When I posted my proposal to create a menopause medicine specialty on LinkedIn, I didn’t include my face. Not because I’m anonymous — my name is right there. Not because I’m trying to hide my identity. But because menopause stole my confidence, and I’m not ready to be SEEN yet, even as I’m fighting to be HEARD.
Before my surgery, I glowed. People told me. I FELT it. I could have walked into rooms naked, that’s how confident I was.
After six years without adequate HRT, I turn my head away. I don’t want people to see me. Sometimes I don’t want to see myself. I feel like I bring darkness to rooms now.
The mental side of menopause is invisible. You can’t see it in bloodwork. You can’t measure it on a scan. But it’s REAL. It blinds you to your own worth. It convinces you you’re no longer beautiful even when everyone around you says you are.
I’m fighting to create a specialty that will treat what I’m still healing from.
I asked someone close to me — someone currently perimenopausal, currently suffering, someone who desperately needs this specialty to exist — to share my LinkedIn post.
She said no. Not because she doesn’t support me. But because she’s afraid that having her name next to the word “menopause” … might cost her future job opportunities in an ageist world.
I understood. Because I’m doing the same thing — just in a different way. She won’t let her NAME be associated with menopause. I won’t let my FACE be associated with it. We’re both hiding what menopause took from us.
But here’s what I’m learning: Visibility isn’t all-or-nothing. I can show up without my face and still be brave. This person can support me privately even if she can’t publicly. We’re all doing what we can with what menopause left us.
The specialty I’m proposing isn’t just about hormone levels and bone density. It’s about treating the WHOLE woman — including the part of her that can’t recognize herself in the mirror anymore. The part that feels like darkness instead of light. The part that’s afraid to be seen.
I’m not fully healed yet. But I’m fighting anyway.
And maybe that’s the point. We don’t have to be perfect or fully restored to demand better. We just have to show up — face or no face, name or no name — and refuse to stay silent about what menopause steals from us.
So no, I didn’t post my face. But I posted my story. My pain. My proposal. My refusal to let 6 more years go by without fighting for change.
That’s enough for today. Maybe one day my confidence will return enough to add my face to my mission. Or maybe it won’t. Either way, I’m here. Speaking up. Creating change. Even from behind the safety of words instead of images.
Because this specialty needs to exist whether I’m camera-ready or not.