Chief Member Dr. Carol DerSarkissian is the founder of Parallel Med, a practice for women in midlife. She is a Menopause Society-certified physician and health strategist.
Dr. Carol DerSarkissian
There comes a moment in many women's careers when the questions begin to change.
It’s no longer, “How do I get there?” But, “Is this what I want?”
For decades, you've been climbing, leading, and delivering. Leaning in. Then, just as the biggest opportunities begin to appear, something else arrives.
You forget a word you've used a thousand times. You wake up at 3:00 AM for no reason. Your patience feels shorter. Your confidence feels shakier. You wonder if you've changed.
You have, but not in the way you think.
No one prepares us for the moment our biology joins the meeting, and that changes everything.
The Collision We Ignore
The average age for a woman entering the C-Suite is between 46 and 59. The often-disruptive effects of perimenopause occur precisely when experience and leadership converge. As a result, two in five women have considered leaving work because of menopause during the most pivotal and potentially lucrative years of their career.
This collision of a woman's biology and career timeline is inevitable, but it’s one medicine has largely ignored. Organizations rarely acknowledged it and women have been left to navigate on their own as a result, often at enormous professional cost.
The symptoms are real. They are not "just aging." Beneath the hot flashes, brain fog, and disrupted sleep are structural changes happening in bone muscle, heart, and metabolism with profound implications for how you live and lead in the decades ahead. That is why I ask every woman I see three questions:
1. Do you have symptoms of midlife that affect the quality of your life?
2. Are you being proactive to safeguard your future health?
3. Do you have a health strategy?
The answers matter.
When Body and Career Both Start Asking Questions
The years before perimenopause are the years to invest physiologically: build muscle, protect your heart and brain, prioritize sleep, manage stress. These are deposits into an account you will draw from for the coming decades. And start paying attention to what actually energizes you versus what you've simply become good at. Those two things are not always the same.
Perimenopause rarely announces itself clearly. Instead it arrives as hot flashes, night sweats, disrupted sleep, a brain that feels slower, a shorter fuse, and energy that no longer follows familiar patterns. Underneath all of it are changes that don't announce themselves, either. Bone loss, muscle loss. Cholesterol shifts. Rising blood sugar. Blood pressure increases. These are not just the consequences of getting older. They are also specific, hormonal changes driven by declining estrogen, and they accelerate cardiovascular risk.
At the same time, the professional questions keep amplifying, keep getting louder. Is this still what I want? What do I want?
This isn't a coincidence. Fluctuating estrogen affects cognition, mood, and stress tolerance in real ways. Brain fog is a symptom, not a character flaw. And this is precisely when the daily demands of senior leadership require exactly the resources perimenopause is affecting.
What Actually Helps
First, Don't Normalize Suffering
If your symptoms are affecting your quality of life, don't simply wait for them to pass. Menopausal hormone therapy remains the most effective treatment for many women and deserves a thoughtful discussion, tailored to you. And for women who cannot or choose not to use hormones, there are effective, evidence-based non-hormonal options that most don’t realize.
Build the Account You'll Draw From
Protect your sleep as fiercely as you protect your calendar. Sleep is foundational. When it goes, so does executive function, emotional regulation, and cardiovascular health.
Know your cholesterol. Your blood pressure. Your blood sugar. Bone is easier to preserve than rebuild. Build muscle before you need it. Beyond "healthy habits," these are investments in your future self.
For many women, reaching menopause doesn't shrink life. It sharpens it.
The need to prove yourself grows quieter. The convergence of experience and biological recalibration brings clarity. The confidence earned over decades finally has room to speak. And what remains isn't less ambition, it's better ambition.
What I Want You to Take Away
The symptoms are real. The biology is real.
Your career asks: What comes next? Your body asks: What do you need now?
Most women think they have to answer those questions separately. You don't. They're the same conversation.
