Chapter One
Welcome to Meno ND
No one tells you that menopause will arrive like a system update you didn’t consent to.
If you are neurodivergent — autistic, ADHD, dyslexic, dyspraxic, highly sensitive, or simply “wired differently” — this update can feel destabilising in ways no one prepared you for.
One day, you are managing.
Not effortlessly. Not without cost. But managing.
You have learned your rhythms. You know which days you can work, which days you must retreat. You know how much social contact you can tolerate, how to ration your energy, how to mask just enough to survive without disappearing entirely.
Over decades, you have built a fragile but functional architecture of self.
And then, quietly at first, it begins to destabilise.
Sleep fractures. Sensory thresholds collapse. Emotions surge without warning. Fatigue settles into your bones like weather. The brain you once trusted becomes unpredictable.
Words evaporate mid-sentence. Focus dissolves. Confidence drains away, replaced by a strange sense of incompetence that does not match your lived experience.
You begin to wonder:
What is happening to me?
The Invisible Intersection: Where Menopause Meets Neurodivergence
Menopause and neurodivergence occupy two overlapping territories of neglect.
Menopause is still framed, culturally, as a brief inconvenience — a few uncomfortable years and then “back to normal.”
Neurodivergence, particularly in women, is still misunderstood, underdiagnosed, and routinely dismissed.
When these two experiences intersect, the result is often invisibility.
Many women are told they are:
-
Simply anxious
-
Overworked
-
Overthinking
-
Ageing
-
Too sensitive
Some are prescribed antidepressants without discussion of hormones.
Some are advised to “slow down” in workplaces that punish any reduction in output.
Some are quietly edged out of careers they built.
Most are left to navigate this transformation alone.
This book exists because that silence is harmful.
The Long Apprenticeship of Being “Fine”
Many neurodivergent women reach midlife having become extraordinarily skilled at appearing functional.
We learned early how to:
-
Read rooms
-
Monitor tone
-
Anticipate expectations
-
Suppress discomfort
-
Translate ourselves into acceptable forms
We learned to perform competence.
Often, we learned to do this so well that even we forgot it was performance.
Careers were built on this invisible labour. Families relied upon it. Institutions benefited from it.
We became dependable. Capable. Resilient.
We were praised for being “strong.”
What was rarely acknowledged was the cost.
Many women arrive at midlife already carrying:
-
Chronic exhaustion
-
Cycles of burnout
-
Sensory overwhelm
-
Autoimmune issues
-
Anxiety or depression
-
Perfectionism
-
Hypervigilance
Menopause does not create these vulnerabilities.
It reveals them.
When the Mask Falls Away
Hormonal change affects neurotransmitters. It affects sleep architecture. It alters pain perception. It reshapes stress response. It interferes with executive function — the brain’s ability to plan, organise, and regulate attention.
For neurodivergent brains, already finely balanced, this can feel catastrophic.
Suddenly:
-
Masking becomes unbearable
-
Multitasking collapses
-
Social tolerance shrinks
-
Emotional regulation weakens
-
Recovery time lengthens
Many women describe feeling as though they are “losing themselves.”
In reality, something else is happening.
The scaffolding that held you upright is dissolving.
And beneath it is a self that has never been allowed to exist fully.
This Is Not a Breakdown
It is important to say this clearly:
Meno ND is not failure.
It is not regression.
It is not weakness.
It is transition.
A neurological, physiological, and psychological reorganisation — one that no one prepared you for.
The problem is not that you are changing.
The problem is that you were never supported in the first place.
You were expected to adapt endlessly, silently, without rest or recognition.
Menopause simply removes the last reserves that made that possible.
What follows can feel like collapse.
It is, more accurately, a reckoning.
Why I Wrote This Book
I wrote this book because I needed it and could not find it.
I needed language for what was happening in my body and mind.
I needed frameworks that respected intelligence and complexity.
I needed permission to be slower without being diminished.
I needed models of ageing that were not built on shame or denial.
Most of all, I needed reassurance that I was not alone.
That what I was experiencing was not personal failure.
That it had meaning.
This book is my attempt to offer that meaning.
Not as a guru.
Not as a clinician.
Not as someone who has “solved” anything.
But as a fellow traveller.
What This Book Will and Will Not Do
This is not a medical manual.
It will not replace professional healthcare.
It will not offer universal solutions.
It will not promise transformation through willpower.
What it will offer is:
-
Context
-
Understanding
-
Language
-
Gentle strategies
-
Permission to redesign your life
In the chapters ahead, we will explore how hormones affect sensory processing, why executive function often collapses, how creativity stabilises identity, and how to rebuild life without burning out.
This book treats you as an intelligent adult navigating a complex transition.
It respects your autonomy.
It assumes your competence.
A New Kind of Authority
Something remarkable happens to many neurodivergent women in midlife.
As the capacity to perform diminishes, something else grows.
Pattern recognition sharpens.
Boundaries strengthen.
Tolerance for nonsense disappears.
Values crystallise.
The need for external validation weakens.
A quieter, deeper authority emerges.
This book is, in part, about learning to trust that authority.
To inhabit it.
To build a life around it.
An Invitation
If you are reading this while feeling confused, exhausted, frightened, or disoriented, I want to say this to you:
You are not broken.
You are in transition.
You are learning a new language of self.
This book is an invitation to explore that language together.
Gently.
Without shame.
Without urgency.
With curiosity and compassion.
Welcome to Meno ND.
