Founder story

I was 41 and falling apart — and told to come back in a few years

I lost my mind over beer in the fridge.

We'd just put in a new kitchen. New fridge. I went to find something one morning and noticed my husband Nathan had put his beers in random spots — different shelves, different sections, just scattered through. And I completely lost it. Like, lost-my-mind lost it. Nathan was standing right there. I unloaded on him over beer placement — voice raised, completely disproportionate, in our brand-new kitchen. Then I burst into tears and apologised for being a psycho.

Except — that was me. That had been me for months. I just didn't know it yet.

The slow unravelling

I'm someone who sleeps like a champion. I sleep anywhere, for hours, deeply. Last Christmas a friend gave me sleep tea as a Kris Kringle joke because I famously don't need it. I laughed.

Then suddenly I couldn't sleep. I'd lie there at 3am wide awake. Nathan would roll over: "What are you doing? Why are you awake?" I didn't know. I started taking Phenergan — the allergy medicine that makes you drowsy — just to knock myself out. I knew that wasn't great. But I needed to sleep.

Then my fuse got short. Really short. We have a busy life — two beautiful daughters, 8 and 6, both with AuDHD, both wonderful but needy and quite demanding. I get that family life is stressful. But I was flipping out at things I'd never normally notice. Furious one minute, crying the next, happy after that, sad again. I remember thinking: this is next-level crazy.

Then the breast pain started. Shooting pains, terrifying — I thought, what is this? My GP sent me straight in for a mammogram and ultrasound. The ultrasound doctor came in halfway through and said: "There's some things there that look a bit strange." I had four biopsies. While I waited for results, I was Googling at midnight — could this be perimenopause? Is breast pain a symptom?

The biopsies came back clear. Just small cysts. The pain was real and likely caused by fluctuating hormones. Great — I don't have breast cancer. But also: what was all of that about?

The first "no"

I went back to my GP. I'd done my reading. I said, "I think this might be perimenopause."

She said: "No. You're too young. Come back in a few years and we'll think about it then." She seemed a bit annoyed. "There seems to be a lot of people hearing things online and asking about HRT. We can do some blood tests to see if anything else might be going on."

On a follow-up visit with another GP I tried again. This time I was handed a printed copy of the Australasian Menopause Society symptom checklist. "Have a look at this. Have a look at the website."

That was it. Here's a printout. Off you go.

I want to be fair to them — most Australian GPs haven't had proper perimenopause training. The new national clinical guidelines are still in development. They weren't being cruel. They were doing their best with what they had.

But I was 41 and falling apart, and "come back in a few years" was not an answer I could live with.

Sitting in Dr Kelly's chair

Here's the part I didn't expect.

I'd been working with Dr Kelly for a few months on the marketing for her clinic — Coastal Goddess on the Central Coast. I'd been her patient for three years before that, going in for the regular stuff: Botox, facials. I knew she'd started doing menopause work but I'd never thought of myself as her patient for that.

I texted her. "I need to talk. Book me in."

I went in determined. Matter-of-fact. Let's do this, let's fix it, I have a list of symptoms, prescribe me something to fix me. We started on the AMS checklist and I was ticking boxes confidently — yes, yes, yes. Then she stopped and asked me something underneath the checklist. I don't even remember exactly what — something about how I was actually doing. How it was affecting me. How things were at home.

And I just started crying.

I hadn't planned to cry. I hadn't cried in any of the GP appointments before. I think I'd been so braced for another "no" that I'd put my armour on before I walked in. But Kelly was warm, and she was actually listening, and somewhere between her third question and my answer I realised how much I'd been carrying. How exhausted I was. How not-myself I'd been for months. How nice it was that someone was treating me like a credible adult with a real problem.

I left that appointment on the eve of my 42nd birthday with my first HRT script in my bag — estrogen gel and progesterone. I cried in my car too.

Then I called my mum

After my appointment with Dr Kelly, I rang my mum. "When did you go through perimenopause? What age did you hit menopause? What happened to you during this time?"

She said nobody talked about it back then. She'd never even heard the word perimenopause until recently.

She said: "I did have hot flushes. I was definitely more short-tempered. I even put on a little weight. But there was no real information about HRT and no dedicated support."

She just got on with it. That's what women of her generation did. Her periods stopped completely by 46 or 47.

Which means she was probably in perimenopause years earlier. Which means at 42, I might be following exactly her path. And not one of the three medical conversations I'd had had asked me when my mother went through menopause. Family history is one of the strongest signals we have about a woman's timeline — and nobody asks.

The night PeriHelp was born

A few weeks later we ran our biggest event of the year at Coastal Goddess — a fundraiser Dr Kelly runs annually for women's gynaecological cancer. The focus this year was women's health, and specifically menopause and perimenopause. We had a panel of experts: another menopause doctor, a psychologist, a physio, a nutritionist, an exercise physiologist. Our MC was Shelly Horton — TV journalist, author, and a true trailblazer in this space. Her book I'm Your Peri Godmother had kept me sane through my diagnosis.

The room was full. The energy was incredible. Women left feeling seen — and we raised $30,000 for WomenCan.

A couple of weeks later Shelly announced a national tour — huge venues in every capital city, with Dr Kelly Casperson and Dr Vonda Wright from the US. I thought: that's incredible. This woman is a powerhouse.

And then I thought: what happens after the event?

Thousands of women are going to walk out of those rooms ready to do something. "I need to sort myself out — where do I go now?" And the truth is, there's almost nowhere. There's wonderful awareness content. There's brilliant advocacy. But there's no destination for the woman who's just had her lightbulb moment and needs to know what to do on Tuesday morning.

I went home and Googled "PeriHelp." Nothing. There were some clinical Australian websites, but nothing that felt like it was made for women trying to find their way through this stage of life. I registered perihelp.com.au and perihelp.com that night.

Where I am now

I'm 42. I've been on HRT for a few weeks. I sleep again. The rage has settled. Some days my brain is sharp; some days I forget the name of someone I've known for years. Yesterday I introduced a friend as Rachel when her name was Kathy. I can't tell you how that happens. But I'm so much more me than I was.

There's something else I've learned along the way. In November last year — eighteen months after my youngest was diagnosed, and six months after my eldest — I was diagnosed with ADHD myself. Late, like so many women. It turns out perimenopause can unmask things that have been quietly there all along; the drop in oestrogen plays havoc with the same systems ADHD already strains. I'm telling you this because it's part of who's building PeriHelp, and because it's the same pattern underneath everything: women being told for years that what they're feeling is nothing, until someone finally takes them seriously.

PeriHelp exists because the next woman shouldn't have to spend a year being dismissed before she finds her Dr Kelly. So that when she walks out of a Shelly Horton event going "that was awesome — now what," there's a place she can go. So that the conversation my mum couldn't have, my daughters will be able to have.

Our bodies have been through a lot by the time we hit this stage of life. It's time to thrive through it, not just survive it.

If you're in this — welcome. I built this for you.

— Kristy Vardanega, Founder, PeriHelp