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What’s Happening:

​HormoneNavigator.com​

It’s 2026, and as a Gen Xer, I’m looking at AI the way I did when trying to work a VCR in the 80’s. Mind-blowing! Yes, my fifth-grade self thought the VCR (beta and VHS) was the coolest thing ever.

But AI is here to stay, and it is not the rise of the machines. Although Arnold Schwarzernager circa 1984, hubba hubba.

Anyway, what I mean to say is, I have embraced the machines. AI that is.

I have created my own AI app called Hormone Navigator.​
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It is an AI guide that is in my voice and based on my clinical framework of 20+ years of working with women in perimenopause and menopause.

It helps you make sense of your symptoms, understand your hormones, and gives you personalized guidance so you know what steps to take next.

• A comprehensive tracker: It brings everything into one place to help identify patterns and changes over time.
  • All your symptoms: sleep, libido, cycles (if you have them), hair, skin, mood,, and more
  • HRT
  • Supplements
  • Exercise
  • Diet
  • Lab reports
• Personalized guidance: It provides recommendations based on your symptoms, your hormone phase, and your goals, and adjusts as your body and health change.
• Ongoing discussion: You can ask your AI guide (me!) any questions or concerns as they come up. You can ask about symptoms, labs, stress, HRT, supplements, or changes you’re noticing, and get answers that are specific to you.
• Private and secure: Your information is encrypted and kept completely private. Nothing is shared, and your data stays yours.

I was hesitant about AI because it can be incorrect, and our data is valuable to big business.

But I am thrilled that it is completely private and encrypted and never shared with anyone. Not even with human-me.

I created this because we’ve received so many hormonal concerns from women all over the world who are struggling to understand what’s happening in their bodies and not finding real answers. There is a gap between knowing something is off and knowing what to do about it.

This is the kind of guidance I give my patients, now available anytime.

If that sounds like something you need, you can learn more at HormoneNavigator.com.

xoDrValorie

Ps. Oh, this is launch week, April 28 to May 8th, there is a 20% discount

Pss: if you have any input or anything that you think could make this experience better, please email me back

Maggie in the Middle

Middle-Menopause

Dr. Valorie Davidson

In the last newsletter, I talked about entering menopause. You met Eliza, who was just entering menopause and was confused and frustrated with her symptoms. Eliza was experiencing what felt like sudden, abrupt changes to her body, such as:

Entering-Menopause:

• Hot flashes
• Night sweats
• Night shivers
• Dropping words
• Forgetful
• Repeating yourself
• Wondering if you have dementia (you don’t)
• Weight gain
• Hair thinning and becoming more fragile
• Now the gray is not menopause, we earned those, and they are pretty (just not pretty on me)
• More joint pain
• Lower libido
• Mood more anxious and irritable
• Fatigue
• Labs can be normal
• Hyperascoutic or just hard to drown out the background noise

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As with all my tales, Eliza’s story had a happy ending. She started some supplements and HRT, which helped her regain her energy and sleep, as well as improve most of her physical symptoms, and motivation to change her lifestyle habits. So go, Eliza!

But what happens if (as many women can attest to), you just push through, suck it up, and just suffer through the entering menopause phase?

Well, they continue the journey of matriculating up to…Middle-Menopause.

What is Middle-Menopause?

This is where you start to notice some good, and some more, shall we say, not-so-good changes.

This is where some of those original symptoms start to fade, and some new, not-so-fun stuff starts to emerge.

In middle-menopause:

• Hot flashes and night sweats start to diminish in frequency and intensity.
• There can still be ongoing sleep issues, brain fog, hair changes, more weight gain, joint aches, and fatigue.

Here comes the next wave of conditions in middle-menopause:

• Cholesterol increases
• Blood pressure can increase
• Increases in insulin, glucose, and hemoglobin A1c
• Vaginal dryness
• Can start to have a little urinary leakage
• Increase in UTIs if prone
• Mood: This is where you might start to see a lack of joy. Or just some apathy, or not feeling like things that used to seem fun don’t have the same appeal.
• Muscle tone is lower and harder to build muscle

Maggie in the Middle:

Meet Maggie, and she is in middle-menopause. Maggie is 53 years old and entered menopause about 49-50.

‘Hi, I’m Maggie. I can't remember the last time I had a period. But I sure can remember when all this started. It was when I turned 49, and everything unraveled. I held on sorta okay in perimenopause, but when I turned 49, menopause hit me like a ton of bricks.

I thought if I just pushed through it, everything would right itself, and I would feel better.

I’m a tough girl, I thought I would just hold on, and menopause will be just fine. I mean, millions of women have gone through menopause and survived just fine, right?

At the time, my doctor said this was a natural part of life, and I would be just fine.

Well, now, like 3 years later, I do not feel fine.

I mean, at least I’m not a sweaty-betty anymore. Sleep is better, and at least I’m not having to change my PJs or sleep on a towel anymore.

But now, my doctor is telling me that I need to go on a cholesterol-lowering medication, telling me to lose weight and stop eating sugar bc I am prediabetic.

I don’t eat sugar! I tried to tell my doc that, and he actually rolled his eyes and said, “Well, sometimes we don’t realize how much sugar we are ingesting on a daily basis.”

But really, I do eat well. I walk every day and really try to take care of myself. I could do a little more weight lifting bc I feel like my muscle tone has left the building. But I do get my steps in and ride my stationary bike.

So now I have high cholesterol, borderline diabetes, and weight gain, and I just do not feel like myself. Needless to say, it's been a while since I felt like myself.

I am starting to notice that when I need to go to the bathroom, I'd better find one fast, or I will have a little leakage. Just a few drops of urine, but that has never happened. Now I’m stealing my daughter’s panty liners. I don’t have an infection, bc I told my doc that I am having some dryness ‘down south’. He checked my urine and said I am fine.

Well, I felt a little embarrassed to elaborate that the dryness is my ‘vajéjay’ buddy!

So I made myself tell Dr. Rolls-His-Eyes that it was painful to have sex. Well, he just stared at me as I had just made the Statue of Liberty disappear.

“I mean… not all the time,” I added quickly, because suddenly I felt the need to defend my vajéjay’s honor.

And then, in true Dr. Rolls-His-Eyes fashion, he sighed like I had personally inconvenienced his entire medical career.

“Well,” he said, leaning back in his chair, “that’s normal at your age.”

I do not feel normal.’

What is going on in Middle-Menopause?

And what makes it different from Entering-Menopause?

As a woman progresses through menopause, her body is smart and trying to rebalance itself. But without estrogen and progesterone, it can be hard to find a happy medium.

Eventually, the hypothalamus regulates fluctuations in body temperature. So the hot flashes and night sweats can diminish and become less frequent.

But estrogen and progesterone have such an impact on insulin sensitivity and cardiovascular health. You start to see more muscle deterioration, and LDL cholesterol, in particular, increases. Additionally, blood glucose and insulin levels start to rise, even without changes to diet.

This is the part that should have been addressed in perimenopause. But that is not Maggie’s fault. In Western medicine, the dogma has always been don’t fix it till it's broke. Bc when it's broken, we all know who benefits and who doesn't (wink-wink). Off my soapbox.
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So what can Maggie in the Middle do?

Maggie and for all the Maggies in the world, there are strategies that can help her through her journey of middle-menopause. But it is not a one-stop shop, she needs a collective strategy to help her feel better.

Let’s talk HRT and supplements!

​In the paid version, I walk you through exactly what to do next, including how to approach labs, HRT, and supplements.

Maggie Has Mastered Middle-Menopause:

‘I cannot tell you how much better I feel. I’m not trying to be cheesy, but I feel like I am making my way back to me. I feel more like myself, not less.

It’s crazy how we blow off hormones and menopause to stress, or life situations, the world, or the environment.

I mean, my life was way more stressful 20 years ago when I was working, raising my daughter as a single mom. Now, when life is easier, I have more financial stability, I don’t need to work, my daughter is the most amazing human, and in college. And I have a great marriage (yes, it’s my second, and it’s the one that taught me what a great marriage actually feels like).

But menopause really took the wind out of my sails. It stripped me of my libido, made sex painful, disrupted my mood, and not to mention my waistline.

But just a few adjustments really helped me.

I mean, I have to work a lot harder than I did when I was 30. I have to make sure I am taking my supplements, working on my nutrition and exercise, and taking the HRT that is tailored to me, myself, and I. But boy, am I back and so grateful. I am losing the weight I gained starting in perimenopause. My libido is improved, mainly bc i not having dryness ‘down south’. I just feel better overall.

It was a journey. I’m certainly not at the finish line, but I am on my way!’

Menopause is not supposed to take the wind out of your sails. Especially when we have worked so hard to get here. This is a time that we want to enjoy our lives and the people around us. Take a pause from the busy hustle and bustle of life and spend quality time with the people we love, doing things we enjoy. It is not supposed to be a time when we feel like we can’t get the answers to our hormones and health. Maggie didn’t get her old body back. She got something better: understanding. She stopped blaming herself for changes that were never about willpower and started working with her physiology instead of against it. The weight didn’t just fall off overnight, her energy didn’t magically return in a week, but little by little, things shifted. She slept more deeply. Her mind felt clearer. Her body felt stronger. And for the first time in years, she felt like she had a say in how she felt again. Thank you for reading,

DrValorie

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Simon Says: Tracking has been shown to increase awareness and improve behavior change, but only when it leads to insight This week, try noticing simple patterns, such as

Your energy after meals What days of the week, month, or cycle you sleep better When do you feel hungriest or have cravings? What time of day does your mood shift? How do you feel after caffeine or alcohol Your afternoon energy dip (when it hits and how strong it is) How your body feels after exercise (energized or depleted) Hindsight is 20/20, but when you start paying attention in real time, it becomes easier to connect the dots and understand what your body may need next.

I can't believe I drank soda when I was younger. Well, that was the 90’s, and everyone drank soda, it seemed. I mean, it was everywhere, even in our school vending machines.

But now we all know, it is not great for our health. But why is it bad? Sure, it’s empty calories, there is no fiber, no nutritional qualities, it’s in an aluminum can or plastic bottle, etc…
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But the real culprit is high-fructose corn syrup.

Yes, we all know HFCS is bad. It’s cheap and loaded in everything processed.

Because HFCS is primarily metabolized in the liver, it elicits a lower insulin response compared to glucose.

This leads to:

• Reduced leptin signaling: leptin tells us we are full.
• Lack of ghrelin suppression: ghrelin tells us we are hungry.

Result: we don’t feel full (even though we might be), and hungrier, so we go back for seconds.​
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Now this leads me to how much worse HFCS is for women in menopause.

In menopause bc of lower estrogen, we are already prone to metabolic dysfunction, insulin resistance/diabetes, and increased risk to heart, brain, and bone health. Throw in some HFCS, and now you've got a metabolic party.

HFCS + menopause =

• Increased insulin resistance: easier weight gain, harder to lose weight, and more blood sugar changes
• Accelerates belly fat: fructose is processed in the liver and converted into fat, leading to more inflammatory visceral adipose (fat)
• Increased risk of fatty liver: menopausal women already have higher rates of NAFLD, and HFCS adds to this risk
• Increased inflammation: HFCS promotes uric acid, oxidative stress, and inflammatory signaling, which can lead to more joint pain, fatigue, and brain fog
• Increased risk to brain health: blood sugar changes, insulin resistance, and inflammation can contribute to brain fog, mood changes, and long-term cognitive decline
• Increased risk to bone health: soda intake may disrupt calcium balance, increase calcium loss, and contribute to bone loss over time, which is especially important in menopause when bone density is already declining

This isn’t about never having soda again. It’s about understanding what it’s doing in your body, especially in menopause, so you can make more intentional choices.

xoDr. Valorie

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