I hit menopause, posted a naked photo of myself and stopped caring about other people’s opinions

Podcaster and motivational speaker Lu Featherstone, 54, lives in South London with her partner. Her son, Oska, is 21.

I’ve always been told I am too much. “Tone it down, Louisa,” they say. For decades I tried to be the nice girl, seen and not heard. Yet at the age of 47, in a moment of impulsive madness, I took a picture of my naked, middle-aged backside at the top of a volcano. And it changed everything.

I didn’t realise it then, but I was just on the brink of menopause . That photograph was me screaming with frustration at the world and at my husband: “Look at me – I’m here”.

Often, all we hear about the menopause is that it’s an anxiety-ridden time when your libido drops off a cliff . Mine wasn’t all fun, either – it was often confusing and rageful. But what it also did was her