The Truth About Self-Care After 45: Perimenopause & Nervous System Shifts | Dr. Natalya Borakowski

Jennifer Norman:
Hello, beautiful humans. Okay, so let's talk about something no one prepared us for. You hit your 40s, you double down on self-care, you eat cleaner, move more, meditate, upgrade your skincare, and somehow you feel more tired, more irritated, and more wired. Why? What if self-care after 45 doesn't fail because you're doing it wrong, but because your biology has changed. Today I'm joined by Dr. Natalya Borakowski, naturopathic physician, founder of the Desert Bloom Skincare Clinic in Scottsdale, Arizona, and founder of Unveil You, a platform exploring the intersection of aging, stress, self-perception, and biology. With nearly two decades in women's health and cosmetic dermatology, she helps women understand aging through science, not fear, and through nervous system regulation, not relentless optimization. In this conversation, we are unpacking why self-care can quietly turn into self-surveillance, how hormonal shifts after 45 change the way your body processes stress, and what it actually looks like to restore energy and feel at ease in your skin again without adding another task to your list. If what used to work isn't working anymore, then this episode may change the way you see your body. So come on in and join us for the conversation.

Jennifer Norman:
Dr. Natalya, welcome!

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Like, so happy to be here, Jennifer.

Jennifer Norman:
It's such a great opportunity to talk about something that has been beligering so many women as they turn 40 and beyond. So before we go anywhere, I want you to tell us, Dr. Natalya, when women finish listening to our conversation today, what do you most hope that they understand about their bodies, aging, and self-care after 45?

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
I think the most important thing is to learn to trust yourself and drop all this ideas that you're doing something wrong. Drop this kind of like a cookie cutter recipe that worked for your sister or your girlfriend and do you. It doesn't have to be perfect. It can be messy. Just do something for yourself every day. That's basically my main message. Love yourself and then just allow yourself to evolve as you go into this hormonal changes. And we're certainly going to talk about hormonal changes as well.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah. This is so important because I think so many women hit midlife and think, I must be doing something wrong. So from a biological standpoint, what is actually happening in the body after 45 that changes the way that we experience stress and energy? Why do the things that we used to do that once worked, like pushing through, optimizing, doing more— why did this suddenly stop working?

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Well, yes, it's all goes through our body really going through the major reconstruction, if you will. If the first reconstruction was puberty, which hopefully none of us really remember that well, but if you have teenage daughters, which I do, mine is 16, you kind of watch watching that reconstruction happening in front of you. And being a physician, you kind of like— I'm at privilege of understanding what's going through her body. So I take her little angry spurts and craziness with a little smile and like, okay, I get it. It's a brain and body reconstruction because her hormones changed. She went through an innocent girl into all of a sudden being a young woman, and the change is so rapid in puberty. Fortunately for us in our mid-40s, once we start going through transition of perimenopause, that process is far, far longer, but it's a second puberty essentially, because first your ovaries very, very gradually starts to shut down and it's a normal process. And I know some women will listen to me and they'll say, well, if I am going through perimenopause, maybe I should look into hormone replacement.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Those are great options, but they not always for everyone. The most important thing you have to think that this transition is natural and what works again for your sister, your neighbor, might not work for you. So be open to possibilities and not ultimately understand— it's not just your body changes, it's the way your brain completely remodels because those hormones very closely talk to your neurotransmitters, mainly dopamine and serotonin. So if you're having this irritability, forgetfulness, brain fog, all of that is kind of fun for the ride. And just, again, take it with a little smile and just be a little bit more gentle to yourself. And as your ovaries going through that permanent vacation, if you will, then your adrenal glands, which really often misunderstood and not really talk about it in medical community, they are tiny little almond-shaped glands that sit on top of your kidneys. They become your main hormone producers. Why it's important, why the stress fits in here and why we don't really tolerate that stress anymore, because One of the major hormones your adrenal glands produce every single day called cortisol.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Cortisol gets a bad rap because when people hear cortisol, they think stress. And yes, it is a hormone of stress, but it's also wonderful natural cup of coffee in the morning. That's a hormone that wakes you up. If you remember yourself as a child, or if you're looking at children, like age of, you know, 5 to 7 before the school stress starts and all that, how they would get out of the bed. They were so excited. They don't need coffee. They're just ready to charge the day. And by afternoon, they ready for a nap because in normal humans, cortisol is super high in the mornings.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
And then by the afternoon, it's about half of the amount. Once the sun goes down, your cortisol should be at zero. And then this opposite, opposite hormone, which calls melatonin, starts to get secreted in your brain. And then you sleep like a baby. And that's a normal stress response circadian rhythm. As we age, first we live in the 21st century surrounded by artificial light. Most of us do not have that normal circadian rhythm and normal cortisol secretion. And if we put stress on top of it, when you have to have those surges of cortisol throughout the day, and for us, we're dealing with chronic stress, you know, all the pressures that all the hats that most women wear, you know, being the mother and then working and being the, uh, also wife and the sister and the caregiver and all those things, all that pressure adds up extra drain in your adrenals..

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
And then now when they're taking responsibility to be a major hormone producers, all the other hormones kind of getting overlooked. And then no matter how much you rest, you just starting to feel dreadful and unfortunately start to look dreadful.

Jennifer Norman:
So what I'm hearing you say is that it's not a matter of willpower. When we get to adulthood, we're used to go, go, going, especially women. We do so much, but it's not that we are getting lazy or that our bodies are necessarily failing us. This is a natural life cycle, this is a natural part of life, and it is a hormonal and nervous system issue. I think that alone feels relieving because I think that a lot of times we just get so down on us, like, why am I not remembering this? Why am I so tired all the time? Well, if a woman listening feels wired but exhausted, this could be why your body is going through natural changes. And it is perfectly normal and okay. But what do you think that her body is really trying to communicate at this time of life?

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Well, if you are feeling fatigue, no matter how much you try, likely it's what we call it, yon adrenal fatigue. That means your adrenal, adrenal glands really struggling with producing that cortisol. So number one recommendation, sleep like your life depend on it because it really does. There's a reason why they call it the beauty sleep, because the more restful sleep you have, then better your skin looks, the better you recover. Because while we sleep, your skin produces collagen, your body repairs. And then of course your adrenal glands have that moment of break when they don't have to constantly secrete cortisol. And if you are struggling with insomnia, I would say this is a number one thing that you should address with your doctor and— Just if you don't get enough sufficient amount of sleep, which for adults, it's only 7 to 8 hours, not like for teenagers who need to sleep 9+ hours, but your body needs those hours. Without it, this hormonal transition, it's going to be quite dreadful.

Jennifer Norman:
Mmm.

Jennifer Norman:
It's just so amazing to me that there is so much science now on the importance of sleep. It is one of the number one causes of early fatality because of the stress, because of everything that we've been putting our bodies through. Sleep has become like the number one thing for self-care. And it is something that we can all do. It's something that I think we had been trained or socialized early on to think that we should be able to get by with less sleep. That is absolutely not true, is what I'm hearing you say.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
That's, that's very not true. And if this is a podcast about beauty, so I would talk to our listeners from the point of beauty. Let's think about what happens to our skin specifically when you don't get enough sleep. So you get constant elevated cortisol, constantly elevated cortisol simply destroys your collagen. It doesn't matter what collagen powders you drink, you know, what kind of fancy skincare you put on. You can do all kinds of injectables, lasers. They're all great. But if the foundation is not there, it's— when people saying, I feel like my body is going against me.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
What if you are putting it in a state that it has to go against you? This will be result. That's why really restorative sleep, it's so essential, just as important as, of course, good nutrition and movement.

Jennifer Norman:
Mm-hmm. Now, I know that you have also said that self-care can quietly become another form of self-monitoring or self-surveillance. So how does this constant vigilance affect the nervous system long-term as well? How can women tell the difference between self-care that restores and self-care that subtly reinforces pressure? Like, if we're saying like, oh, you need to get sleep and somebody is saying, oh my God, I didn't get enough sleep, or I got terrible sleep last night. And then they start feeling bad about themselves. Like, how do you get them to start working away from that cycle?

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
That is, that is such a great point, Jennifer, and you're absolutely right. And that's why I'm so careful of giving kind of a specific wellness advice because it's exactly what we do. Overachieving women, the women who like to up optimize things, you know, trying to be efficient in their life, and they're trying to optimize their health. And then you're right, they create this as another form of task. And then when it comes that self-surveillance monitoring task, then it becomes destructive on its own. If you're constantly checking yourself, am I relaxed enough? Did I get enough restful sleep? Am I— what— wearing this special bracelet that telling me if I get enough REM deep and whatever thing you're measuring, you probably stressing yourself too much and not really get full benefits of it. So this is why in the beginning of conversation I said it's okay if you don't do it perfectly. Don't do it perfectly.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Do it as you feel for the day. Maybe one day you need 10 hours of sleep. Maybe another day you'll be totally okay with getting 6 and a half. Just ask your body what it needs. Don't try to be perfect. Yes, body likes routines. So if you do go to bed at the same time, wake up at the same time, your body will respond better. But don't do it on somebody else's schedule.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
If somebody tells you optimum time to go to sleep at 9 PM, but you absolutely cannot follow— fall asleep until 11, it's okay. You have to do it on your own terms. You have to try, you have to see what works, what doesn't. So don't turn it into another form of, again, self-monitoring. Just do it from the point of ease and self-connection and trust and listening to the body. The most extraordinary thing, what I see in women, we are naturally very connected to our bodies. We have a fantastic intuition. We can know when there's something off, something wrong with our body.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
But I feel like in this 21st century, because we have so much noise, so much information around us, we getting disconnected. We no longer trust of what our body tells us.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
So typically I just say to women, if you feel like you have so much, so many different advices, people telling you different things, you feel overwhelmed, take at least 24 hours complete silence, withdraw from all the noise, social media, even podcasts. And yes. Jennifer's podcast is wonderful, but if you have to take a 24-hour break, we will forgive you.

Jennifer Norman:
I concur.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Ultimately, sit with your thoughts and then just listen to your body and ask, what do I need today? Do I need to move? Do I really need that— another cup of coffee? Or do I need maybe an herbal tea? Do I need silence or do I need noise? And it's okay. And only you know that answer.

Jennifer Norman:
Mm-hmm. I think that in most cases, those of us who had been in business, we had been taught that whatever we measure improves. And I think that that's why we do all of the little gadgets and devices to check and monitor and this and that. And it's one of the reasons why I never got an Oura Ring. I was always intrigued by it, but I was like, okay, it's gonna tell me that I didn't get enough sleep at— last night and Well, then what, what do I do about that? And, and so I, I just thought that it would be like something else that I wasn't necessarily listening to my body. I was listening to something external to tell me what was right or wrong with me.

Jennifer Norman:
But if you take that quiet moment, like what Dr. Natalya is saying, your body knows, you know, deep down inside how you're feeling. And if you get a good night's sleep, if you get that deep sleep the next day, you may, if you are able to tap into that intuition by being silent enough to sit still and know how you're really feeling, kind of just do that body scan, do that, you know, breath for a moment, take that beat to get away from the noise, to get away from all the metrics, to get away from all the you should, you should, you should, or you shouldn't, you shouldn't, you shouldn't. You'll— you will know what's right for you.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
So yes, absolutely.

Jennifer Norman:
Uh, yeah. And so I think that that is it. It's almost like self-care had become another arena where women had been feeling evaluated or were evaluating themselves so much. And we've been taught to optimize everything from productivity, from beauty to wellness. What do you think that, that cultural pressure does when it layers on top of hormonal change?

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
It's a very difficult position to be in. We are first generation of women that aging under constant self-surveillance, and it's really hard. And that's what I really saw in my clinic, because most of my patients are in my age, so it's perimenopausal, 45 to 50. And what I see is women aging in the front of the camera and the front of mirrors and the front of some random, you know, Zoom meetings, photos. So basically we are on constant surveillance of videos when we're not even ready to pose. And we see ourselves from the angles that typically normal healthy women would not. So that creates that constant self-monitoring and sort of preformative behavior. And I'll explain you where I'm going with this.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
So let's start with a personal story. A few years ago, I was, uh, completely burnt out because I seen way too many patients. So I decided I need to take a break. I'm gonna book myself a beautiful retreat here in Scottsdale, Arizona. So as any high-functioning overachieving woman, I decided I'm gonna go take advantage of every single class there. I'm gonna go do all the detoxes. So I know you're laughing and you know where I'm going with this. So I was so overbooked by the time I came home 3 days later, I was physically sick.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
I was just— my stomach was wrenching. It was absolutely terrible. It was not detoxing. It was destructive. And that's where I understood that this moment of self-connection and this moment of disengagement from the mirrors, from phones to cameras, is essential to establish that self-trust. And for us, as we age, aging is inevitable. And then pretending like we all going to look 20 for the rest of our life is impossible. You're going to overtax your tissue, you're going to run into complications, or you're going to turn into someone you're not with overcorrected, overstretched skin.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
And, you know, we've seen all those crazy photos on Instagram, I'm sure. Um, so ultimately, again, taking time for yourself and then doing what supports your body, not from the point of correction, but always from the point of support.

Jennifer Norman:
Mm-hmm. I want to go a little deeper and talk about the mirror for a moment. And you are exactly right. I think that it's interesting to see how aging today is versus aging— talk about like maybe a generation or two prior— where now we have so many options available to us, your clinic included, where we can rejuvenate, where we can quote unquote stay more youthful in terms of our skin and in terms of how we look. Because I think that a lot of us are self-critical because we see the criticism of others through comments and whatnot on social media and, and other places. And we just want to stay as young looking as possible. All the while we're going through perimenopause and having these issues and fighting it— I say fighting against the clock, but you know, that's the traditional anti-aging method is that, you know, don't age gracefully anymore. We don't have to, there's no need to, we have options available to us.

Jennifer Norman:
So how do you kind of walk that fine line in helping people navigate through wellness, healthful aging, and also having these youthful options available to them?

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
That's a wonderful question. And it's a— I can give you a very long answer because I'm actually writing the entire book on that topic specifically. But it's challenging things. Is it's very challenging? Yes. Because the, the most important thing is to understand that our faces, our reflection, our relationship with the mirror, it's a deep psychological relationship because our face is not just a face. It carries a lot of societal value. Just think, you're— strangers looking at your face and they judge you immediately by your expression on your face, by consistency of your skin. They charge you, uh, judge your social status, your success.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
They, uh, judge the level of your friendliness. They judge your level of intelligence. Everything is written on your face. So of course, for us women, we want to look as attractive as possible and there's nothing wrong with it. And I— for people who say that women are vain, I have a big beef with it and I can give another really long, very long conversation about this. But going back with aesthetic treatments, the biggest problem becomes it's when we take medical tools and instead of taking informed medical decision of to do the treatment or not to do treatment,— we use a cultural fear and cultural conditioning as a driving decision choice. So this is a very nuanced moment, and it's something that good physician, good practitioner should see it in a patient. So if the woman is chasing image of herself that she was 10, 20 years ago, this is likely just a cultural fear.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Because ultimately, another very important topic there is women not necessarily want to be young. What they want— they want to feel safe in their body. Because there's a very fascinating in relationship with our reflection in the mirror. Often what we see in the mirror, when you look at the familiar mirror, like in your bathroom, for example, day in, day out, it's an image of yourself several years ago. It could be as long as 10 years ago, unless you did like a recent remodeling, for example, because our brains, let's face it, it's a little lazy. It's kind of like, looks at the familiar settings and like, okay, that— this is what I see. This is what she always is. It's the same phenomenon when people experience when they suddenly lose a lot of weight or gain a lot of weight, like during pregnancy, they always have like, Oh my gosh, I am all of a sudden so big.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
It didn't happen all of a sudden. It's just because your reflection finally caught up to you. And it usually takes some kind of a changing moment. It could be you look at your reflection in some strange mirror. It could be a hotel room or like some venue, or it could be somebody took unsightly photo of yourself. And once you see whatever that imperfection that caught your eye, the first thing your nervous system responds is fear because you've seen something unfamiliar. Because again, our faces, it's so much more than just a pretty face. It's your identity.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
It's your social status. It's just, it's just so much more. It's a very deep meaning there. So when you get into that state of fear, that typically many people start dialing up a number for the person with a syringe and saying, I need to fix this. And if they come to me, we having this conversation, what are we fixing? Are we fixing something that's even exist? Like, what is your overall goal? Because then we can talk about skin health. What is your routine? Are you taking care of yourself? Because if my patients don't do the basic 4, I call them, which is sleep, movement, nutrition, and managing stress, really doing all the injectables, it's like you're swimming across the stream. You're not feeding your body. You're not giving it what your body needs.

Jennifer Norman:
Mm-hmm. Wow. That is so compelling. I do remember after doing market research, um, back in the day, this was a bit ago, but I would come across women who would give those insights and they were such compelling insights. They said, you know, I caught a glimpse of myself in the rearview mirror in my car. And I thought, who the heck is that? And they they were startled, or they put on a long sleeve shirt and their hand comes out and they're like, whose hand is that? Like, they don't even recognize who it is anymore. And to your point, it's, it's a loss of identity. Like, oh my God, I've just turned into my mother. I thought my mother was sitting behind me, but, you know, almost turned around and thought that.

Jennifer Norman:
And there, there is something about wanting to remain vital and this identity of this person that had more energy, that had more abilities and, and things like that, because there is an impression that we we have internalized— and let's be honest, we have internalized, and society has reinforced— that when people age and they start to get the scowl lines, or they start to get the elevens between the brows, they start to look angrier or not happy. You yourself might feel so vibrant and youthful and happy and wonderful inside, and there's a mismatch between what skin is showing and what you feel inside. And by the way, listeners, if you are finding this conversation helpful so far, then please stay with us because we're gonna start talking a little bit more deeply about what actually works differently. Dr. Natalya, if trying harder isn't the answer, if adding more isn't the answer, what is the more supportive shift that women can make to restore energy and feel at ease again without turning this into another project? What's that look like in daily life?

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
So it looks very different for everybody. So I know some of my clients, they get frustrated with me because again, I'm not going to give something specific. I'm not going to tell you, you should wake up at 5:00 AM and then go for a run at 6:00, and then you should have that green smoothie juice and blah, blah, blah. It could be a great idea for someone. It probably not for you. So you just try yourself and ultimately you do you. You can take advice of some, you know, social media wellness influencer. Answers, but don't take it as a script.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Play with it. Life is overall, it's a fun dance and play. So you just kind of look at it as such. And even aging, I hate the word anti-aging. One of my really good friends, she called it youthing. So let's call it youthing. And so if you are youthing, but you're not really feeling like yourself, you really feel, uh, dreadful.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Let's say that the first thing, let's establish. We're not really fighting aging. What we really want to do, we want to reestablish feeling of safety within our body because our body changed. So how do you cultivate safety? You do it by activating your parasympathetic nervous system, which is that rest and digest nervous system. And then there's a different things you can do. Like, for example, I can just, um, give you a couple tiny little shortcuts if you do feel stressed. And I'm sure you already done this. Deep breath is the number one easiest thing you can do. You can do it, you know, sitting at your desk.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
You can hide in the car or hide yourself in the bathroom if you're in a busy corporate office. Just take that 2 minutes of a deep, deep breath. If that still doesn't work for you, another thing you can do, it's what I call it the horsey lips. So hopefully I'm not gonna trigger my, uh, microphone doing this, but what you do, you just exhale really forcefully and you bubble your lips as you do this. And as you do that, yes. And as you do that, all of a sudden you feel lighter. I know it does feel good, isn't it?

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
And then if you're not wearing like running mascara, another thing you can do is flush your face with a really, really cold water. Not lukewarm. I'm talking icy cold. That will not just gonna stress you out or make you awake or any— it's it actually calms you down, surprisingly. So those tiny little shortcuts. And as I mentioned earlier, the body loves predictability. So whatever your routine is, your favorite skincare products, your, uh, night bath or shower that you take before bed, or reading before bed— try to stay away from blue lights because we know it's affecting your cortisol. We talked about it. But it doesn't have to be long, excessive list, but it's something that you do every day. I always try to talk to mothers in the room and say, remember when those babies were born, nobody taught them how to sleep.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
We had to teach them how to sleep. And how do we do this? We establish some kind of routine. And then once it worked once, you know, and again, for mothers who had multiple children, they know what worked for older child might not work for younger one. So you do this separate routine for another human because we're all genetically different. We're different individuals. But once you find that magic juice that make you relax, make you get in your body, so then you feel safe. Remember, the keyword is safety. And then you just repeat it like a clock.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
This is your recipe. And then that's how you cultivate that wellness, that true self-care that works for you.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah. I want to take a moment just to let everybody know that, for example, When we say make sure you're getting enough sleep, that used to irritate the hell out of me because I'm a single mom of a disabled boy who lives on life support. He has a ventilator and I was his caretaker. I continue to be his caretaker and I am up multiple times a night making sure that he is alive, safe, well, cared for, turned, all of that. And so when somebody said, you need more rest, you need to get more rest. And I would be like, Fuck you. You know, it was like, I would so like, shut up. Like you have no idea what I'm going through.

Jennifer Norman:
So this is my message to you. This is not a criticism. Everything that we are saying here, we understand that some of this is just impossible given your life situation. And so that is why, you know, we're here giving a bunch of like maybe free tools or maybe free ideas. Take what you want, throw the rest away. Please feel free to comment and let us know, you know, what parts just don't work for you and what parts do, because that will help you to see what actually can fit in and is conducive and convenient for you in your current lifestyle and in, in what you're doing in your days.

Jennifer Norman:
The breathing part of it, I do actually love. I— because everybody breathes. Everybody can take a big deep breath. Do it with me right now. Take that deep breath. It takes a few seconds and it can help you relieve the stress that you might feel in that moment. The horsey breath. I think that those are brilliant. So thank you, Dr. Natalya, for reminding us and for giving us these new tools that I think can fit into anybody's day, no matter who you are, what you're going through.

Jennifer Norman:
So just wanted to throw that in there because, you know, we're not about necessarily giving like, you know, cookie cutter advice. That's never what we wanna do, what I wanna do. And it's one of the things that I loved about Dr. Natalya before we even met today, because it is so important that this is, this is your podcast. This is your opportunity to maybe, you know, try on something that might fit a little bit better and that you can incorporate into your life because we care about you so much. We want you to be well, we want you to love yourself, and we don't want self-care to be yet another burden.

Jennifer Norman:
So instead of optimization, we are talking about conducive regulation. Instead of control, we're talking about safety. This is a completely different paradigm, right? Okay. Yes. So let's talk about self-trust and something about identity then, a little bit of what we talked about before, because when women understand what's happening biologically when they stop blaming themselves when what changes and all these things, how they're moving through midlife, you know, what does aging with self-trust rather than fear actually feel like? How will somebody know if they're moving in the right direction, Dr. Natalya?

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
That's really ultimate goal, and I wish absolutely every woman to arrive there. It does takes a lot of practice and patience, which unfortunately we got conditioned for so long not to truly trust our own body and our own intuition. And in this noisy world, it comes from the moment— of course it does come from, uh, understanding your body to really understanding and normalizing the emotions you're experiencing, normalizing that yes, maybe someday you will be irritable and understanding that yes, you might go through the little weight loss, weight gain, uh, swings. All of that is a part of the journey of transitioning into a new woman post-menopause. As you're going through this process, once you understand what's normal, what's not, you found a physician you trust who has that great dialogue with you, explaining you the hormonal shifts, how it's affecting your memory, your mood, even your self-perception. And from that moment of knowledge and the moment of stillness and the safety within your body, that's how you cultivate self-trust, because now you don't afraid of symptoms. You experiencing hot flash? Well, unless you start taking estrogen, you kind of laugh at it like, all right, that's it. My hypothalamus, it's actually fighting with my estrogen.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
It's recalibrating my temperature right now. So here comes the hot flash. Maybe I'll wear just a lighter clothing. Maybe I'll wear waterproof mascara so my face doesn't melt. So you kind of have a little bit more so compassion, support, little humor, and that's how you cultivate that ultimate self-trust.

Jennifer Norman:
Mm, I love that, the self-compassion and the humor, especially. The gentleness and the kindness that you can show to yourself is everything because it will reflect on the way that you show up in the world for your family, for your loved ones, for colleagues, and, you know, showing them a bit more grace and kindness too. Because if we're so hard on ourselves and we criticize ourselves, we're not so great to be around, are we? We're— it's really true.

Jennifer Norman:
So, you know, for miserable pe— no one wants to be miserable, right? We all wanna be happy. We all wanna have joy. And so that sense of humor and that self-compassion goes such a long way. It really does. And that kindness, that self-love, which is not self-care, which is not monitoring and checking and making sure and guilting ourselves if we're, if we think that we've caught ourselves, it's, it's being like, oh dang, I didn't go to the gym yesterday or dang, I'm too tired to make dinner. Oh well, you know, that becomes your favorite catchphrase. Oh well.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Yes, yes, I love it. Oh well, you know, yesterday was yesterday, today is today. Today I'm gonna do me. And speaking of gym, you know, as much as I'm a big advocate of exercise, I try not to use the scary word exercise with women because many of them so allergic to it, you know, like you allergic to word of sleep, right? So I just Just say movement. Do something that gives you joy. Maybe it's dance, maybe it's, I don't know, uh, doing dishes, maybe it's doing lunges when you vacuum, maybe it's running after your kids or running with a dog. That doesn't have to be something specific.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
It doesn't have to be that sexy yoga class that's everybody going to. If you hate it, don't do it.

Jennifer Norman:
A lot of us are so sedentary. We sit at desk. There's almost like this sitting epidemic. And so movement is so beautiful because it could standing up. It could be, you know what, I'm gonna take a breath and go get a glass of water or taking the stairs or something like that. Getting your body up and out of the chair, doing 10 air— and if you feel a little bit more compelled, then you can stand up and do 10 air squats, just that. And that's your exercise for that day. And that's beautiful.

Jennifer Norman:
At least there's a little bit of movement built in that's above and beyond what you used to do. And it's keeping your joints resilient.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Yes. Yes, it's a beautiful thing.

Jennifer Norman:
Oh, well, Dr. Natalya, where can people learn more about what you do, your website, all of that good stuff?

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Well, they can find us on social media, in— on Instagram, uh, the social media handle is @unveilu.life, same as our website, www.unveilu.life. It's an educational platform. We are trying to download as many free resources as possible, but it is a new project, so there's a lot of things that's still under construction. But yes, we're trying to build this beautiful forum so women can ask questions and we can have those great conversations and, um, kind of discuss the hot topics that most women don't even want to talk to their girlfriends or even the doctors with. Um, otherwise, I am writing a book which is still not published yet. It's in the hands of a publisher, but it's probably going to take another month until it's ready for pre-sale. So just go to our website at unveilyou.life and then just put yourself on the mailing list. So once we have it on the pre-sale, you'll be the first to know.

Jennifer Norman:
Amazing, amazing. And I love that on Unveil You, you have courses. They're self-guided video courses that people can go through. Can you tell us an example or two of what you offer there?

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
So, 3 courses. There's 3 core courses. My favorite is Beyond the Mirror because I'm all about the psychology, and it's all about your relationship with your own reflection. Because as you mentioned earlier, we are so self self-critical. And unfortunately, as we go in through perimenopause and our progesterone, estrogen drops, that self-critic gets extremely loud because we're losing that buffering of those beautiful, very soothing female hormones. So if you feel very self-critical during perimenopause and menopause, take a deep breath. It's normal. But then there's a things— there's a tools, meditations you can do to recognize that and reconstruct that self-talk.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
Because ultimately all that self-talk is something that you learn and you can always unlearn that. Uh, the second course is all about aesthetic medicine. It's quite popular because people love asking questions. What is the Botox for? What does it do? What it doesn't do? So it's just educational information. I never promote any treatments because I don't even do it in my own clinic. My goal is to give women tools, help them understand what the tools do and what meaning they add to the tools. The reason they apply the tools It's up to them. And the last course, it's also quite popular.

Dr. Natalya Borakowski:
It calls Aging Unveiled, and it's all about biology of aging. What's happening through your body? What is collagen elastin? You know, what is this biohacking? How many supplements you're supposed to take? Do you even need to take supplements? So just answering questions like that.

Jennifer Norman:
Oh, beautiful. Well, thank you so much. And everybody, beautiful humans, I want to reflect back something to you as you're listening right now. Because really today's show was not about abandoning self-care. It's about how you can evolve it, because we've been taught that midlife is something that you should fight against tooth and nail, that aging is decline, exhaustion means we're not disciplined enough, but this is not your body failing you. It's asking for a different kind of partnership from you. Maybe it's less performance, less regulation, less surveillance, and more safety. Midlife isn't a breakdown. It is a recalibration.

Jennifer Norman:
And maybe the most radical form of beauty at this stage is self-trust, understanding your biology, honoring your nervous system, releasing that idea that you have to earn your radiance. Dr. Natalya, I wanna thank you so much for being my guest today and helping us see that aging isn't something that we should fear. Here, but it's something that we can understand. And to everybody listening, if this conversation resonated with you, share it with a woman who needs relief instead of another checklist. Remember, beauty was never meant to be a performance. It was always meant to feel like coming home to yourself. I'm Jennifer Norman, and this is the Human Beauty Movement. I'll see you in the next episode.

Jennifer Norman:
Thank you for listening to The Human Beauty Movement Podcast. Be sure to follow, rate, and review us wherever you stream podcasts. The Human Beauty Movement is a community-based platform that cultivates the beauty of humankind. Check out our workshops, find us on social media, and share our inspiration with all the beautiful humans in your life. Learn more at thehumanbeautymovement.com. Thank you so much for being a beautiful human.