The statistics are staggering. 69% of people in the UK believe women face discrimination at work due to menopause. 17% of menopausal women have considered leaving their jobs due to lack of support, and 6% have already left. Almost 900,000 women in the UK have left their jobs because of menopausal symptoms.

But here’s what the statistics don’t tell you: why this keeps happening, even in organisations with menopause policies, diversity training, and leaders who genuinely believe they’re supportive.

I’m going to suggest something controversial: the problem isn’t that your organisation lacks a menopause policy. The problem is that the people implementing that policy are operating from nervous systems that have been conditioned, for generations, to read women’s bodies as problematic.

The Latest Chapter in a Very Old Story

Let me take you back through history for a moment. This just the latest iteration of a pattern that’s been running for millennia.

In the 1800s, women’s health concerns were dismissed as “hysteria”—a diagnosis literally derived from the Greek word for uterus. The medical establishment decided that women’s reproductive organs made them inherently irrational. Fast forward to the 1980s: modern medical research standards are established, but women are largely excluded from clinical trials. The NHS didn’t mandate inclusion of women in research until the 1990s! This means the medications and treatments we use today were tested primarily on male bodies.

Even today, we’re still discovering how deep this exclusion goes

• Women are 73% more likely to be seriously injured in car crashes because crash test dummies were modelled on male bodies. What? Yep, female dummies weren’t even tested in the driver’s seat until November 2025.
• Period products were tested with saline solution instead of actual blood until 2023, making it impossible for women to accurately assess heavy bleeding that might indicate serious health conditions. And leaving women, and girls convinced that they have “heavy periods” based on absolute nonsense.
• Women’s pain is consistently undertreated and dismissed by medical professionals, despite decades of research documenting this bias.

So, even with the best will in the world, from the very best intended processes, most people are still operating with some subconscious belief about women, their health and how we handle it.

EXAMPLE:

Woman experiences brain fog, a menopause symptom in the workplace – (VERY normal for a peri-menopausal woman to lose words, forget names of things, or even struggle to construct a coherent sentence.) Most people observing may have a sympathetic response, and MOST will have a subconscious flash of “this is annoying, she’s incompetent, get on with it”.

Woman experiences rage, a menopause symptom in the workplace (VERY normal to have mood swings) and her colleagues around her may experience a flash of “god, she’s hysterical” or “she’s being unreasonable”

Woman experiences deep fatigue, a menopause symptom in the workplace, following months of broken sleep, panic attacks and heavy night sweats disturbing her rest. The rest of the team may experience a thought process of “she’s letting the team down” or “we’re ALL tired Susan!”.

I’d like to point out at this time, that the recommended “8 hours of sleep” is based on a male body and male system, not a female one.

So, poor Susan starts to feel incompetent, embarrassed and like she can’t keep up. The rest of the team view her symptoms as problematic, and the senior leaders aren’t sure how to handle it.

2027 menopause legislation

Most HR teams are preparing menopause policies for 2027 compliance. But here’s what I’ve learned from working with Equal Experts, ANS, and Bureau Veritas: a policy in a drawer doesn’t help the woman struggling with brain fog during a presentation, or the manager experiencing hot flushes in back-to-back meetings.

You need both: compliance AND practical support.

And, if you’re open to it – a touch of subconscious rewiring. To really get to those deep rooted unconscious bias beliefs about how women’s health is problematic.

Everyone else is selling:

• “Menopause awareness”
• “Breaking stigma”
• “Policy templates”
• “Champion training”

ME: “Here’s a tool you can use RIGHT NOW when the hot flush hits during your presentation.”

I address the real problem

Others say: “Let’s talk about menopause openly!”

ME: “Here’s how to actually manage the symptoms when they strike.”

And this is the absolute game changer when it comes to menopause support in the workplace.

Avoid menopause discrimination in your workplace. And get yourself a proper menopause action plan.

You can read more about how I do that here https://louisahussey.com/menopauseatwork

Let me know what you think.