The post-re/productive: researching the menopause

In reflecting on our experiences of bidding for, winning, completing and disseminating a government-funded report on the effects of menopause transition on women’s economic participation, we consider the impact on our work and on us. These experiences took place in a variety of work contexts. Following the publication of the report, we undertook collective, autoethnographic memory work that forms the empirical body of our argument. This is presented in thirteen vignettes. From the earliest days of the menopause transition project, we found ourselves continually traversing the supposed public-private divide in our work contexts. Our experiences speak to broader social issues around gendered ageism in these contexts. The paper analyses the challenges of researching what is a universal experience for women yet also a taboo subject. It discusses the relevant implications for and possible effects on researchers who investigate such topics in organisation and work studies and elsewhere. Menopause experiences as they connect to work are under-researched per se. Our paper extends knowledge of how this research area is not only shaped by researchers but has an impact on those researchers.