The Thinking Practitioner

🎙 Menopause, Pain, and Bodywork (with Ruth Werner)

What if midlife achiness isn’t simply aging—and isn’t necessarily an injury that needs fixing?

Menopause can affect far more than temperature. As hormones shift, sleep, mood, cognition, bone and cardiovascular health, pain, and tissue tolerance may all change. Yet most hands-on practitioners received little or no training about what this means for the people on their tables—or for practitioners going through menopause themselves.

Pathology specialist Ruth Werner joins Til and Whitney to separate what we know from what we merely assume. They explore why hot flashes remain surprisingly mysterious, how declining estrogen may intersect with inflammation and musculoskeletal pain, and whether naming a “musculoskeletal syndrome of menopause” improves recognition or risks turning menopause into a catch-all explanation for midlife symptoms.

Most importantly, they bring the conversation into the treatment room: adjusting expectations, avoiding unnecessary overwork, accounting for medications and longer-term health changes, and recognizing that listening and thoughtful support may be as valuable as anything we do with our hands. They also make room for menopause as more than loss or disruption—for many, it can be a passage into greater maturity, clarity, creativity, and freedom from others’ expectations.

✨ We talk about:
• Why menopause is a normal transition, not a disease—and why its effects can still be profoundly disruptive
• Perimenopause versus menopause, and why the transition can affect decades of a person’s life
• What may be happening during a hot flash—and how much remains unknown
• The difficult overlap between menopause, aging, pain, and injury
• Estrogen’s possible roles in inflammation and musculoskeletal health
• The promise and limitations of the term “musculoskeletal syndrome of menopause”
• Practical session considerations: temperature, osteoporosis, cardiovascular health, medications, and tissue sensitivity
• Why changing our expectations may matter more than trying to “correct” hormonal effects
• Listening, validation, and the therapeutic alliance when clients feel dismissed elsewhere
• Menopause as a potentially powerful, creative, and liberating stage of life.

🎓 Continue with the complete course:
This episode offers a useful overview and key takeaways. Ruth’s complete 85-minute course, Menopause for Bodyworkers, goes deeper into the physiology, symptoms, treatment options, research, and hands-on implications. It includes the full presentation and discussion, course handout, quiz, and one continuing-education credit. Purchase it individually—or access it at no additional cost with an Advanced-Trainings subscription—at https://advanced-trainings.com.

✨ Resources:
• Ruth Werner’s courses, writing, and resources: https://ruthwerner.com
• I Have a Client Who… Pathology Conversations with Ruth Werner: https://ruthwerner.com/podcast/
• Vonda Wright and colleagues, “The Musculoskeletal Syndrome of Menopause”: https://doi.org/10.1080/13697137.2024.2380363
• Advanced-Trainings courses and subscription library: https://advanced-trainings.com

🌱 Sponsor Offers:
• Jane – Try it free for one month with code THINKING1MO at https://a-t.tv/jane
• ABMP – Save on new membership at https://abmp.com/thinking
• Books of Discovery – Save 15% with code thinking at https://booksofdiscovery.com
• Advanced-Trainings – Try one month free of the A-T Subscription with code thinking at https://a-t.tv/subscriptions
• Academy of Clinical Massage – Grab Whitney's free Assessment Cheat Sheet at https://academyofclinicalmassage.com/cheatsheet

✨ Watch the video / connect with us:
• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@AdvancedTrainings/podcasts
• Whitney Lowe – https://academyofclinicalmassage.com | https://facebook.com/WhitneyLowe | https://twitter.com/whitneylowe
• Til Luchau – https://advanced-trainings.com | https://facebook.com/advancedtrainings | https://instagram.com/til.luchau

📧 Email us: info@thethinkingpractitioner.com

The Thinking Practitioner Podcast is intended for professional practitioners of manual and movement therapies — bodywork, massage therapy, structural integration, physical therapy, osteopathy, and similar professions. It is not medical or treatment advice. Rolfing® is a registered service mark of the Dr. Ida Rolf Institute®.