💌 Inside This Week’s After Party -Health, Hormones, & The Holy Shift

🍸 Opening Toast

From the desk (more like dance floor!) of Robyn Cohen:

To the hot flashes, mood swings, libido loss, and to loving this body anyway.

Because real wellness isn’t about pretending we’re 25. It’s about getting radically honest with what’s happening right now, and honoring the hell out of ourselves through it.

Here’s the truth: I didn’t expect this chapter to hit as hard as it did.

It all started in January 2023. Out of nowhere, I began experiencing intense mood swings, the kind that made me question if I was losing my mind. I chalked it up to stress. I was under enormous pressure financially, work was rocky, and I figured life was simply doing its thing. But the emotional breakdowns kept coming, deep, heavy, and every few weeks.

By June 2023, it got so dark that I found myself in a place I never thought I’d be — thinking about ending my life.

Thankfully, something in me knew to reach out. I called my husband and told him to come home immediately. Then I called one of my best friends and asked her to stay on the phone with me until he arrived. That moment changed everything. I took a few days to rest and reassess my life.

That’s when I remembered a blood test I took back in 2022. It showed I was likely entering perimenopause, but no one really told me what that meant. So I started researching like my life depended on it (because, honestly, it did).

I went to see my doctor, hoping for insight and a plan. Her response? Antidepressants.
I nearly fainted.

No conversation about my hormones.

No context.

Just a prescription. I was furious. I stormed out of her office and decided to take my health into my own hands. I began learning everything I could and started experimenting with supplements instead of jumping straight into hormone replacement therapy. I added DHEA to my daily mix of B12, D3, and adaptogens.

And for a while, the rest of 2023, in fact, I felt good. More balanced. More myself.

Then in April 2024, for no particular reason, I decided to double the dosage of everything I was taking. I wasn’t working with a doctor. I was just trying to keep up with a body that was shifting beneath me. That’s when the hot flashes, insomnia, and heart palpitations began.

I brushed it off as more perimenopause symptoms, until June 2024, when things escalated.

My heart was racing.

I felt feverish and unwell.

I went to a walk-in clinic. Everything looked normal. But at home, curled up in a ball, flushed, nauseous, and scared, I didn’t feel normal. So I went to the ER.

Again, all the tests came back fine.

When the ER doctor asked what I was taking daily, I rattled off:
100mg DHEA, 5000mg of Vitamin D3, 5000mg of B12, adaptogens, collagen…
He looked at me and gently said:
“Maybe you should stop taking all those supplements for now.”

So I did, except for the adaptogens. Something told me to keep those in my routine.

From June 2024 to March 2025, I felt great again. Until I ran out of my go-to adaptogens while traveling. I grabbed a new brand on the road. Big mistake. For three weeks, I had non-stop night sweats. Waking every night at 2–3am, drenched.
I finally got back on my usual brand in late March 2025, and since then, things have stabilized again.

It’s been a rollercoaster.
And I know I’m not alone.

At 51, I’m still moving through this transition. But the lack of accessible, real information and supportive medical care is staggering. The fact that antidepressants are often the first line of “treatment” for women in perimenopause is infuriating, and heartbreaking. I can only imagine how many women are walking around medicated for something that could be better supported with knowledge, context, and actual care.

But here’s the good news, ladies: we got this.

We are not broken. We are not crazy.
We are just walking through the fire of change — and rising, hormones and all.
Welcome to The After Party.🥂

💣 Truth Bomb

One day you’re fine. The next? You’re crying over a paper towel commercial, sweating through your sheets, and wondering why your heart won’t stop racing after a cup of coffee. And the scariest part? You think it’s just you.

But it’s not.
This is what it looks like when your body decides it’s time for a rewrite — and forgets to send the script.

The emotional swings, the physical shifts, the mental fog — they’re not signs you’re falling apart. They’re signals. Hormonal changes don’t just affect your cycle or sleep. They affect your nervous system, your brain chemistry, your energy, your relationships, and your sense of identity.

And no one teaches us how to decode the symptoms.

❓ ASK YOURSELF:

• Have I dismissed symptoms that might actually be hormonal?

• Am I listening to my body, or overriding it to keep up?

• Do I have support — medical, emotional, or communal — as I move through this?

🎯 THIS WEEK’S CHALLENGE:

Spend 15 minutes this week tuning into your body. Not judging, fixing, or pushing — just listening.

➤ Where do you feel tension?
➤ What’s shifted in your sleep, mood, or energy?
➤ What’s one small change that might feel nourishing right now?

Then say it out loud:
“I trust what my body is telling me — and I’m allowed to change how I care for her.”

🧠 WANT TO DIVE DEEPER?

Here’s a handful of reads and resources to help you feel less alone and more informed:

• 🧠 What's Going On In Your Brain During Menopause? —  Women’s Health Mag
  Why you’re not imagining the brain fog — and what neuroscience is finally learning.

• 💊 Why Are So Many Women Getting Antidepressants for Menopause Symptoms? — The Flow Space
  A breakdown of the (flawed) default medical response to women in hormonal transition.

• 🌱 8 Natural Remedies for Perimenopause Symptoms — Healthline
  From adaptogens to diet tweaks — what might actually help.

🪞 Mirror Talk

“To the version of me who thought she was crazy… No babe, it’s just peri.”


(And maybe a little dehydrated. Go drink some water!)

👑 The Guest List

Stacy London — Style Icon, Co-Host of Wear Whatever the F You Want, and Midlife Megaphone

We first met Stacy London as the whip-smart, no-nonsense co-host of What Not to Wear, where she made over wardrobes, and lives, with tough love and impeccable taste. But behind the bold prints and even bolder opinions was a woman who, like many of us, was trying to make sense of a body she no longer recognized.

In 2016, Stacy began experiencing a slew of physical and emotional symptoms: insomnia, anxiety, weight fluctuations, hot flashes, and mood shifts that didn’t feel like “her.” Like so many women, she initially chalked it up to stress, burnout, or just “getting older.”

But the truth was more complex, and more universal.

She was in perimenopause.
And no one had prepared her for what that actually meant.

There were no clear answers, no roadmap, and very few trusted resources. What she did find? A culture that treated aging in women as something to be fixed, silenced, or denied altogether.

So Stacy did what Stacy does best, she said what needed to be said, loudly and unapologetically.

And she did something about it.

From 2021 to 2024, she was the CEO of State of Menopause, a brand dedicated to helping women navigate the messy, marvelous truth of midlife. Their products were science-backed and symptom-specific, but Stacy’s impact goes far beyond the shelf.

She’s been turning up the volume on a conversation that’s long been whispered in bathrooms, avoided in boardrooms, and dismissed in exam rooms. Whether she’s posting candid reflections about hormonal rage, calling out ageism in the beauty industry, or simply telling it like it is, Stacy is rewriting the menopause narrative with humor, honesty, and heart.

Her mission is clear:
🧠 Educate.
🧴 Support.
🔥 Normalize.

She reminds us that midlife isn’t a breakdown, it’s a breakthrough.
A time to unlearn shame, rewire expectations, and reclaim our vitality on our own terms.

Stacy’s voice is a rallying cry for all of us navigating the “holy shift” one that says:
You’re not crazy. You’re not broken. You’re becoming.

You can catch Stacy on her new series, “Wear Whatever the F You Want", reuniting with Clinton Kelly.

She also just launched her new newsletter, “Forgetful by Stacy London.”

🎁 Party Favors

This week’s roundup is for every woman whose body is going through something. Whether it’s hormone hell or a quiet shift, these are small rituals and resources that say “We see you.”

• 🧴 Use It: Menopausal Skin Saviors by Evolve — Four must-have skincare products designed to not only support aging but bring brightness and life back to the skin too.

• 📘 Read it: The New Menopause by Dr. Marie Claire Haver — For women seeking both medical expertise and actionable self-care strategies.

• 🧘🏽‍♀️ Buy It: Lola Blanket in Antique Ivory — For the days when it’s time for some serious self-care, along with some Netflixing and chilling .

• 🎧 Listen To It: Menopause & The Brain: New Breakthroughs in Women’s Health with Dr. Lisa Mosconi — Be Well By Kelly’s interview with the one and only Dr. Lisa Mosconi exploring menopause’s effect on the body, brain, and hormones.

📣 Last Call…

Before we turn the lights up...

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Until next week,