Perimenopause and Redundancy or Job Loss: Coping With Uncertainty
Losing a job during perimenopause is a collision of financial stress, identity disruption, and hormonal change. Here's how to cope and find a way forward.
When Two Sources of Instability Arrive Together
Losing a job is a significant blow at any life stage. During perimenopause, it arrives alongside an already demanding set of hormonal and physical changes. The financial stress, the dent to identity and self-worth, the loss of structure and social connection that work provides, these all land harder when your nervous system is already managing hormonal fluctuation. Understanding that you are dealing with more than just redundancy helps you respond to yourself with appropriate care rather than pushing through as if nothing else is happening.
The Identity Dimension of Redundancy in Midlife
For many women, career is closely linked to identity. Being made redundant in your 40s or 50s, particularly in a role you held for years, can feel like a loss of self as much as a loss of income. Perimenopause is already a period of identity reassessment, raising questions about who you are now and who you want to become. The two together can feel destabilising. It can also be an unexpected invitation to examine what you actually want, not just what you've always done.
How Perimenopause Complicates the Job Search
Perimenopausal symptoms can make the practical challenges of job searching harder. Brain fog affects the clarity and confidence needed for interviews. Fatigue makes it harder to maintain the sustained energy that applications, networking, and interview preparation require. Anxiety, which is a common perimenopausal symptom, can magnify the already stressful experience of job seeking. Acknowledging this isn't defeatist; it means you can adjust your approach to work with your capacity rather than against it.
Managing Finances During the Gap
Financial anxiety during perimenopause is particularly hard to carry because cortisol and hormonal fluctuation can amplify worry into near-constant dread. Getting a clear, honest picture of your finances as early as possible reduces the uncertainty. Check your entitlements, understand your outgoings, and look at where you have flexibility. Speaking to a financial adviser or a free advice service is worthwhile. Taking action, even small steps, tends to reduce the sense of helplessness that financial stress can create.
Protecting Your Mental Health
The intersection of redundancy and perimenopause creates real risk for low mood and anxiety. Both are already associated with depression independently, and together the cumulative burden increases. If you notice persistent low mood, loss of interest in things you normally enjoy, or feelings of hopelessness, speak to a doctor. These are signs that you need more support than willpower alone can provide. There is no virtue in managing alone when help is available.
Staying Anchored Through the Uncertainty
Structure matters enormously when work disappears. Create a routine that includes regular movement, adequate sleep, social contact, and some form of purposeful activity each day, whether that's job searching, skill building, volunteering, or creative work. Tracking symptoms during this period can also help you recognise whether perimenopausal changes are worsening under stress, giving you useful information for a medical conversation. PeriPlan lets you log symptoms and spot patterns, which can be grounding when much else feels out of your control.
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