New West local pushes back on the topic of menopause

Imagine attempting to advocate for your health, and effectively being ignored.

Now, throw in the topic of menopause.

It's a problem Jennifer Thompson says she experienced during a visit with a medical professional, and while she admits it resulted in what she characterized as "a small cry in the elevator on the way home," it did eventually lay the foundation for Herstasis Health, a company she launched to make sure women don't face the same challenges she has.

"There was sort of a turning point for me, in that I'd experienced a lot of joint pain ... pretty much literally one day I couldn't [run] anymore, and it caused no end of emotional distress. And I still haven't gotten over it. I can ride my bike long distances, but it really hurts my neck. Long walks make my knee really hurt. I don't get the endorphins that I used to get through exercise, which causes a lot of feelings about your body," she tells The Anchor.

Thompson says the rheumatologist—whom she'd waited six months to see—refused to acknowledge medical literature she'd seen about the impacts of estrogen on musculoskeletal performance.

Today she's on an estrogen patch to help with her medical needs, but the jarring experience in her more than decade-long journey made Thompson realize that someone needed to help with the destigmatizing and demystification of menopause.

Herstasis Health launched in 2020, and Thompson proudly explains that this is a business for women and by women. After she initially pitched the idea to some good friends who are doctors, she says she was surprised to have received negative feedback.

"[I was asking] 'why can't I measure my hormones? Why can't I measure my hormones and my symptoms at the same time?' They were like, 'nobody needs that, it's all garbage. No medical doctor's going to look at that.'"

But she wasn't deterred.

"[The initial response] caused me to reflect on my privilege as a white, wealthy woman that, if I can't make the system work for me, what's happening to women who don't share my privilege?"

Marrying her loves of entrepreneurship with health and technology, Herstasis Health is taking a modern approach to allow people to access information at their fingertips, while also building a supportive, online community.

"We've got an app, and a medical device under development, and a free website. We're going to have user stories coming in."

One of those user stories includes Roz, who opened up in a Herstasis Health video a few weeks ago, to talk about her own personal experience with menopause. The now 56-year-old had trouble with her period in her younger years—noting that her menstrual cycles were sometimes so bad that it some days it was tough for her to work.

She was eventually diagnosed with endometriosis, and had surgery to have the issue corrected. She had her first child, and eventually adopted two more children once she realized she was having difficulty conceiving. As she approached her 40s, she ended up suffering a broken cyst, resulting in emergency surgery.

"They said, 'We're sorry, we're going to do the best we can to save your ovaries, to save whatever we can inside of you,'" Roz outlines in the video. "'If we have to go in and take out everything, if it has to go.' And I said, 'Do whatever you can. I can't take this any longer. I've had enough of these 10 years plus of pain and discomfort and [being] unhappy.'"

She was 40 when she had her hysterectomy, launching her into a completely new chapter of her life.

"I was aware of menopause, but I didn't know completely what to expect ... I started getting these symptoms, and this discomfort, and thought, 'Oh. This is different!'"

While she felt some emancipation—no longer having to go through the use of tampons and pads, for instance—the shift in her life came with a ton of questions.

And—in a similar vein to Thompson's experience—joint pain.

"I had to go down on one knee first just to pick up [my son] Malcolm, and then it was just, 'I can't do this,'" says Roz, who eventually went to her doctor to ask for some kind of relief, even if it was just short term. She ended up taking hormones.

About five years later, Roz was diagnosed with breast cancer. She had a mastectomy, and to this day she's still getting treatment. For all she's made it through, Roz says the reason why she chose to share her story was to take control of her menopause.

"The freedom that I have now, the energy I have now despite having cancer...it hasn't stopped me...I feel for myself, and I feel for women. Don't let menopause stop you from living your life."

Stories like Roz's are part of the reason why Thompson continues to work towards the growth and goals of Herstasis Health.

"The women that get ahold of me on Twitter, on LinkedIn, they say, 'Thank you so much for what you're doing, you're really helping,'" says Thompson. "Maybe it's not a profitable enterprise, but we're getting people from all over the world using our app."

As for what needs to change on the topic of menopause, Thompson says there's still plenty of work to do—and she's looking forward to continuing to disrupt the negative, preconceived notions people have.

"The medical system, and there's some practitioners out there doing this, the medical system needs to embrace a more holistic approach for menopause, and for women's health in general."

To learn more about Herstasis Health, and how you can get involved, be sure to check out the company's website, Instagram, and Facebook pages.