Mayoni Gooneratne
Founder and Medical Director at Human Health + Skinfit. Helping women thrive by reaching their best health.
United Kingdom
Stress!! Post COVID women are taking on many more different or extended roles than we have before. We will have survived job restructuring, loss of loved ones, caring for anxious children, ailing parents who have become more fearful, supporting partners who have been made redundant. Any one of these things are considered a big T trauma. For many women, these are happening all at the same time and in many areas of their life. It can be crippling. And more importantly I am seeing women not priortising their health. This was always a problem but now it is so way down and buried under the ladder of self care – it’s madness. And it’s dangerous because we are setting ourselves up for a metabolic health disaster of unprecedented proportions in 10-20 years time if things don’t change.
We are seeing it manifest in all parts of our health:
Mental poor health: Unveiling ADHD, brain fog (many causes) , anxiety.
Physical stress causing supra-physiological levels of cortisol and equally then total burnout. Manifests in gut symptoms, mental health issues, altered periods, heightened PMS, skin changes eg acne, rosacea.
Spiritual sense of having to do it all alone or without help of others including a partner, immediate family or support of friends.
A post COVID woman is made of some extra special stuff I tell you!
Helping the current population of peri menopause navigating the false hype and the effects of the WHI study which has scared us. How are we going to navigate ourselves out of this impending metabolic implosion. Changing the story around a scarcity mindset (running out of HRT, it can give you cancer or strokes) to switching into your abundance on instead (having full use of your brain and body so you can live your best life).
Each generation of woman faces a different sort of health challenge:
Menopausal women who may have missed any health support. Yet face a crisis of brain, bone and cardiovascular health now as they approach 60+ years.
Younger women who need educating NOW about their future health by making small reagular changes from today.
Males in society so they can better understand how and where to support women (in all areas of their life)
Healthcare professionals so they can really help to give women OPTIONS rather than the paternalistic model that we have grown used to where there is a pill for every ill, and women are told they are ‘fine go away and get on with it’, or take this tablet and it will make it all better (which is also not true) but it might give you cancer! What a choice!!!?
Policy makers so that women’s health is at the top of the table. We are the central lynchpins to societal health. We have the power to influence all around us to look after themselves differently. So it’s time we were able to take care of our selves. Also if we are meant to be outliving men, what will that look like in 20 years if metabolic diseases (diabetes, heart disease, strokes and dementia) are at an all time high in older women?
Work force we are critical to the socio-economic health of businesses. We bring not only an ability to perform, learn and appraise, but also bring a feminine divine to the board room which means we shift out of DOING and into BEING and CREATIVITY. Vital for the growth and development of any business.
Women prioritising themselves. Without this, I cannot see how we are going to ask for better health, nutrition and education. This requires mindset work, a letting go of the labels and roles we adopt, and stepping into our truest power. Of remembering who and what we are.
