Menopause CBT Clinic

10/04/2026

Hi

Finding the right support during menopause for emotional, psychological and mental health challenges, isn’t always easy.

We know that:
• CBT is recommended for menopause support (NICE guidelines)
• Mental health during menopause matters (Royal College of Psychiatrists)

And yet many women still say:
“I can’t find a therapist who really understands mental health and menopause.”

Because menopause isn’t just physical.

It affects mood, sleep, thinking, identity, relationships… and how you feel in yourself.

And working with this properly requires more than general therapy skills, it needs a menopause-informed approach.

That’s why we’ve created the EMBERS® Menopause-Informed Practitioners Directory. A place to find clinicians who are trained to understand the complexity of menopause and are trained to support the emotional and psychological side of this transition.

We’re starting small, with more practitioners joining over time, but it felt important to begin. If you’re:
• Looking for the right kind of support
• Supporting someone who is
this is a good place to start.

If you’re a menopause doctor or clinic and would like to offer more joined-up care, supporting mental health alongside HRT and medical treatment, feel free to get in touch to explore opportunities for working together.

🔗 https://www.menopausecbtclinic.co.uk/menopause-cbt-therapist

Please share, as this is something many women are still struggling to find 💛

13/03/2026

Today is World Sleep Day. Up to 70% of women experience significant sleep problems during perimenopause and menopause. Hormonal changes play an important role. Declining and fluctuating oestrogen and progesterone can affect thermoregulation, mood, and the brain systems involved in sleep. Symptoms such as night sweats, anxiety, and low mood can further disrupt sleep.

Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) can help some women by addressing the hormonal component. However, sleep difficulties during menopause are rarely explained by hormones alone.

Sleep is influenced by a wider biopsychosocial picture, including:
• lifestyle factors such as diet, alcohol intake and physical activity
• psychological factors such as stress and worry
• environmental and life pressures such as work or caregiving

For this reason, psychological interventions can play a very important role.
NICE guidelines recommend Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for Insomnia (CBT-I) as the first-line treatment for persistent insomnia.

In my clinical work with menopausal women, I often use a compassion-focused adaptation of CBT-I inspired by Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and the work of Dr Guy Meadows. Rather than relying heavily on strict sleep restriction, which can be overwhelming when women are already exhausted, this approach focuses on reducing anxiety about sleep, developing a kinder relationship with wakefulness, and rebuilding trust in the body’s natural sleep system.

Sometimes the most helpful shift is moving from the pressure of “I must sleep” to the permission of “I can rest comfortably even if sleep does not come immediately.”

Within the EMBERS® Menopause-Informed CBT framework, sleep is addressed in the E - Essentials step, where we focus on restoring the foundations of wellbeing: sleep, nutrition, movement and nervous system regulation.

On World Sleep Day, it’s worth remembering: menopause may change sleep, but it does not mean good sleep is lost forever.

If you’d like some practical strategies to improve sleep during menopause, check out this blog post with six evidence-informed tips that can help improve sleep during menopause.

https://www.menopausecbtclinic.co.uk/blog/six-tips-to-improve-insomnia-in-menopause

05/01/2026

New Year resolutions? Anyone else feeling the pressure?

January often pushes us towards drastic changes like eat less, exercise more, fix everything quickly. But motivation driven by the New Year resolutions rarely lasts.

Drastic plans, restriction and all-or-nothing thinking tend to leave us exhausted, discouraged and often feeling like we’ve failed.

For women in midlife and menopause especially, sustainable change doesn’t come from punishment. Our bodies and brains are already navigating hormonal shifts, stress and competing demands. What helps is support, not harsh regimes or criticism.

Begin by changing how you relate to change itself, leading with kindness and compassion rather than harsh strategies or self-criticism.

If you’re wondering what that looks like in practice, here are a few ideas informed by the ethos of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy.

1. Start with kindness - This may mean speaking to yourself more gently. It might also mean letting go of the idea that change has to be fast or brutal to be effective. Behavioural science consistently shows that most habits are built gradually, not overnight.

2. Bring curiosity into the process - Curiosity is often more helpful than criticism. Instead of asking, “What’s wrong with me?”, try “What’s going on for me?” Our expectations are frequently shaped by unrealistic images of health and bodies that don’t reflect real life.

3. Let enjoyment be your companion - Enjoyment matters more than we often realise. If a change makes life harder or joyless, it’s unlikely to last. Look for ways of eating and moving that you enjoy. When the process feels good, you tap into a more sustainable form of motivation.

4. Reframe the narrative - Shift the focus from restriction and punishment to supporting your body and mind. Instead of asking what you need to cut out, ask what would help nourish and support your brain and overall wellbeing.

5. Choose progress over perfection - Small, consistent steps are far more sustainable in the long run. They lead to real change that fits into your actual life, rather than an idealised version of how you think things should be.

And here is a question for you to reflect on:
What is one small, kind change I could make this month that would support me, not fight against me?

Let this be the year you do things differently and succeed in making changes that last.

31/12/2025

As we step into a new year, I want to pause with you for a moment 💛

If the past year felt messy, slower than you hoped, or simply hard at times, please know this: you have not failed. Perimenopause and menopause bring real hormonal and nervous system changes that affect energy, mood, focus, and resilience. That’s physiology, not weakness.

Alongside the challenges, this phase can also bring clarity about what no longer fits and what matters most now.

As the year begins, there’s no need to push for reinvention. A gentler and more helpful question might be: What does my body and mind need from me now?

Thank you for being part of this community and for showing up for yourself in whatever way you can.

Wishing you steadiness, kindness, and moments of ease as the year unfolds. Happy New Year !!!!.

17/12/2025

Christmas can be magical, but it can also be overstimulating, unpredictable and emotionally demanding. And if you’re already navigating hormonal changes, brain fog or stress, December can feel especially heavy on the mind and nervous system.

Here are six psychologically informed strategies to help you brave the festive season with more clarity and calm:
🎄 1. Pace yourself, don’t push through - Slowing down and spreading tasks out reduces overwhelm and protects your cognitive and emotional bandwidth.
🎄 2. Guard your attention - Even 10 minutes of doing one thing at a time can refresh your mind.
🎄 3. Lighten your emotional load - Naming emotions (“I feel overwhelmed”) softens their intensity and calms the nervous system.
🎄 4. Use grounding anchors - A deep breath, a moment outdoors, a 3-minute pause. Small resets make a big difference.
🎄 5. Stabilise your rhythms - Regular meals, hydration, sleep and wind-down routines support mood, focus and energy.
🎄 6. Practise self-compassion - Kindness towards yourself is not indulgent; it’s SELF-CARE. Criticism clouds clarity while compassion restores it.

However your December looks - busy or quiet, joyful or simple - I hope you find pockets of rest, connection and warmth.

You deserve a holiday that supports your mind and honours your energy. You don’t have to do Christmas at anyone else’s pace. Let it be gentle, nourishing and right for you. 💛

07/12/2025

🌟 A Brilliant Podcast on Nutrition & Mental Wellbeing — Plus a Book Recommendation! 🌟

Hi everyone,
I wanted to share something that I think many of you will find both interesting and genuinely helpful.

There’s often so much confusion out there about supplements, multivitamins, and whether they make any real difference to our health, especially during midlife and menopause. Social media is full of mixed messages, and it can be hard to know what to trust.

This week I listened to a fantastic podcast with Professor Julia Rucklidge, a clinical psychologist and leading researcher in nutrition and mental health. What I love about her work is that it’s based on solid science, not trends or marketing.
In the episode she talks about:
💊 Why some people benefit from broad-spectrum multivitamins
🧠 How nutrients affect mood, focus, energy, and resilience
🧬 How stress and modern life can change our nutritional needs
🥗 How to choose good-quality supplements (and avoid the hype)
It’s eye-opening, easy to follow, and full of “I had no idea!” moments.

🎧 Here’s the link to the episode:
https://www.thedoctorskitchen.com/podcasts/324-can-multivitamins-help-treat-depression-anxiety-and-prevent-mental-health-issues-professor-julia-rucklidge

And if podcasts aren’t your thing, or if you’d love to go deeper, she’s also written an excellent book called The Better Brain. I’ve started reading it and honestly, I’m having lightbulb moment after lightbulb moment. It’s definitely worth popping on your Christmas list (if you can wait that long!).

📚 The Better Brain by Julia Rucklidge and Bonnie Kaplan
If you give the episode a listen or pick up the book, come back and let me know what you think. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Coming into this podcast my opinion was that multivitamins are just not worth it. Whether that’s for general wellbeing, cardiovascular health, sleep and especially mental health, I just was not convinced that they did anything at all.

27/11/2025

As we wrap up the latest cohort of the EMBERS® Professional Training Programme, I’ve been thinking about what this really means for the women who are struggling through menopause, especially those who are wondering whether psychological support might help.

This cohort brought together clinicians from the UK, US, the Bahamas, New Zealand, Germany, Denmark, Italy, Colombia, and Russia. The fact that professionals from so many parts of the world are seeking this training says something important:
💛 Women everywhere are experiencing emotional and psychological difficulties during menopause and they deserve support that truly understands what they’re going through.

Menopause-informed psychological care matters because:
• Many women are told “it’s just hormones” when something deeper is happening
• Symptoms such as anxiety, low mood, brain fog, irritability, or a sense of “not feeling like yourself” are often misunderstood or dismissed
• So many women have never had their experience properly explained or validated

If you’ve been feeling confused, overwhelmed, or unlike the person you used to be, you are not alone and there is a way forward.

This specialised psychological approach can help you:
✨ Make sense of what’s happening in your mind and body
✨ Feel more in control and less overwhelmed
✨ Rebuild confidence, resilience, and clarity
✨ Move from coping to thriving

Seeing clinicians from around the world commit to learning menopause-informed psychological care gives me real hope. It means more women will have access to support that is compassionate, informed, and actually tailored to this stage of life.

If you’re considering getting help, please know this:
🔥 You deserve care that recognises your experience - not minimises it.
🔥 You deserve a safe space to understand what’s happening.
🔥 You deserve to feel like yourself again.

And support is available. Women everywhere deserve nothing less.

If you’ve been struggling and are ready for support, you don’t have to do this alone. Me and my colleagues at the Menopause CBT Clinic® can help you feel like yourself again and regain control over your mind, body, and life.

Reach out via our website💛

23/10/2025

The NHS has just announced that the routine 40–74 health check will now include questions about menopause for the first time. 🙌

This is brilliant news and a long-overdue recognition that menopause matters to women’s health.

But we also know menopause is not just a physical transition.It can profoundly affect mood, confidence, identity, and emotional wellbeing.

That’s why we need to make sure that mental health is part of this new health check, too.

Women identified as struggling with low mood, anxiety, or emotional overwhelm deserve access to menopause-informed psychological care, not just medication or reassurance.

As a community we can help make this happen, by raising awareness, sharing good practice, and keeping the conversation focused on the whole woman: mind and body.

🎥 I’m sharing this short video — Be Part of the Change in Menopause Psychological Care — as a reminder of why this matters and how we can lead the way.

Please take a few minutes to watch and share it.

Together, we can make sure this new initiative truly supports women in every sense. 💛

💬 What small actions can each of us take to help ensure mental health becomes part of this new menopause health check? Let’s make our collective voice heard.

18/10/2025

🌍 Happy World Menopause Day 2025!!!!

This year’s theme is Lifestyle Medicine, an evidence-based approach that uses everyday lifestyle choices as powerful tools to prevent and manage health challenges.

Lifestyle Medicine focuses on six key pillars: sleep, nutrition, movement, stress regulation, connection, and reducing harmful substances. Together, they help restore balance to both mind and body, something especially important during menopause, when the brain is recalibrating and the body is rebalancing.

Therapy plays a vital role in this process, not by prescribing diet or exercise plans, but by supporting behavioural change. It helps women reflect on what they already know, build confidence, and turn small, sustainable habits into lasting change through mindset and self-compassion work.

Menopause is not something to “get through” as it’s a time to rebalance, to care for yourself with kindness while your body and brain adapt.

Here are 6 small, evidence-based ways to start:
💤 Sleep: Create a gentle wind-down routine - dim the lights, avoid screens for at least 30 minutes before bed and do something calming before bed. Quality sleep supports hormone balance and mood regulation.

🥗 Nutrition: Think steady energy - balanced meals with fibre, protein, whole foods, and plenty of colour on your plate. Avoid skipping meals (your brain and blood sugar will thank you).

🚶‍♀️ Movement: Move every day in ways that feel good - a brisk walk in nature (even better), dancing, stretching, or strength work. You don’t have to “exercise”, just keep your body moving and avoid long periods of sitting. Movement boosts endorphins and supports bone, brain, and heart health.

🧘‍♀️ Stress Regulation: Even 5 minutes of slow breathing, mindfulness, or journaling can calm your nervous system and reduce cortisol.

💬 Connection: Spend time with people who lift you up. Social connection protects mental health and builds resilience.

☕️ Reduce Harmful Substances: Notice your relationship with alcohol, caffeine, ni****ne, and screen time. Small reductions can make a big difference in how you sleep, think, and feel during the menopause.

💛 Small steps count. You don’t have to change everything - consistency, not perfection, is what supports long-term balance.

This World Menopause Day, take one small action for your wellbeing. Because how you live is part of how you heal. 🌿

08/10/2025

When therapy “doesn’t work”, it’s not always about the person who's seeking support or the therapist. Sometimes it’s about CONTEXT.

Hormonal changes during menopause can deeply affect mood, anxiety, sleep, and sense of self, yet many women’s therapy never touches on it.

That’s why Menopause-Informed Psychological Care matters. It helps women feel seen, understood, and supported in ways that generic therapy often can’t.

And that’s where the EMBERS® Menopause-Informed CBT framework comes in - an evidence-based approach that adapts therapy to the menopausal context, bridging CBT, neuroscience, and lifestyle medicine to help women regain control over their mind, body, and life.

💛 The next EMBERS® Professional Training Programme starts 22 Oct – 26 Nov. Booking is open for one week only!

👉https://www.menopausecbtclinic.co.uk/embers-professional-training_-booking-page-october-25

Let’s make Menopause-Informed Psychological Care the norm, not the exception.

If you believe in the importance of Menopause-Informed Psychological Care, please help spread the word by sharing this post with your community. Your support helps more clinicians make an informed decision to join. Thank you 🙏

01/10/2025

Have you ever felt this as a clinician?

Ever felt like therapy for menopause just… isn’t quite helping? It’s not because you’re “not trying hard enough.” It’s not because your therapist isn’t skilled.

Here’s the truth: most therapy wasn’t designed with menopause in mind. Think of it like this: 🔪 A knife works brilliantly in the kitchen. But would you want the same knife used in surgery? Of course not. Both are “knives,” but one is adapted for a very specific, delicate job.

It’s the same with therapy. Generic therapy tools are helpful, but when it comes to menopause, you need an approach adapted to this stage of life. Otherwise, you can end up feeling “stuck,” confused, or even blaming themselves.

✨ That’s what Menopause-Informed Psychological Care does. It takes proven approaches like CBT and adapts them to the unique challenges of menopause, so you feel understood, validated, and supported in ways that make real change possible. Because therapy should fit YOU, not the other way round. 💛

I’d love to hear your experience: When you’ve had therapy, did menopause or hormonal changes ever get mentioned? If not, what would you want and hope for from therapy at this stage of life?

24/09/2025

🌸 Is menopause the missing link in how we understand midlife women?

So often, women are told their struggles are “just stress” or “all in their head.” But what if the missing piece isn’t another miracle cure… but something much simpler: AWARENESS.

Menopause is a universal transition, yet too often its impact on mental health gets overlooked. That’s why so many women feel dismissed or unsupported when they’re dealing with brain fog, anxiety, low mood, or exhaustion in midlife.

Awareness changes everything. ✨ It helps us see these experiences are real and valid. It reframes symptoms as part of a biopsychosocial transition, not a failing. And it opens the door to strategies that can restore balance and help you move from suffering to thriving.

💛 Awareness is where transformation begins.

👉 Have you noticed how hormonal shifts affect your mood, sleep, or clarity of mind?

Share your experience below. And remember, YOU ARE NOT ALONE!