Sugar is bad for my health, therefore I can't have any and am a weak person if I eat a donut.

Well, no. Human beings are really good at holding seemingly mutually exclusive positions (sugar is bad/I love sugar) at the same time. We're also really good at then feeling guilty and flawed for holding both ideas simultaneously.

Women are often caught in this bind in midlife: our culture celebrates youth, therefore aging must be "bad." Except that aging brings a whole lot of good with it, including experience, wisdom, and frankly, caring a whole lot less what "culture" has to say about our value.

Holding two views at once isn't crazy or wrong or weak; it can even be empowering. There's a tension in the gray space between that can cause stress, but it's also often a source of creation, of reimagining, of growth.

In this fascinating conversation between Gennev Director of Health Coaching Stasi Kasianchuk and regular guest metabolic surgeon and gut health expert Dr. Erika La Vella, they explore the "tension of duality." 

It doesn't have to be either/or (either sugar OR good health), so learn to embrace your "and."

Discover more from Dr. La Vella on her website LaVellaYourGuts.com. Be sure to check out all of her podcasts with Gennev at Gennev.com. And if you're ready to take the next step to better health in menopause, connect with a Health Coach at Gennev.com/plans. 

Talk to Meg Mathews for 30 seconds, and you'll know you're in the presence of a force.

Known for her work in marketing, music, fashion, and design, she is a highly accomplished woman with a big life and a big energy to sustain it. Now she's putting that drive and savvy behind educating the world about menopause.

Her new book The New Hot is a must-read for anyone dealing with menopause (and their partners). She takes on the taboos with common sense, humor, and a brook-no-BS born from years of being a celebrity. 

In this conversation with Gennev CEO Jill Angelo, Meg tells her personal story, and how the lack of good information and advice around menopause drove her to become a resource for others needing help.

Meg is a powerful advocate for women and trans individuals dealing with symptoms; she is also dedicated to helping others learn to advocate for themselves.

Meg Mathews is an icon of the nineties Brit-pop scene, a former music industry executive, and the ex-wife of Oasis guitarist Noel Gallagher. In 2017, she launched Megs Menopause, a platform dedicated to breaking the stigma around menopause. In 2018, she held her first annual conference for menopause information and discussion. That same year, she was awarded the Inspiring Public Figure Award by the Inspiring Leadership Trust. She lives in London.

Learn more about Meg Mathews at her website, megsmenopause.com, or follow her on Twitter, @MegMathews, or Instagram, @megmathewsofficial_.

Follow Gennev at gennev.com, on Twitter @MyGennev, and on Instagram, @MyGennev. 

Ada Calhoun's Book Why Can't We Sleep? was an instant New York Times bestseller. 

Gen X women are finding it hauntingly and painfully and upliftingly familiar. 

Gen X women are ... unhappy. Not all of them, not all of the time, but certainly there is more of a cloud over this generation than others. Sandwiched eternally between the much larger, much louder Boomer and Millennial cohorts, Gen X has been overlooked and ignored like the latchkey kids we so essentially are.

And that's doubly true of the women of Gen X, who are now aging into "invisibility" - those supposedly unsexy years after 40. 

Ada Calhoun wanted to know why we're such a miserable bunch, so she started asking. Two hundred interviews with Gen X women later, she's got answers, and she shared them in this fabulous podcast with Gen Xer (and what an irony that my computer's spellcheck doesn't recognize "Xer"), Gennev CEO Jill Angelo.

Hear their conversation about the price of trying to have it all, what it's like to be the first generation not to do better than our parents did, and why perimenopause and menopause are making it even harder on the women of the forgotten generation.

Spoiler: it's not all bad news. But there is some.