Zara Hanawalt
Stop whispering, start talking: sharp, sassy takes on life in a female body.
Why Millennial Women Are Suddenly So Obsessed With the Midlife Crisis
I co-host a podcast called The Millennial Sandwich, and when we polled our audience to learn what they want to want to hear two almost 40 ladies yap about, the answer was clear: The millennial midlife crisis.
We gave the people what they want, and we quickly realized that this particular issue is top of mind for so many of our fellow millennial women.
For so long, we've been sold this idea about middle age. Men turn 50-ish, buy a hot little car, have an affair with much a younger woman...essentially upend their entire life as they face their own mortality.
Women, on the other hand? They become invisible in midlife, according to the narratives we've been handed. They disappear into the background of their own lives. But if there is one thing I know about millennial women, it's this: We won't retreat into the shadows without a fight. And thanks in part to social media and other digital platforms, we don't have to. We get to control the narrative and steer the conversation on these platforms.
And we get to put a new narrative about the much-discussed midlife crisis in place...and maybe we even get to give the entire concept the full rebrand it deserves.
Because maybe it isn't a crisis at all. Maybe it's a pivot. A moment of reinvention. An era that is less about falling apart and more about redirecting. (But also...maybe it's perimenopause?)
I'm seeing so many women, both online and IRL, who are rethinking so many pieces of their lives, perhaps most notably, career. They're giving themselves permission to do less, to invest more in their relationships, to think more about their overall health as opposed to just how they look.
We're setting the stage for the rest of our lives. We're confronting our imperfect relationships to burnout and hustle and beauty standards and guilt and pressure. So call it a midlife crisis if you want...but I have a feeling we're going to emerge from this moment better than ever.
Ask Clara:
"What is a midlife crisis?"
The Case for Getting More Sleep
Women have long been left out of the conversation around heart disease thanks to its stereotype (as an issue that affects middle-aged men almost exclusively). But heart disease is a major issue for women too, despite this cultural perception: According to the CDC, it is the leading cause of death among women in the United States.
We've long needed more answers about how exactly heart disease affects and kills women. We know that generally speaking, heart disease risk factors are both genetic and related to lifestyle, and we talk about both of those things in the context of men's health. But we don't give women nearly enough guidance on how to reduce their risks.
Yes, we have some guidelines — exercise often, eat well, avoid smoking — but here's something we don't often consider when we think about cardiovascular disease risk: Sleep.
Women's Health recently shed light on the relationship between these two factors, citing research from the Menopause journal that involved the study of 3,000 women. Sleep ended up being the biggest predictor of cardiovascular disease risk.
This seems especially true among midlife women. The experts interviewed for this coverage point to increased inflammation, high blood pressure, and obesity in connection to these findings.
Here's what is so complicated: Show me a midlife woman and I'll show a person who is under-rested. At this phase of life, so many of us are juggling enormous loads: Kids, parents, home, marriage, community, demanding careers...and even if we make time for enough sleep, often we can't fully shut down. As we know, sleep disturbances are particularly common in middle age.
So what do we? I...don't know. I guess, for starters, we start to take sleep seriously. This research shows us how truly important it is.
Finding routines that help us wind down, investing in comfortable bedding, finally setting those boundaries around shutting down the phone and turning out the lights...all these things can help.
Ask Clara:
"Why do so many women struggle with sleep?"
The Air Quality is a Mess and I am Too
We are going on day six of poor air quality in my city, thanks to smoke from the Canadian wildfires, and chat? I'm struggling. Not just with anxiety about climate change, even though that’s a very real thing, but also with a real sense of disruption to my routines. Between this and the whole can-we-even-eat-lettuce-safely-right-now thing? I long for precedented times.
To be clear: This is a larger issue, and it's absolutely not about me feeling a little stir crazy and a hefty dose of FOMO to be stuck inside during those fleeting summer months.
But this isn't a column about the environment, it's about women's health and wellness...and when there's smoke in the air, we have a real choice to make: Do we abandon our wellness practices or do we take the risk and step outside into smoggy air to keep up with them?
I've recently landed on a wellness routine that is really working for me: A short walk first thing in the morning, before it gets hot out, and then a longer, more leisurely walk at night, which brings me to (an admittedly arbitrary) goal of 10,000 steps most days. Honestly? I've been feeling great...that is, until the air quality issue came and had me reconfiguring this ritual. It’s wild, especially at this point in life, to feel how dramatically even these minor disruptions can affect your overall well-being. It’s just a sign of how connected it all is.
Again, this isn't about me. This is a much larger issue. The point here is this: These larger issues, issues tied to our environment and our food supply and all the things that feel somewhat distant, do affect us. They affect how we live our lives.
Ask Clara:
"What are wellness practices?"
People are Eating Sardines as Skincare...are they Actually onto Something?
Red light masks, microneedling, HydraFacials...sardines?
There are so many new recommendations when it comes to skincare and it's impossible to keep up with all the product and procedure recommendations. But there's one thing I'm seeing as a skincare hack that is neither a product nor a procedure: It's a food. And not a super common (or universally loved) food at that.
Across the internet, wellness girlies are praising sardines for their ability to give them glowing skin.
Let's face it: Tinned fish is expensive, but not nearly as expensive as all the products, facials, injectables, and tools we're told we "need" to have if we want the best skin of our life. Could this be the (relatively) affordable skin hack that will benefit more than just your skin, but your overall health as well?
I reached out to Anna Bohnengel, a registered dietician, to fact-check the claims that sardines are edible skincare.
Turns out, there might be something to do this...but there's also some misinformation out there.
"Sardines are one of the richest sources of EPA and DHA, the omega-3s that can help calm the chronic inflammation to prevent the collagen breakdown that contributes to skin aging," says Bohnengel, who adds that there's evidence to support the idea that fish oil can protect against UV-related collagen damage and improve skin hydration.
But if you don't love sardines? Well...you'd have to really lock in to get these benefits.
"Note that to achieve this benefit, that would mean eating 13-15 oz of sardines a day, every single day, for months (not just an occasional serving)," she adds. "There is a physiological plausibility that eating sardines provides skin-health benefits, but to see meaningful impact, they would have to be a daily routine... and not replacement for prevention in the form SPF."
TL;DR? If you enjoy sardines, eat up! Incorporating them as a daily lunch or snack (I've seen people make sardines on toast, for example), could be a great way to protect your skin as you age.
But if you're not a fan? No need to force yourself to eat 'em.
One thing to add, per Bohnengel: "Astaxanthin is often cited as part of the 'fish = skincare' story, but sardines aren't actually a meaningful source of it," she says.
Ask Clara:
"Does your diet affect your skin?"
Joking About a Parasite to Help You Lose Weight. Disordered or Darkly Funny?
As you might know, I am neck deep in cyclosporaisis content. Thanks to my health anxiety (which kicks into overdrive when issues that cause GI symptoms are concerned) , I am constantly thinking about the state of this particular health issue and how to avoid it.
If you're not all the way down the rabbit hole like I am, a refresher: Cyclosporaisis is an infection caused by the cyclospora cayetanensis parasite, which is so teeny tiny, it isn't visible, yet it's powerful enough to cause "explosive" diarrhea that can last for up to a month.
Yay! So fun.
Of course, because I've been seeking out every bit of information on this parasite and how to avoid it, I've seen tons of content about it...and I've noticed a real theme. There are so many jokes about people "trying" to get the parasite because...well, it sounds like a good way to lose weight.
There are videos of people saying "when there's an explosive diarrhea parasite going around but you have some weight to lose" alongside video footage of themselves hastily lettuce or raspberries, which are the two most commonly named types of produce that may carry the parasite.
Listen, some of it is kind of funny. I see people joking about planning a beach vacation after they've recovered from this illness. I see others talking about how "a good cleanse" is all they need to get to their goal weight.
But I also find myself wondering what this says about our cultural obsession with thinness, especially right now, and our willingness to put ourselves through real suffering in a pursuit of a "better" body. In a world of so much toxic messaging around how bodies should look, it just feels especially important to address.
Because yeah, people are allowed to joke (I'm not saying I'm above making this type of quip myself, if we're being honest!), but it does, I think signify something larger at play. And personally, I draw the line around making these jokes around children. What message would we be sending young, impressionable minds by doing so? That meeting a certain beauty standard is more important than health? That pain, suffering, and the risk of things like dehydration are worth it in pursuit of a smaller body?
Ask Clara:
"What does diet culture affect women?"
PSA: Pregnancy Speculation is Never Okay, Even Towards Problematic Celebs
There's a certain female celebrity who has been in a lot of hot water recently, and much of it feels well earned.
This person was at the epicenter of a major scandal, and she responded to that scandal without much grace or accountability. But that doesn't excuse what's happening right now.
Many people are speculating that this star might be pregnant. The "evidence" to support this? From what I've seen, mostly just a photo of said celebrity with her dress billowing a bit. Could easily be me after when the wind hits me just right and I happen to wearing a loose dress, and I'm definitely not pregnant.
But here's the thing: Even if the evidence is far more compelling, there's just never a good reason to speculate that someone may be pregnant — even if it's someone you don't like.
Because at the end of the day, this is about whether the person you're talking about "deserves" privacy or grace. It isn't about extending respect and courtesy to someone. It's about creating a culture where we understand that speculating whether someone may or not be pregnant is just not okay. No matter what.
There are so many factors around why pregnancy speculation is so not okay: Someone could be recovering from a miscarriage. They could be dealing with another health issue that leaves them bloated. They could be getting sober (and so much pregnancy speculation happens when someone turns down a drink). They could be struggling with infertility. They could, in fact, be pregnant and not ready to share the news...and that's their choice to make.
Bottom line? Even if you don't like a celebrity, wait for a confirmation from them before publicly speculating that they may be expecting.
Should We be Treating Having a Baby After 40 Like it's Some Revolutionary Thing?
When Anne Hathaway revealed that she's pregnant with her third baby, the news quickly became about the actress's age.
Listen, you know how we feel about terms like "geriatric pregnancy" and "advanced maternal age" (if not, a quick summary: We hate them), but here's the thing: Age is a factor in reproductive health, and at 43, Hathaway is well over the threshold of both of those labels, which kick in at age 35.
Does that mean there's something revolutionary about the fact that she's having a baby? No. As someone who had a harder time getting pregnant at 28 than many women I know who conceived at 40, I know that contrary to what some people think, your ability to get pregnant doesn't just completely fall off a cliff once you turn 35.
We're seeing more and more women have children after 40: Last year, the number of babies born to moms over 40 outpaced the number of babies born to teen moms. Hathaway is far from the only celebrity to have a baby later in life. And of course, reproductive technology has come a long, long way, and has given real people so many more options when it comes to family planning.
What Hathaway is doing shouldn't be newsworthy. The fact that we're talking this much about a woman's reproductive status in general is icky to me. But as a journalist in this space, a person who comments on the state of women's health issues? I don't quite know what the right approach is here. I know people will see news like this and claim that all the advice we heard about age and fertility were "fear-mongering". And yeah, some of it probably is. At the same time, not all narratives about age and pregnancy are rooted in fear; sometimes they're rooted in fact.Because the reality is, getting pregnant at 43 is often challenging, sometimes impossible. Fertility does decline, and the risks of complications do increase with age. When people see their favorite celebrities have babies, seemingly without issue, without the necessary context, it can make people think there's nothing to really consider before delaying parenthood. In a perfect world, we wouldn't have to share this context and comment on people's reproductive lives.
Unfortunately, we don't live in a perfect world. Age affects fertility. Not everyone has the resources to utilize the reproductive technology that exists. Not everyone will still have the ability to conceive without this technology — ever, but especially into their 40s.
And so, while I don't love talking about a woman's pregnancy and age...I also think it's important to paint a full picture.
The Netflix Documentaries That Actually Need to be Made
The "Netflix documentaries" trend is all over my feeds right now. I even hopped on the trend to make a joke about how I'll prepare when they make the documentary about what it was really like to be a woman of color working in the magazine industry during the height of the #girlboss era (which is something they should totally make a doc about...or you could just watch The Devil Wears Prada, tbh. It's not far off).
This trend got me thinking about the things that truly deserve to be made into documentaries. Because when it comes to women's wellness, there are so many stories that have gone unheard.
We are out here trying to tell them ourselves, but most of them deserve so much more airtime than they're getting. Rather than a social media post we're making, they deserve to be explored in long, nuanced ways, and given larger platforms.
Here are some concepts that deserve the Netflix documentary treatment:
The pain gap: The minimization of women's pain is real. For too long, our discomfort has been normalized, and not in a good way: In a way that pain is treated like an expected part of life for women, rather than something to be explored and addressed. A documentary featuring women who have had their pain-related concerns dismissed, only to be suffering from a serious, treatable condition.
The wage gap: Ah, another gap! This one (like the other one) is questioned constantly. Some people believe it's a "myth" (it's not), when it actuality, it's getting wider. We need a whole documentary exploring the wage gap and why we just can't seem to get rid of it.
What diet culture truly did to millennial women: We grew up with some truly toxic attitudes around what bodies "should" look like and how we "should" get our bodies to look the same way. We desperately need a space for women who grew up with it to reflect on what diet culture truly did to them.
The money behind social media: There's a real lack of income transparency where social media careers are concerned, and that's a shame — especially because this is one industry where women dominate. We need a real look at the money behind the machine, not just for transparency's sake, but also so young women can understand what to expect for this type of career. It would especially interesting for this documentary to explore the real money the "tradwife" influencers are making while pretending they 'don't work"...
The behind-the-scenes of reality TV: Reality TV runs on women's pain. I've seen a few reality stars jump on this trend and every single time I think "wow, yes I would definitely watch this". I just knew there's a lot of crazy stuff happening behind the scenes, often to make women look worse or exploit their hardest moments.
The "just freeze your eggs" narrative: Ten-ish years ago, the advice to young women was "freeze your eggs, build your career in your 20s and 30s, and have a baby once you've cemented your professional success". For many, that is the right path. But not for everyone: We need a documentary about how so many women felt lied to. They were made to believe egg freezing was guaranteed success. But...it's not. And it's not available to or the right option for everybody.
Surrogacy: There are so many misconceptions about surrogacy. The reality is, it's complicated, with so many moving parts and variation from state to state. A documentary could clear up some of the mystery and misinformation...and hopefully, chip away at the stigma
Ask Clara:
"what is the pain gap>"
Are We Doing Enough to Prevent Hearing Loss?
Like most millennials, I like to joke that I get overstimulated by two people asking me a questions at once now, while 15-ish years ago, I could easily spend hours at an incredibly loud club, screaming over blasting music, keeping cool as multiple people bumped into me, and generally managing to have a good time in an incredibly loud, stick environment.
Now? One hour in that type of space and I'm struggling...which might be a good thing, at least where the noise intolerance piece is concerned.
A friend of mine recently threw a "2008" themed party, and it was loud — like, nightclub-blasting-Pitbul-during-our-partying-prime loud. I found myself thinking "wow, I really used to do this all the time"...which of course led me to wonder if I've messed up my long-term hearing health as a result. Because let's face it: I spent my 20s in a lot of very, very loud rooms, and that is...well, not the safest thing you can do to protect yourself from noise-induced hearing loss.
According to the CDC, if you need to shout to be heard over the noise around you, it's too loud. Yikes.
Of course, being in this type of atmosphere occasionally is better than being chronically exposed to loud noise, and the louder your sound exposure, the more dangerous is becomes. But noise-induced hearing loss is real, and it carries real risks. Hearing loss has been linked to dementia. According to materials from Johns Hopkins University, mild hearing loss doubles a person's dementia risk, moderate hearing loss triples it, and severe hearing loss can cause a five-fold increase.
So...yeah. We should be thinking about preventing hearing loss.
What's done is done. I can't go back and stop myself from spending so many nights at loud parties, but I can make sure I do what I can to protect my hearing going forward, as so can you. I can avoid super loud gatherings, use earplugs when appropriate, and most of all, just be mindful of this issue and the real risks that can come along with not thinking about noise-induced hearing loss.
Ask Clara:
"How can I prevent hearing loss?"
A 19-Year-Old Stay-at-Home Wife is Going Viral and We Need to Talk About It
If you've been on a certain app recently, you've likely seen a video of a (very young) woman talking about how she's 19 years old with no degree, no job, and one husband. The woman is, by her own admission, exactly where she wants to be.
And you know what? Maybe she truly is living out her dreams. Maybe it'll continue to go well for her.
But the people of the Internet? They have thoughts. They're calling the move reckless, dangerous, stupid.
I think they have a point; I just don't love how they're making said point...and what they're leaving out of the conversation.
Attacking women for their choices is easy. What's harder — but ultimately better — is realizing that choices don't exist in a vacuum. That our choices, as well as the outcomes around them, are deeply influenced by context. This particular woman is clearly wealthy, she's white, she's married under the laws of the United States (which give women legal avenues to leave their marriages if they no longer serve them), and (this is the piece most people are neglecting to mention) she's getting a lot of attention on social media, and this type of attention can typically be parlayed into a career.
I'm not worried about this woman. I am worried about the other women — girls, actually — who may see this romantic, aestheticized view of this tradwife-y content and think this is the only answer. Because maybe marrying young and forgoing education and career is a possible path to happiness...but more often, it's not. These are the things we need to be talking about: How so many additional factors affect how women can navigate their choices...and who ultimately has choices, and safety nets to rely on if they change their minds.
There is no risk-free way to build your life and no right age to get married, but I would strongly encourage young women to take their time. Nothing can truly replace the years between childhood and full-on adulthood — the years you spend living along and figuring out who you want to be, and feeling truly independent for the first (and perhaps last) time in your whole life. I won't shame women who opt not to do it this way...but I will continue to talk about why the ability to stand on your own two feet matters.