Oh! So No One Told You?

Sara Flamm and Liz Forman

A Hollywood producer and a Wellness Coach walk into menopause… Real talk on aging, identity, health, and WTF is even happening. Remember when you thought you had life figured out? Then menopause hit and suddenly you're Googling "Is this normal?" at 2am. Sara and Liz get real about everything women either glossed over or forgot to warn us about: hot flashes, brain fog, disappearing libidos, career shifts, and all the curveballs not mentioned. Oh! So no one told you? Yeah, we know. So... we're fixing that. Nobody prepared us for this journey either, so let's navigate it together.

  1. 20 hr ago

    So... What Exactly Is Messing With Our Hormones?

    We started with a conversation about dogs, lawn chemicals, and the things we’re exposed to without even thinking about it. And then, naturally, it spiraled. This week, Liz and Sara are talking about endocrine-disrupting chemicals and all the places they can show up in everyday life: plastics, food packaging, receipts, fragrance, cleaning products, personal care products, water, cookware, pesticides, clothing, and probably a few things you have never thought twice about. The point is not to panic or try to live in a chemical-free bubble. That’s probably impossible anyway. It’s to start paying attention. What are we exposed to every day? What might actually matter? Where can we make better choices without making ourselves completely nuts? And how could all of this be affecting hormones, fertility, thyroid health, metabolic health, perimenopause, and menopause? Also discussed: why thermal receipts are suddenly suspicious, why Sara is emotionally attached to a dying basil plant, why Liz knows way too much about gas stations in 1989, questionable cookware, filtered water, and Edward Cullen shimmering in a jar. You know. The usual. We’re going much deeper into the research, products, apps, water filters, resources, and links from this episode over on Substack, including a few things we went back and fact-checked after recording. ohtellmepodcast.substack.com Have a story, question, or topic you want us to get into? Email: otellmepodcast@gmail.comInstagram: @ohtellmepodcast Hit play, we’re right there with you! Disclaimer:This podcast is for informational and personal experience purposes only. Sara and Liz are not medical professionals, and nothing shared should be taken as medical advice. Please consult your doctor or a qualified healthcare provider before making decisions about your health, medications, supplements, or treatment.

  2. 2 Oct

    Perimenopause, Menopause & Everything We Should’ve Known — With Special Guest: Dr. Banafsheh Bayati

    Perimenopause, menopause, and all the things we probably should have known before we got here. This week, Sara and Liz are joined by Dr. Banafsheh Bayati, a board-certified OB/GYN, Menopause Society Certified Practitioner, and medical co-founder of Perelel. She has spent 25 years caring for women from adolescence through menopause, and after going through a difficult late perimenopause herself, she began looking at this stage of a woman’s life a little differently. And we had A LOT of questions. We talk about why perimenopause really needs to be understood as its own life stage, why so many symptoms get treated separately before anyone connects them back to hormones, and what women can start learning and doing before, during, and after the transition. We get into HRT, birth control in early perimenopause, vaginal estrogen, testosterone, libido, iron and ferritin, supplements, sleep, food, protein, strength training, the dreaded meno belly, GLP-1s, and why there really isn’t one magical formula that works for every woman. Dr. Bayati also explains why patience matters when you’re trying hormone therapy, why your treatment may need to change right along with your hormones, and why perimenopause is probably not the time for a “see you next year” approach to care. And maybe most importantly, we talk about learning the vocabulary, knowing your own history, asking better questions, and understanding your options so you can be an active participant in your own care. Because the whole point is to get to a place where women aren’t looking back ten years later thinking... Wait. THAT was perimenopause?! We could have kept Dr. Bayati for another hour. So yes, we already asked her to come back. Links from this episode: Dr. Banafsheh Bayati: smobgyn.com Perelel: perelelhealth.com Want to go deeper into this episode? Come join us on Substack, where we share more information, guest resources, more extensive links, commentary, and a lot of what we couldn’t fit into the conversation: ohtellmepodcast.substack.com Have a story, symptom, question, or topic you want us to dig into? Email us at otellmepodcast@gmail.com Instagram: @ohtellmepodcast Disclaimer: This podcast is for informational and personal experience purposes only. Sara and Liz are not medical professionals, and nothing shared should be taken as medical advice. Even when we have doctors on our show, they are doctors, but not your doctor. Please consult your doctor or a qualified healthcare provider before making any decisions about your health, medications, supplements, or treatment.

  3. 18 Sept

    The Business of Menopause: Would You Buy This?

    The Business of Menopause: Would You Buy This? Menopause has become a full-blown marketplace, valued at $18.7 billion last year and expected to hit $28.8 billion by 2033. This week we're going through the pile: cooling pearls, menopause-specific protein powder, arousal oils, beef organ supplements, weighted vests, and yes, tickets to Menopause The Musical 2. We play a round of Would You Buy This and get into menowashing, the trend of taking a totally normal product, making it pink, slapping "menopause" on the label, and charging more for the exact same thing. We also talk about why this market exists in the first place: women who've spent years searching for real answers are an easy target for anyone selling a solution, and it's worth asking every time whether something actually works or just looks the part. For the full breakdown of every product we discussed today, including the ones we said yes to and the links to find them, check out our Substack: Oh! So No One Told You?! Have a story, a symptom, or a topic you want us to dig into? Send it to otellmepodcast@gmail.com or DM us on Instagram @ohtellmepodcast. This podcast is for informational and personal experience purposes only. Sara and Liz are not medical professionals and nothing shared should be taken as medical advice. Even when we have doctors on our show, they are doctors, but not your doctor. So remember: please consult your doctor or a qualified healthcare provider before making any decisions about your health, medications, or treatment.

  4. 4 Sept

    The Whole-Person Approach — With Special Guest: Dr. Talina Hermann

    The Whole-Person Approach — Guest: Dr. Talina Hermann, Founder of Optimized Human This week's guest is Dr. Talina Hermann, a functional and integrative medicine practitioner for women who built her practice after years of chasing answers Western medicine couldn't give her, first for her own health, then for her. She explains what functional medicine means: not treating symptoms in isolation, but tracing them upstream to find out where they started. The conversation covers a lot of ground. Why starting HRT earlier in perimenopause tends to produce an easier transition into menopause, and why she preps patients for HRT the way you'd prep for pregnancy, dialing in gut health, liver function, cortisol, and blood sugar first. What a DUTCH test actually measures versus standard bloodwork, and why she runs one on every patient. Where herbal medicine fits in for women who can't or don't want HRT. And a wild stat that reframes our whole conversation: the ovary is the fastest-aging organ in the female body, and how fast it ages may predict lifespan! What? Peptides get a real breakdown too, BPC-157 and KPV for gut health, GLP-1s and why she doesn't rush patients off them, and a clear-eyed answer on the gray market: why sourcing matters, what compounding pharmacies actually offer that research-only peptides don't, and the real reason people are ending up with medical issues (hint: it's not the peptide itself). The episode closes with practical stuff anyone can use: how to actually protect your sleep, what ferritin levels have to do with waking up at night, and why protein needs go up, not down, once you're in menopause. Links from this episode: Website: drtalinahermann.comInstagram: @drtalinahermannHave a story, a symptom, or a topic you want us to dig into? Send it to otellmepodcast@gmail.com or DM us on Instagram. This podcast is for informational and personal experience purposes only. Sara and Liz are not medical professionals and nothing shared should be taken as medical advice. Please consult your doctor or a qualified healthcare provider before making any decisions about your health, medications, or treatment.

  5. 21 Aug

    Know Your Normal! - With Special Guest: Gina Lamanna, Founder of The Fondle Project

    This week's guest is Gina Lamanna, a stylist of 25 years whose 2016 breast cancer diagnosis was caught only because she trusted her gut after two clear screenings. Her doctor found nothing alarming on an ultrasound and told her to come back in six months. She paid out of pocket for an MRI instead. That decision likely saved her life. Gina walks through the whole arc: the diagnosis delivered on New Year's Eve, pursuing second and third opinions at Sloan Kettering and MD Anderson, choosing a double mastectomy over radiation and Tamoxifen, and losing herself so completely afterward that she avoided mirrors for over a year. She also gets into something a lot of women don't know: breast cancer survivors are often told they can't go on HRT, full stop, but that guidance is shifting, and Gina is now on hormone therapy with her oncologist's approval, monitored closely, after years of headaches and zero libido that nobody could explain. The conversation also covers the founding of The Fondle Project, the nonprofit Gina built after her teenage daughter found a lump and asked her mother if she had breast cancer too. Gina talks about closing her successful styling business to pursue it full time, what it's like to pivot into something with no steady paycheck, and why she's telling women who feel dismissed by a doctor to keep looking until someone actually listens. Her message, in her words: know your normal. Links from this episode: The Fondle Project: thefondleproject.substack.comInstagram: @thefondleprojectHave a story, a symptom, or a topic you want us to dig into? Send it to otellmepodcast@gmail.com or DM us on Instagram. This podcast is for informational and personal experience purposes only. We are not medical professionals and nothing shared should be taken as medical advice. Please consult your doctor or a qualified healthcare provider before making any decisions about your health, medications, or treatment.

  6. 7 Aug

    The Identity Shift We Didn't See Coming

    Menopause doesn't just come with symptoms, it can also strip away the ability to perform, people-please, and smooth things over for everyone else's comfort. This episode is about what's left once that softening effect is gone, and the disorienting work of figuring out who you actually are underneath it. We read a Reddit post out loud that nails the shift: this isn't a transition, it's an identity collapse. From there we get into resentment, saying yes when we mean no, and what it actually takes to finally say no and mean it without the guilt hangover that used to follow. In this episode: An estrogen patch dose that had to get walked back after some very unwelcome side effectsA sleep score of 100 worth gloating aboutWhy "I don't feel like myself" might be the most honest sentence either of us has saidThe Reddit post that reframed everything: menopause as identity collapse, not just transitionLearning to say no without carrying the resentment for days afterwardGrieving who we used to be, and why we don't want to stay thereThe floor-sitting debate nobody asked for but everyone needsHave a symptom, a story, or a topic you want us to cover? Email us at otellmepodcast@gmail.com or send a DM on Instagram @ohtellmepodcast. We want to hear from you. This podcast is for informational and personal experience purposes only. We are not medical professionals and nothing shared should be taken as medical advice. Please consult your doctor or a qualified healthcare provider before making any decisions about your health, medications, or treatment.

  7. 24 Jul

    The Symptom List Nobody Handed You. Chin Hairs, Vertigo, Phantom Smells... Yep. All Menopause.

    Hot flashes. Night sweats. Mood swings. Yeah yeah yeah. We know those ones. But what about the vertigo that lasts a year and a half? The hip pain that shows up out of nowhere and will not let you sleep? Plantar Fasciitis. Frozen shoulder. The heartbeat you can suddenly hear in your ear? The phantom smell that makes you wonder if you are having a stroke? The chin hair you find that is somehow already an inch long? Nobody handed us a list. So we made one. In this episode Sara and Liz go deep on the symptoms of menopause that nobody warned them about. The weird ones. The ones that sent them to orthopedic surgeons and neurologists and Reddit threads at 2am. The ones that turned out to be connected to menopause all along even though not a single doctor ever mentioned it. They also get into something that does not get talked about nearly enough. The shame that comes with having symptoms. The internal spiral of: am I complaining too much, am I being too sensitive, are these symptoms even real. And why so many women have been conditioned to dismiss their own experience before anyone else gets the chance to. And of course... Liz has some thoughts on that. This one is personal, a little wild, and genuinely useful. Whether you are deep in it or just starting to notice things that feel off, this episode is for you. Hit play. You are not losing your mind. And you are not alone. Find us at ohtellmepodcast@gmail.com For the full symptom breakdown, book recommendations, resources, and Liz's coaching perspective head over to our Substack and subscribe. This podcast is for informational and personal experience purposes only. We are not medical professionals and nothing shared should be taken as medical advice. Please consult your doctor or a qualified healthcare provider before making any decisions about your health, medications, or treatment.

  8. 10 Jul

    Reunited and It Feels So Good... You Know Our Hormones, Now Meet Us.

    You know us as two women figuring out menopause together. But do you actually know who we are and how we got here? This is that episode. Sara and Liz are recording in person for the first time, and something about being in the same room just opens things up. Sara spent 27 years in film production, starting with LA Confidential straight out of college, traveling nine months out of the year, and eventually burning out in ways she is only now starting to connect to where she was hormonally. Liz went from science to CrossFit to coaching, found her calling at 35 on the sidelines of an early CrossFit competition, and has spent the years since helping people get out of their own way. That was only the beginning. They also get into how the podcast started, over dinner a year ago, and why they felt like this conversation needed to exist in the first place. But it would not be their show without the real stuff. Progesterone is now on shortage. Liz forgot her estrogen patch at her family reunion. Sara showed up in Michigan with an empty testosterone tube instead of the full one sitting on her counter at home. And both of them have a lot of feelings about all of it. They also touch on something important. Not every woman can do HRT, and that conversation deserves its own space. They are putting it on the list. This one feels a little different. It is warmer, a little more personal, and honestly one of their best ones yet. Hit play. Now you know us a little better. Find us at ohtellmepodcast@gmail.com For more on everything we discuss including links and resources, subscribe to our Substack.

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About

A Hollywood producer and a Wellness Coach walk into menopause… Real talk on aging, identity, health, and WTF is even happening. Remember when you thought you had life figured out? Then menopause hit and suddenly you're Googling "Is this normal?" at 2am. Sara and Liz get real about everything women either glossed over or forgot to warn us about: hot flashes, brain fog, disappearing libidos, career shifts, and all the curveballs not mentioned. Oh! So no one told you? Yeah, we know. So... we're fixing that. Nobody prepared us for this journey either, so let's navigate it together.

Information

  • Creator
    Sara Flamm and Liz Forman
  • Years Active
    2026
  • Episodes
    19
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Sara Flamm and Liz Forman
  • Show Website
    Oh! So No One Told You?