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No one has it all figured out. And anyone who says they do? Well, they’re lying.
This is for the women who are trying. Trying to juggle all the things. Trying to make sense of what they actually want. Trying to keep their heads above water without losing themselves in the process.
Career. Money. Relationships. The pressure to do it all. The pressure to want it all. And the moments you secretly wonder, is it just me?
Here we speak openly, laugh through chaos, and ask questions instead of pretending to have all the answers.
Because we’re all a work in progress.
Megan Dimmer (00:00):
We don't have it all figured out. We are still a work in progress. We're humans. We will always be a work in progress. But to have a friend like you, to have a community also that to lean on is everything. And I encourage everyone out there to find a tribe, to find a community. This one is a great start. You're not alone.
Gayle Kalvert (00:25):
This is Work in Progress. I'm your host, Gayle Kalvert, and yes, I'm a work in progress. Hi everyone, and welcome to Work in Progress. I'm so excited for you to be here with my friend Megan Dimmer. Megan is a fractional growth expert and an executive coach, and one of my dear, dear friends. We are going to talk today about how approaching 50 can actually be fabulous physically, mentally, professionally. Megan is feeling the best that she's ever felt in life, and I'm so excited for all of us to learn from Megan what the changes she made are, why this stage of our life can be so fantastic and why turning 50 can be something you look forward to and not something you dread. So Megan, thank you so much for being here. Let's dig in.
Gayle Kalvert (01:21):
Megan, you just turned 49 and congratulations for being vocal about that, right? We're not afraid to tell anyone our age and you're feeling better than ever. Can you walk us through the transformation looked like for you? Have you always felt this fabulous? What's been going on?
Megan Dimmer (01:42):
Have I always felt this fabulous?
Megan Dimmer (01:45):
Absolutely fucking not. Literally, this past weekend I turned 49, and so I'm recently reflecting on it. I feel the best as it relates to personal, professional, social, all of the different aspects of my life. We were talking about it the other day, right? It's something for me that lifestyle has become the truth, has become my reality, whereas I'm eating healthy on a regular basis, not just in the moment, not just because it's New Year's resolution, but because it makes me feel good and the results that I get from eating healthy food, I feel I see, I feel like other people can see in my skin and my body. And don't get me wrong, I'll eat a salad with some French fries once in a while, but for the most part, I stay focused on, I don't eat any dairy. I don't eat refined sugar. I've discovered that you can eat dessert that has coconut sugar or honey or maple syrup, and I go down this rabbit hole with you right now because it's been a long process to get here.
Megan Dimmer (02:53):
And I had always said when I was younger, I want to be in the best shape of my life by the time I'm 50 because I feel like at that point, if you haven't achieved it, it can go downhill fast. And so I work out regularly. I didn't always do that. I let career come first. And I'm going to say obviously, but my son, my son John, as you know, and he's always come first and I let myself be second or third to job and to being a mom and doing all the parenting. And what I've discovered is when I don't feel good, I'm not showing up as my best self in professional and personal, in any of the aspects of my life. So it's taken me a long time to get here. And when you and I talked about talking about this, I'm so passionate because I want other people to know. The sooner you really get yourself in that spot where you feel great with what you're eating and you feel great with what you're doing physically from a fitness perspective, that everything can fall into place, less stress, just things when you feel good about yourself, especially at an age where you thought was going to be this old woman on Golden Girls.
Gayle Kalvert (04:04):
I was just saying that to somebody. It's like the Golden Girls, I think were actually supposed to be 50 something, and if you look now they looked 80 something, like this is a little offensive. But yeah, let me pause you for a second. That's amazing, right? I'm going to be the voice of myself and probably a lot of other people there that can say a lot of great for me. There are a lot of great things about this age. I started my business at 44. I know much more about myself. I feel more confident in my abilities, a lot of great things. But I'll tell you, I absolutely am still prioritizing work. I'm prioritizing my kids, you know this, but I'll tell the listeners I don't work out. I do not work out. And that's something that, yeah, I would like to do. I have at times worked out and felt like it was really great, but again and again and again, it sort of just becomes something that like, yeah, I'd like to do that, but everything else is more important. That's for me. I would like to feel better, but I do have a million things to do. Is there anywhere you'd maybe recommend to start?
Megan Dimmer (05:13):
Yes. As you know, I coach a lot of women and the women who I coach are top performers, all of which are very similar to you and me. We're in the hustle is a constant way of life. I had this conversation on a regular basis with my clients, and the reality is, as a human, you need to find things if you want to make them a habit that you enjoy. So if you said, Megan, you're going to go to the gym and work out by yourself, I would probably curl into the fetal position underneath my desk that I'm sitting at right now. I had to find things that make me happy, that bring me joy. To anyone who wants to prioritize fitness, try things out, carve out, start with 30 minutes, start with a one-hour class where it's Pilates or yoga, or if you like to punch things, go to a boxing.
Gayle Kalvert (06:14):
I do like the kickboxing portion of the working out.
Megan Dimmer (06:19):
And so once you find the thing, oftentimes it's the community that is at that studio. Sometimes you might find a kickboxing that you like, but you're like, I feel like an outsider. Everybody knows each other. Find another one. If you live in a place that has lots of options, find a different one. And what I have found over time is if I find something that I love, I'll stick to it. And others have experienced the same thing.
Gayle Kalvert (06:45):
One example I'll talk about, I hear this, I love to garden. That is actually exercise. I think too, people think, well, exercising means this one thing, it's orange theory or it's the trainer or it's this or that. And by getting out and doing things that are just, you're moving your body when it's springtime and I get to go out and work on work outside, that really drives me. That brings me a ton of joy. And I used to be embarrassed, like, oh, I like to garden. I mean, I'm almost 50 and I'm still embarrassed, like, oh, I like to garden. But it's like, fuck it. I like to garden. I like pretty flowers and that makes me really happy. So finding something that you like and it doesn't have to be what everybody else potentially is doing. Okay, I like that. Let's talk about the food thing.
Gayle Kalvert (07:34):
And Megan, I don't know if I can ever give up all the sweets. I, for me, I'm not a big snacker. People will comment to me like, oh, you don't work out and you're thin or whatever. But there are a lot of choices that people make that aren't always visible. I do try to make good choices and watch how much I'm eating, but everything in moderation is sort of my MO. And like I said, that works for me. Everybody's different. So how did you start cutting out and finding all the replacement for maybe the vices, what do we call it? All the stuff in the food that we should not be having?
Megan Dimmer (08:13):
Well, let me tell you, I didn't cut it out because I was trying to watch my weight. The things that I cut out of my diet were based on how I was feeling and looking.
Megan Dimmer (08:23):
I'm not saying that in how much I was weighing at the time. More so, sugar makes me angry. I wasn't correlating to how I was feeling with what I was eating. And when I stopped eating sugar, I felt so much better. So because I love it, it forced me and forced me, but I wanted to have something sweet. And so I started to do research and I was able to find things that were sweetened with things other than refined sugar and try them and say, oh, wow, I am not feeling this sort of angry feeling I was feeling. And then I realized that there was this sort of layer of bloat for me that came along with sugar that I didn't even realize. And so it's just that added little bonus of if I really wanted to, when it's Girl Scout Cookie season, don't think that when my kid has Girl Scout Cookies, I'm not really wanting to dive face first into Thin Mints, but I've found chocolate alternatives. And so that's what I would say is if someone's trying to cut something out, doing the research to find an alternative that's going to be healthier. I mean, so many people I feel like went down the path of cutting out gluten because it was a thing. And what they realized, and I included, it was a fad, I guess five years back, let's call it the calorie intake and the sodium intake of the gluten-free product was actually worse for me than the gluten, and I didn't need to be gluten-free. And so I think doing that research and really just becoming familiar with options and trying to avoid preservatives and all those things that are kind of stuck in the middle of the ingredients on things is just important to be aware of. Does that answer?
Gayle Kalvert (10:04):
Yeah. Yeah. I totally am with you. I make small changes too. I drink my coffee black. Some people can't have coffee without milk and sugar. That's okay. So I'm saying there are areas where maybe you can make changes that add up because no matter what, overhauling your diet or going from not working out to being the superstar with a personal trainer, it's not realistic. So yeah, start small. Okay. What else is going on for you now that is making you feel like, well, I just feel incredible. I'm 49 and I feel better than I did when I was 29. Is there anything else impacting that besides the food, the working out?
Megan Dimmer (10:48):
Yes. And it's this secret word menopause, right? First of all, why menopause? It didn't pause, it stopped. Let's just start there. It is taboo. It's something that I feel like people don't talk about. And the reality is it happened for me a couple years ago. I thought something was wrong. I was sweating a ton at nighttime, I'd sweat in the middle of a conversation, I'd be like, sweatshirt on, sweatshirt off, sweatshirt on, sweatshirt off, annoying. And the libido was garbage. And the whole just lifestyle, everything about life just felt soggy and off and hormonal. And I didn't have support from my doctor. Basically, you're too young, go home.
Gayle Kalvert (11:37):
Right? Because this was happening for you a few years ago, which is typically young. So yeah, people are thinking, or you might even be thinking it's something else.
Megan Dimmer (11:45):
But these symptoms, I mean, the reality is the interwebs are real. I can Google and figure out that, oh, what's happening to me is actually directly correlating. And I asked, could I be going through menopause? Could you test my hormones? And it was no. And so I didn't get the support I needed and it was bullshit, frankly. And so I went through menopause completely. Move to Arizona, get a new doctor who's forward thinking, who basically was like, let me test your hormones. And literally I had none. And she was like, oh, what way? You're all the way through menopause. And I was like, well, I guess I'm a better expert in this area of using the internet than I thought. So ChatGPT was like, yes, you have gone through menopause. So I will tell you that hormone replacement therapy has, and you and I have been in conversations with other people where I feel like people don't know, women don't know. It's still so taboo that people aren't talking about it. And the reality is it's easy. It's not crazy expensive, and within three weeks you are optimized, your hormones are optimized. I feel like a new human.
Gayle Kalvert (12:56):
It's a really good point. We are in a group of women and we were coaching someone who was having issues totally unrelated. You would think. You would never think, oh, maybe it's menopause, right? It's all these things. I think that's the hard part about being a woman. It's like, is it hormones? Is it because we're tired? Is it because we're just overburdened? There's so many things you can blame your symptoms on because there's been so little education and information about perimenopause and menopause that it was just not even on any of our radar. And then this person was like, oh my God, all of the issues that I thought I was just pissed off and being a bitch is actually something that can be treated like you said really quickly and easily. But I went to my GP and she actually told me she could not test me for my hormones. So we're not doctors here, but is this like a GP or did you go find a GYN literal bullshit?
Megan Dimmer (13:58):
That makes me angry because who has tested it? Both my OBGYN current, the last one that I told you about. So two plus I went to a biomed spa that I personally looked up the brand of hormone replacement therapy, which as an aside, you don't have to go through menopause to get hormone replacement therapy. They can optimize you even before perimenopause if perimenopause, if you need it. And you don't know you need it until you have your hormones tested. And by the way, I don't have it in front of me, but I will send to you what the panel is called and it's essentially estrogen. It is testosterone, and then there are a couple different indicators of how far you are through or in menopause. All of that can be run in one panel.
Gayle Kalvert (14:45):
Wow. Okay. I want to say again, we're not doctors, but we'll put the information in the show notes and everyone can take a look. But the fact that it was easy for you, because I think people can be fearful. Maybe they don't want to have testing or you go and happened to me. This was last week. The doctor literally told me that there was not a test she could take for this. So I think it's important we find this again and again in conversations no matter what the health issue is, it's like just because your doctor says no or it's not an issue, doesn't make that true. Go get another opinion.
Megan Dimmer (15:20):
What I've learned is when you have a balance, let's call it optimized testosterone, and I'm not a doctor, but I do know enough because I'm experiencing it, good things happen. Positive things happen in your body physically when you're optimized, like your muscle adjusts, your muscle mass. All of these things around having the energy to want to do the workout is directly related to feeling great chemically inside your body. And so I say that with a lot of, I would say there's background of conversations I've had with other women I know whose doctors don't want them to be on this form of hormone where they take a pill or they have cream or whatever the case is, but where they're feeling very different and much better in those areas where they have symptoms. And so to your point, don't take no for an answer.
Gayle Kalvert (16:19):
One of the things I love about you, we're the same way we're really open about life and everything that's going on with each other and everybody else. Midlife is there are a lot of transitions. I have aging parents, I'm raising kids. You're in the same situation you've been through divorce. That can seem like a lot, right? And I just see a lot of that on social media, sort of like woe is me or Woe is all of us because we're the sandwich generation. But I choose to look at things differently. I choose to find the positive. I think raising teenagers is one of the best experiences that I've had to date. I think it's only going to get better as they get older. It's awesome. My aging parents are giving me a lot more depth in my relationship with them. I'm more intentional with them. There's a lot of positive with that. When you're at this period of your life, how has that changed when you think about yourself as a 20 something, 30 something and now in our forties?
Megan Dimmer (17:24):
Relationships in general are deeper for me now. Like you were saying, my mom lives close to me now and the time I spend with her is amazing. And I'm finding same thing. There's such a gift in being able to spend that time. Also, I love raising a teenager, love watching him grow and getting him ready to launch. So last year of high school for mine and going to different colleges and helping him make some decisions about what his life is going to look like has been amazing. And I have always been a proponent of therapy. We've talked about this in the past. I think having resources in areas of our life that we are not subject matter experts is super helpful. I recently experienced EMDR, which is that eye movement desensitation, right?
Megan Dimmer (18:14):
And it has really helped me with relationships and sort of unknown trauma in my life. And so when I think about all the work that I've put into me and I think about if I'm giving advice to people, I think the biggest thing, male or female, if you have the means to invest in you and there are things that are coming up in life that really you can't seem to navigate on your own. I really think, at least for me, that that has helped me evolve far more than anything else I've experienced and has helped me get into a place of now I really know how to navigate relationships better than I probably had in the past, and I didn't know why until I uncovered it through a resource that's not me trying to Google it on the internet.
Gayle Kalvert (19:09):
Right? Yeah. You're the one who told me about EMD. Well, I'm seeing a lot of it everywhere. I see references to it, but I hadn't heard personally from anybody how it helped them and how it worked, and that's awesome. I think we keep saying there are different things that work for different people. One thing experience you and I both had in common was going to therapy where the therapist always telling you, you're doing great listening and maybe wanting to hear more about it was getting that recurring revenue and not necessarily pick and fixing the problem. So I think just like we're talking about doctors that you see for medical reasons, for your physical health, I would say the same about therapy is interview these therapists and really make sure that this is somebody who knows how to help in the area that you're looking for.
Gayle Kalvert (20:03):
‘Cause like anything, right, depending on what you're going to therapy for, you need somebody with maybe a different kind of expertise or you might be seeing somebody who was great and now your needs change and you need a little different perspective. I think that was something I learned just because when I started therapy, for me it was postpartum depression and I was in crisis mode and I just needed help. And so you go, right? You don't always have that ability or perspective and going, if I look back, that would've been helpful for me to have gone sooner and to have sort of done a little more homework to see if the person or people that I was talking to were going to be able to help and listen and give you actionable advice. Very important. So one of the coolest things for me is, like I said, I started my business when I was 44. I really wish I had done this earlier because I love it so much, but I think I personally really needed those 20 years of experiences to be in a place where I was ready to do this. You've been out on your own for a pretty long time. How did you decide to go from the corporate sales climbing the ladder you were doing amazingly well to taking that leap to leave and go out on your own?
Megan Dimmer (21:28):
I wouldn't say that I necessarily made the decision to go out on my own because I had the, let's call it courage. It was more I had achieved my career goal. I became CEO of the largest department design firm in the world, and it was a big deal job, and for lots of reasons that ended. I had done the I've arrived stamp, I had done the, I've achieved my career goal, checked that box, and I needed to come to terms with how to disassociate my identity from those two things because I'd done those things and I was no longer when I left, I was no longer the CEO of this industry leader and I was no longer, I mean, I had achieved the goal, but I wasn't still sitting in the seat of what my goal was. So I actually did a deep one year leadership program where I was surrounded by others who essentially became accountability partners.
Megan Dimmer (22:40):
It was led by a chair who at the time had been my executive coach for a number of years, and that helped me to really understand Megan for who Megan is versus Megan as this worker, Megan, the CEO, Megan, trying to achieve the thing. I really needed to figure out who the hell I was because I had been so focused on work for so many years and climbing the ladder and figuring out what's next, what's next. In order to get me to that goal of becoming CEO, I literally had to figure out who I was and to not keep saying, I'm Megan, I'm the CEO, I'm Megan, I am executive tech sales leader, but I'm Megan Dimmer. The next step was, okay, I'm Megan Dimmer, separated from this title and this job now what motivates me now that I can separate myself? And so I would say that's where sort of branding myself as Megan Dimmer started just as this is who I am and my authenticity started to start really coming out and shiny because this is who I am.
Megan Dimmer (23:54):
Then I said, what motivates me and what motivated me and inspired me was helping others, particularly helping women to achieve greatness personally and professionally, which is when the executive coaching started, and I say coaching women because I believe shared experience, at least for me, has been key when other women are experiencing the same things or when other women want to become something, move up the corporate ladder or make a change. I've done those things and so it's easier for me to coach them, and I think it's easier for them to really resonate with them. The other piece of it for me was I've spent this whole career growing businesses from Fortune 500 to the architecture firm. I'm really good at it and I like it. So that's when I decided that I want to be a fractional in-house growth expert for people. And I've done that in multiple organizations, which is when I met you and I love it. And so I wouldn't say that defines me. I think all of the things we've talked about have really are part of me, and now I have this career that makes me happy. My glass is filled and I can step away from it when I'm not working. And I don't need to think that's me. That's all of me. And I find other women are in similar situations. When you're a high performer, you associate with the job and with the title. And the reality is we're so much more beautiful than that.
Gayle Kalvert (25:32):
A hundred percent we're more complicated. And that I think you're summing up what that evolution to middle age or whatever, the forties and fifties and why so many women say, this is the best time of my life so far because I relate to that where I don't feel like having success in one area is my job anymore. For me, it was getting ahead in the corporate world. Now, I very much look at my life as on a whole like you, and does what I'm doing every day from a career work perspective, does it motivate me? Do I like it? Am I good at it? Is it bringing me joy? And then you're bringing that to other parts of your life and they're all equally important. I think that that is really helpful. And I see a lot of women in their twenties and thirties that struggle with that.
Gayle Kalvert (26:27):
How do you have boundaries with work and have time for other things in your life? And it is nice that at some point it sort of all starts to come together. But I think starting earlier is better than just kind of pounding the pavement and trying to really have success in one area of your life, and then I'll get to the other stuff later instead. Trying to be a little more balanced about all the things in your life that make you happy. So when you look ahead, what are you most excited about now for as we hit 50 and beyond?
Megan Dimmer (27:05):
Continuing with all of the optimization and balance that I've found and achieved, and to your point, I wish I would've found it sooner. And I think that there are a lot of things like resources. We probably didn't have the same resources done that we have now. Certainly in the nineties and early two thousands, a lot of the things we're talking about, there was such a stigma in the fact that it's a gift that now it's not a stigma, and we can talk about it out loud. I also think, Gayle, that, and I'll say this, you and I have talked in the past about not necessarily feeling like we could be our authentic selves when we were working in these super male dominated sort of staunch conservative atmospheres. And I would say the best way to put it now is not giving a whole lot of fucks. Do you know this whole no fucks given idea? I love humans. So I would say it's not no fucks given, and I definitely want people to want to be around me, but I think it's a lot easier to come out and talk about these things when you're not worried about your corporate boss or someone hearing you or seeing you. If someone like us would've been there for us when we were younger in our younger years saying, here's just a couple of tips and tricks, how it could have helped.
Gayle Kalvert (28:34):
Yeah, hopefully that's exactly what we're doing right now is trying to be real. Because if you look at your LinkedIn or my LinkedIn, you might think, oh my God, how are they doing this? I get that question. How are you doing all these things? But there are of course areas where we've struggled or we are struggling now, and knowing that that's normal is I think really, really important. That's been a huge benefit for me of social media and technology that you're able to get that information and sort of demystify.
Megan Dimmer (29:08):
Totally. And I am going to plug your podcast for a minute. I get the chills when I hear you say Work in Progress because it rings true. We don't have it all figured out. We are still a work in progress. We're humans. We will always be a work in progress. But to have a friend like you, to have a community also that to lean on is everything. And I encourage everyone out there to find a tribe, to find a community. This one is a great start where you're not alone. We don't have it all figured out, but other people have done the things too. And so to know and be able to lean on others and say, okay, this at least is a start. That's how you can get to the point where you can have balance and where you can start to feel good in all areas of your life. And frankly, I look at the future and I say, I want to be wearing my two piece swimsuit, which I wore on my birthday, by the way, a new Barbie pink sparkly one. To be able to do that going into our future, do it proudly. There's something to be said from that.
Gayle Kalvert (30:23):
100%, like, lean in, ladies. Lean in. Right. Just enjoy it, for sure. Okay, let's have some quick fun questions. Coffee or tea?
Megan Dimmer (30:33):
Oh, girl. Tea all day long.
Gayle Kalvert (30:36):
That's tea?
Megan Dimmer (30:38):
I do. I’m like a Brit. I do tea with oat milk.
Gayle Kalvert (30:42):
If you go back home to Michigan, the freezing cold.
Megan Dimmer (30:45):
I only go back to Michigan in the summer and to see friends. My family isn't there anymore.
Gayle Kalvert (30:50):
Okay, so you're just excluding cold weather from your life. I feel that. I can't wait. I'm in New York. I can't wait to exclude cold weather from my life one day. Totally. What's your guilty pleasure? I know you have a lot. Give me one.
Megan Dimmer (31:04):
Red, Red Wine.
Gayle Kalvert (31:`0):
So many people sing on this show. I love it. Okay, what's on your hype list right now? What's your happy song?
Megan Dimmer (31:18):
My happy song depends on the day, right? So when I was pre-partying for my birthday, I had the whole Rihanna mix on.
Gayle Kalvert (31:25):
Do you have an app that's saving your life right now?
Megan Dimmer (31:28):
I love it and I hate it. I think IG is always my favorite app, frankly. I'm an Instagram girl. I am going to go on the record and say, I'm not loving LinkedIn anymore. So I try to avoid it.
Gayle Kalvert (31:41):
I understand. My LinkedIn algorithm is a work in progress. We need to spice it up, and that is what we're trying to do here. Megan, we're going to put...
Megan Dimmer (31:51):
It's so boring.
Gayle Kalvert (31:53):
But we're going to spice it up. We're going to get this show into people's algorithms on LinkedIn. Who's excited? I want to hear from you. So that's a perfect segue to if there are topics that anyone listening right now wants to hear Megan and I talk about, or you want to hear a guest talk about, DM us, let us know. Where can people find you, Megan?
Megan Dimmer (32:15):
Megan@megandimmer.com.
Gayle Kalvert (32:18):
If you want to email her.
Megan Dimmer (32:19):
And my website is megandimmer.com.
Gayle Kalvert (32:22):
Okay. Keep it simple.
Megan Dimmer (32:23):
And if you want to find me on LinkedIn, I'm Megan Dimmer.
Gayle Kalvert (32:28):
All right. I am picking up the theme. You can find Megan Dimmer anywhere. There is a Megan Dimmer alias. They got you. Okay. And we're going to put it in the show notes. Megan, this is awesome. You're clearly coming back, so I hope we get lots of messages from people on what else they would like to know about Megan and Gayle, and what other embarrassing stories do we have. Maybe we can share some someday.
Megan Dimmer (32:51):
If they’re lucky.
Gayle Kalvert (32:52):
Yeah, we have a few. Okay. I love you. Thank you so much. Thank you everybody for listening.
Megan Dimmer (32:58):
I love you too.
Gayle Kalvert (32:59):
I hope that was helpful. If you know someone that you go to for this topic, send them my way. After all, we're just figuring this out together. See you next time.