Robyn Malcolm had one hell of a ride with menopause and figures one thing that could help all women have an easier run of it, would be to start talking about it more. Here she shares her story as we uncover some eyeopening statistics about perimenopause and menopause.
After letting it sit on my bedside table for years, two weeks ago I finally picked up my copy of Catherine Newman’s best-selling novel Sandwich and read it, almost in one sitting, while on holiday.
If you’ve read it, you’ll know what a delight it is. And if you haven’t read it, well, you simply must. It’s about a woman grappling with the fact that her children are now adults, her parents are becoming elderly, the regrets she has over decisions around her fertility and motherhood – all while she is in the ghastly throes of menopause.
My mouth literally dropped open a few times as she writes openly and in great detail about some of what’s happening to her body. She describes how her vagina is literally shrinking (both in length and width) – the horrors of vaginal atrophy. ‘Hmm…’ I naively thought. ‘How brave to talk about these truly horrifying symptoms that surely must be so uncommon. How weird and ghastly, but surely so rare?’
Well… apparently not. Not by a long shot. The very next week I‘m sitting opposite national treasure Robyn Malcolm (I’ll explain what she has to do with this all soon) and Dr Iona Weir and am handed the results of an intense piece of research. It was then that I discovered I – and very few of us apparently – really have any understanding of what happens to women’s bodies during perimenopause and menopause.
Because yup, vaginal atrophy is actually super, super common. Women just aren’t talking about it. And there’s so much we’re not talking about – although, as Robyn shares, there’s also a lot that’s positive aspects we’re keeping mum about (stay tuned for the 92-year-old having multiple orgasms and women post-menopause experiencing three-and-a-half-minute orgasms).
The research – ‘The View From Downunder’, commissioned by Weir Science – discovered that Genitourinary Syndrome of Menopause (or GSM) is experienced by at least 50% of menopausal woman and as many as 84% (!!!!!!). And if you have never heard of GSM (I’m raising my hand here) you’re certainly not alone. Even amongst women aged 50+, only 30% had ever heard of it. That means the majority of women who likely have it, don’t even know it exists and they’re not alone in what is going on.
So, what’s going on? Essentially GSM is what used to be called vaginal atrophy (a horrifying term, that does kind of describe some of what happens). The term was upgraded to GSM in 2014 to be more accurate because it’s about more than the vagina: it encompasses the tissues of the vulva, vagina, urethra and bladder. GSM therefore has a wide range of symptoms: vaginal dryness, itching, irritation, burning, frequent urination, recurrent UTIs, urinary incontinence, loss of libido, pain during sex and other kinds of pain and tenderness. And yes MORE THAN 50% of women will have these symptoms.
As Dr Iona Weir explains, the loss of estrogen as we age, affects our cells and therefore our nerve senstitivity. This means it can be harder to orgasms as we age. “Yes, our ability to orgasm reduces and is a case of use it or lose it!”
So… why don’t we talk about it, or the symptoms of GSM? Apparently everyone’s too embarrassed to say anything because no one realises that what they’re going through is so normal. In fact, 40% of women haven’t said anything to ANYONE about it. Only 30% of women experiencing GSM have plucked up the courage to tell their doctor, and only 13% have told their partner.
That’s the stat that makes Robyn Malcolm baulk.
“What the f**k?” she says. “Not even their partner!? How incredibly sad that statistic is.”
Robyn, who just turned 60, says she had a hell of a run with menopause, and it has become a topic she’s passionate about.
“I started experiencing some symptoms in my 40s and was on some hormones for that, but then when I was about 50, I had what my endocrinologist described as an endocrinal melt-down,” she says. “Everything went hay-wire, and I became clinically – and quite frighteningly – depressed.”
Medication helped, she says, as well as sharing her experiences – which often felt like it was going against the grain. It feels like the societal norms when it comes to menopause include just sucking it up, staying quiet about what we’re feeling (physically and emotionally) and keeping the whole subject taboo.
“It was hard,” she says. “To be honest the hot flashes were the least of my problems, but when I had one, I thought about how we’re sort of somehow supposed to keep this to ourselves and I thought, f**k that. I’d make my partner or whoever I was with come and stand with me outside in the cold while it was happening.”
Robyn says she’s always been political, but she’s felt a fire (no pun intended) under her about the way women in this stage of their life are treated in western cultures, like our own.
“I’m really interested in anything that’s about women in middle age and really everything that happens to us from the moment our fertility is no longer a thing,” she says. “I’m interested in it on a social level, I’m really interested in it on a political level and a health level because not only are women used to being second-class citizens, but for millennia women who can’t make babies have been even worse off. We’ve been an invisible crowd for such a long time – we’re witches, or crones, or failures.”
And it really doesn’t have to be like this, she reiterates. Really – as it is treated in other cultures – it’s just a new, often even more powerful, stage of our lives.
“Women who are past their childcare years, I think, can completely recreate, reinvent and make their decisions about how they want to live their lives according to their own rules,” she says. “In other cultures, post-menopausal life is referred to as the second spring.”
Robyn points to one of her favourite skits – Amy Schumer’s ‘Last F**kable Day (ft Tina Fey, Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Patricia Arquette)
“They’re sitting around having a celebratory champagne, celebrating ‘the last day’,” she says. “It’s about how, as an actor, you get to a certain age where you are no longer ‘believably f**kable’. Because do you know what? There’s actually a hell of a lot of freedom in that.”
Robyn says she found it hilarious, but also so interesting. Is there really an age where society (or the media?) decides that you’re ‘too old’ to be the love interest? Too old to be ‘believably f**able?’ Too old to actually want to have sex?
“There seems to be this idea that when you get to a certain age your sex drive disappears,” says Robyn. “Yet… that isn’t what I was experiencing. Why should we feel that way? Where did that come from? How much of that is genuine and how much of it is learned behaviour, where we’re just following this narrative of how a menopausal woman is supposed to feel and act?”
Robyn feels a surge of anger when she thinks about how different it is for men. “Everyone talks about ‘dad bods’, but there’s no ‘mum bods’ talked about,” she says. “And then we have people like for instance, your Clint Eastwoods, who, at the age of 80 can do a movie where he’s having sex with a 30-year-old and no one bats an eyelid!”
So, when Weir Science (led by renowned cell biologist Dr. Iona Weir) approached Robyn about becoming the official ambassador for a new menopause support product made here in NZ, Myregyna, she was interested – but cautiously so.
“I don’t put my name to anything unless it works,” she says. “I said to them to give me three months’ worth and leave me alone. Well, after three months I went… [she raises one eyebrow, leans and whispers] …it works.”
In a nutshell Myregyna is a skin-based, non-hormonal, non-invasive solution developed to support sexual and genital health during and after menopause – and it offers new hope to women dealing with GSM. It uses a unique “outside-in and inside-out” double-action Hydrating Cream and Dietary Supplement system based on the globally patented biotechnology Myrecil® invented and made in NZ by Dr Iona Weir. Her name may already be familiar to you as the brains behind Atopis Skincare – a brilliant brand that offers particular relief to ezxcema sufferers (I had a bout postpartum and swear by the stuff).
In fact, it was one of her creams meant for other tissues that a specialist started using on herself on her vaginal area and started seeing some amazing results – leading Iona to start developing a product specifically for the female genital area to help rejuvenate skin and tissue that had been affected by menopause.
“Iona told me that she ended up with a group of international medical specialists trying it out themselves,” says Robyn. She leans in closer to tell me quietly, “They ended up timing their orgasms. One of them had a three-and-a-half minute orgasm.”
“I’ve worked out what I think it is too. I think I know what they’re talking about from my own experience. It’s like a rolling maul, just a longer experience, and that’s about the muscles, I think. It’s magic. It’s a really good time.”
Robyn started posting about Myregyna on her social media, and suddenly it was like the flood gates opened – everyone wanted to talk to her about their own experiences with menopause and sex, for better or for worse.
“My mother called me and said, ‘I was just having a chat to a 92-year-old friend of mine the other day and she just wanted to tell you that it’s absolutely possible for 92-year-olds to have multiple orgasms.”
And now, Robyn says she’s thrilled there’s something effective that women can “have in their toolbox” to combat some of the more difficult aspects of menopause. But, she’s also excited to see some of those stats change and see more women feeling confident and less alone, and able to speak out.
“It’s our second spring, it’s our time to live by our rules”