The Hum You Mistake for ‘Just Life’: Perimenopause, Breath and the Pace You Live In

If you’ve ever sat down at the end of the day, taken a breath, and felt… uncomfortable, then you probably know the feeling I’m about to describe.

There’s this hum.
Not a sound. A feeling, like a buzz under the skin that keeps going even when everything around you has finally gone quiet.

I know this hum well. I lived inside it for years.

Most women describe the hum in different ways:

“I can’t switch off.”
“My body feels restless.”
“I feel like I’m supposed to be doing something.”

It’s not panic. It’s not exhaustion.
It’s not a dramatic stress episode.

It’s anticipation. A body living a few seconds ahead of the moment it’s actually in.

The Pace That Creeps Up Without Permission

At some point, often around early motherhood, life picks up speed. You don’t notice it at first. You’re in survival mode. Everything is quick because it has to be quick.

And slowly, the pace becomes a personality.

The way you eat.
The way you talk.
The way you scroll.
Even the way you breathe.

By the time your kids are older, the logistics calm down....but your body doesn’t. Stillness feels itchy. Quiet feels like a gap you need to fill. And the hum, that low-grade readiness, becomes the baseline.

It’s not that you can’t relax.
It’s that your body can’t recognise what “relaxed” feels like anymore.

The Nervous System Version of This Story

You were never designed to live in ongoing anticipation.

Your nervous system is brilliant, but it’s ancient.

Yes, our ancestors faced real dangers: predators, hunger, harsh weather. Stress came in sharp bursts. Then it ended. Their systems reset.

We don’t get that ending anymore.
Our threats are subtle and constant:

Emails.
Notifications.
Responsibility.
Multitasking.
Overthinking.
Over-doing.

None of these look life-threatening, but your nervous system doesn’t care.

Adrenaline doesn’t check context.

So the hum lingers. The loop never closes.

And your body gets stuck halfway between “prepared” and “safe,” never fully arriving at either.

The Ayurvedic Lens (Vata and the Modern Woman)

Ayurveda has its own way of explaining this hum.
Vata, the element of wind, governs movement, speed, and stimulation.

In balance, it gives creativity, clarity and lightness.
In overdrive, it looks like:

• talking too fast
• irritation over tiny things
• five tabs open in the mind
• eating fast or mindlessly
• wired at night, foggy in the morning

You don’t have to be a “Vata type” for this to happen.
Modern life is Vata dominant.
Perimenopause is when the cracks start to show.

Perimenopause: The Amplifier, Not the Cause

By your late thirties or forties, your hormones become more responsive to the life you’re living.

Progesterone, your calming hormone, starts to decline.
Estrogen becomes more unpredictable.
Sleep gets lighter.
Blood sugar becomes fussier.

Yes, hormones shift. But the nervous system shifts first.

Your hormones aren’t the root cause of the hum. They’re the amplifier.
Perimenopause simply magnifies whatever pattern you’ve been living in for years.

So when we say: “It’s just my hormones,” we’re missing the whole picture.

This is why the usual midlife advice - eat cleaner, lift heavier, fast smarter, cycle sync, take supplements, track everything often lands on a system that isn’t ready to receive it.

You can’t optimise a body that’s still stuck in survival mode.

Why Deep Breathing Doesn’t Help Either

Now you are in the thick of perimenopause with your system in overdrive, and suddenly everyone tells you to “regulate your nervous system.”

So you try the usual things like yoga, breathwork, a calming video on YouTube.

You’re told to “breathe deeply from your diaphragm,” so you give it a go.

A big inhale.
Chest lifts.
Jaw tightens.
Shoulders creep up.
You breathe out through your mouth because someone, somewhere, once said that’s how you’re meant to do it.

But nothing shifts and you still feel exactly the same.

Frustrated, you decide breathing “doesn’t work” for you.
And you’re absolutely right, that kind of breathing won’t.

Here’s why:

When your system is already overstimulated, “deep breathing” turns into forced breathing:

Big inhale.
Chest expanding.
Neck bracing.
Exhale pushed out.

Physiologically, that type of breath:

• drops CO₂ too quickly
• tightens your blood vessels
• increases heart rate
• signals the brain to stay alert

That’s not calming. That’s still bracing.

So when women say to me in class,
“I try to breathe deeply but it makes me feel worse,”
I’m never surprised.

Because it’s not you.
It’s the method.

Your body isn’t asking for big breath.
It’s asking for soft breath.

The Foundation: Soft, Natural, Quiet Breathing

(What I learned through yoga, and what every woman needs to relearn)

In traditional yoga, we were never taught to breathe big.
We were taught to breathe naturally.

Quietly.
Through the nose.
With softness, not effort.

This is the kind of breath the nervous system recognises as safety.

Here are the real guidelines:

• breathe through your nose
• keep the breath quiet
• inhale softly, no dramatic inhales
• exhale slower than you think
• soften the jaw, chest, and belly first
• let the breath be subtle
• feel the tiny pause after each exhale
• don’t chase “deep”, chase “comfortable”

This is the breath that tells your body:
“You’re safe. You can stop bracing.”

Not effort. Not performance.
Softness.

Where to Start (Tiny and Practical)

You don’t need a protocol, perfect routines or the ‘right’ time.
Just small, doable shifts:

1. Notice the hum without trying to silence it.
Awareness alone down-regulates.

2. Loosen the body first.
Unclench your jaw. Soften the belly. Relax the neck.

3. Replace deep breaths with quiet breaths.
Soft in. Softer out. Only breathe as much as you can without force or strain. You can lengthen the breath slightly, but only if it still feels natural and comfortable.

4. Look for the pause.
That tiny moment after the exhale is where your nervous system relearns safety.

5. Practice for one minute at a time.
Not to become calm but to remind your body what calm feels like.

A Different Kind of Ending

Years ago, somewhere between raising toddlers, rushing through days, and living in my own hum, I came across a line that changed everything:

“If you’re always running to the next thing, what happens to the moment you’re in?”

That was the beginning of my shift.
Not a dramatic life overhaul.
Just tiny decisions toward less noise, less speed, less stimulation.

I still feel the hum at times because life, right?
But the difference now is that my body doesn’t live there anymore.
And I want women to know that this shift is possible.

This is why I teach breath the way I do in my classes.
This is why I start with softness, not performance.
This is why I don’t push deep breathing onto bodies that are already overwhelmed.

Because once the nervous system finally learns safety,
your hormones, your energy, your focus, your digestion…
everything starts to work the way it’s meant to.

The hum quiets.
The body exhales.
You come back home to yourself.

Softness is the medicine.
Everything else grows from there.