I Don’t Even Recognize Myself Anymore: What Perimenopause Is Really Trying to Tell Me

“I don’t even recognize myself anymore.”

It’s the phrase I’ve caught myself whispering more and more this year.

Catching a glimpse of myself in the mirror and thinking, When did this happen?
The sagging neck wattle — maybe scarves need to make a comeback.

Or waking up to my period ten days early, after three days of simmering rage that left me wondering, When did I become such a hormonal bitch?
I don’t recognize this version of me.

Sometimes it feels like my body is betraying me.
The hot flashes. The sleep that doesn’t come. The way I can look at a donut and swear I gain three pounds.
What the actual fuck is happening?
I don’t even recognize myself anymore.

This is 42. This is perimenopause.

And here’s what I know and am continually reminding myself of…

For decades, we were taught that being good meant being agreeable.
Calm down when you wanted to scream. Push through exhaustion to prove you’re strong. Smile when you wanted to say no.

That’s how our nervous systems learned to survive by overriding what we actually felt in order to belong.

But perimenopause? It rewrites that code.

That simmering rage you feel isn’t random hormones, it’s your body finally refusing to swallow another “no.”
That bone-deep fatigue isn’t laziness, it’s your system slamming the brakes after decades of performing productivity at all costs.
That stubborn weight or the way your body shape is changing? It’s not betrayal. It’s your body refusing to keep being decorative, manageable, or endlessly optimized.

Your nervous system is recalibrating, teaching you a new equation for safety.
One where safety isn’t earned through perfection, people-pleasing, or pretending.
It’s found in truth, boundaries, and finally listening to what your body has been trying to say for years.

This is also why so many of the things I’ve tried, supplements, diets, therapy, even meditation apps, don’t stick.

Because I’ve been trying to build transformation on dysregulated ground.
You can’t support your body when you’re in shutdown.
You can’t find your identity when you’re in constant activation.
You can’t create community when your system sees people as a threat.

It’s not discipline that’s the problem. It’s the foundation.

So, when everything feels like too much, the rage, the fatigue, the “who even am I anymore?”...

I have to remind myself: I don’t need to fix it all. I just need to start with my nervous system.

Before the supplements. Before the self-improvement plans. Before trying to “get back” to who I was.

Start here.
Start with presence.
Start with noticing.

When my body feels like it’s betraying me, I pause and ask:

“What state am I in right now — shut down, wound up, or grounded?”

That one moment of awareness is regulation beginning.

Sometimes that means stepping outside and feeling my feet on the ground.
Sometimes it’s one slow exhale before reacting.
Sometimes it’s humming in the car, or shaking out my hands before I talk to my kid.
Sometimes it’s noticing a 2% increase in energy and calling that a win.

Because nervous system work isn’t about controlling your emotions, it’s about building capacity, one small shift at a time.

The truth is: perimenopause isn’t here to destroy us.
It’s asking us to finally listen — to the body, the signals, the exhaustion, the fire.

And when we do, we stop fighting ourselves.
We start working with the recalibration instead of against it.

That’s the work.
Not perfecting it. Not mastering it.
Just beginning — again and again — with awareness, breath, and a little more compassion than last time.