35: Why Midlife Women Are So Hard On Themselves (and How to Stop)

Why Midlife Women Are So Hard On Themselves (and How to Stop)

Have you ever caught yourself thinking…

•  “Why can’t I keep up like I used to?” 
•  “What’s wrong with me that I need more sleep?” 
•  “Why do I feel less capable, less sharp, less resilient?” 

I was talking to a client recently, and she said something that stopped me in my tracks:

“I need more sleep… and I have so much judgment about it.”

The truth is, so many women in midlife feel this way.  You’re needing more rest. Your energy isn’t the same. You’re not as productive, not as able to multitask, not as tolerant to stress, alcohol, or intense workouts…

And instead of meeting yourself with understanding, you meet yourself with self-criticism.

But here’s what we want you to know:  Your body isn't failing.  You're in conflict with it. 

In this episode you're going to find out:

• Why midlife changes in sleep, energy, and brain function are completely normal 
•  The hidden self-judgment that’s making your experience harder than it needs to be 
•  Why you feel less productive or less capable and what’s actually happening 
•  How your identity (being the one who can handle everything) is shifting 
•  The self-judgment loop that keeps you stuck in frustration and burnout

The real work isn't fixing your energy, it's ending the war with yourself.  Listen to this episode and begin the journey to quieting the inner critic. 

References from this episode

Limitless: Upgrade Your Brain, Learn Anything Faster, and Unlock Your Exceptional Life  by Jim Kwik

Join us in Costa Rica, October 2026 for our Retreat: Soul-Aligned - Design Your Extraordinary Next Chapter! Click here for details.

Find us on instagram:

 @midlifewomenrising

@jenreimercoaching

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome. This is the Midlife Rising podcast. I was chatting with a client the other day, and she said something that stopped me in my tracks. We were talking about sleep and the and the body, and she said, I need more sleep these days, and I have all this judgment towards myself for it. How many of you out there are also feeling like that for maybe not being able to function on less than seven hours of sleep? Last episode, Jen and I talked about the body positivity movement and how we all still judge our bodies and how they look. And then when we hit midlife, this whole other level of self-criticism sets in. We start criticizing our bodies for why we can't keep up like we used to. Or what's wrong with us if we need more sleep than we used to? Maybe where has my resilience gone? You know, we used to be feel so resilient. We could take on more, we could, we could soak up more, we could do more. Or maybe you're someone who is just not feeling as efficient as you used to be. You can't multitask like you used to. These are all things that come up in midlife, and we criticize ourselves for them. We criticize our bodies. So today, I, me, Sherry, I am gonna do a solo episode and I'm gonna break this all down why you feel like this and how to shift it. This is life-changing for some women. So if you want that, stay tuned. You're a woman over 40 who spent your life being the one who holds it all together. But now your body's changing and your soul is done pretending everything is fine. Welcome to Midlife Rising. We're your hosts, Sherry and Jen, twin sisters and modern medicine women, here to help you rewire your stress response, balance your hormones, and reclaim your feminine power. Every episode is a rebellion against the rules you never agreed to and a return to yourself. Join us where midlife isn't a crisis, it's a catalyst. Okay, welcome back to the Midlife Rising podcast. I'm so glad that you joined me today. If you are a first-time listener, welcome. If you're returning, thank you so much for coming back. So today, uh it's Sherry here, and I'm doing a solo episode. Jen is off doing other things, and she'll be back next week. So, today, I really want to talk about this. What I think that a lot of women are experiencing, and maybe you are too. So, first of all, the need for more sleep, and then feeling frustrated about that. Maybe not having the same energy that you used to have, or the same stamina. Something else is that comes up is brain fog, or I didn't even really know what brain fog was. We have a whole other episode on brain fog, but this is something that that a lot of women in their 40s and 50s and then 60s feel is just being less sharp. It's harder to multitask, and we feel like we're not as efficient or productive as we used to be. And then feeling less resilient. So maybe a lower tolerance for alcohol, a lower tolerance for stress. Maybe you can't do as intense of a workout that you used to. Maybe just feeling like you just can't handle what you used to be able to handle. And underneath of this, there's some stuff going on. So the first one, I think, is obvious: self-criticism. There's this feeling of like, what is wrong with me? And that's something that comes up a lot. It's what came up for my client. She was really criticizing herself for needing more sleep. She said to me, I'm so glad I'm not in the corporate world because I just, I don't even think I could do a 40-hour work week anymore. She's someone who works from home. I kind of feel the same way, you know, too. When I think back to my 30s when I was getting up at the crack of dawn, going for a workout at the gym, and then getting to work for 8, 8:30, spending all day there. Um, oh, and by the way, there's a commute on the way, and then commuting home, getting home at like 6:37, making dinner, and then getting up to do it all over again. And I don't know if I could, I don't think I could do that. I wouldn't want to do that now, put it that way, but I'm not sure my body would do that. And maybe you're feeling the same way. And then also criticizing your body for not being able to handle what you could in your 30s. Now, I'm gonna come back to this later because there's there's a shift I think that we can do here. But the other thing that we do is compare ourselves now to our younger selves. And we are really, you know, when you hit your 40s and then your 50s, and then maybe even you're in your 60s when you're listening to this, we are not the same person we were in our 20s and 30s. We have completely different, we're living in different bodies. We have completely different demands on us. Everything about our world is different. You know, if you think of today's world versus 20 years ago before we even had social media. So everything is different, and we're comparing ourselves and chastising ourselves for not being able to handle what we could 20 years ago. Something else that you might be feeling that that tends to layer underneath of all of these frustrations and the self-criticism is a fear that our bodies are declining. And that with that comes a feeling of being less than we used to be. Worthless. Not worthless, but like worth valued less. We're we're kind of we're gonna get into why this is, but there's this, you know, there's cultural conditioning around, you know, when you hit 40, that's the beginning of the decline. There's tons of jokes about it. Over 40 is over the hill. And so I think, you know, those jokes are actually hitting on a fear that we, on a legitimate fear that we have around the decline, being in the second half of life. And then there's some subtle shame underneath of this about needing to slow down, or maybe even wanting to slow down, but not feeling like you can. And our society has created this level of shame. So I'm gonna come back to that as well. But what I really want to sum up here, what I'll say to sum this up, is that midlife isn't just about a physical change. It's the judgment about that change that's creating additional suffering for ourselves. So, what I think you want to feel, at least what I wanted to feel when I was in my 40s and 50s up until now. And I still feel feel this way sometimes. I want to feel at ease in my body. I want to feel, I want to feel like I'm welcome in my body. I don't want to fight with my body anymore. I don't want to criticize my body. But I also want to feel capable. I still go through bouts where I feel like I'm like I'm just not efficient and I criticize myself for that. But I want to feel capable in a way that's actually sustainable. I don't want to do what I was doing in my 30s, to be honest. And I really want to stop the constant inner criticism. And maybe you feel like that too. So here's how I would sum that up. It's not that you want your 30-year-old body back, or maybe you do. That would be nice, I guess. But what I really believe that you truly want is to love the body you're in and to feel high energy and capable and resilient. And we're told that that's not possible after 40. I'm here to tell you that it is, and it is possible to stop the criticism. So that's really what I want to talk about today. So let's talk about first why you're experiencing this, like why we have so much self-judgment and self-criticism that particularly ramps up when we hit our 40s and then even more so in our 50s and 60s. So let's go a bit deeper here. First of all, there's the cultural conditioning. And this is, I think this is actually ramped up in the last 20 years, but it has been building through patriarchal conditioning, through societal conditioning, particularly as women join the workforce. We have taken on this identity. We've built identity around being productive, being capable, being the woman who can handle everything, being the person who can, you know, whether you're here as a mother or not, we've all taken on this identity that we can be the super mom or the superwoman. We can do everything. We can work full-time, we can take care of the home, we can take care of the kids if we have them. We can do all of the things. And we tie our self-worth, our value to output, to results, to efficiency and productivity. And that I think is what's killing us. What happens in midlife is that your body's changing. So, and it's not just your hormones. Jen and I have talked about this lots before. Your nerve system is changing, your brain is changing, your your recovery needs, because you're going through such a big transition, you need more sleep. You actually require more recovery time. But your expectations haven't updated. So what you're doing is holding your current body, your midlife body, to outdated standards. And you're never going to feel like you're living up to those standards if that's what you're doing. Then we have the judgment loop, which is I should be able to do more. And so then we actually push harder, and then we feel worse, and then we judge ourselves for struggling through that. And then we're back to, well, I, but I should be able to do more. And so then we work harder, we push harder, and that makes us feel worse physically, and then it makes us feel worse emotionally. So it's a cycle, it's a loop that we can get stuck in. And I think of that as a downward spiral. That's the downward judgment loop. I want to get you on the upward spiral, the worthy spiral. So the summary here, the deeper truth, is that your body isn't actually failing you. It's not that you're in decline. Your body is just changing and you're in conflict with it. You might even be at war with it if you're really in that self-criticism in the judgment loop. And something else that I've been thinking a lot about is that midlife, when you hit your 40s, it's kind of a catalyst. It it starts to show you. It starts to show you what's not sustainable and maybe what never was sustainable. You know, we go through our 20s and 30s, especially. Like our 20s, I feel like, you know, we're still kind of young and maybe not married yet, maybe not, you know, we still have a fair bit of independence and freedom. And maybe I'm just, I don't know, maybe I'm misremembering or or or you know, placing judgment on the 20s-somethings. But I feel like I had more of that in my 20s. When I hit my 30s, that was when I really started to hustle. That was when, you know, I bought my first house. I started loading on like a lot more, you know, I started to volunteer. I took on a lot more. And so I really started to hustle. And that really was never sustainable. And when you hit your 40s and 50s and beyond, it your body just exposes that. So it's not like you could ever really, you know, even if you were still in your 30-year-old body and that just sort of carried on and you weren't going through this transition, you probably still wouldn't be able to carry on at that pace. So midlife is just exposing what never was sustainable. So maybe let's stop trying to go back to that 30-year-old body and shift what we were doing to it at the time and what we might still be doing to it. The body's actually asking you for a new way of operating. It's giving you signals, messages for what it needs. And Jenna and I talk about this a lot. Your body when whenever you feel physical symptoms, whenever you feel yeah, symptoms I guess is a big thing. Those are those are signals. Those are messages that your body is giving you. Discomfort, pain, even hunger, having to relieve your the bladder, those are all just signals from the body that you need to do something. It's asking for something. So now it's asking for a new way of operating. Now, here's what I really want you. Here's the probably the most important part of this episode. This is what I want for you. I want you to stop trying to get back to who you were, to stop trying to get back to that 20-year-old body, that 30-year-old body, and start listening to who you are now. Start listening to the body you're in now. So let's break this down. Instead of overriding your body, which is really what we try to do, we kind of, you know, if our body is asking for rest, we override. Nope, I'll give you some caffeine instead so that you can keep going. Instead of responding to it. So when your body is asking for rest, what if we just give it the rest it needs? What if we stop thinking of more sleep or the requirement for more sleep isn't a weakness, it's just information that your body's giving you. And maybe that lower tolerance or less resilience, that's not a decline. It's not a flaw. That's just information. It's just feedback from your body. The next thing I want you to try is instead of asking what's wrong with me that I need all this extra sleep, what's wrong with me that I'm not as productive or efficient as I used to be? Can you reframe that? What if the fact that you need more sleep isn't even a problem? What if that's not even a problem? What if just allowing your body to have more sleep, it it actually changes the internal relationship that you have with your body, giving your body that sleep allows you to build a better relationship with your body? What if needing more sleep means your body's getting deeper repair? What if you being less tolerant or less resilient is actually an opportunity to set clearer boundaries? We've talked about boundaries recently on the podcast as well, two episodes ago. What if less multitasking means you can be more present? I was listening to a book the other day. By the way, this is a little side story. Multitasking, this is what we do. We're not actually getting worse at multitasking. We never were actually very good at it. What we are doing, let me see if I get this right. I read it, by the way, in Limitless by Jim Quick. I'll drop a link to that in the show notes so that you know what, um, remember if you want to go back to that book. He talks about the prefrontal cortex gets involved when you multitask and it uses up because you're you're not actually, our brains are not actually able to do two things at once. What you're doing is flipping back and forth from one thing to another, to another, really, really fast. And what that does is cause your prefrontal cortex to use all the glucose that it is in your brain, all the fuel. It's like massively um oxygenating that fuel. So it's like being in overdrive in your car, like it's revving and using up all the fuel way faster than if you just focused on those two tasks one at a time. So, and when you do that, you become more present, right? If you focus on one task instead of trying to do two things at once, you're focusing on that one thing, getting it done, and then you're shifting your focus to the other thing. So it allows you to be more present. And the last one that I wanted to mention here, can we reframe lower capacity as an invitation to as an invitation to really I don't want to use the word prioritize because it's not just about reprioritizing. It's about really thinking about what is important to me. What's really important to me and what maybe isn't. Like how many things are we doing that we don't even really want to do or don't even we don't like doing or we don't need to do. Okay, the other thing that I want you to do. So so I'm I've been talking about, I've got four things really that I've that I want to relay here to help you reframe. The first that I talked about was instead of overriding your body, see if you can respond to it. And the second one that I just talked about was instead of asking what's wrong with me, let's reframe that as like, what if all of these things that you feel that are failing aren't even a problem. So for example, what if the fact that you need more sleep, that's not a problem? The third one, what if instead of measuring productivity, we measure success by alignment. So it's not about how much how much can I get done in a day? It's how aligned do I feel. So that leads you to make more make decisions that are more intuitively led, more energy led instead of decisions that are sort of logical or forced. But productivity feels forced. Alignment feels like ease and flow to me, at least. I think you'll agree. So that's the third thing. Instead of measuring productivity, let's let's measure by alignment, measure success by how aligned we feel instead of by how productive we are. And then the last one that I want to offer you as a reframe instead of pushing for For more capacity, can you begin to build trust with your body? So whenever you honor your body, your capacity actually stabilizes. That align this kind of goes along with alignment, actually. When you listen to your body and honor what it needs, so if it's asking for water and you actually get up from your desk and go get a glass of water, that's honoring your body. And then your body, you build trust between you and your body. If you give your body rest when it needs rest instead of caffeine, or instead of you know, pushing through, I gotta just get this one more thing done before I go to bed or before I can sit down and relax. That builds trust. And that's when the self-criticism begins to slow, is you're building a friendship with your body, you're building trust, a relationship. And that's when you stop criticizing your body because it actually starts working for you. Okay, so I'm gonna close this out now by saying that all of this, everything that I just talked about, what you're feeling, what you might be experiencing, why it's happening, and the reframes that I've offered you. We this is what Jen and I do inside of, we do it inside of the sleep sanctuary, which is our sleep program for midlife women, getting you to sleep through the night. We just launched that. We're gonna be launching it again soon. So watch for that. We also do this kind of reframing, this kind of mindset shifting, belief shifting in all of our retreats, our programs. So stick with us. If this has resonated with you, keep coming back because we're just gonna keep giving you more and we're gonna give you opportunities to come into our programs, to come to our retreats so where you can really dive deep on this stuff and not just shift how you feel in your physical body, but the way that you think about your body. So if you want that, come back, stay tuned, come back for next week's episode, go back and listen to the ones you've missed. I'm really grateful that you were here. Thank you for listening. And if you found value in this episode, please share it. Go to whatever platform you're listening to and like and subscribe and leave us a review. We would be so appreciative of that.