Welcome to THE GOOD BATCH!
What is the Good Batch? Well, each month, I’ll gather up the best conversations with women over 40 doing remarkable things, the ideas fueling our courage, and what I can’t get enough of right now.
We’re launching this now because, well, October was Menopause Awareness Month. Who knew? (Certainly not me until inspiring women like Midi’s Joanna Strober kicked the door wide open and said: enough with the silence, enough with the shame, enough with telling women to shrink and disappear at midlife.)
Why “The Good Batch”? The name is an homage to our favorite ice cream sandwiches in Brooklyn. They smash together complex and surprising cookie flavors with the creamiest ice cream to make something way better than any single ingredient alone. That’s what we’re doing here, and frankly, it’s kind of what mdlife is all about: bringing the best of our lived experience together into something rich and delicious.
Why Sundays? The sweetest stuff always seems to land in my inbox on weekends. Inspired by CBS Sunday Morning with Jane Pauley, Lia DeFeo’s Sunday Wanderings (extra special this month for infertility awareness), Carla Zanoni’s beautiful Substack, and E-Town radio playing in the background. Look to any of the women behind these for big, brave stories.
This is brand new, so I’d love your thoughts. What works? What would make this more useful? Hit reply or comment and let me know!
October on The Uplifters
If there was a theme threaded through October’s conversations, it’s this: The second half of life isn’t about winding down, but about leveraging everything we’ve learned to create our most energizing chapter yet.
#130: Big Moves in our 40s, 50s, and 60s with Elaine Perkins, Adena Artale, and Tracy Keibler. Three women from our community reached out to share their transformation stories. Elaine packed up her Brooklyn life at 60 to become a homeowner in Delaware. Adena finally pursued her childhood dream of acting at 45. Tracy became a nonprofit founder at 50 providing medical and support services to the oldest among us, and has since served over 8,000. Proof that courage doesn’t have an expiration date. → Listen here
#131: Nutrafol’s Dr. Isabelle Raymond What happens when a scientist with two decades of pharmaceutical research experience realizes she doesn’t understand what’s happening to her own body? Dr. Raymond’s journey from confusion to groundbreaking scientific research that changes how we approach menopause is so inspiring. → Listen here
#132: Midi Health’s Joanna Strober Perimenopause, self-advocacy, and starting a healthcare revolution when the system fails you. Joanna built what she needed when she couldn’t find it. → Listen here
#133: Hala Alyan on Motherhood, Identity, and Resilience Poet, novelist, and psychologist
(whose novel Salt Houses I’m re-reading and can’t get over how freaking good it is) on navigating the beautiful, impossible terrain of creative work and motherhood and war. → Listen here#134: When “Fine” Isn’t Enough - Catherine Clark When her successful 25-year business partnership stopped generating energy (but looked fine from the outside), Catherine made the brave choice to rebuild instead of tolerate. She closed up shop and built an entirely new agency with her passion for Gyrotonics at its philosophical center. What others dismissed as “too woo-woo” became her most powerful competitive advantage. → Listen here
What We Were Thinking About
Harvesting from Old Seeds (Oct 6) Someone asked me about my relationship with old dreams - the ones we planted years ago that didn’t bloom when we expected them to.
What Would Your Momager Say? (Oct 13) My new favorite time filter for making decisions about where to invest energy.
SOG is my KPI (Oct 20) How I’m measuring success these days (and why traditional metrics stopped working for me).
Is it too early to start thinking about 2026? (Oct 27) Week 1/8 of our annual planning series. Spoiler: It’s never too early or too late to start dreaming bigger.
What We’re Into Right Now
The Grandmother Hypothesis - From an evolutionary perspective, why do women live far beyond their reproductive years? Dr. Roy Casagrande explains the “grandmother hypothesis”—that women evolved to live longer to educate younger generations, passing on knowledge about survival, social structures, and cultural traditions. Grandmothers aren’t just caregivers, but the heart of how humanity preserves and passes down collective wisdom. In other words: midlife women aren’t past our prime. We’re the evolutionary advantage.
Madeleine - A stunning animated short film by Raquel Sancinetti about friendship, aging, and living life to its fullest. Go watch it!
The Residence - Finally, a show centering a quirky, brilliant woman in midlife totally embracing herself and not performing for anybody’s comfort. (Check out tomorrow’s regular newsletter for reflections on our tendency as women to perform for others and how to be more like this lead character - fully, weirdly, wonderfully ourselves all the time.)
Jenny Jing Zhu’s Dreamweaver Foundation - We attended the NYC premiere of this film based on Jenny’s life - her journey from a small village in China with no electricity to founding the massive home decor company Lush Home Decor. Now in midlife, she’s turning her focus to supporting other dreamers
Bucket List Careers with Christa Lauri - A podcast that centers midlife women making bold pivots. I was so honored to join her on a recent episode to talk about raising courage capital.
The Mother Code - Can’t get over how good this book was. will be on the podcast in November, stay tuned!
Midlife Private Parts - A soulful and revealing collection of essays exploring the many facets of this transformative time in life. Each story sheds light, with humanity and good humor, on what it really feels like to move through the world as a midlife woman and beyond. Curated by midlife badass besties
and , who I had the good fortune to meet at The Swell Summit - where a gaggle of midlife baddies gathered to highlight companies focused on supporting women in midlife, cultivating community, and sharing science about midlife women.
’s new Five Archetypes Relationships Channel on YouTube. In 15 minutes or less, Carey applies the 5A Method to help improve one relationship challenge, live on Zoom. Educational, transformative, and you’ll leave with at least one simple action that can relieve the discomfort. Listen to her Uplifters episode here and click the link above if you’re interested in being a guest on her new show!
Sundari Malcom’s Healing Doula Academy - It’s been a dream for Sundari to create this powerful training program for doulas who guide us through the end of life. Such remarkable work from a remarkable guide. Listen to her Uplifters episode here.
Uplifters in lights - A huge highlight of the month was attending the Emmy Awards with my dapper husband. We got to celebrate a big win for him that night and cheer for two incredible Uplifters recently featured on the show
(listen to her ep here) and (listen to her ep here)Baking cozy treats to make cooler weather feel like less of an affront to my big, midlife joy
The Best Dinner Rolls - My daughter said they rivaled King’s Hawaiian. I did something super crazy and channeled my inner Christina Tosi by using cereal milk leftover from breakfast instead of plain old milk. Highly recommend (unless you’re trying to eat fewer sweet, gooey buns. In which case, do not make these because you won’t be able to stop eating them)
Sourdough Crackers from King Arthur Baking
Butternut Squash Soup with mushroom chili crisp on top from the wonderful folks at Join The Tryb - founded by a midlife entrepreneur focused on uplifting small (mostly female and often midlife) founders who are creating innovative food products. She’s shared a bunch of her faves with me, so I’ll be sharing more thoughts here next month!
Planning Uplifters Live - Join us for our annual gathering in NYC. It’s officially scheduled for Friday, March 13, 2026! Mark your calendars.
Getting ready for our next Uplifters Retreat. This one is sold out, but sign up here if you’d like to be first to know about the next one
That’s the batch for October! I’m experimenting with this format, so please let me know what resonates, what you’d like more (or less) of, and what would make this most useful for you.
And I would love to hear from you! What are you reading, watching, eating, thinking about? Tell us all about it in the comments!
Let’s keep rising higher together as we shift into November’s adventures,
Aransas