Episode 21: The Birth of 'Hot Flash Mama' with Pam Mitchell
Oct 18, 2023
Kathy Mead Fronheiser
What if you met someone who faced the inevitability of menopause at just 30? Meet Pam Mitchell, a beacon of strength and resilience, who shares her unique journey into menopause, natural health, and the birth of her thriving business and podcast, Hot Flash Mama. Pam has learned to embrace life at every stage - we'll here about her travels and her new life in a small Kansas town.
Let's talk about health coaching - it's a calling that Pam has made her own, selecting her clients and making a difference in their lives. In this episode, she unravels her experience with fibromyalgia and lupus, her determination to help those in similar situations, and how her empty nest syndrome became a catalyst for her to serve others in the latter half of her life. Pam's incredible journey of overcoming fears and taking control of her life is inspiring, to say the least.
Finally, we'll explore how seeking feedback can help us identify our strengths and weaknesses. Listen in as Pam discusses the joy she finds in spending time with her loved ones, while also gaining a deeper understanding of what truly matters in life. For the Hot Flash Mama fans, we've got an exclusive on how to connect with Pam and tune into her podcast. This episode is a fun chat about health, self-discovery, and a testament to embracing life, one hot flash at a time.
What if you met someone who faced the inevitability of menopause at just 30? Meet Pam Mitchell, a beacon of strength and resilience, who shares her unique journey into menopause, natural health, and the birth of her thriving business and podcast, Hot Flash Mama. Pam has learned to embrace life at every stage - we'll here about her travels and her new life in a small Kansas town.
Let's talk about health coaching - it's a calling that Pam has made her own, selecting her clients and making a difference in their lives. In this episode, she unravels her experience with fibromyalgia and lupus, her determination to help those in similar situations, and how her empty nest syndrome became a catalyst for her to serve others in the latter half of her life. Pam's incredible journey of overcoming fears and taking control of her life is inspiring, to say the least.
Finally, we'll explore how seeking feedback can help us identify our strengths and weaknesses. Listen in as Pam discusses the joy she finds in spending time with her loved ones, while also gaining a deeper understanding of what truly matters in life. For the Hot Flash Mama fans, we've got an exclusive on how to connect with Pam and tune into her podcast. This episode is a fun chat about health, self-discovery, and a testament to embracing life, one hot flash at a time.
Welcome to the fun over 40 podcast. This is your host, kathy. I'm super excited to bring my new friend, pam Mitchell, the hot flash mama, to the podcast today. So I think you guys are really going to enjoy this conversation between the two of us, but also just getting to know Pam a little bit and what she's all about and it's always fun to meet new people, I think. So, pam, tell us a little bit about you and about your business.
Speaker 2:
Well, I just turned 55 and double nickels, I know. And my daughter just turned 30, or she turns 33, and I said that's fun.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, that is fun.
Speaker 2:
And I was 22 and I had her obviously, so it's a good time. But I just turned 55 and I just started a podcast not too long ago myself called the hot flash mama podcast, and it has been so fun, awesome.
Speaker 2:
Trying things that you know later in life, that we've always wanted to try or we didn't know we needed to try it until later. But I have, I'm a dog mom, along with a real mom. Yeah, my kids, my kids, get mad when I start with the fact that I'm a dog. That's okay, he's. I have one that's with me like 24 seven, little Yorkie, and then I have a couple of other dogs too that I just I love them all. And then I'm happily married and we just moved. I moved from California to the great big city inside of Kansas, a little, actually, a little teeny tiny city in Kansas.
Speaker 1:
Yes, yes, Well, you know it's fun to try new things and try new towns and all the things we just moved. I may have told you this when you and I first talked, but I had lived in Nashville for 20 years. Up until two years ago we moved to a different town, still in Tennessee, but two hours away. So you know, it's not like I'm hanging out with the same people. Like you know, I definitely had to make like a whole new friend group, for sure, and it was more challenging than I expected it to be. I don't know if it was because I was older or because I'm not really sure, but but I think it's also depends on, like, how you look at it too. You know, I think you can look at it as opportunity right to make new friends and Absolutely Learned about new cultures and all the things you know.
Speaker 2:
Well, to be fair, I've lived about half of my life in the Midwest and about I was born in California, southern California. So I've lived back and forth throughout my life and it's something that which is kind of inspiring. Another podcast that I'm going to be doing, because I've traveled that route 66 so many times yes, yeah, that's cool, that's that's going to be another one coming out, but I just I love to drive, I love to travel, I love to be on the road and, do you know, experience things. So making friends was not something I really had to worry about, because I had a lot of friends here.
Speaker 1:
Right.
Speaker 2:
I make friends everywhere I go like. I'm one of those people that you know. I have just I. There's no strangers.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, yeah, that's awesome. Well, that's a good skill to have, I think for sure. So well, tell us a little bit about, like, what you do as far as you know the hot flash mama, how that came about, what your goal is with that podcast and you know, and your education behind that. You know your natural, natural I'm going to say it wrong. I want to say naturopathic. I don't know if I'm saying that right, no, okay, okay.
Speaker 2:
So it's funny because everybody struggles with that and and it's okay, but it's a naturopathic degree, or naturopathy is another way to say it. So see how it's different.
Speaker 1:
However, you're using it.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, it's okay. It makes it's very easy to make that mistake or not be able to say it perfectly. But so I have actually been in health and nutrition for and I say health and nutrition meaning more like functional type and you know, supplementation and cleansing, and and even though we talked about it before I really fell off the wagon on the exercise, I still talk about it to people, I still promote it to people because it's essential. But I've been doing it for over 25 years and it's it's it's kind of like God just threw it at me because I was doing it and Then I got sick and.
Speaker 2:
So I had to learn why and what and how to Basically get myself healthier. But it also is Something I was in men. I started menopause, you know, when I was 30, because I was on a birth control shot that you know. Nobody said oh hey, you know, you're gonna, you're actually gonna go into menopause with this. They did. Oh my gosh right, they did say that you your period may stop and I was like yay, party good job.
Speaker 1:
You're like that's con.
Speaker 2:
That would be amazing Right and, at the time, my lack of education. I thought that was a great thing, but it's not because that means that your body is not doing the thing it's supposed to be doing, right. But I, luckily I was in the natural health field at that time, so I reached out when I found out I mean I was going to a mental health counselor. I was. I was, if you imagine, driving down the freeway at like 75 80 miles an hour and then slamming on the brakes. Yeah, you know, everything from the back comes forward at you and you are in shock. And that's what went with me, because I was 30. Why was I in menopause?
Speaker 2:
I didn't know I was in menopause for like the first year or two and then discovered it, realized that's what all these things were, and I have a little funny story about thinking I wet the bed when I had my first night sweat.
Speaker 1:
Oh my gosh. Well, sure, because you weren't even thinking about that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2:
No, but that was the thing that got me seeking. That was like the big thing. That, yeah, motivated me, sure. So I learned about, you know, what I needed to do to bring myself back out of menopause, and I did, and I've had a Normal cycle for almost 20 years before now at 55. I'm right in that again. So I've had both this, you know, I've had it from both aspects medically induced and naturally right. So I feel like why not start a podcast?
Speaker 1:
Yeah, well, and you know that's something I talk about a lot Perry menopause, post menopause. If you've been listening to the show, you know that I'll probably be talking about it more. So, and one of the well, what I'm trying to say is I don't feel like it's talked about a lot, and so I'm glad that.
Speaker 1:
I'm talking about it I that's one of the reasons I am talking about it is because it's not talked about enough. And you know, I think I saw a statistic the other day from a doctor, an OB, actually, on Instagram. This was super interesting. She said did you because she was going through? She is going through, not going through menopause. You know, there's Perry menopause and then menopause is like one day. Technically, like the definition is like the day that it's been 12 months since you had your last period and then your post menopausal, so literally like it's one day. But anyway, she was post menopausal I should say I'm trying to be good about using, like, my terms Appropriately and she so, of course she was looking into more information about menopause and she said you know, when I was going through school to be a gynecologist, she said All of my schooling was about getting women, helping women get pregnant, helping women stay pregnant, delivering babies.
Speaker 1:
The end I've never had kids, pam. So guess what? She's not? Well, she's not helping me. You know what I'm saying? Like that really was a knot.
Speaker 2:
There's, and there's, a lot of women that haven't had kids.
Speaker 1:
So it's like okay, well, I'm glad that everything in your schooling was about babies, but what about the women who don't have kids? Slash, what about the women? What about perimenopause and postmenopause? Anyway, her point being that 30% more women are going to go through menopause than have children. And that would be me, like I fall into that 30%, you know, because every woman is going to go through menopause if she lives long enough, right, not every woman is going to have a baby, but yet her schooling was all based around babies, was her point, which I thought was super fascinating.
Speaker 2:
I love it and that is such an incredible point. Just because you don't have kids doesn't exclude you from menopause.
Speaker 1:
Exactly.
Speaker 2:
And one of the things that I feel is like I talk to people all the time and I'm so. Once I brought myself out of it, I kind of made it like more of a mission and I was like, okay, I need to, you know be, we need to educate people because this is not something that's normal to go in it at this age, but a lot of people are. Because of modern day medicine, a lot of women are in it and they have no idea.
Speaker 2:
they think they're just depressed or they think they're you know all the things, and so I want to reach those women. And then you have the women who just kind of skate through it and they have zero symptoms. But that doesn't mean that you have survived it without what's actually happening in your body because it's happening.
Speaker 1:
It's still happening.
Speaker 2:
Yes, yes, and if you want to slow the aging process and I feel like this is where I'm really on fire you want to slow the aging process. That means you have to be proactive. You can't just sit on the sidelines and watch it go, because it will one day be too late at this and I just really, I just really feel like those women that are like oh, I didn't have any symptoms, I don't have to do anything. No, I need to grab you by the hand and say listen, your body is still declining in the amount of hormones which is accelerating the aging process so
Speaker 2:
rapidly that the next thing, you know, you may not have symptoms, but your hair is going to be all fallen out. You're going to be, you know, 80 pounds overweight and you're not going to be able to dress those things again. So, start now, preventively, you know, and then nutritionally is the best way to do it. Whether it's what you I mean, you can't get it all. You know a supplement is something that you put in to make up for the difference, right, basically, and you know, if you waited so long, if you do it early enough, you can do it through diet, exercise, right, you know?
Speaker 2:
but if you don't, then you got to start adding in some supplements. So I like to give people those options and I have, you know, people come on and speak so that they can help people approach it differently, because there's so many, there's so many people going through it and we don't talk about it. Yes, you know, we don't talk about libido, we don't talk about fatigue, we don't talk about the menobelli, and I want to talk about it all yeah, yeah, well, and that's why we're doing what we're doing.
Speaker 1:
So I mean, I think just in, and then somebody's going to hear this and it's going to spark them to do something. You know what I'm saying. So it's just that snowball effect which I just think is awesome, just empowering women really to talk about what's going on. I mean, and it's happening to all of us, so it's okay, you know, like it's okay, it happens, it's totally natural. I mean, like you know, it's supposed to happen, right, okay, cool, well, so that is really your motivation and obviously you get super pumped to share that which I love.
Speaker 1:
I think I get super pumped too, so I get it, you know. So let's talk about health and wellness. So what does that look like for you and your life, and how does that then affect your ability like energy-wise or anything else in your business or your podcast? How do you? Like to incorporate it or what does that look like for you.
Speaker 2:
So I've always exercised a little. It's never been anything. I'm super active, like I'm always running and going, and so intentional exercise has not been in the forefront of my life. And I found that through COVID and working from home, because I've worked for home. I mean I've been self-employed for as long as I can remember Right. But the podcasting is new and some of the other things which it requires a lot of sitting at a desk.
Speaker 2:
You've got to do your research and your podcasting, and so it started with me just in the last probably eight or nine months, when I started sitting a lot more that my back would block up, and so for me, that's when it started to become apparent that that was the one thing I was lacking in was moving my body more.
Speaker 2:
So I've been trying to be more intentional, but I'm trying to find something that's enjoyable, not just the. And then health and nutrition is basically like I said if you're not going to, if you're not going to eat, what you need to eat to provide the nutrients for your body, you have to supplement. Right, right.
Speaker 2:
And there are those people and I'm going to be honest, those are my people, because I like a good salad every once in a while. I don't want to eat at every single meal. Right, I love meat, but you know, I know I don't get enough. But I also love my carbs, and you know. So I'm about cleansing. I love to cleanse, I love to. You know, when you cleanse out something, you got to put something good back in, or the bad just come back, right?
Speaker 2:
Right, so that's what I have laid. That's what I've been about for the last 25 years. I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia lupus. You know, I was in menopause at 30. And I just, you know, god put me into all these places so that I can figure out how to get out of them and then teach other people how to do it too.
Speaker 1:
So so do you teach people one on one, do you have groups or is your teaching through your podcast? Like, talk a little bit about how you teach people about the supplementing and the nutrition and all that good stuff.
Speaker 2:
So I actually used to do a lot of speaking, you know like, and I would do radio interviews back in the day and some TV and I did a lot of group meetings. I prefer I'm not the coach material kind of a person because, yeah, I'm just going to be honest with you. When somebody says, oh, I don't want to do that, I'm like, okay, be South and don't. You know, I don't, I mean I'm not going to make you do something, right, right, and you know you've got to be in the right position to do it. I am not somebody to I encourage and I love to encourage. That's like my love language is to encourage and to serve. But when I own a health food store for about three years.
Speaker 2:
And again, I mean I have worked one to one with so many people. I used to charge for nutritional consultations and all the things, but I found that I would rather put the information out there. Okay, let people eat from it when they're ready to. Yes.
Speaker 1:
Yes, yeah, I think that totally makes sense. You know, like we were talking about. So I was actually. We just recorded prior to this on Pam's podcast, so she interviewed me and we were talking about the health coaching.
Speaker 1:
You know, because that's something I did for over 10 years, close to 15 years, and I agree the nice thing I will say now because before, for the first 12 to 13 years, I was working for a company, so I had to work with, you know, whoever got put on my schedule, right, you know I was working for a healthcare company, but now I can choose my clients I almost said patients, because that's what we always call them before but anyway, I can choose my clients and really I totally get where you're coming from. The clients that I now choose to work with are the ones that are ready and they just need the knowledge and the accountability and the cheering you know. So just something to think about. You can kind of you can. You can not say yes to every you know client. You don't have to accept all of them, although, granted, it's hard to know, right, in that very first conversation.
Speaker 2:
You know it is and it's very hard to.
Speaker 2:
It's also when, when you build a relationship with somebody, it's hard to tell them no so it's time to sever that relationship and, and you know, I've learned that as I've gotten older, as is one of the things that I feel like has come to me later in life. You know, and I'm going to be honest with once I hit 50, I started wearing what I wanted to wear more. I started doing what I wanted to do. I stopped I shouldn't say I've stopped because my I was really had a fear of what others think of.
Speaker 2:
I've had that so hard. For my whole life I was a people pleaser and I still am, but it's gradually getting better. It's gradually getting more about. Okay I? It's not my job to please everybody.
Speaker 1:
It's just not.
Speaker 2:
So I need to really take care of myself, so that I can take care of the people that are important to me and provide, and once I learn, how to do something. I don't know if you know who Alex Hormozzi is, but he is such a he's like a bodybuilder guy that had Okay, his name is familiar.
Speaker 1:
He's probably, yeah, probably.
Speaker 2:
I actually listened to him on a podcast and he said you can best help the person you used to be. Yes, and I was like and that's brilliant because I've been a lot of things- you know, I've been buried twice. I've had health problems. I've lived and you know I've done all these things. I want to just really like serve people in the second half of my life. Besides that, you know, when you go through empty nest syndrome, you start looking ways to fill your time anyhow.
Speaker 2:
Yes, yes. So here I am just trying to serve people as much as.
Speaker 1:
I can. Yeah, I think that's great, especially the empty nest syndrome. You see that also, when people retire, you know they've been all about whatever their job, or the job just took up their time, right. I mean, sometimes it just has to do with time, and then they were tired when they got home or they had kids and they just whatever. And then they get to where they retire and they literally don't know what to do with their time. I have always said I'm going to be like the busiest retired person, but anyway, right, I don't think I'm going to have any problem with that, but start a podcast if you don't know what to do with your time.
Speaker 2:
Exactly my grandmother when she retired at 71, she retired at 70 and she died in her sleep at 71 because she just didn't replace that with anything and she just kind of and I did not get that person. I overdo things, like I try to do too much.
Speaker 1:
Yes, yes, Well, and the recommendation is because, I mean again, those are some people that I used to coach as well and people that were coming up on retirement, which I think is great that they were thinking about that right Now. Of course, we would talk about it in the health and wellness, fitness sort of space, but I would also just say you know, another thing is to prepare yourself for retirement. You know, start to think about. You know, two or three years ahead of time, when you see retirement sort of down the way, you know, start to think about what are the things that I enjoy, what can I sort of start doing in my spare time now that I can build on. You know, whether it's just a hobby or a book club, I mean it doesn't have to be anything. It does not have to be a podcast. You know it doesn't have.
Speaker 1:
I was kind of joking, but it can be. Yeah, I mean whatever. It doesn't have to be anything major. But to your point, like, have a reason to get out of bed in the morning, it could be volunteer work, right, I mean.
Speaker 2:
I truly believe that God spends our lives to you know. I mean, I feel like it's kind of like a process. We spend our lives working up to something that we're supposed to share with others whether we get shared at 40, 50, 70,.
Speaker 2:
You know it's, it's gosh experience is. It's invaluable, it's invaluable. There's just nothing that can replace experience. It's, you know, parenting, for example, and as a parent, I'm less likely to take any recommendations or guidance from somebody who's not had a child to rear. If they're telling me how to rear my child, but I'm not going to have somebody tell me how to drive a car if they've never driven a car.
Speaker 2:
Right, right, you know so experience is really so. Look at what your experiences are and really just build on it and make it something that that will fulfill you, because you've been preparing for it for your whole life, you know.
Speaker 1:
I think there's a couple of nuggets in there that I that I think are important to talk about. One is especially for women. You might be listening and thinking I don't know anything. Well, first of all, stop saying that. That is absolutely not true. We are here to tell you that you do, believe me, yes. And the second one is if you really genuinely. Sometimes I have heard somebody say it's like being in a bottle and trying to read the label on the outside. Sometimes you're too close to it, like when it's inside you you can't see what your you know, special skills are, or whatever you want to call it. So, like, ask your best friend, ask your spouse, ask your kids, whatever. Like, ask people around you. What do you, what am I good at? I know that sounds really silly or or when you think of me, what are the three words, or whatever you know? Like, what do you think when you think of me? Or what do you think I'd be good at? You know when I retire, or whatever, but you might be surprised at what they say.
Speaker 2:
I feel like you and I listen to a lot of the same personal development because I mean, that's what you're supposed to do. You're absolutely supposed to reach out and ask people they say not your spouse or your, your like your children or your parents right, but to reach out. But I did, I reached out and I got encourager and a lot of those types of you know teacher, even though I'm not a teacher educator or things like that, and so it's kind of you know part of what inspired me to do what I do.
Speaker 2:
So yeah, yeah, Okay.
Speaker 1:
One of the questions I always love asking people is what do you do to have fun?
Speaker 2:
I'm just gonna be really honest with you. Okay, so I'm not enjoying like we celebrated my birthday last night at a winery with some friends.
Speaker 1:
And it was very, very enjoyable.
Speaker 2:
I love having girlfriends. I just I love connecting. I love hanging out with my husband and my dogs. But if you love what you do, work wise. You don't like ask me the last time I took an actual, like a real vacation, it's been, you know, seven years six years.
Speaker 2:
Right, I just I mean, I take little vacations throughout the year and I explore and I just enjoy everything that I do. I make it to where I enjoy my life. I'm just so grateful to get to be here at 55 and to get to have the health of my body, which we talked about on the podcast. Before you know, move it or lose it, and I'm I need to get my hat out of my booty and start really working out again and getting that part motivated, cause I have I put on some pounds and I just, like I said, my back has been, you know, but it feels better now that I started walking again and that's really what it takes to just I don't know how we got on that with vacation, but that's okay.
Speaker 1:
You were talking about enjoying your life you know and that you're happy to still be here at 55. And that's.
Speaker 2:
I think that's where we got here I agree Every day is a gift for sure. It is, life is what you make it.
Speaker 1:
Yes, yes, that's true, that is true. Everything, yeah, so Okay, what is the best thing about being over 40?
Speaker 2:
The, the. It is limitless to tell you all the list, but, yes, I am. I first of all, the. The best thing is probably the experience. Yes, and you know they say hindsight is 2020 and but they use that kind of in a negative way. But it's not Right and you know there is no such thing as a failure as long as you keep trying. And you know some of us need to keep trying the entire time. But I love caring less and I know this sounds bad, but caring less and less about what other people think about me when it's the wrong people like caring. You know, I used to try to please everybody and I realize now that I don't need to please everybody.
Speaker 2:
I need to please the people that are important to me. So, I love that, that clarity that came with that age. With age, it comes with age. But my daughter, who's 33, she already knows that and I was like, well, why didn't you tell me?
Speaker 1:
that? Yeah, you know. You taught it to her. She watched you and that's how she learned it.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, she learned by that example though, which is great, so good for you, mama. It's funny, do you know? I've asked a lot of people that question and that's basically what everybody said it a little differently, but that's basically what I would say 99% of people have said, and I would say it is not bad to not please others or worry about pleasing others. I mean, at the end of the day, you're taking care of the people you love and who love you, and you're taking care of you Right, and that's what matters. So we can go down that rabbit hole of I call it compare a noia, and it'll make you crazy, so anyway. So no, I think that makes perfect sense. All right, ms Pam, tell my audience where they can find you and just how they can get more of your amazing energy and more knowledge and education from you as well.
Speaker 2:
Well, I have a group on Facebook. It's the Hot Flash Mama Mama's group, I think. I just changed the name of it and I just started an Instagram for the Hot Flash Mama. Oh good, so yeah, and I have my podcast, which is no the, it's just Hot Flash Mama podcast, and that is everywhere. So I will be on YouTube with interviews that's gonna be launching in the next very, very quickly, like in the next week, within the next week. So I have them on YouTube. They're just not videos, that's right, gotcha.
Speaker 1:
Okay, cool, they're just like that.
Speaker 2:
So, yeah, you can find me there, and if you have any questions and you wanna send me an email, I'm thehotflashmamaatgmailcom. I don't you know, I just I'm just kind of getting started with the social media thing. Yeah, that's okay so eventually I'll have all the things, but it's hard to be. I'm not somebody who can delegate very easily. Yeah, yeah, so I gotta do it all. If I can't do it on my own, I gotta learn how to do it before I can let somebody else do it. Does that make sense?
Speaker 1:
Well, yeah, that makes sense, because you learn how to do it. And then you realize like, okay, this is how I, this is my process, and then you train someone on your process right your.
Speaker 1:
SOP, that's your SOP, standard operating procedure and then you train someone on that, so, and then you know they're doing it the way that you want them to do it, and then you can delegate and they can come back to you with questions, right, you know. And then you know you let them loose, and then you have all that extra time that you can go live your life, right.
Speaker 2:
So there you go, we're starting another podcast, Right, exactly exactly.
Speaker 1:
Well, I will get all those links from you, Miss Pam, and we'll put those in the show notes. So everybody go check out Hot Flash Mama podcast so you can learn more from Pam. And thank you so much for joining me on the Fun Over 40 podcast.