Sally Wainwright on Riot Women, Identity Theft of Menopause, and Writing Real Female Characters

Summary

---

unPAUSED with Dr. Mary Claire Haver

Sally Wainwright on Riot Women, Identity Theft of Menopause, and Writing Real Female Characters

Air Date: January 17, 2026
Guest: Sally Wainwright (acclaimed British television writer/producer: Happy Valley, Gentleman Jack, Last Tango in Halifax, Riot Women)
Host: Dr. Mary Claire Haver

---

Episode Overview

This episode features a compelling conversation between Dr. Mary Claire Haver and esteemed writer/producer Sally Wainwright, delving into the genesis and impact of Wainwright’s latest project, Riot Women, a BBC/BritBox drama about five midlife women who start a rock band as an escape from the compounding stresses of caregiving, menopause, and feeling invisible. The discussion confronts head-on the realities of midlife womanhood, the underrepresentation of real female experiences in TV, and the often-overlooked struggles and triumphs of menopause.

---

Key Discussion Points

Sally Wainwright’s Journey to Storytelling

• Origins and Writing Roots

  • Born and raised in West Yorkshire (Huddersfield, Halifax); University at York.
  • Always writing—stories, cartoons, plays, with her sister since childhood.

  “I just never stopped. I just literally never stopped.” – Sally Wainwright (04:20)

  • Studied English literature; obsessed with dialogue from a young age.

  “I realised I was a sort of dramatist without even realising I was.” – Sally (04:57)

• Early Career, Unusual Day Jobs, and Breaking In

  • Moved to London to become a writer; worked as a bus driver for flexibility and inspiration.

  “Three years at university didn’t teach me very much. Whereas 18 months as a bus driver... really, you had to grow up.” – Sally (05:44)

  • First break: agent discovered her play, got her writing for radio soap The Archers, then Coronation Street, EastEnders, and her own acclaimed dramas.

The Making of Riot Women

• Personal Inspiration and Autobiographical Roots

  • The story began 10 years prior, rooted in her own experiences: late-onset menopause, caring for a mother with dementia 200 miles away, raising teenage sons, a struggling marriage, and mounting work pressures.

  “I started to feel that I was disappearing. It’s like everybody needed a piece of me... In the middle of that, I started to kick back a bit and be quite angry... starting to get quite low moods. Brain fog.” – Sally (12:07)

  • Writing as therapy: “The character of Beth... is as sort of autobiographical as I’ve ever been.” – Sally (13:38)

• Tapping Into the Midlife Female Experience

  • Menopause is present but not the focal point: “It wasn’t the star of the show... it’s an aspect of what these women are dealing with, but really it’s about everything women deal with when you get to a certain part of your life.” – Sally (10:54)

  • “Identity theft” of menopause: When menopause hits, you feel you’ve finally arrived at confidence in your 40s, only to have doubts, brain fog, and loss of joy return.

    “It was like you do become a diff—you feel like you’re not the person you thought you were.” – Sally (25:19)

• Purpose of the Show

  • To show multidimensional women living through real complexities: “Women on TV are so poorly represented. They’re often impossibly glamorous, stick thin, usually under 30... That’s what we normally get as role models for women.” – Sally (16:01)

Authenticity in Character and Production

• The Realism of Riot Women

  • Characters based around 60 (except one at 44); each with rich backstories and real, unvarnished grievances and joys (aging, caring for loved ones, medical realities, mental health, libido, heavy bleeding).
  • Avoided stereotypes and “whiny women” tropes.

    “There’s so much drama in women who’ve got history... It makes them rich, complex, layered, and interesting.” – Sally (16:21)

• Casting and Immersion

  • All cast members learned to play their instruments for five months, which bonded them.

    “They had five months to learn. And apart from Rosie, who played Kitty... none of them played their instruments at all... it really bonded them.” – Sally (24:13)

The Representation of Menopause

• Portrayal Beyond Hot Flashes

  • Moved away from generic comedic menopause: “The more I learned about menopause, the more I realized how much more there is to it.” – Sally (30:35)
  • Included topics rarely shown: HRT, libido, anhedonia, perimenopausal symptoms, and caregiving stress.

• Stigma, Silence, and Education

  • Highlighted lack of language for menopause in some cultures, and Western tendency to minimize its effects.
  • Sally’s mother told her she “laughed her way through” menopause, which masked underlying depression—a generational silence (27:23).

• Honest Depictions of Mental Health

  • Opening scene shows two main characters contemplating suicide from different ends of the spectrum.

    “The most likely time a woman will commit suicide or complete suicide is between 45 and 55. No coincidence.” – Dr. Haver (28:56)

  • Theme: women can rescue each other when backed into crisis, and creative projects can sustain hope.

• HRT: Barriers and Benefits

  • Sally delayed HRT due to outdated fear of breast cancer, only to benefit when she finally tried it:

    “After about three months, it really kicked in and made a difference... I wanted to reflect that in the show.” – Sally (35:37)

  • Portrayed positively and matter-of-factly on screen—unique for television.

The Cultural Moment – Why Stories Like This Matter

• Changing the Narrative

  • Historically, female characters were either babes, authority figures, or old women—no middle ground.

    “Women have three ages in Hollywood: Babe, District Attorney, and Driving Miss Daisy.” – Dr. Haver (16:01)

  • Sally writes characters “who have lived entire lives before we ever meet them”—richer and truer to reality.

• Audience Reception

  • “We’ve had so many comments from women... saying ‘I feel seen. I feel this really reflects what I’m going through.’” – Sally (17:27)
  • Surprising number of men also responded positively, though some criticized the absence of “nice men.”

    “If you want depictions of nice men, watch 95% of telly... I’m doing something else.” – Sally (18:52)

• The Middle Squeeze and Multi-generational Pressures

  • “It’s about what Tamsin Greig very eloquently calls the middle squeeze... elderly parents, adult kids, grandkids—you’re the one who’s there for stability for everybody.” – Sally (42:19)

Reflections on Aging and Authenticity

• Positive Perspective on Menopause and Later Life

  • Both host and guest celebrate increased confidence, disregard for trivial judgment, and new creative ventures emerging post-50.

    “You do have permission to live your best, authentic life—because if you don’t, no one’s coming to save you.” – Dr. Haver (40:49)

• Female Wisdom and Roles in Other Cultures

  • Referenced Maori and Chinese “second spring” ideas—cultures where older women are respected as wisdom keepers.

• TV’s Missed Opportunity and Hope for the Future

  • TV historically ignored or distorted older women: “It’s the myth that women aren’t interesting at all except how they relate to men... for so long on television.” – Sally (45:05)
  • Need for women to write about women, disrupting inherited male-centred constructs.

---

Notable Quotes & Moments (with Timestamps)

• On Burnout and Rage as a Midlife Woman:

  “In the middle of all that, I started to feel that I was disappearing. It’s like everybody needed a piece of me... you’re capable of dealing with these things because you always have... and you start to feel you are disappearing.” – Sally Wainwright (11:16)

• On Loss of Joy (Anhedonia):

  “This feeling that all the joy had gone out of life and losing motivation to do anything... If I’d known that was part of menopause, how much happier I would have been.” – Sally (12:45)

• On the Unpreparedness and Silence Surrounding Menopause:

  “If you can give something a name, it means it exists. And it’s not just you... in some cultures there is no word for menopause.” – Sally (26:16)

• On Real Female Characters:

  “There’s so much drama in women who’ve got history. There’s so much drama in stories that begin 60 years ago.” – Sally (16:21)

• On ‘Invisible’ Women in TV and Society:

  “Women on TV are so poorly represented... impossibly glamorous, usually stick thin, under 30... that’s what we normally get as role models for women.” – Sally (16:01)

• On Men Complaining About No Nice Men in the Show:

  “If you want depictions of nice men, watch 95% of telly... I’m doing something else.” – Sally (18:52)

• On Midlife as a Renaissance for Women:

  “I never imagined at 57, I would start a company or 55, 50, whatever I was, you know, start a podcast, start a social media channel, step away from my safe, guaranteed job... It’s pretty interesting time of life and I think you’re capturing that so well.” – Dr. Haver (42:54)

---

Timestamps of Significant Segments

• [04:29-05:06] – Sally’s early writing obsession and bus driving days
• [10:15-13:38] – The personal genesis of Riot Women, dealing with menopause, caregiving, and feeling invisible
• [16:21-17:27] – On creating rich, layered female characters and the show’s reception
• [24:13-24:41] – The cast learning instruments and the bonding that resulted
• [25:04-26:03] – Sally describes menopause as “identity theft”
• [28:34-30:07] – Opening scene of Riot Women, introducing suicide in midlife, the characters rescuing each other
• [34:29-35:57] – Sally and depiction of HRT; her personal reluctance and experience
• [36:30-37:13] – Audience response: letters saying “I feel seen,” actionable impact
• [42:19] – Discussion of the “middle squeeze” and its effect on women
• [44:03-46:27] – TV’s historical shortcomings and the importance of women writing women

---

Takeaways for Listeners

• Menopause is a multifaceted, often invisible experience with profound emotional, cognitive, and social impacts—which media rarely portrays honestly.
• Creative expression and community (even impromptu rock bands!) can be lifelines for midlife women feeling overwhelmed or lost.
• Positive, empowered stories about midlife women are urgently needed, resonating deeply with both women and (surprisingly) male viewers.
• There is value in normalizing discussions of hormone therapy, mental health, and authentic female aging onscreen, subverting decades of “male gaze” storytelling.

---

Riot Women premieres on BritBox January 14th.
Find Sally Wainwright on Instagram @SallyWainwrightOfficial.
Full episodes of unPAUSED are available on YouTube at Dr. Mary Claire.

---

Transcript

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Today's guest is someone whose creative work has shaped the way millions of people see women on television. Not young women, not simplified Hollywood versions of women, but real women, older women, complicated women, angry women, brave women, women breaking rules, women who don't tidy up their emotions for anyone. Sally Wainwright is the creator and producer behind some of the most acclaimed British television dramas of the last 20 years. Happy Valley, Gentleman Jack, Last Tango in Halifax, Scott and Bailey and Unforgiven. Her stories introduce us to characters who have lived entire lives before we ever meet them. Women who carry grief, desire, sexuality, rage, intelligence, love, courage, exhaustion, trauma and resilience. Embodies reflect actual lived experience. Now Sally has a new 6 episode BBC Brit Box drama called Riot Women. It's a series about a group of five women in midlife who escape their complicated lives filled with caring for kids and ailing parents and dealing with menopause by forming a rock band. I just finished watching it and I was hooked within minutes. I cried in the first 10. I laughed hysterically in the next 10. She hits so many of the issues I hear from women every single day in my clinic, in my DMs and in their whispered questions and late night fears, Body changes, aging parents, loneliness, isolation, mental health, shifts, feeling invisible, the emotional freefall of midlife that no one prepares us for. These characters are multidimensional, complicated women dealing with the issues my patients walk into my clinic carrying every day. And Sally puts all of it on screen with honesty, ferocity and humor. The tenderness, the rage, the absurdity and the heartbreak. It feels like someone in entertainment is finally telling the truth. I'm Dr. Mary Claire Haver, a board certified Obstetrician and Gynecologist and certified Menopause practitioner. I'm also an Adjunct professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Texas Medical Branch. Welcome to Unpaused, the podcast where we cut through the silence and talk about what it really takes for women to thrive in the second half of life.

[Brooklyn Adams]

This episode is brought to you by Peloton Break through the busiest time of year with the brand new Peloton Cross Training Tread Plus. Powered by Peloton iq. With real time guidance and endless ways to move, you can personalize your workouts and train with confidence, helping you reach your goals in less time. Let yourself run, lift, sculpt, push and go Explore the new peloton cross training tread [e-mail] hey, it's Brooklyn Adams and.

[Abercrombie Brand Representative]

I'm partnering with Abercrombie to tell you about the newest Drop from their active brand. Your personal best YPB leggings are made with buttery soft fabrics that hug you in all the right places. And common Abercrombie's viral curve love fit designed to eliminate waist gap. Paired with sports bras and super soft sweatshirts, it's activewear that supports every part of my busy lifestyle and gives me my best butt ever. Head into the new year feeling your personal best shop Active by Abercrombie in the app online and in stores.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Tell me a little bit about your background. Like where are you from?

[Sally Wainwright]

Well, I was born in Huddersfield in West Yorkshire, and I grew up in West Yorkshire. I grew up kind of in Halifax. I went to university in York, which is North Yorkshire. And then I finally went to live in London. Because at that time people said, if you want to be a writer, you've got to live in London.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And that was always your dream.

[Sally Wainwright]

Oh yeah. I really wanted to get away from like a lot of people where you grew up. It was like the back of beyond and I wanted it to be where it mattered.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Were you writing your whole life?

[Sally Wainwright]

Always writing, yeah. Yeah. I never stopped writing. You know, when you're a little kid, you write. And so me and my sister used to write stories and draw cartoons and that kind of thing. And I remember when I was about like 10, 11, 12, me and my sister used to write plays together. And it got to a point where I knew she was doing it to humor me and she was getting too old to do this. She kind of outgrew it and stopped. And I just never stopped. I just literally never stopped.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

So you did it all through secondary school and university. What did you study in university?

[Sally Wainwright]

English literature. I wrote dialogue since from being about 11, because I. I kind of thought it was the most important thing when I read novels. I'd never seen a play written down, but I was writing dialogue before I kind of knew what a play was because whenever I read a novel, I thought all the other stuff was boring. All the descriptions, you didn't need that. You just need to know what people are saying. So that's what excited me most. I realized I was a sort of dramatist without even realizing I was.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And then your first job was a bus driver?

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah, As I say, I went down to London. Cause people said if you want to be a writer, you've got to go and live in London. Which isn't true anymore. But it was then and I didn't have any money, didn't have a job. I managed to get a room in A house with a friend from university. One friend said to me, oh, you should apply to join the civil service. And another friend said, oh, you like driving? Why don't you apply to be a bus driver? They also need bus drivers. So I applied for both and I got offered jobs from both on the same day. And I decided that being a bus driver was more compatible with wanting to be a writer. Cause it seemed more wacky. It would leave my brain free to think about drama and think about writing.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And did you.

[Sally Wainwright]

And it was a good experience.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And there's so many different people getting off and on the bus.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah, exactly. I mean, three years at university didn't teach me very much. Whereas at 18 months as a bus driver, kind of. Really, you had to grow up, you know.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

When did it become you are a writer and now you're going to make your living as a writer?

[Sally Wainwright]

Well, I. I took a play to the Edinburgh Festival when I was at university. I wrote to a lot of exec producers whose names I'd seen on TV and agents, and nobody came to see the play. But one agent wrote to me and said, I can't come, but will you send me a copy of the script? And she took me on as a young writer, you know, and she got me a job on a radio soap called the Archers, which is the longest running soap in the world. It was started in the 1950s in England. And so I wrote the Archers for a couple, which Tamsin Gregg was in, who plays Holly in Riot with me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was my big. I started off writing Coronation, the Archers. Then I moved on to soaps like Coronation street and then finally got my own original drama away in 1999 with a show called At Home with the Braithwaite, which was nominated for an Emmy, which was the first time I came to New York. Wow. So.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

So I just have this vision of, you know, there's been a few shows in the US where they show writers rooms, you know, for, you know, they're dramatizing, you know, a TV show and you'll walk into a room and there's like a conference table with like eight people. Is that what writing was like in those early days?

[Sally Wainwright]

It was like that on soap operas like Coronation street and EastEnders, that kind of thing. But on hour long dramas, we don't tend to do that the same way in England, largely cause it's money, we can't afford to do it in the same way that it's done in America. Often a show like that will be run by one person and I think the model's changing now with streaming, there are shows where you will have big numbers, like Dr. WHO, which is such a big operation. They'll have, you know, any number of writers involved in something like that. But on the whole, it still tends to be sort of author led or writer led.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Where do you write?

[Sally Wainwright]

Where do I write? I've got an office in my house. I can actually write anywhere, I've realized. But I know I'm a workaholic. You know, this morning I was thinking about, where can I write? Where can I sit down? There wasn't a desk in my room at the hotel and I was like, what am I going to do?

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Do you. So you have your laptop and you just start dreaming up ideas.

[Sally Wainwright]

I think I'm a workaholic. I never actually. My brain never actually stops.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah.

[Sally Wainwright]

People think, you must be. I must be very disciplined. And I'm not. I'm not at all disciplined. It's just like, I have to work.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

It's internal drive. And you have two sons?

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah, I've got two boys who are in their 20s. Yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And then. Do they live close or.

[Sally Wainwright]

They live with me. Oh, good. Me and my husband split up about five years ago and, yeah, the boys are still at home. They both work. But it suits us all at the moment.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

It's great. This is so curious, this whole world of, you know, I'm a doctor. Most people, I say I'm a doctor and everyone knows what that is. Right. But what is a showrunner? You're described as one of the most prolific showrunners, like, in the history of the BBC.

[Sally Wainwright]

It's kind of a misnomer. Cause I'm not a showrunner. Cause what I think a showrunner is, it is an American thing. And it's somebody who has invented the show, has a lot of experience, is usually a writer, and has a group of other writers with them who they sort of are in charge of. And they run the room where. The writers room. And then they also act as an exec. So I don't do that bit. I don't run a room. I tend to write all my shows myself. But then the other aspect of being a showrunner, which I do do, is I'm an exec on the show as well. So I'm across all the decisions that I made about casting heads of departments, you know, what the show looks like, what it feels like, what the ethos of the show is, how it comes across on screen. And I also direct my own shows.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

I was wondering.

[Sally Wainwright]

So that's again, that's not what usually a showrunner does. A showrunner would usually be across who all the directors are and I assume be on set with them. And again, it's about the look and style of the show. So I'm kind of assuring you in that I exec and that and I direct. So I'm very much across what the show is. It's probably different to what people do.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

You do the editing, everything post production as well.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah. I'll be in the edit. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

How long does that take?

[Sally Wainwright]

Well, Riot Women, I started writing in the January of 2023.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Okay.

[Sally Wainwright]

And I finally finished in the edit of July this year. So it's been two and a half years.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Sally Wainwright]

So it's a big undertaking.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Amazing. It seems like listening to, you know, reading about you, that you are drawing from your own life. For a lot of the characters, Riot.

[Sally Wainwright]

Women was really personal. It was a really personal show. I don't know whether it was conscious when I started, but it was kind of my own response to realizing that I was starting to go through the menopause.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And when was that?

[Sally Wainwright]

So I started. Well, I started the idea of. It came to me about 10 years ago.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Okay.

[Sally Wainwright]

There are a number of things that brought it about. First, the show is a conflation of two ideas. It's a female rock band and it's about. I hesitate to say it's about the menopause. It's more about the female experience when you get to 50.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

No, I think you're totally right. Menopause part of the story. As is. Menopause is part of every woman's story, if she lives long enough. But it wasn't the star of the show, right?

[Sally Wainwright]

No, exactly.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Except the women in their lives.

[Sally Wainwright]

It's kind of touched on and it's an aspect of what these women are dealing with, but really it's about everything that women deal with. When you get to a certain part of your life and it doesn't have to be 50, it can be earlier or it can be later. But for me it was personal on a number of levels. The idea started basically when my mum was starting to develop dementia.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah.

[Sally Wainwright]

And she lived to. I live in Oxford and she lives in Yorkshire, so It was like 200 miles away. And she was starting to be forgetful and starting to experience things that were a problem for me and my sister, who just didn't live close to her at the same time. I'd got two teenage boys. My marriage wasn't as good as it had been. I had huge amount of pressure at work, you know, being across several shows at the same time and being pulled in lots of different directions there. And you get to this age where you kind of feel you are capable of dealing with these things because you always have done, because you're somebody who's always prided yourself on dealing with stuff. And in the middle of all that, I started to feel that I was disappearing. It's like everybody needed a piece of me, you know, or the adage about, you know, if you want something doing, ask a busy woman.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Right.

[Sally Wainwright]

And I felt like, oh, it's me. I'm the person who's been asked things of. And in the middle of that, I started to sort of kick back a bit and be quite angry in a way that was not always appropriate and you don't quite realize what's happening to you and starting to feel. I started to get quite low moods. Brain fog. And the bit worrying someone who uses.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Their brain so much.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yes. And be worried. You know, when you write a script, you're using your brain in a. A thousand ways a second, you know, a thousand different ways a second. You know, you're constantly thinking about patterns and connections and how things work. You know, the structure of telling stories is so complex if you want to get it right, which I always wonder. So you start to worry that, oh, well, if this isn't working anymore, what am I going to do? The other big thing that struck me as I was starting to develop the show more was something I started to experience, which was quite shocking, was this feeling that all the joy had gone out of life and losing motivation to do anything. And it was. You know, it's a real shock when that kicks in. And if I'd known that was part of the menopause, how much happier I would have been. But I didn't. I just thought it was me being miserable and depressive. And the problem is, when you get into that, you start. You don't want to tell your friends, you don't want to talk to your friends, because you don't want to be the miserable one who's offloading all the time. So you kind of keep it to yourself. So it seemed to me that I needed. It was my own therapy to be able to write about this. So the character of Beth, who Joanna Scanlan plays beautifully.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

So beautiful.

[Sally Wainwright]

It's really personal. That kind of is as sort of autobiographical as I've ever been. And I'm not saying I was suicidal in the way that she is. When the show Opens But I've certainly been low, where I've thought about. Nobody'd notice if I wasn't here.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

My patients admit the same thing you are describing, and I've been through some of it myself. The amalgamation of the patient experience of a loss, a feeling of invisibility, a feeling of overwhelm, a loss of resilience where they could. They had their lives managed, they had the sick parents, they had the teenagers, they had all of that was managed. And then all of a sudden they're struggling to manage and then they're having reactions to things that were different, like rage or anger or severe sadness or. Like you said, in medicine, we call it anhedonia, which is loss of joy.

[Sally Wainwright]

Oh, there's a medical term for it. Yes.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

So it's not that you're depressed or so low, but you can't get motivated or have joy. You've just lost the joy in everyday things. And so we see it in the patients all the time. And that's why I'm so excited about this show, because I think shows are starting to mention menopause more. But this one really gave such a realistic.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah, yeah. Well, I think portrayal. I think that's the. The show was originally called Hot Flush or Hot Flash, as you say. Yeah. And the menopause doctor I was working with in England said, I really do think you should call it that. And we pushed back against it eventually, even though I think the BBC liked it because it was. It was clear what the show was, if you called it Hot Flash.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

I have a question, though, about. Did you get pushback? You want to do a show about. I mean, you're a champion at the BBC and they're incredibly successful.

[Sally Wainwright]

I think it's an interesting question because I think, because I've got a certain status there.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Would you been an unknown?

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah, I think it's probably less likely. But also, just getting funding for it wasn't as easy as you might think, because it's not the usual staple of men with guns saving women, which is what 95% of television is. And even when we do see women playing lead parts in shows, it's often a male version of what women are. Women on TV are so poorly represented. No. They're often impossibly glamorous, they usually stick thin. They're usually under 30. You know, that's what we normally get as role models for women alike.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

The line from First Wives Club that said women have three ages in Hollywood, Babe, District Attorney and Driving Miss Daisy. So those are the big three. And I'M like, you found the sweet spot. You found like the actual real women living real lives and well, I think.

[Sally Wainwright]

That, you know, there's so much drama in women who've got history. There's so much drama in stories that begin 60 years ago. I wrote, when I wrote Last Tango, it was a story that started 60 years ago. Riot. Women is a story that starts yay number of years ago because the women have all got life experience. And that's, that's interesting. It makes them rich, it makes them complex, it makes them layered and it makes them interesting cause they don't, you know, take crap off people anymore.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

The character Kitty, you know, I didn't want to like her. She was hard, you know, Cause she was an opening scene. Yeah, she's a challenge. And at the end of course I absolutely fall in love with her. And she's probably one of my favorite. They're all fantastic. Your sweet spot seems to be this multi layered, complex, you know, woman who's going through 10,000 things at once. I love that you didn't just take it down to one dimension. She's just menopausal. She's menopausal with a mother with Alzheimer's, with a son who's struggling with, you know, all the normal things that my patients, my followers are going through. I really think, how did the show do in the uk?

[Sally Wainwright]

It's done really well. I mean we, it's, it's, it certainly hit its target audience, but it's gone beyond that as well. It got really good viewing figures. You know, we've had so many comments from women predominantly saying I feel seen. I feel this really reflects what I'm going through and I'm not seeing it on screen before. We got a lot of really nice comments from men which really delighted me. And it was interesting actually when we were thinking about the show, who will watch this? Will men watch it? And it's interesting because people never ask if you make a west and nobody says oh, will women watch this? That question is never asked, is it? But obviously it's niche because it's about women. It's even more niche because it's about middle aged women. It isn't. It's for anybody who likes being told a really cracking story. I think, however, I have to say we did get a handful of really small minded comments from some men who had comments like there are no nice men in it and Sally Wainwright doesn't write men nicely or something. And it's like, hello, there are no nice women in it. Actually there are complex, interesting women in it. But the whole, you know, the point of the show really was about the female experience. And a big part of the female experience is the way men look at women or the way men treat women, or the way women feel at this age that they're either made to feel invisible or often the target of disparaging comments. You know, like what happens to Kitty in episode four? We had a really interesting storyline meeting where all the women in the room talked about how they'd had nasty little sexual comments whispered in their ear or shouted at them across the street. You know, sexualized put downs that are intended to show power, sexual power and under. And that we all like to think, oh, it's water off a duck's back, but actually it isn't. It falls into your brain and spoils your day. You know, every woman in the room, even me, had experienced that kind of behavior 100%. And then I get criticized because I don't write nice men. It's like, watch 95% of telly if you want depictions of nice men, you know, But I'm not, you know, that I'm doing something else. And it's interesting when you think about that because it's so common. I don't know. I say every woman I've ever spoken to has experienced that at some point.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

At some point, yeah. So there's a quote you have, which I love. I find women just more interesting than men. I think women are more heroic than men because they have more to deal with. I think women are more emotionally articulate than men, so it's easier to write them having difficult times and being articulate about it. So I really think you captured that well. What made you decide that midlife and that all that comes with it for women would be why this? Why now?

[Sally Wainwright]

Well, again, I tend to write about women who are my age. I've realized, yeah, I don't think there's ever a problem. All my shows across the last kind of 25 years, I've realized that the men. The person who is the most. The people who are the most interesting. Me are people my age. I guess all writing is by autobiographical at some level. Not always consciously so.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Did you start with an idea of they're gonna have a rock band?

[Sally Wainwright]

Yes, as I say, it was. What I wanted to do was try and find a way to write about this part of women's lives and the experiences that go through at this time without being whiny women. I wanted to find a way of creating a show that people would Think, oh, that looks interesting. That looks exciting. And then by stealth, explain to them about the midlife experience. So it was conflating the idea of a punk rock band, a female punk rock band, which. With women who are at this age where you're doing a lot of stuff, you're juggling a lot of life's difficult things. I'd wanted to write about a rock band since I was 13. There was a show on telly in England when I was 13 called Rock Follies. It was actually Rock Follies of 77. So I was 13 in 77, and it was about a female rock band. And it totally changed my life. It was like watching this show, it was. It was like something had happened to me. It wasn't just like watching telly. It was like something had actually happened to me watching this TV show. And I remember really tangibly thinking, oh, that's what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna make television. I'm gonna write television. So I was lucky at 13 that I knew what I was gonna do, and I did actually go on to do it. Yeah, it was a kind of guiding.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Light, and you got to bring that full circle to write music.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah, it felt like it was. It was like my homage, really. Writing Riot Women to Rock Follies.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And you have. So some of the characters are in their late 40s, some are definitely in their. They say their ages a couple of times, but you actually have characters in their 60s.

[Sally Wainwright]

The kitty's 44, but the other four women are around 60. They're either just. Just under. I think they're all just under 60. One of them's just over 60. Yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

What kind of research did you do for the show? I know you had a medical advisor on the show.

[Sally Wainwright]

We had a doctor who specializes in menopause on board. But the most research for the show was the music. That was the biggest kind of.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

So it's obvious that Kitty's character was singing her own voice, which was phenomenal.

[Sally Wainwright]

But she's a big West End star. She's not particularly big on telly, but she's massive in the West End.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

So West End for our US Listeners is like Broadway.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah. So she really was acting in a show.

[Sally Wainwright]

Oh, my God. Yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And then they're playing instruments. Were they really playing?

[Sally Wainwright]

Yes, they were, because I wanted them to. I didn't want it to look like they weren't doing the real thing, the real deal. So I asked them to if. If they would. When. When we offered them the parts, it. We asked Them if they would also learn to play the instruments. So they had five months to learn. Wow. And apart from Rosie, who plays Kitty, who could play guitar, none of them played their instruments at all. So they had five months.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Even Beth, Beth's character. So she.

[Sally Wainwright]

No, no, Beth. Could she keyboard it off Joanna? I think she did a little bit, but not in any way that she felt confident with. So they did all learn. They all had tutors. And then they all came together. Lorraine, who's the drummer, Jess, had even less time. Cause she couldn't get on board. She was busy. So she had even less time to learn than the others. And I learned to play the drums, especially as research for this. And I know it's hard, like learning any instrument. And then they all came together for two weeks rehearsal. One was for the scenes and one was for the music. And that's a real achievement. And do you know the wonderful thing was it really bonded them. You know, like when you rehearse with actors, they bond anyway. Cause they're all putting their hearts and souls on the line. But actually asking them to play music together, it gave them a real buzz. There was real adrenaline in the room.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

You could feel it in the show. And you see how nervous the Tamsen Gray character was on the bass. Like how unsure she was. That came across as I was like, well, Tamsin, she's really playing.

[Sally Wainwright]

Well, Tamsin would tell you she was acting at that point. Cause she actually got better as Tamsin than she was supposed to be as Hol when she was practicing, when, you know, she'd learned so much. But they had to play two gigs. One is at the concert in episode four, and then one is at the festival. The festival in episode six. Because of the magic of telly, we had to put the music on top afterwards in the edit. But they were actually playing properly. So when they came off stage, they were just. They were saying, oh, I can understand why you do want to go back and smash your hotel room up. They came and they got so much fun, energy and adrenaline flowing. Yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

You've called menopause. Identity theft. I like that term.

[Sally Wainwright]

I think there's this common thing that women go through when they've. I did. And I've talked about to other women about this. When you get to force, you go through a phase of thinking, oh, I don't care anymore. This is me.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

That's the best part to me.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah, it is. It's wonderful where you stop worrying about all the silly little things that people might think about. And you just think or if you've said something a bit silly and you used to agonize about it, you get to 40 and you think, oh, they know what I meant. They won't misinterpret it. You get so confident about all the silly little things that used to worry you. And then I got to, as I say, 50, and all those little doubts seemed to creep back in again and snatch away this thing that you'd achieved where you felt, I'm okay now I've arrived, I am who I want to be kind of thing. So that's what I meant by that, that it did. It's not just the sort of joylessness that seems to see that takeover and the brain fog. And it was like, you do become a diff. You feel like you're not the person you thought you were.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Do you feel like if you would have known, if someone would have prepared you, that these things might happen, you may have these symptoms, these mental health changes, these. The brain fog. If you were like, oh, that's what this is, what this is, definitely would.

[Sally Wainwright]

Because, you know, if you can give something a name, it means it exists. And it's not just you. I was at a conference in Oxford on Saturday, a menopause thing, where I think I'd been asked along as the light relief. There were some professors who. Three women who specialize in studying the menopause. And one of them does work with, well, all different kind of communities all over the world. And she was saying, in some cultures there is no word for menopause. So how do you go and talk to the doctor about it if there's no word for it? You just describe a collection of symptoms and you don't necessarily know it's this one thing. So, of course.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Well, in the US and I think in the UK for decades, you know, menopause. The menopause was only defined as absence of periods. So most women can identify that and maybe some hot flashes. But this whole, like you said, the list of 35 that you saw. I was never taught that in any of my training. This is something that I learned in the last five years, you know, becoming a menopause specialist.

[Sally Wainwright]

Well, I wasn't. I mean, I. My only knowledge of the menopause was what my mum told me, essentially.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

What did she tell you?

[Sally Wainwright]

My mum told me that she laughed her way through the menopause.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Oh, amazing.

[Sally Wainwright]

But she didn't. This is the thing. This is what she told me. And I kind of believed her because she was a funny woman, very clever, very funny. And she said I laughed my way through it. And I believed it just because she said it. And I believed everything my mum said. But now I look back and I don't think she was. I think she was actually quite depressed then. And I didn't see it. I certainly didn't see it as being part of the menopause because I didn't have a clue. I just thought she was depressed. But when it came to menopause, she laughed her way through it. I didn't connect the two. And now I realize she wasn't at all laughing her way through it. It was just her generation didn't acknowledge the menopause. It's like, oh, that's not going to touch me. I can deal with things and I'll deal with that. So I just thought the menopause was, your period stopped. Good tick. And you laugh your way through it. Good tick. So when these things started to happen to me, I didn't connect them. I hadn't even heard of the perimenopause.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah, perimenopause. I learned how to pronounce. I want to go back to riot women and talk about Beth and Kitty and this. This opening scene, which, like, grabbed me by the breasts. You know, we can't say grab me by the balls. Cause I don't have any. But I guess grab me by my ovaries, which have shriveled up and died, but. So they're both suicidal.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

I don't want to give it away.

[Sally Wainwright]

No.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

But I want to make it seem like a downer, but, like one's going out like a lamb and one's going out like a lion. I think that's a quote from you.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah. Well, I said one's going out with a bang and one's going out with a whimper.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah.

[Sally Wainwright]

But I mean, it doesn't.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Was that important to you to include that in the story because. Yes, because statistically, the most likely time a woman will commit suicide or complete suicide is between the ages of 45 and 55.

[Sally Wainwright]

No coincidence.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah.

[Sally Wainwright]

I wanted them to rescue each other. Basically. They kind of come to each other's rescue. It's like these two very unlikely women you would never imagine being friends, and they find this very unlikely connection and it becomes a very creative connection. And then it becomes even more of a connection than they've realized, which I can't give spoilers away, but you know what I mean? So I had to start off with them being load to show how they rescue each other and how they find and the whole thing about what's, I hope, joyous about the punk rock band is they start writing songs about the stuff that bothers them. So they start.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Did you write the songs?

[Sally Wainwright]

No, I didn't, no. We got a punk rock band called ARCS on board. It's these two brilliant young women who live in Brighton. It was so wonderful. But we would give them ideas. We'd give them. We'd send them, like what the song, basically what the song should be about. So Seeing Red definitely about the need for hrt. So we sent them lots, like ideas for lines, ideas for the theme of it, ideas for. I think I came up with the drumbeat for that, in fact. But interestingly, the first line, which is, I'm so depressed I can't get dressed. That came from my police advisor. She came up with that when we were just chatting about things. So that's quite joyous.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Two of the main characters are police officers. Well, one.

[Sally Wainwright]

One.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah. And then the side character.

[Sally Wainwright]

Oh, that's right. Nisha. I've got.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah, so.

[Sally Wainwright]

So, yeah, I did have my police advisor from Happy Valley on. What? And she came up with that first line for the.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

You know, we're playing catch up in popular culture and the way menopausal women are portrayed, it's usually comedic.

[Sally Wainwright]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Which can be funny. So much of menopause is kind of funny.

[Sally Wainwright]

And saying only about why I moved away from Hot Flush being the title because that's what often get menopause gets reduced to. And of course, the more I learned about the menopause, the more I realized how much more there is to it and how much more I was experiencing that.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Was the menopause when you were researching like all the. Were you having like, aha moments like, wait, wait, wait, that. That was me, you know?

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah, yeah. You know, just thinking about all the brain fog, worrying that I'd got dementia, all that kind of thing, I realized this. I can't call this Hot Flush. It's. There's so much more to it and I didn't want it just to be about the menopause either.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

So you were able to incorporate, I mean, in six episodes, HRT libido. That was super fun feeling of a visibility. I'm astounded you got this past people funding the show. I just, you know, I just imagine the walls you must have hit when you're like, we're going to do this show and it's five women in their 50s and they're having libido issues and they're having heavy bleeding. You Did a great job with Kitty's character having. In medicine, we say menoragia, even, like, sure, we're getting off the couch in, like, a puddle, you know, of Blenheim. This is very, very real stuff that's happening. So I've never seen that integrated into a storyline. And I just, you know. No pushback?

[Sally Wainwright]

No, no, I think not. Because I think. I think after I'd written Happy Valley, which did hugely well in England, I think it went down pretty well in America as well. I think people attributed me with knowing how to tell a good story. So I think. I hope that's what it was, that people knew. Whatever it's about, it will be entertaining, it will be fun to watch. It'll have layers, it'll be interesting, it'll be saying something and it'll be fun.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

It definitely had funny parts to it which were all appropriate when you handed the scripts. So you picked your actors who were incredible. Incredible, Incredible, fantastic. And their reading these parts, like, what was their reaction to the character? Were they identifying?

[Sally Wainwright]

I think they loved it. I mean, we didn't. We weren't. You know, they were very happy to come and do it. They were all pretty eager. And I think they. I think, you know, what was really interesting is they all got on really, really well. They had a fantastic friendship group off screen, and it was a really happy shoot. There was a really nice atmosphere. And one of the interesting things, as I say on Saturday at this conference I was at in Oxford, was how important female community is in menopause, how we often all support each other through it, we talk to each other about it. And that came. That was really apparent, I think, in their responses to the script, that they understood that this was something important to talk about that they hadn't quite seen before. And the way they were dramatized through the, you know, the very vivid characters that they were all playing. I mean, any one of those five women would play the lead in any show. So the fact that they were all happy to come and kind of be an ensemble was a bit of a win, you know?

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah, no, it was great. I've never seen this before, ever. Is. You openly talk about HRT on the show, going down to the doctor to get sorted, and it was like, no big deal, you know, I'm gonna take you to whatever you call it in the uk, to the farm, to the gp. Yeah, to the gp. And go get yourself sorted. And then the flashes forward about six weeks or so. I mean, their lives aren't perfect, but they're just feeling so much better.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And able to manage. And one of them even has her libido back. And they're kind of joking really nice about that. And I have never seen that talked about in such a positive way.

[Sally Wainwright]

Oh, good.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Great.

[Sally Wainwright]

I'm pleased.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Or in any way, really, at all. You know, there's usually hot flashes and the joke stops there.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And maybe she's making an appointment to go to the doctor, but never like the aftermath. So of how a woman can kind of get some of her resilience back and be able to function and take on those challenges that were stumbling her before. So kudos to you.

[Sally Wainwright]

Thank you. Well, it was kind of important for me to do that because I resisted going on hrt. Why? Because I still was under the impression that it causes breast cancer, which I now know it doesn't. And I know if you have breast cancer, you can't go on hrt.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Right.

[Sally Wainwright]

But if you haven't got breast cancer, it's. It is not.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

It's going to cause it breast cancer. Right.

[Sally Wainwright]

And I didn't know that because there was the report that was about 20 years ago.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And, you know, most women, we're working on it to. To spread that message, but that is the prevailing thought in most women. And I love that. You didn't even have to go there. Yeah. You didn't even talk about the breast cancer risk or any of that. You just. They went to the doctor, they got what they needed, and now they're back on track with their lives.

[Sally Wainwright]

And I also thought that I don't need to take. I was like my mom from my mom, you know? You know, I don't. I don't take anything I don't need to take. And I didn't understand. I did. I just didn't understand that, you know, you don't get through the menopause. You stop having. You stop creating those hormones, and once they've gone, they've gone. You don't get through it. It just stops.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

It's your post. Menopausal forever.

[Sally Wainwright]

The doctor we worked with persuaded me to start trying hrt, and I did, and it did, like, about three months.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Oh, for yourself.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah. Yeah. So because as I say, I had brain fog, joylessness, depression, and I just accepted those things. I thought it was part of the human condition that I should feel like this. I thought it was because I was a writer, I should be miserable.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

So I think you're just more emotional than most people.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah. And after about three months, it really kicked in and made a difference. And I Wanted to reflect that in the show. It happens quite quickly in the show. It's six weeks and I know it's different for everybody how soon it does actually start to kick in. But it certainly made a big difference to me. It certainly affected the joylessness that kind of really disappeared and the lack of motivation, the lack of feeling like you just don't really want to do anything.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

What have you. The people who've seen the show, what kind of responses as far as. Are they telling you it's changing their life or. You said they feel seen.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah, I think a few people have. Again, it's just talking about it and people knowing that these things are part of the menopause. I think that's what the response. There's so many messages on Instagram and that kind of thing. The BBC have had more letters about this than I saw our exec from the BBC last week. And she said normally when people write to the BBC to complain. Yeah. So it's been kind of refreshing for them to get a whole bunch of letters that are saying well done, thank you, well done. This is interesting. You're helping me, you know, this has helped.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

So you also have some personal. A lot of personal experience with grief, dealing with your parents, dementia, both of your parents.

[Sally Wainwright]

Both my parents died with dementia. Yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And were they very close together or were there.

[Sally Wainwright]

No, my dad died 25 years ago.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Okay.

[Sally Wainwright]

And he had quite early onset. Well, he was 1773 when he died and then my mum was 93. Wow. So she, she. My dad's dementia was there were kind of different.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah, one of them.

[Sally Wainwright]

But my mum lived with dementia for about six years. It was like a slow process.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

That's where my mom is right now.

[Sally Wainwright]

Right.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Good days and bad days. Yeah, she fell and broke her hip. So she's wheelchair bound. And just all of the, you know, I cried in those first few minutes, the suicide. But then you quickly touched. She answered the phone with her brother in that first scene and he was arguing with her about the dementia care and Beth's character. And that made me cry because I've been through that. And it's also like my sister lives close to my mom and so we're the eldest daughters and she's really bearing the brunt of the day to day decisions. And I feel so guilty about that, you know. Cause I'm a state away, you know, I'm 400 miles away, 300 miles away and you know, super busy and traveling and doing all this stuff and she is really managing the day to day stuff. It's so hard.

[Sally Wainwright]

It is hard. And it tends. It does tend to fall to one.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Child to do it, because it's like a logistic, you know, reality of her choosing to stay close to, you know, where we grew up, and it's fallen on her, you know, I want to die like a man, you know, but my dad literally lived his best life. He had some slowdown that last month. We were all gathered around. We loved on him, and he died peacefully at home with all of us there. It was great. And after a long, wonderful life in his 80s and, you know, the women, it's forever.

[Sally Wainwright]

It's horrible. I. I'd say my mum lived for six years in a care home. I mean, it got to a point where she needed 24 hours. Yes.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

My mom's in a care home, too.

[Sally Wainwright]

Which I wasn't gonna give my career up to do that. I couldn't have done it. Even if I had. I don't think it would have been feasible. I don't think I could have physically done it. Yeah. And I think one of the sadnesses that I've tried to reflect in the character of Beth is watching what your parent goes through in those six years and having to witness things that you kind of feel nobody should. A child should never have to witness their parent going through, but you do. You do have to witness it, because it's happening. Yeah. And you have to be there and you have to, you know, see them go through things that, you know, they would not want themselves. That.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Or that's never planned for that to be your life.

[Sally Wainwright]

Because we don't plan. We don't plan for it. We don't plan for dementia. Nobody does. You know, because you. You kind of.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

You.

[Sally Wainwright]

You do, you know, you hope it's not going to happen because it doesn't always happen.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

I wouldn't wish it on anybody.

[Sally Wainwright]

And I do feel like a different person because of that.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah.

[Sally Wainwright]

And. And at the same time as all the. The menopausal changes are happening to you.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

As well at the same time, and you had teenagers, you went through a separation, you're divorced now. Is that, you know, was all that happening at once?

[Sally Wainwright]

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. But as I say, my therapy really was writing this show. My way of dealing with it was. Was creative, which is kind of the message of the show. It's. My message for the show is if you struggling with the menopause, join a rock band.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Well, the characters you've written have this. This truth that I'm seeing over and over again on you Know my direct messages on social media and in my clinic of the positives of this age, the biggest one is that loss of caring about the small stuff and just feeling like you now have permission to live your best, authentic life, because if you don't, no one's coming to save you. You really have to circle the wagons around yourself so not really caring what people think or what you're wearing or what all these things you would fret about before for me. And you deal with some parent child relationships in the show or the younger, you know, the. Tom. Is it Tom?

[Sally Wainwright]

Yes.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

And then the old. The other kids of.

[Sally Wainwright]

Oh, Jessa's kids. Yeah. Chloe. Yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

So, you know, I'm so focused on, like, how do I figure out this adulthood with my daughters? And, like, not mothering, but I'm still the mom, but I want to let them be independent. So I have to, like, shut my mouth, you know, like, remind myself, don't talk or comment on their clothes or what they weigh or what their choices and decisions are, because I want them to remember me happy, you know, in a good way. And it just makes me think about, you know, all the comments. So I think you did a really good job with that, too. Showing how difficult those relationships can be of being a mother, but not mothering well, the show really is, and letting them be who they are.

[Sally Wainwright]

It's about what Tamsin Greg very eloquently calls the middle squeeze, where you are, you know, you've got elderly parents and you're dealing with them, but you've also got adult kids who've often got kids of their own. So your grandma as well. And you are somehow in the middle. You're kind of the matriarch. You're in the middle of all this. You're the one who's there for stability for everybody. So I kind of wanted to dramatize that.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah, you did a great job. So it seems, though, we're having a cultural moment. Women of a certain age in their 50s and 60s are really, you know, we're done with the Golden Girls, though. They were fabulous. I have to say. I love that show.

[Sally Wainwright]

Oh, good.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

But I feel like there is a renaissance. So I'm seeing, you know, when I was 30, when I thought about 60, I thought gray hair, grandma, and slowing down and becoming quiet and invisible and being a family supporter, I never imagined at 57, I would start a company or 55, 50, whatever I was, you know, start a podcast, you know, start a social media channel. Step away from my, like, safe, guaranteed job of delivering Babies, which was beautiful and I'm glad I did it. And like open a rogue menopause clinic. It's, it's a pretty interesting time of life and I think you're, you're capturing that so well. What was 30 year old Sally thinking about? 60 year old Sally, or did you think at all?

[Sally Wainwright]

I don't think I was thinking about me at all at that age. I, I couldn't imagine. I thought about my sons being bigger. You know, my sons were tiny boys. I wondered what they'd be like when they were 27, but I never thought about myself. Yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Would you imagine you'd still be like producing some or you'd be producing some of the most successful shows?

[Sally Wainwright]

No, I didn't, I just didn't project ahead. I didn't imagine what I would be like. But I think it's interesting to talk about the plus side of menopause that you, you know, you, you do.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

I love it.

[Sally Wainwright]

You know, you know, there are cultures like Maori culture where women are celebrated.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Well and then they call it second spring in China. You know, it's.

[Sally Wainwright]

Or they've achieved wisdom and they're retaining their blood because it is now part of their wisdom.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Yeah, different cultures do celebrate and the women are the wisdom keepers and they hand down their traditions and they are. And there's, you know, there's some anthropologic theories of menopause. Some of them are bunk and purely patriarchal. But one that I kind of like is that, you know, we, if we just kept having children like other mammals. They have. Most mammals can breed till they die, but women get this break so that they can pass on the history, the generations, the teaching. That doesn't mean they're the caretakers or the babysitters, but they are the source of wisdom. Cause the men still have to go out and hunt and gather. So I do love that part of it. So what do you think that television has historically kind of gotten wrong about our age?

[Sally Wainwright]

I think it's just the invisibleness of it. It's the myth that, well, the myth that women aren't interesting at all really, except how they relate to men, which we've suffered with for quite a long time on television. You know, we've suffered for quite a long time on television with women being female constructs because old telly was written by men for so long, forever. And even to the point where when it was written by women, women also bought into those female, those male constructs of what women should be. In the same way that men have Designed women's bodies for so long with, you know, the invention of corsets and high heels. You know, women didn't invent those, men did.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

So I had a conversation with Dr. Elizabeth Komen. She's an oncologist, so she does just breast cancer, but she studied medical history as an undergrad at Harvard. And she talks about, like, plastic surgery. The evolution of plastic surgery. It started with men getting their faces shot off in wars. And then once they figured out anesthesia and they could do this painlessly, surgeons became not just butchers chopping off limbs, but they could put someone's face back together. And that kind of evolved into, well, can we take women who are not attractive and make them more attractive? Because not being attractive to a man is a mental problem and we can make them mentally more happy. And so all of the. Originally, there's some great female plastic surgeons, but when the field developed, it was all the male gaze.

[Sally Wainwright]

Yeah.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Like women were not coming in asking for breast implants. Men were telling them in the beginning that you have micromastia, small breasts, a medical condition called small breast. And that's making you unhappy. If we make them bigger, you'll be happy. Which just absolutely blows me away. Fascinates me. That'd be a good show.

[Sally Wainwright]

Shocking, isn't it? On tv, it's about women writing about women and being honest about women. You know, and it's, you know, historically, when you think about Charlotte Bronte, when she wrote Jane Eyre, the reason that was such a big part, a big part of why that was such a big hit when it, when she wrote it, because it was the first one of the first time, there was some literature that was genuinely about the female experience as a governess, a working class woman writing about what it was really like to experience what she went through as a woman. But I think that's what we've got wrong for so long is that men have written women the way men have taught and we've bought into what women should be because of what we've seen on screen.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

We see the same thing in medicine. So forever medicine doctors were men. You know, nursing didn't become a profession until, you know, there were nursing type things. But they weren't writing books and papers and teaching until, you know, the last hundred years or so and forever, like the male body, the white male body was the default. And anything else was atypical, abnormal, you know, so that first generation of female physicians coming through, which was amazing, were biased by what we were taught. So some of the people I've had on the podcast who trained a generation above me. Talk about how you just fall into the trap because that's. That's what you know and it's what is taught to you as normal. So those you know until. And it's now that we're like, wait a minute. These studies were never done for us in women. This. We're not reflecting the true female body in this study or this experience. So yeah, we have the same thing. Okay, well, I love the show.

[Sally Wainwright]

Thank you.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

I can't wait for everyone to see it. It's coming out in the US I just loved it. So I did get to see it unofficially. Your producer sent me Access Jen and I binged all six episodes. Fantastic. Such a beautiful portrayal. I can't wait for it to come.

[Sally Wainwright]

Out in the U.S. thank you.

[Dr. Mary Claire Haver]

Sally's new series, Riot Women is premiering on BritBox January 14th. You can also find Sally on Instagram at Sally Wainwright Official. You can find full episodes of unpaused on YouTube at. Dr. Mary Claire, I'd love to hear from you about this topic and and anything else that's on your mind. You can find me on Instagram rmaryclaire and get honest, accurate information on health, fitness and navigating [e-mail] My upcoming book, the New Perimenopause, is available for pre order on Amazon. If you're loving this podcast, I have an important request. Please take a moment to follow Unpaused on your favorite podcast app. Following and listening is what pushes this information to more women who need it. So if this podcast has helped you feel seen, understood, or supported, hit follow right now so you never miss an episode. Thank you for being here with me. Let's keep going. Unpaused Unpaused is presented by Odyssey in conjunction with pod people. I'm your host, Dr. Mary Claire. Haven't ever the views and opinions expressed on Unpaused are those of the talent and guests alone and are provided for informational and entertainment purposes only. No part of this podcast or any related materials are intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.