Perimenopause, your skin and wellbeing
Hormones are your body’s natural rhythm-keepers, quietly guiding everything from your energy and mood, to how your skin feels each day. When those rhythms shift, your skin often reflects it, through breakouts, dryness, flushing, or sensitivity that seems to come from nowhere.
These changes are a natural part of your cycle, perimenopause and menopause, but that doesn’t mean that you have to live with unpredictable skin or feeling low confidence. Rather than relying on harsh skin treatments or products, my work focuses on restoring harmony within your whole system - improving circulation, soothing your nervous system and nurturing your skin barrier, so that it can repair and renew.
How Your Skin Changes During Perimenopause
During perimenopause, the stress hormone cortisol begins to play a bigger role. When cortisol remains high, skin repair slows down and inflammation rises, leading to flare-ups, puffiness, or fatigue in the complexion. At the same time, changes in oestrogen begin to affect hydration and firmness. Skin can feel thinner, less supple, or a little out of balance, sometimes dry, breaking out, or both.
It’s pretty likely, you’ll also find changes in your sleep, your mood, your digestion or your energy (or even all of these things, fluctuating along your cycle).
This is why nervous-system care becomes essential, and through facial massage, reflexology, and aromatherapy, we activate your parasympathetic “rest and restore” response, which can lessen your symptoms and allow your skin repair to accelerate naturally.
How Holistic Treatments Can Support Menopause and Perimenopause Symptoms
∴ Reflexology has been shown to be useful for receiving fatigue and promote sleep and lessening hot flushes, see link to 2012 study and 2016 study
∴ The 2011 peer review study published in Menopause states that chronically elevated cortisol (feeling stressed a lot of time time) increases the likelihood of severe menopause symptoms (link)
∴ When we support your hormonal health from the inside out, clients notice renewed energy, fewer skin flare-ups, redness and sensitivity.
When we soften the systems together, through therapeutic touch on the skin, giving a positive feedback loop of relation to your whole body.
My Approach
In Traditional Chinese Medicine, menopause is seen as the Second Spring, and a season of renewal, not decline. My approach honours this philosophy, blending intuitive touch with evidence-based techniques to help your body find balance and your skin regain its natural vitality.
Each session invites you to find deep relaxation, steadier moods, improved sleep and a clearer, more radiant complexion. Clients often leave feeling lighter, more grounded and reconnected to themselves, a reminder that renewal is always possible.
I incorporate aromatherapy phytoestrogens (natural plant based oestrogens found in essential oils) and body and facial acupressure with massage for clients struggling with the symptoms of perimenopause and menopause. This approach is based on training and evidence from Jennifer Young of the Global Wellness Institute’s Hormonal Wellness Initiative, and founder of The Institute of Hormonal Health and Wellness and advanced training with Sally Earlam on Reflexology for Menopause