Buncrana mum aims to break the silence around perimenopause with unfiltered new book

“At 46, with regular periods and a life already full to bursting, I assumed the night sweats, anxiety and sudden rage were stress. Then a damp tea towel tipped me over the edge; and led to the diagnosis that changed everything.”

This striking account is at the heart of a new book by a Donegal woman who hopes her own unfiltered experience of perimenopause will spark more open conversations about a transition that can leave women wondering what is happening to them.

Buncrana-based author Marie McLaughlin, a mum-of-two and a Learning and Development specialist, has drawn on her own lived experience for her first book, ‘The Rage, The Sweat and The Patches’. When Marie first began experiencing perimenopause symptoms, she said she had “no idea what was happening” to her.

But as she began talking more openly about what she was going through, she quickly discovered she was far from alone.

Other women were describing similar experiences, often believing they were burnt out, depressed, not coping or simply ‘losing the plot’.

Marie said she became increasingly interested in what happens when those symptoms follow women through the workplace, and how employers and colleagues can better understand and respond to them.

That became the starting point for a book which aims not only to inform, but to get people talking. Its tagline – ‘Perimenopause: unfiltered, unapologetic . . . and maybe a little bit moist’ – aims to reflect the honest and humorous approach Marie takes to a subject that can sometimes as she said can be discussed too clinically, too cautiously or, in many cases, not at all.

Combining lived experience, evidence-informed information and humour, the book intends to explore the physical, cognitive and emotional realities of perimenopause, covering everything from brain fog, rage and sleeplessness to relationships, work, identity and the often confusing search for the right help and support.

The book sits within Marie’s wider Peri Mayhem platform, through which she is developing menopause awareness, manager and organisational training programmes to help women feel better informed and workplaces respond with greater confidence, consistency and compassion. Marie said her philosophy is straightforward: “menopause is serious, but talking about it doesn’t always have to be.”

Living in Inishowen with her husband Niall and their two girls, Marie said: “The heart of it all is a desire to make sure women are better prepared for a transition that can affect almost every part of their lives.”

‘The Rage, The Sweat and The Patches’ will be launched at the Inishowen Gateway Hotel, Buncrana, on Thursday, September 24, at 7.30pm.

Tickets can be purchased via Eventbrite, with information also available at www.perimayhem.com.