Episode 36: Perimenopause & Your Gut: What’s Really Going On

Since moving into your 40s, have you started noticing changes in your digestion or gut health—like more bloating, constipation, other changes in bowel movements, reflux or heartburn, food sensitivities, or feeling heavier and more sluggish after meals? You're not imagining it, and you're definitely not alone. During perimenopause, our shifting hormone landscape doesn’t just affect our mood or periods—it has a profound impact on the gut too. In this episode, I’m unpacking the key ways that gut health changes in perimenopause, including: How declining oestrogen and progesterone affect gut motility and the gut lining Changes in the microbiome, including the estrobolome Why gut permeability (“leaky gut”) might become more of an issue The gut-brain axis and how it impacts mood, anxiety, and sleep How blood sugar and stress hormones can feed into gut imbalances What this all means for symptoms like bloating, constipation, food sensitivities, and more Links: Take my free perimenopause quiz: https://quiz.francescaliparoti.com/start-page  Explore my Midlife Thrive membership: https://francescaliparoti.com/midlife-thrive-membership/  Work with me 121: https://francescaliparoti.com/services/ Connect with me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/perimenopause.with.francesca/  Support for the Empowered Perimenopause Podcast Your support in listening to these episodes means the absolute world to me and helps me make an impact with my work, which is why I’m here. I’d be so grateful if you could subscribe and share, and leave a review – 5 stars would be amazing and so helpful!