up in knots about everyone else - maybe I should just concentrate on what it is that I want rather than trying to predict (or worse) control what comes next. 

And this brings us back to that workshop and back to how looking at that calendar brought me back to the blog. I came to realise that so much of what I was doing was aiming to satisfy the needs of others. The groups I thought I had to be part of. The content I thought I had to create. The style I thought I had to communicate in. If you open LinkedIn and it makes you go 'ugh' or you open your email and there's yet another daily update from someone you suspect is a shyster who is offering you the world if you'd only sign up to their content generation course then why on earth are you killing yourself trying to play the same game? If it doesn't feel right, deep down, then it's not right. And you don't have to get all angry (done that) or try hard (done that) or bend over backwards for someone that's sending your BS detector into overdrive or trampling your boundaries (done that too!). Sure we all have to do things sometimes we don't like but, in common with lots of my friends who are now at the fifty-mark, we're tired of doing it. Knackered in fact. If we've got this far, and survived - and I don't say that lightly given the losses we've collectively suffered - then we need to be able to stand up for ourselves. Which, for me, begins with letting it out.

If you like this, or can relate to this, please give it a share with the people you feel you're able to 'go let it out' with. I'd love to know there are more groups of awesome women supporting one another. 

Love

Toni xx (here's a pic of me letting it ALL out at a gig I did - thanks to the phenomenal woman who booked me and trusted me :))

Soundtrack: Go Let it Out by Oasis. If you bear with me a bit I'll be sharing a Spotify playlist for the blog very soon!

IT's (Still) Different for Girls

Of all the things we tell our young people about careers, I don't think we put "You'll make lifelong friends" anywhere near the top of the list.

We say it a LOT about university. A world that is now opening up to me with one child in sixth form and the other one having gone off into the world of work. Not that either of my kids wanted / want to go to uni. One found the sixth form experience so awful they couldn't wait to see the back of education and the other is keen to make money and avoid the potential punishment that is repaying a massive loan. 

The school, meanwhile, had other ideas, so hellbent is it on maintaining a position of being seen as a 'Good' school (by which I don't mean OFSTED Good, I mean moneyed parents choosing it as a less expensive but socially acceptable state-school option after the absolute kidney punching that is private secondary education 'good'). 

But I digress - and I want to be even-handed. Uni is - for many - an awesome choice. For my friends with children at uni, and off the back of a night out me and a friend had with my daughter and her daughter when we went to visit the latter at Nottingham University, it most certainly offers PRIME opportunities for making friends for life in new and exciting (and old-school raucous) ways.

Anyway, let's put that wild memory aside and return to the topic in hand: finding friendship as a woman in the world of work. It's something I reflected on 12 years ago in this post about the challenges I faced as a woman in IT. The post features a photo of me with some friends I'd made in one of my early tech jobs. Friends who I still spend time with today. Friends who 25 years on from when we first met are still among the first women I'd choose to spend time with and to whom I turn when times are hard.

The post in question performed marvellously. It resonated vividly with women in a similar position and made a man get publicly upset with me on LinkedIn which I think means it must have really been on the money. I wonder if I'll get the same reaction again....

And what of the 12 intervening years? What's it been like for us since then? The women in the photograph, myself included, have all gone on to develop their careers and experiences which have taking them into a range of more senior, seasoned, visible roles. Those 12 years have been power years of putting our skills, networks and talents into action. 12 years during which we have grown not only as individuals, but grown our families. Raised children to the point some are now leaving home.

Today we operate at EMEA and Global level and are trusted with some pretty serious stuff. We are Board members, business leaders, budget holders. One of us is an MBE and then there's me! In the 13 years since I went solo, I have written more thought leadership pieces for senior tech leaders than I can tell you about, fronted some pretty niche webinars for some of the biggest tech brands in the world and stood on stages delivering keynotes for their women in business and social mobility networks. I am simultaneously in front and behind the camera or screen, off to the side but still very much part of the IT community. Both visible (as my children will attest when they realised their friends had googled my profile) and invisible (for all that I publicly put online, there's a ton of webinars that will only ever be seen by CIOs and solution architects in certain sectors - told you they were niche!).

And what are the challenges that face us now? 

• We have made our way up despite being passed over and made passes at by men who should know better 
• We've shouldered substantial workloads alongside serious responsibilities 
• Dealt with death and divorce and decisions involving elderly relatives 
• Sorted budgets whilst selling houses and surveying care providers 
• Managed meetings alongside mile after mile of pick up and drop off and parents evenings 
• Been seen as simultaneously at work and available for every last whim of every family member whether we like it or not because we are 'the woman' and so must be there for all of the emotions all of the time.

We are heavy with the weight of high expectations around maintenance and appearance and being agreeable and adaptable and aging whilst looking ageless and OH MY GOD!

So no wonder I felt like I'd absolutely lost my mind earlier this year.

No wonder my family felt like they needed to tell me that I was acting strangely after I lost my shit at the dinner table.

And thank goodness I knew I could drop a line to my friends that I'd made all those years ago to tell them what happened and ask them a question without fear of judgement: 

"Do you think that I might need to go to the doctor?" 

We don't get to ask questions like that of everyone. Sometimes we don't even get to the point where we feel like we can ask - so quick are we to turn on ourselves at any given moment with an internal voice that says:

"What if I'm just being selfish? I mean, look at what I've got here, why don't I just get over it? Other people have it harder, isn't this just being self-indulgent? Other people don't want to know this - why can't I just sort it out myself?"

Well, I'd tried that. Done all the 'walks-in-nature-hug-the-dog-breathe-deeper-smile-at-your-children-keep-a-gratitude-journal-run-walk-swim-spa-detox-don't-sweat-the-small-stuff' and it didn't work.

So I messaged my friends. And they said.

"Go to the doctor" 

"This happened to me too" 

"You are not going mad"

"It's going to be ok"

"OMG you need to ask for HRT - NOW!"

And I took that last line seriously and did what my friend said. 

And it WORKED.

And it's not just down to the appointment I eventually made. It's down to those friends. Those women I met when we were all little more than 21, all full of fun and excitement and big plans and bold ambitions and oh. so. hot! 

Without them my life would have worked out a little different. They formed a template for friendship and we've held hands all the way. We all have other friendship circles too. Groups we've become part of as mothers, neighbours or shared interests. But this group endures. And it started in IT.

IT is (still) different for girls. But for the girls that are in it, were in it, thinking about joining it, it's oh so much more the richer because of the other girls and women you will meet. Stick at it, stay in it, there's a place for you in IT.

Like this? Tell a friend - god knows we all need one :)

Love

Toni 

xx

25 years on....still going strong!

Seventy Four, Seventy Five

Hopefully I won't get
'egged & floured' this time!

In six months I'm going to be 40.  It feels a bit exciting as I love a 'big' birthday, although I'm not sure of the significance of this one compared to my 18th and 21st unless there's some legal thing I've missed which means I get a double-strength vote or am allowed to ride a unicycle through Westminster while dressed as a horse.

I guess it's supposed to be a point of reflection, a time to think about how far you've come, count your blessings and stick a flag on summit that is reaching official Middle Age.  But what does that even mean now?  We're all busily extending our teenage years well into our fifties, refusing to give in to M&S elasticated trousers and continuing to go out when we really ought to be hosting civilised dinner parties instead.

Some people use it to attack their 'Bucket List' but I used up a whole load of that stuff (and probably nine lives) in charging through my teens and twenties because partly I had a 'life is short' rocket up my arse thanks to the death of my dad when I was a teenager, and partly because I knew jumping out of aeroplanes would be a less responsible thing to do once I became a mother (despite stating frequently I would "never have children" I guess there was always a part of me that secretly hoped I might).

What is good about this impending milestone is that it means a lot of my friends are turning 40 too, bringing ample opportunity to celebrate - and a welcome change from invitations to ferry the children to and from village halls and soft play centres where you stand about and drink lukewarm squash while your children get a serious sweat on and cry that they don't have enough Hula Hoops.  This has brought about some already very memorable parties and the realisation that when you get a group of grown ups together without their children, you find the same jokes you shared when you were 14 still have the power to make you cry with laughter.

Over the past couple of months I have....

• Been in hysterics over memories of old school teachers, and spat my drink out as former classmates confessed to being the source of phone calls about "massive willies" 
• Used words that were once terms of abuse as terms of endearment - I don't know why my year group used "skippy cotter" but we did.  So there.
• Marvelled at how ten - even twenty years after last seeing someone - they still look the same as their class photograph from 1987 (minus the terrible brown and green uniform - see picture..)
• Danced like a woman possessed.  No, hang on a minute, like a sixteen year old girl who is awe-struck that bands like the Happy Mondays and Jane's Addiction even exist
• Bellowed "no future" with some other mums whilst hurling ourselves around a living room to the Sex Pistols 
• Hugged friends - current, new, long-lost and found again wrapped in bear hugs and embraces

These parties have been awesome, emotional and above-all life affirming.  A chance to come together, reflect on the girls we were and the women we now are; so if this is what being 40 is all about then you can bring it on :)

Soundtrack: '74 - '75 The Connells