Have you ever looked at your calendar, noticed your mood, and then found yourself reaching for a random bag of chips and wondering, “What is going on with me?”

If you’re in your late 30s or 40s and things suddenly feel a little off. Your sleep isn’t the same, your patience feels thinner, and your body doesn’t quite respond the way it used to. You may be moving through perimenopause. Some people call it a “second puberty.” But instead of growth spurts, it can show up as shifting hormones, changes in energy, and moments of brain fog.

In Traditional Chinese Medicine, this stage is often seen as a kind of second spring. A transition, a shift in energy, a quiet reset. It isn’t seen as something going wrong, just your body moving into a new phase and needing a slightly different kind of support.

What Exactly is Perimenopause?

Perimenopause is the lead-up to menopause. Menopause itself is actually just one point in time, the 12-month mark after your last period. Perimenopause is everything that comes before it, and it can last for several years. During this time, hormones like estrogen and progesterone start to shift and fluctuate. Because of that, things can feel a bit less predictable than they used to. Energy, mood, even that general sense of feeling like yourself can feel a bit off on some days.

The Signs You Might Be There

It’s not always about hot flashes. Sometimes the signs are a lot more subtle:

• The Shrinking Cycle: Your 28-day cycle suddenly becomes 24 or 21 days.
• The 3:00 AM Wake-up Call: You’re wide awake for no reason, staring at the ceiling.
• The Short Fuse: Feeling a surge of irritability over things that never used to bother you.
• The Sudden Puffiness: Unexpected bloating or weight shifts around the middle, even if your diet hasn’t changed.

A Holistic Way to Navigate It

We hear a lot about pushing through and keeping up… but this stage can feel like a bit of a shift away from that. It’s really more about slowing things down and reset wherever you can. It’s a time to be supporting your body a little differently and giving it what it needs to find its balance again.

1. Eat for Your Hormones

I like to think of my kitchen as a bit of a pharmacy. Instead of focusing on what to cut out or restrict, try focusing on what you can add in, specifically nourishment that actually makes you feel good.

• Mineral-Rich Broths are a good place to start. A slow simmered soup or broth is one of the easiest ways to get nutrients back into your body. When you’re stressed, your body burns through minerals faster than you’d think, and broth is about as easy and digestible as it gets.
• Healthy Fats are another one I keep coming back to. Your hormones literally need fat to function, so things like avocado, a good olive oil, a handful of walnuts.

2. Your Stress Bucket is Probably Full

During perimenopause, your body naturally becomes more sensitive to stress and cortisol. When that stress bucket starts to overflow, you’ll notice it, more irritability, feeling wiped out, or just that general sense of being done by midday.

Something I find worth remembering: if you look at how people lived generations ago, life had a much slower rhythm. Not lazy, just more settled. Less noise, less rushing, less being always on. Our nervous systems haven’t changed much since then. A long walk outside or sitting quietly with a cup of herbal tea isn’t doing nothing, it’s actually giving your body what it needs to reset.

3. Slow Restoration

This is not the time to push through and run on empty. I know that’s easier said than done, but if you’re exhausted, the most useful thing you can do for your hormones is rest. Not power through. Actually rest. And if something is adding to your load right now, it’s okay to say no to it.

Sleep is a huge part of this. Keep things simple, a magnesium bath before bed, keeping your room cool and dark. Small shifts, but they make a real difference in how your body regulates mood and energy the next day.

Perimenopause isn’t just something to get through. It’s actually a reasonable time to start putting yourself a little higher on your own list, maybe for the first time in a while. Your body and your mind are going through a lot, and they both need your attention.

Simply Salt & Soul

The Salt (The Science): During perimenopause, the body becomes more sensitive to blood sugar shifts and stress. Progesterone, your body’s natural calming hormone, starts to decline, which can show up as a shorter fuse, disrupted sleep, or energy that feels all over the place. From a nutrition standpoint, keeping blood sugar steady is one of the most practical things you can do. Pairing healthy fats and protein with something fibre-rich, like root vegetables, helps your body release energy slowly and steadily. And here’s something most people don’t realise: when blood sugar is more stable during the day, sleep tends to improve at night too. It works like an anchor, when everything else feels like it’s shifting, that steadiness is what helps keep things from feeling completely out of control.

The Soul (The Wellness): In Traditional Chinese Medicine, the shift toward menopause is called a Second Spring. The idea is that the energy we’ve spent so much of our lives directing outward, toward kids, work, and everyone else, starts to turn back inward. When I notice I’m irritable or just completely done, I try to catch myself before I spiral. It’s not PMS and it’s not me being difficult. It’s just my body asking for a little more care. And instead of pushing through, I’ve been trying to soften a little, a walk, five minutes of sitting still, or simply saying no to something I don’t have the energy for.