What is Menopause-Informed Couples Therapy?
You don’t recognize your relationship anymore.
Sure, life’s many stressors—both good and frustrating—have kept you busy and left less time to connect. But this feels different. You’re not on the same page. Conflicts pop up over small things. One minute you’re having a normal conversation, the next you’re "in it." You wonder if your partner feels it too. Sometimes, it just feels easier to retreat. And now you’re worrying the distance between you might not be temporary after all.
You want to talk, but how do you explain something you don’t fully understand yourself? You know your partner has their own frustrations too.
You miss them. You miss how you used to be together. Maybe you even feel guilty—like roommates or co-managers rather than loving partners. Sex feels like a negotiation or has disappeared altogether. You suspect menopause is part of what’s going on, but you’re unsure how much to blame or how to fix what’s breaking down. And honestly? It feels like even if you treated the symptoms, it wouldn’t be enough to fix the distance that’s taken root between you.
Does this sound familiar—whether it’s you or your partner going through menopause?
Menopause, while commonly known for symptoms like hot flashes and mood swings, also shows up powerfully in our relationships. It’s not just a personal experience—it’s a relational one. The emotional fallout, identity shifts, and loss of connection can quietly wedge couples apart. But you both deserve to understand what’s happening—and to feel understood.
This is where Menopause-Informed Couples Therapy™ comes in.
Medical support like hormone replacement therapy can be helpful, but it doesn’t address how menopause is affecting your relationship. This approach does.
Whether you’re feeling confused, disconnected, anxious about the future, or unsure how to move forward, you don’t have to navigate it alone. This isn’t just about symptom relief—it’s about relationship repair and reconnection.
Drawing from Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT), psychoeducation, sex therapy, and radical acceptance, this model offers an integrative and actionable path forward. Together, we explore what’s happening, build mutual understanding, and apply meaningful tools to rebuild emotional intimacy, communication, and connection.
Menopause-Informed Couples Therapy™ is a compassionate and holistic approach designed to address the very real emotional and relational impacts of the menopause transition on couples.
How Menopause-Informed Therapy Came to Be
John and Claire came into their first session and immediately told me, “We’re not getting a divorce.”
I work with couples at all different points in their relationship, for all kinds of reasons—from communication breakdowns to affair recovery—but it’s rare for a couple to lead with why they don’t want therapy.
John and Claire were in midlife, about to become empty nesters. They had always looked forward to this next chapter—finally time for “just them” again. They shared hobbies, laughed together, had navigated parenting as a team. But lately, everything had changed.
Claire was feeling a wave of unfamiliar and disorienting symptoms: increased anxiety, trouble sleeping, hot flashes, fatigue, brain fog, weight changes, and a growing disinterest in sex and socializing. She assumed it was menopause—but when she brought it up to her gynecologist, she was told she “wasn’t there yet,” so there wasn’t anything to do.
John saw she was struggling and believed her—but he couldn’t help feeling helpless and frustrated. He tried to encourage her like he would himself through physical pain—push through, stay positive, keep going. But his efforts landed wrong, and neither of them knew how to bridge the growing emotional and physical distance.
Claire felt guilty, ashamed, and misunderstood. John felt lonely, confused, and increasingly ineffective. Both missed each other, and both were silently grieving the connection they once had.
Claire and John were the first couple to walk into my office naming menopause as their reason for seeking help. It wasn’t a hidden undercurrent I discovered sessions in—it was right there sitting between them on the couch.
And it changed everything.
I quickly realized there was almost no guidance in our field on how to support couples navigating menopause together. While there’s growing awareness around menopause symptoms, there’s little about its impact on relationships. So, I did what I often do when something’s missing: I built what I couldn’t find.
I combined my deep experience in couples therapy with extensive training in menopause education and developed a relationally focused model for supporting couples through this transition.
This is the heart of Menopause-Informed Couples Therapy™: a first-of-its-kind approach that centers not just the individual symptoms, but the couple’s shared experience.
How it Works
Menopause-Informed Couples Therapy is grounded in Emotionally Focused Therapy and attachment theory, and designed to address the specific ways menopause disrupts emotional connection, communication, and intimacy.
You’ll receive psychoeducation, structured support, and practical tools to help you understand each other more deeply, express yourselves more clearly, and find your way back to one another.
And this isn’t just intuitive—it’s evidence-based. Research shows that marital satisfaction significantly increases when the partner of a menopausal person receives education about menopause. Understanding leads to empathy, and empathy leads to reconnection.
Let’s return to John and Claire.
Once we created space for each of them to share what this experience had been like—from both sides—we began to uncover the loneliness and misunderstanding that had been keeping them apart. They discovered that menopause wasn’t just happening to Claire; it was happening to both of them.
We worked on how to talk about it, how to approach symptoms together, how to reintroduce intimacy, and how to reframe this life stage not as the beginning of the end, but as the beginning of something new.
By the time we wrapped up our work, John and Claire weren’t being pushed apart by the menace of menopause. They were saying “yes” again—to themselves, to each other, and to their future together.
Okay, So How Long Does Menopause Last?
Ready to Learn More or Take the Next Step?
If this conversation resonated with you—whether you’re currently navigating menopause or supporting a partner who is—you’re not alone, and support is available.
Here are a few ways to keep exploring:
Free Resources to Start the Conversation
Visit the Free Resources page for thoughtful, therapist-created exercises and reflections designed to help you and your partner reconnect emotionally, communicate more openly, and better understand how menopause may be affecting your relationship. These are a great starting point if you’re not quite ready for therapy but want to begin exploring together.
Interested in Couples Therapy?
If you live in California and are looking for personalized support, you can learn more about Menopause-Informed Couples Therapy™ at my therapy site, Magnolia Therapy & Wellness. This work is compassionate, collaborative, and tailored to where you are now—no matter how disconnected or stuck things may feel. You don’t have to figure it out alone.
Join the Workshop: “When Menopause Meets Marriage”
If you’d like to better understand the emotional and relational impacts of menopause as a couple, I invite you to register your interest in When Menopause Meets Marriage: A Workshop for Couples Navigating the Menopause Transition Together.
In this live, psychoeducational workshop, I’ll guide you through:
What menopause is and how it impacts the mind, body, and relationship
How to talk about it in ways that build empathy, not conflict
Exercises for emotional reconnection and renewed physical intimacy
Tools to help you co-create a new kind of closeness in this season of life
It’s perfect for couples who want information, connection, and a plan for moving forward—whether or not you choose therapy.
👉 Click here to register your interest and be the first to hear when dates are announced.