💌 Don’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe for weekly reflections and conversations on midlife reinvention.

#queenagers #inspiration

Subscribe to the email version of the Queenager newsletter at NOON.org.uk or watch the video on our YouTube channel.

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✨ In this newsletter:

* The rise of the term NER (Not Employed or Retired) and the reality for midlife women * Why women often power up in midlife while men may struggle

* A powerful mindset shift: from climbing ladders → to living on a “lily pond”

* The healing power of nature, stillness, and community

* Downsizing (or “right-sizing”) and redefining success, purpose, and freedom

* Why endings in midlife often hold the seeds of new beginnings

💬 This is a conversation about real change—redundancy, menopause, divorce, reinvention—and how these transitions can open the door to becoming who you truly want to be.

🌱 “In midlife, what falls away creates space for something new to grow.”

👉 If you’re navigating change or craving inspiration, you’re not alone. Join the Queenager community and discover what’s possible in your next chapter.

📅 Join us in person: We still have a few spots left for our One Day Wasing Retreat (April 24th) – come connect, reset, and recharge.

💌 Don’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe for weekly reflections and conversations on midlife reinvention.

#queenagers #inspiration

Subscribe to the email version of the Queenager newsletter at NOON.org.uk or watch the video on our YouTube channel.

Check out NOON.org.uk

#queenagers #inspiration

Subscribe to the email version of the Queenager newsletter at NOON.org.uk or watch the video on our YouTube channel.

Subscribe to the email version of this newsletter on www.noon.org.uk. You can also see the video version on YouTube.

She also shares her tips on what to do if you’ve just been made redundant.

#queenagers #midlifecareers

Subscribe to the email version of the Queenager newsletter at NOON.org.uk or watch the video on our YouTube channel.

In my view, um, if you’d like to read the, uh, newsletter, rather than have me read it to you here, then go to noon.org.uk and sign up and then it’ll be sent to you directly rather than through Substack. What we do on Substack here is to, um, read it out. ‘cause some of you say you like to hear it being listened to you, but I know some of you would actually rather read it.

So in which case, go to noon.org uk. Um, so here we are. This is my Queenager newsletter for February the 22nd, and it’s the Tale of three, um, Queenager heroes of mine, really? Antonio Romeo, who was made, um, the Chief Cabinet Secretary, first woman ever this week. Gisèle Pelicot, um, who you all know about. And Samantha Cameron.

So here it goes.

Dear Queenagers, I hope you’ve had a good week. I found myself. Unexpectedly moved by “Wuthering Heights”, uh, which I saw just the other night, which was our noon pro outing this week. It was so beautiful. Sumptuous costumes, incredible landscapes, such a powerful love story. And who could argue with Margot Robbie, Martin Clunes and the chap tipped to be the next James Bond, Jacob Elordi is Heathcliff.

The film has had some damning reviews, but we all liked it. We sat in a row at the Soho Picturehouse and I thought it was gonna be a bit 50 Shades of Grey, but it really wasn’t. And actually I love Emerald Fennell. I thought it was beautifully directed. So yes, it’s kind of based on Weathering Heights, the novel rather than totally faithful to the plot.

But you know, a bit of artistic license is a good thing. The cinema was full of women, lots of them Queenagers, and I suppose that’s not really that surprising. Men like Marvel and football, my husband’s downstairs listening to the cricket. Why shouldn’t we enjoy two and a half year hours of pure escapist, romance and beauty in the Yorkshire Dales?

And in terms of Ste as Seediness. Our view was it was a lot less embarrassing than Bridgerton, and I watched “Wuthering Heights” with my 82-year-old mother. She was there as one of the party. I actually thought it was really beautiful. So do go.

I want to write this week about three amazing Queenagers, Samantha, Cameron, Dame Antonia Romeo, and Gisèle Pelicot.

Um, I had to say that, and the highlight of my week, other than Wuthering Heights was going to the closing clearance sample sale of one of my favorite clothes brands, Cefinn. I never know how to pronounce it. And it was set up by Samantha Cameron, wife of, you know, that David Cameron, who used to be also the creative director of, um,  Smythson  and Cefinn was her Queenager dream.

I first came across Cefinn as a label, a clothes label when I was photographed by The Daily Mail. They serialised my book and they, um, they put me, um. They gave me a kind of sheet, um, from The Mail to, uh, publicise it. Now, for those of you who’ve never done a kind of professional photo sheet, it is really weird.

They give, they give you a kind of wind machine to make your hair look tussled. There was a crew of hair and makeup people to kind of try and make you look pets and a rack of clothes. Most of which were really not my cup of tea. The newspapers have a kind of particular look for their case studies, so they put everybody into those horrid color block kind of, um, frock dresses, very kind of Fox News reader.

There were, there was a lot of Boden and a lot of things I don’t really wear on the rail, um, because, you know. All the papers want to make you look like someone that their readers could relate to. They hated my green nails. They said the readers wouldn’t like them. But on the, on the rail, the best thing I saw there was a rather beautiful blue silk dress, um, which I put on.

It was Cefinn, which I kind of knew about a Sam Cam’s label, but I had never really worn, and I was just super impressed by it. Blue. It hung beautifully. It was super flattering. It was made out of the most lovely silk, I have to say. I liked it so much that I went out and bought it, bought a version of it in my favorite green to wear to my daughter’s graduation.

And after that I decided that I would have a look at Cefinn. because I do quite a lot of public speaking and things, so I need some smart clothes sometimes. And I started going to their sample sales because they’re quite expensive. And what I found on Wednesday was that I’m really not the only Queenager who loves

 Sam Cam’s  designs. I got to Bond Street to the final sale ‘cause she’s shutting the label down. And I got there at like 12:55. It was starting at 1pm and the queue was round the block. We had to queue for 45 minutes just to get in, during which I chatted to loads of the Queenagers around me. One had come all the way from Devon and she was saying she just loved the s and clothes because they made her feel so elegant and confident and it was really sweet. All around us. Women were wearing, um, their things from the label. This is actually a Cefinn shirt. There’s a lady wearing a sweater dress from last year. Lots of her trademark sleeveless jumpers. I’ve got three. I had say I’ve got a navy, black and a cream.

I just find her clothes super wearable. And the sample sale was great. I got a long leather skirt for £30 reduced from £400 and an amazing sequin party dress. Green, um, which I was actually zipped into by Sam Cam herself. She was there overseeing what must have been one of the push jumble sails in history.

It was a huge room with full of Queenagers, kind of in tights, all their bare legs trying on silk dresses and velvet trousers, party frocks, day dresses, all desperate to nab a bargain because everything had to go. But what was really interesting was they thought they’d do it over two days and it was so popular that everything had sold out within about two hours.

And I sat down and chatted to Sam about why she was closing down and said to her how proud she should feel. Because all those women there obviously so loved what she’d done and how she made them feel. And I really asked her why it was that she’d set, she’d shut. She was shutting it down because she’s an incredible Queenager.

And so I really wanted to know, you know, this was her Queenagers dream, this business. So I wondered why she was she was shutting down, I mean. Probably the economics of the business weren’t really working, but she said that it was stressful and exhausting and that she really needed a break and that she just wasn’t really sure that she could go on doing it for another five years.

She said how happy she was to have fulfilled her dream of running this business. She’d always wanted to own her own fashion label ever since she was a girl. And she was almost teary actually about how much the ladies loved what she’d done and how they made her feel. Um, and. You know, I just said to her, your clothes really are magic and you’ve done something amazing.

Because she was a rare fashion designer who truly saw midlife women like us. She loves us and she really wants us to feel good about ourselves in her clothes. I gave her a hug, you know, we know each other a bit from my former life. I once profiled her for the Sunday Times Magazine, um, and I’ve always been a big admirer of her.

I think it’s jolly hard to have such a successful husband and a very successful entrepreneur mother. I said I thought she should feel really proud of what she’d created and the pleasure that she’d spread. You know, and I really love a Queenagers who goes for her dream, particularly when it’s an entrepreneurial one.

And there really is another equally important lesson here, which is it’s also really important to know when to quit, when to know when our passion or the thing that the dream that we had is no longer serving us. You know, like many of us, Sam has had her own midlife collision. She said she got a kid doing GSCEs.

Uh, David Cameron’s, um, very publicly had prostate cancer. She was running a big business in a very tricky market. Fashion’s really polarized at the moment so that the very luxury stuff is profitable and the very cheap kind of sheen stuff, but in the middle, lots of, lots of good brands are going out of business, which is just such a shame because something like someone like Cam and Cefinn really did see midlife women. Um, it’s funny, when I wear Cefinn, I always feel kind of cool and comfortable and on top of my game. They’re made, the, the material, the material that she uses is fantastic. It’s never sweaty and they really last, I’ll be wearing them for years. So I really hope Sam enjoys her sabbatical.

She’s a grafter, so I know this won’t be her last throw of the dice. But also well done her for creating such an amazing and much loved label and also knowing when to stop. And it must have been really hard to throw in the towel so publicly, but I think she should feel really proud.

Another Queenager in the news this week, and actually another one I know was Dame Antonia Romeo, who’s been made, um, appointed the first ever woman to be Cabinet Secretary in 110 years.

Now. That really is quite a moment. Hooray. I wrote a column about it in The Telegraph. There’s a gift link at the bottom of here, um, about, you know, how her appointment is partly an attempt by Starmer to stop the, uh, kind of boys club inside Number 10 and to bring in some more women. And he’s been under a lot of pressure from the kind of parliamentary Labour Party to do that.

But I also was really struck by the incredible misogyny around Romeo’s appointment. Before she was even, before she was even, um, she announced in the job, there was an absolutely horrid kind of smear campaign by all the kind of men at the top of the civil service who obviously didn’t want her to get the job.

They dug out an ancient investigation, um, into her expenses when she was the Consul General in New York, back in about 2017, and accused her of bullying. Which was a charge, which had been thoroughly looked into and found to be totally groundless at the time. And, you know, we’ve all worked with bullies, which is horrible, but that’s not Antonia.

So it made me really think about the double standard around ambition for women. You know, Antonia is ambitious. She’s super bright, she’s hilarious. She’s definitely got an eye on the prize, you know, full disclosure, she’s a bit of a mate. We both went to Westminster as girls in the Sixth Form, which I have to say I think was a great preparation for dealing with the male British establishment.

We really learned to see them look them in the eye and know how to deal with them as a teenage girl. And then she also went to Brasenose College, Oxford, like me. She’s always been hyper ambitious, but I think that a, a very ambitious and successful man would never face the obstacles that she did. She was really bitched about for liking designer dresses.

I mean, why shouldn’t you have a nice frock if you are a successful woman? She had an expensive watch and all sorts of people had a go at her for wearing a Rolex. Or something equivalent. Whereas I’ve never seen a man attacked for having an expensive watch. And when she left, um, her colleagues mocked up a picture of her on the cover of Vogue because she’s such a fashionista.

She absolutely loves her fashion. And again, she was really, really attacked for that. So I just think that there’s a real double standard around women in the public eye as opposed to men. And also there were all these men kind of saying, oh, she should be looked at for kind of, you know, her kind of behavioral style, which I think is just because they’re not used to women being forceful.

One of the ministers that she’d worked, worked with said how good she was always. Kind of standing up for him, even if she put other people’s noses a bit out of joint. And if we’re gonna be successful in the world, you can’t always be pleasing. And there’s a real contrast there between I think, how men are seen and how women are seen.

So I, I really kind of congratulate Antonia for having got to that point and forgetting the job. And she, I know she’s been wanting it for a long time, and also it’s incredible that in 2026, she’s the first one. I mean, that really is a huge achievement. Anyway, if you’d like to read the column I wrote for it in The Telegraph, which I’m proud to say was puffed on the front page, um, it’s free here on the gift link [Editor’s note: Gift link is available in the free email newsletter for subscribers].

And my final, incredible Queenager of the week is Gisèle Pelicot. If you haven’t seen the interview that she did with Victoria Derbyshire on Newsnight, I really, really would recommend that you did. I thought it might be quite grim actually. It wasn’t grim at all. It was incredibly inspiring about her. I love her line about how shame should change sides, that it’s the men who should be feeling shame because of what they did.

You know, this is the woman who was raped by her husband and all sorts of people while she was asleep, and she was also, uh, she was incredibly impressive in terms of her bravery, her composure, and her lack of bitterness.

There’s a wonderful part of the interview when she’s shown a series of vox pops with French women talking about how the, the impact that she’s had. How her taking the stand is emboldened women everywhere to call out sexual abuse. If you haven’t watched the interview yet, please do. She truly is an icon.

I think this is how we begin to turn the tide on sexual violence against women with firmness, with dignity, with putting the blame back where it belongs on the perpetrators. And it’s a really, I think it’s really important that the rest of us as women. It kind of support her, you know, we should, we should watch that interview.

We should really take on board what she says because she’s right that it’s only through putting the shame on the men and through being kind of, you know, dignified and kind of grown up about how we talk about it, that we begin to change this narrative. And I think that people will look back at this point as a really important pivot in the way that we think about sexual violence.

The other book I’m reading at the moment is Virgina Guiffre’s memoir, which I have to say is quite a tough read. But again, if she could, if she could go through all of that ghastliness of the hands of Epstein and the others around him, it’s a really important portrait of that world, then we should be able to steal ourselves to actually read her book.

I really recommend, and I think it’s important that we do, but anyway, um. Another more positive news if you’d like to come along to a noon thing. We’ve launched, um, we launched our trip to Luxor last week. We’ve already sold 15 places. There’s only 20 on the trip, so if you wanna come, really do get on with that NOON.org.uk for the details.

And we’ve also got a whole load of March and. I’m doing a circle in London next week, which I think is sold out, but there are a whole load of March Circles if you’d like to come along. And the other thing is we’ve got, um, two Wasing retreats this summer. That’s where we go to the incredible Wasing estate in Berkshire.

It’s just near Reading off the M4 and we have the run of their 3000 acres of this most beautiful estate. It’s a wonderful lake with a sauna. We do lunch, we do yoga, we go for a walk through the woods. We all sit in the sauna. It’s really good fun. Lots of laughs, always. And lovely Leslie, who I used to work with, comes and does the yoga and we just really have a fa fantastic day.

So if that, if you’re, if you’ve been thinking about coming along to a NOON thing, and weren’t sure what to do, or don’t fancy a Circle, or, you know, can’t spend a whole week doing a trip, coming onto a Wasing retreats just one day. It’s not expensive, and that would give you a real sense of what we’re trying to do here.

So have a wonderful week. Thank you so much for spending this time with me this morning. I really appreciate it and I look forward to, um, seeing some of you at anything soon. Take care and remember if you really like, if you’d rather, um, read these in future, you wanna hear about us at NOON, it’s www dot noon as in the middle of the day, dot org uk.

And I’m Eleanor Mills. Thanks. Bye.

Wonder what the secret is to a happy life? Eleanor’s beloved stepfather shared his view on the subject. In this newsletter she celebrates stepparents, reveals what happened at our first Essex NOON Circle and shares details of awesome events coming up.

Eleanor Mills presents her signature newsletter for midlife women from Sunday 8 February 2026.

In addition to Epstein’s victims, Eleanor highlights how Mandelson’s appointment as ambassador to Washington required the removal of a seasoned and successful Queenager – and discusses what this means for all of us.

Watch or listen to experience the most influential newsletter for Queenagers in the UK. Subscribe to The Queenager newsletter here or sign up to the email version here: https://noon.org.uk/newsletter/

What do you think about Mandelson’s appointment as ambassador? Is it emblematic of the ways that qualified women are pushed aside by the old boys’ club in general?

Let us know in the comments!

#queenagers #midlifetravel

Eleanor Mills reads her signature newsletter from Sunday 25 January 2026 for midlife women aloud on video.

Watch or listen to experience the most influential newsletter for Queenagers in the UK. Subscribe to The Queenager newsletter here on YouTube and sign up to the email version here: https://noon.org.uk/newsletter/

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In this companion episode to The Queenager Podcast, host Eleanor Mills and coach Wendy Lloyd discuss the biggest takeaways from our guest Laura Tenison, founder of Jojo Maman Bébé and now owner of an amazing Welsh farmstead and retreat.

Check out Laura’s inspirational takeaways to help you can take action and make positive change in your life.

Eleanor Mills is the founder of NOON, the UK’s leading network for midlife women. She’s also author of the bestselling book Much More to Come.

Wendy Lloyd is a Women’s Centred transformational coach. To find out how Wendy can support you through your midlife reinvention, visit www.dramafreeyou.com and book a FREE 30 minute coaching call.

Eleanor Mills sits down with Laura Tenison, MBE, who founded the enormously popular maternity and baby retailer JoJo Maman Bébé. Now she’s sold the business and begun running wellness retreats in her native Wales, with a focus on nature and wellbeing.

In her first interview since selling the business, Laura reveals the top lessons she’s learned as an entrepreneur, how to think about risk and her beautifully created retreat (and home of the NOON Wales Wern-y-Cwm getaway).

This classic Queenager Podcast episode was originally aired 1 August 2024.

This is the kind of ‘calling in’ that will actually produce results. I have a couple of case studies as well as inspo for putting Plan-ifesting in place for yourself.

Let me know what you think!

x

Eleanor

Hope your freezing February Monday isn’t too grim! I just got back to grey London from sunny Devon, hard to believe that only 24 hours I was swimming in the River Dart in the sunshine (yes here is the proof!).

I’m writing you a little extra newsletter because I would really like your help… it is over three years since I set up NOON and became an entrepreneur at 50. It’s been quite the ride – I’d never run a business before and it took a while to get to grips with Stripe and Streamyard, Xero etc and to try and work out what I was doing. BUT it has also been probably the BEST thing I have ever done; I love the autonomy, the community we are co-creating together and the amazing sense that every thing is possible. Having worked for one of the biggest companies in the world for nearly a quarter of a century, I also love the liberation of being able to make decisions without running them past loads of sub-committees. And of course I love my wonderful NOON team. New research from the US shows that older entrepreneurs are twice as successful as younger ones (our grey hair is good for something) and UK research shows that women entrepreneurs are a better bet in terms of hitting their targets, being realistic about growth etc.. in fact in 2023 women aged 45 to 60 made up 69% of all business owners. I’m not surprised, being your own boss brings flexibility (16 times more important to Queenagers than status according to our research) Purpose (crucial, we want to make the time we’ve got left count) and autonomy (v important to Queenagers in our NOON research). So I want to encourage MORE women to take the plunge and start their own businesses, not least because us Queenagers are behind over 90 per cent of all household spending decisions yet appear in less than 10 per cent of adverts… our research shows that midlife women would be 68% MORE likely to buy from a brand that represents them authentically, which a Queenager Founder is much more likely to do. There is huge potential here because the mainstream generally ignore us. So that is why I am sending around a NOON survey, all about becoming a midlife entrepreneur. It’s not just for women who are doing it, but for those who are thinking about it too… if that’s you, please fill it in. And if that’s not you, maybe you know a woman who it would apply to. This is all about supporting each other; we’re trying to work out the barriers to entrepreneurship and the opportunities so we can get more money invested in midlife women (only 2% of Venture Capital goes to women… yes you read that right, not 2% goes to older women, but 2% globally goes to ALL women). This has to change.. this survey will be used to lobby to make the case. Our current government is desperate for growth and if women started and scaled businesses in the UK at the same rate as men we’d boost the economy by a huge £250 billion according to the Rose Review. So let’s help Queenagers help themselves – please fill in our survey!

Dear Queenagers

As a recovering hack, I find weeks when there are huge news stories challenging. There’s a bit of me that longs to be back in the adrenaline-fuelled post-news-conference meeting where the real decisions were taken. I loved ‘the knowing’ – that sense of being at the heart of the first draft of history.

Watching President Trump take power; seeing him sign orders intended to remove the USA from everything from the Paris Climate Accords, to the World Health Organisation; ditching Diversity Equity and Inclusion and (worst) saying he will expel anyone who is in the country illegally (even if they have been there for 30 years) was quite a thing.

Most notable to me is how quickly the media world in particular is shifting towards his agenda. The Tech Bros can smell the money; cash for missions to Mars (Elon Musk), more power and influence for a Facebook with no fact checkers (Mark Zuckerberg). Less discussed is how Jeff Bezos, Mr Amazon, who now also owns the Washington Post (once the paper that broke Watergate) broke with history by failing to endorse a Presidential candidate this time (Bezos didn’t want to be on the wrong side of Trump). And there he was, next to Mr Google, in the front row at the inauguration.

And its not just in America. Much of the British media swung in behind Trump too. “Trump is humiliating his woke enemies and it’s a joy to watch” screamed the Telegraph last week, while one of their columnists wrote: “Why we Brits envy the US having Donald Trump”.

So while there is a bit of me that yearns for the drama of a big breaking news story, there is a new, larger, part which feels liberated. These days I can write exactly what I want with no fear of my true views or feelings not being acceptable (which used to happen a lot) and no fear of writing against what the proprietor would wish. Here, we are free to express our Queenager viewpoint, see the world through our older female lens. At this moment, that feels like a huge boon. (If you’d like to see more of my work, come to a NOON event, or sign up to receive newsletter - which is now sent from my own website, please visit Noon).

Watching Trump, surrounded by his powerful Tech Bro sycophants, I thought back to my visit to Facebook HQ in Silicon Valley in early 2020. I’d gone there to interview Sheryl Sandberg for International Women’s Day (the article was the cover of the magazine I then edited and the puff on the paper’s masthead). While I was in Palo Alto I was invited to dinner by Nick Clegg and his wonderful wife Miriam Gonzales (we’d met through her Inspiring Girls organisation where I had been a mentor). The house was pure Dynasty, knee high picket hedges and legions of staff in white aprons with silver trays. The supper was an intimate affair for about 10 with some Facebook insiders, some other Clegg friends from the UK and me. I started chatting to Nick (who left his role at Facebook last month, just as Zuckerberg switched his allegiance to Trump) about media barons and political influence. I’m sure I don’t need to remind all of you that Nick Clegg was once the UK’s deputy prime minister during the LibDem/Tory coalition; or that at the time I was a senior executive at News UK. It is a matter of historical record how Thatcher, Tony Blair and then David Cameron courted the Murdoch press and its powerful proprietor. Nick argued vehemently that night about how, although the tech moguls now had more power than someone like Rupert Murdoch, they were not yet wielding it or using it politically in the way that press barons traditionally did.

Sometimes five years feels like a long time; the array of new-media-tech-bro barons sitting in the front row at Trump’s inauguration shows just how quickly that changed. These days Musk, Bezos and Zuckerberg are fully MAGA’d up, inside the tent with Trump. When Trump was first elected, it was Murdoch he courted and who was on the end of the phone. These days the power of social media and its platforms eclipses even the reach of Fox News (which was at the centre of the drama in the first Trump election as the TV series Succession so brilliantly depicts).

So why does this matter? Well as the world shifts into a macho, strong-man era, where women’s rights are eroded (abortion anyone?) alongside protections or help for those who enter the world from a place of disadvantage (the point of DEI) I feel passionately that it is going to be up to places like NOON to keep burning the candle of hope for a different, more inclusive, female and progressive way of being.

In a more masculine, combative era, with a UK press skewing dramatically to the right: The Sun, The Times, The Telegraph, Daily Mail (even outlets such as the outwardly liberal I-Paper are owned by Associated Newspapers, the parent company of the Mail). That leaves on the left only the financially depleted Mirror and The Guardian (which can be just as biased but from the left).

In this media landscape, it is going to be increasingly important to keep making the case for a different, female, progressive, older, inclusive point of view. One which argues passionately that women don’t, (as the Gen Z Bible goes) Owe Men Pretty, that females are not here just to be eye-candy or pussy-groped by alpha males (like Trump), or breed their children (Elon Musk’s view of females) - but that our experiences and our lives matter. That we should have control of our own narrative and our own bodies.NOON

In a world where women’s rights are under assault from Afghanistan to Washington, and we have an American President who has been found guilty in a civil case of rape and brags about how he gropes women, it looks like the next five years are going to be testing.

So what can we do? Well for one thing spaces like NOON and our Queenager community can act like a beacon and a rallying place for a different point of view. And rather than despairing, we need to engage in radical hope. I’ve just been re-reading Rebecca Solnit’s book Hope in the Dark: The untold History of People Power. She explains that all big social changes have arisen because a small group of people got together and made the argument. Often it took years – look at the fight to get women the vote, that took a century and we are still pushing for equality now. There have been ebbs and flows. Recently I have been feeling a little despondent; for the first time in my adult life I began to think that perhaps women have got as far as they are going to get in terms of equality. I’d always believed that the generation behind us Queenagers would land far higher up the beach than we have. Now I wonder whether rather than being the forward troops, with a mighty army forging behind us to travel further, we are actually as high as the tide is going to get… But then I re-read Hope in the Dark and I changed my mind.

Solnit writes: “Hope locates itself in the premise that we don’t know what will happen and that in the spaciousness of uncertainty is room to act. When you recognise uncertainty, you recognise that you may be able to influence the outcomes – you alone, or you in concert with a few dozen or several million others. Hope is an embrace of the unknown and the unknowable, an alternative to the certainty of optimists and pessimists. Optimists think it will all be fine without our involvement: pessimists take the opposite position; both exclude themselves from acting. It’s the belief that what we do matters even though how and when it may matter and who and what it may impact are not things we can know beforehand. We may not in fact know them afterward either, but they matter all the same, and history is full of people whose influence was most powerful after they were gone….hope is a dimension of the soul… an orientation of the spirit, of the heart; it transcends the world that is immediately experienced and is anchored somewhere beyond its horizons. Hope in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as joy that things are going well.. but rather an ability to work for something because it is good.

Sometimes one person inspires a movement, or her words do decades later; sometimes a few passionate people change the world; sometimes millions are stirred by the same outrage, the same ideal and change comes upon us like a change in the weather. All that these transformations have in common is that they begin in the imagination, in hope. To hope is to gamble. To hope is dangerous and yet it is the opposite of fear, for to live is to risk. Hope calls for action; action is impossible without hope.”

I found this profoundly comforting. Things may feel dark now but we have co-created a space where different values can flourish. As I look around the bleak media landscape of Tech Bros and cover-ups, bias and illegal acts I thank the new technologies and indeed social media for the way it allows individuals like me and groups of women like us to speak to each other without our words and thoughts being censored by a proprietor. I am grateful for the freedom to write these words today without having to persuade a phalanx of chaps to let me write them, or publish them. When I interviewed the Dalai Lama years ago he said to me: “If you ever think you are too small to make a difference, think about spending a night in a room with a mosquito”.

Women’s suffrage came about eventually because women like us organised and made the case for it. Similarly we can keep pushing for a new narrative about what women are for: we are not just here to be breeders and eye candy for men like Trump or Musk. We matter in and of ourselves. As we age, we move into our power and wisdom – that has value in and of itself, even if this toxic macho male lens doesn’t recognise it. Of course it is not ALL men; the majority are lovely and suffer as much from the antics of a few Alpha leaders under patriarchy as women do. The world Musk and Trump want to build will work for the few, not the many; despite the MAGA promises of a better world for all.

So while the next years play out, let’s in the immortal words of Voltaire “Cultiver notre Jardin” – keep making the arguments for Queenager power and why we matter. We might feel we are being submerged by a mighty tide pulling in the opposite direction, but if we keep our candle burning, our hope alive, we can remain a beacon of possibility. That there is another way; a different approach, a better way to be.

Six weeks ago, we launched our NOON Fundraiser – I am so grateful to all of you lovely people who donated. Your money is helping us to expand the NOON Circles across the UK (and the world), paying for our new Supporting Queenagers series (do check out some of our events on divorce) and allowing NOON to keep making the case for a new story about the value of older women;that we have so much more to give, that there really is Much More to Come. The Crowdfunder is still live – if you’d like to help us keep the hope candle burning, consider becoming a Paid Member of NOON or donating.

Have a lovely Sunday. And thank you.

Xx

Eleanor

Me and Lucy Ryan: Head of NOON Consulting and an expert on midife female careers - do check out her book Revolting Women, Why midlife women leave and what to do about it

Dear Queenagers

Welcome to our monthly NOON Jobs Board where we list a whole load of opportunities from companies actively seeking Queenagers. We know all about gendered ageism - we know it is real. At a recent panel I was on with the CEO of Smartworks, she told me how women over 50 take TWICE as long to find a new job as women under 50. During our consulting work with NOON we also get a chance to look under the bonnet at what is going on when it comes to Queenagers in the workforce. I saw some figures which showed how in one big organisation the number of women employed fell from 32% for women aged 45-50 to only 18% for women aged 50-55. The Queenager brain drain is real. As our head of NOON consulting Dr Lucy Ryan says: “Too many women leave their jobs because of a midlife collision; you know, when your elderly mum has to go to hospital, just as your teenager is suffering from huge anxiety… when we feel so squeezed we decide to walk away from our job, thinking, well I’ve always found more work before, pretty easily. But this time, it’s different. Once we get older it’s hard to get back in: that is gendered ageism at work”. If you’d like to know more about Lucy, do read her book Revolting Women: Why Midlife Women Leave and What to do about it (I love the fact that when you go onto her Amazon page they also offer you my new book Much More to Come: Lessons on the mayhem and magnificence of midlife, which thanks to all of you is now a Times Bestseller! If you click on that link and use the code Muchmore50 you can get a special Queenager half price discount).

But I digress! It is BECAUSE we know lots of you are hitting a wall when you try and get back to work, despite excellent experience, references and qualifications, that NOON has teamed up with 55 Redefined to bring you a jobs board with a difference. On our NOON Jobs Board, you won’t get knocked out by an algorithm because you are 50 plus because the companies we feature are ACTIVELY recruiting Queenagers. Why? Because these firms know that midlife women have a great work ethic, huge experience, the kind of wisdom that comes with being forged in fire by life - and generally huge amounts to offer. So if that’s you, why not apply for one of our midlife-friendly jobs…

This week we are specially featuring roles at:

The Bristol law firm Osborne Clarke. It was one of the first law firms to sign the Centre for Ageing Better's pledge to support older workers. They are marching on with their age inclusion journey. They recently surveyed their workforce to find out what they wanted to do 'about work' nearing their so called retirement age - and for many it wasn't fall off the cliff at 50! They are proudly understanding, hiring and supporting older workers as a progressive law firm ahead of their competition.

There are 46, 12 month FTC, fixed term or  part time roles available across the practice HERE

Do you live near Greater Manchester?: Then a job at Together, a financial firm established 50 years ago, with 750 employees, which operates in the mortgage world might be just the ticket for you. They have a wide range of jobs in Cheadle, in communications, strategy, and underwriting. If you would like to be a PA, mortgage broker or get back into sales, see what's on offer from this age-inclusive company. HERE

Or is Advertising more your kind of thing? With open roles in Manchester, London and Edinburgh, leading global advertising agency Dentsu could be your next employer. There are 78 Jobs to pick from HERE

The jobs and the employers advertised on the NOON Jobs Board (powered by 55redefined) only list roles where the hiring managers are actively seeking experienced candidates. Grab a coffee, and take a browse through, knowing that your career achievements to date won't be overlooked - in fact they will be celebrated, just as they should be. HERE

Good luck and happy job hunting - do email me and tell me how you get on eleanor@inherspace.co.uk. And do share this newsletter with a Queenager you think might need it. We all rise when we support each other!

Love

Eleanor

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Liz Earle and me at the studio recording the Queenager podcast all about coming through the dark times of midlife and coming out the other side. We are laughing that our books both have the same colour scheme and we’re wearing matching combat trousers..

Dear Queenagers

Hope you are having a wonderful August. The highlight of my week was swimming with my daughter at the Ladies Pond in the sunshine at noon yesterday (ha!) and….. drumroll… we saw the Kingfisher. Just like on the cover of Much More to Come (which thanks to all of you is now a Times Bestseller, in at Number 4!). I am so touched by all your emails etc about how much it has moved or helped you… would be brilliant if you could write a review on Amazon or Waterstones to spread the word).

I’ve been pinching myself about that all this week… it just feels like a dream. In March 2020, I was whacked from Times newspapers and slunk out of there feeling done, on the scrapheap, a failure; and now four years later my book is on the Times Bestseller list. Talk about a midlife collision followed by renewal. All I can say is that if you’d told my weeping self when I walked out of there what was to come I would NEVER have believed it. So it just shows a midlife renaissance is possible, we really can reinvent. It can feel like the absolute worst of times but come good again.

It's a theme I’ve been exploring in the latest episode of our new The Queenager podcast with my friend, and guru of midlife wellness Liz Earle. You have probably heard of her eponymous cleanser (bought by Boots and now nothing to do with her, must be so weird). I met Liz when I first launched NOON, we were introduced by a mutual friend. I founder her funny, warm and incredibly supportive. Back in my own dark time, she  invited me to Adweek (the biggest jamboree of the advertising world)  to be interviewed about NOON on her – massive – podcast. We horrified the (mainly male) audience by saying we didn’t want to be seen through a menopausal lens, that we are Queenagers, not walking hot flushes. That you wouldn’t say to a room full of middle age blokes: “Welcome to the Viagra years…” so why should we put midife women in a hot, sweaty menopause box rather than seeing us as all that we are.

Liz very kindly came to record in the studio with me (the pic is us there together) and was so honest – about her own health regime and her new much younger lover – but also about her own midlife darkness.

“With Queenagers there seems to be this cloak of invisibility that descends on midlife women. We are battling so many disadvantages – ageism, gender – when I look back on my own life I definitely have a sense that in my mid  40s/early 50s I lost myself, I became a lot of things to a lot of other people – wife, mother, friend, daughter, community support worker and where was I in all of that? I put on a lot of weight, I ate all the wrong things, I drank far too much… ”

Liz went through a classic NOON midlife collision: a painful divorce after 17 years of marriage, the selling of her company (with her name), Covid… she has five kids, one born in her late 40s so she knows about the mega juggle. But she is also proof that starting a new chapter is possible. After selling her company she returned to her original calling, health journalism and set up Liz Earle Wellbeing and has just written an excellent book bestselling book,  A Better Second Half which synthesizes everything she knows about midilife female health.

Since we recorded the podcast about 6 weeks ago I have started (mostly) following her morning routine. It goes like this: get up and immediately put your head in natural light (I poke mine outside my bathroom window as I live in the attic). . I used to wake up and blindly look at my phone. Going outside feels much better and it also resets our circadian rhythms so we sleep better. Next I scrape my tongue to remove the white gunk which accrues there overnight. To begin with this felt weird, now I find it both fascinating and essential.. then I drink a pint of water and take some vitamins (the wellness company LYMA sent me some of their supplements to try which are super expensive but do make me feel indefinably sharper..). Next I do 50 deep squats and 30 press ups against the wall and then I meditate for 20 minutes or so (the meditation is my thing not Liz’s, although she is all for it).

This sounds like a lot but I don’t do the squats etc if I am doing pilates on the reformer. I’ve done this twice a week, first thing,  for the last 20 years; as a writer I spend too long at my desk typing, if I do pilates my back doesn’t hurt. If I stop, it seizes up. Liz says ‘use it or lose it’ in midlife; that this is the time to do weight bearing exercise (thus the squats and press ups) that way you don’t need a gym. I then swim every day at noon, rain or shine, winter or summer – I am smiling as I write this as I sometimes joke that these days I do so much ‘wellness’ I hardly have time to do anything else. But weirdly this self-care – anathema to the old busy-addicted Eleanor – makes me way more productive. I am more focussed, more in flow when I do sit down to write. I faff about less.  I get more done. I think it’s because I am now less distracted. More able to concentrate. That is the biggest difference daily meditation has made for me.

And although it sounds like a lot; this is the time when we need to put ourselves first. Putting a little time into our health everyday not only makes us feel better it has long-term benefits: midlife fitness is THE KEY to health in old age according to Liz who has crunched all the science. I do far more exercise now than I did when I was younger, but I see it as making up for all those years where I viewed my body a bit like a stick which conveyed my brain around. Now I feel much more truly in it and grateful to it. And, if we want to stay mobile as we lead the 100 year life, we need to keep moving. I went for lunch last Sunday with old friends and their 90-year-old parents, both sprightly and living independently. They both skied till a few years ago, he was a pilot; they were a great advert for keeping active. As my mum puts it: “Just don’t let the old people in” – keep going with everything you love for as long as you can is the secret to a healthy old age.

I reckon – and Liz agrees - that the biggest bit of self care and self love we can give ourselves is time. In the everyday, - of course. But also by taking a chunk  of time out for ourselves at a retreat. If you fancy trying I, we’ve got an early bird offer on for our latest retreat. It’s called Noon Escapes to the Country and is being held at the splendiferous new retreat farmstead created by Laura Tenison (Founder of Jojo Maman Bebe and the first guest on the Queenager podcast). I’m going to be sending a special members-only offer out next week with extra discounts (a good reason to sign up to become a paid subscriber if you haven’t yet..). And a great way to meet your new tribe, and lots of new friends.

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And speaking of the 100 year life, as crucial to our long-term happiness as health, is money. So  this Tuesday, August 20^th at 6.30pm we’re running a free webinar with Danni Hewson, ex BBC Money Correspondent and now Head of Content at AJ Bell Money Matters talking about understanding financial risk (crucial if we Queenagers are going to make the right decisions for our long term futures). If you are interested in knowing more about how to best manage your cash do sign up for their fab newsletter.

Oh and we’ll be running regional NOON Circles on September 9^th all over the UK – check out the Events page of the Noon website (noon.org.uk ) or click on the link for details.

Lots of love

Eleanor

Ps our Queenager Podcast is kindly sponsored by And Begin skincare. Their CMO Sophie Van Ettinger is a fellow Queenager and a refugee from the mainstream beauty industry; she became sick of its ageism and wanted to work on a new brand which was actively pro-ageing and pro-Queenager. We found them some inspirational Queenagers from the Noon community to tell their stories of new chapters for the brand’s launch last year so we know they mean it. Sophie says: “And Begin is on a mission to help you reveal your best skin yet with personalised prescription age-renewing skincare. Discover dermatologist-designed multitasking formulations made with clinically proven ingredients, dosed at your ideal levels. Simplify your skincare routine and amplify your results.”

If you would like to try it go to their website and use the promo code QUEENAGERPOD and you will receive your first bottle for a bargain £4.99 it is normally £29.99.

Dear Queenagers

I was so thrilled that Much More to Come (my book) entered the Times Bestseller charts this weekend at Number 4. Hooray!

Fittingly it was one of you lovely Queenagers who whatsapped to tell me it was there! Because it is because of all of you that the book is already such a success. THANKYOU for buying it and supporting this NOON project.

I would have loved to have had all of you at the physical launch last week but a)there are too many of you to fit in the Groucho Club and b) lots of you are not in London or indeed the UK so online might be better. So here is your online invitation! This is an event for Paid Subscribers only. (If you would like to become one either sign up here on Substack using the button below OR (better) if you are currently a free subscriber here head over to noon.org.uk and sign up on our new member portal and we will send you the link for tonight).

Subscribe now

Here is the zoom link for tonight at 6pm

And here it is again if you’d rather copy it into your browser: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/87813747971?pwd=85jsE5WPDVmK8bARxzRRnMHm24kjae.1

I’ve had so many gorgeous messages from you all about how much you are enjoying the book and how it resonates for you. A few say they can’t read it while wearing mascara because it has brought tears to their eyes; others say I have made them laugh out loud while walking the dog or making the supper (I assume that’s with the audio book).

Anyway I wanted to celebrate with all of you and give you a chance to ask me questions and generally hang out. We’ve also organised a special Queenager cocktail recipe for y’all if you would like to get into the festive spirit.

Queenager Cocktail

25ml Aperol

15ml Elderflower Syrup (actually I made this lower as it was too sweet)

10ml Lime Juice

Top up with Prosecco

Garnish: Mint

Glass: Rocks

Fill the glass with one large piece of ice

Add all ingredients to the glass

Stir gently

Fire up your ZOOM - and come armed with some questions…

See you on Tonight! xxxxx

Some of you wonderful Queenagers on our Noon Purpose and Power retreat at Broughton earlier this year - we’ve all just swim in the tarn and dunked in ice baths; trying new things is the key at midlife. Look at those radiant grins!

Dear Queenagers

Well I’ve spent a lot of this week talking about my book, giving interviews (I like this one in the Irish Times) speaking to podcasts (I’ve done Davina McCall’s new one, and Iain Dale and we’ve just launched our Queenager Podcast too). I’m also on Carole Vorderman’s LBC show this afternoon if you fancy it , and I’ve been writing lots of articles. But whether I am being asked about becoming a midlife entrepreneur (I wrote this piece in the Telegraph) or reinvention after redundancy (The I paper) or my whacky way through a midlife crisis (Good Housekeeping) – the theme I keep coming back to is courage. Trying new things. Taking risks. Which is what this newsletter is about today.

I keep being asked how I had the courage and confidence to reinvent – why I didn’t just take another job in my old industry. Why I took the risk to strike out on a new path championing older women. At my launch party, my publisher Lisa Milton said: “It takes immense courage to speak a new narrative.”  

So why did I take the risk?

It would be easy to look back now and say it was all easy. But it really wasn’t. In the aftermath of being whacked by my old employer I felt broken, done, on the scrap heap – as if I had died. I write about this in the book and I can type that sentence now relatively easily. But when I first tried to articulate how I felt, it was terrifying, humiliating – so shameful that my face would be wet with tears as I sat at my lap top. When I first started to write my truth, from the heart, I would quake with fear before I hit send. I’m not really sure why I persisted. It would have been much easier to give up. Believe me I considered it. But I was driven by that Queenager favourite of: if not now, when? (Over half of you agreed with the statement: “I’ve got less time to live than I’ve already had so I need to live it well” in our Queenager research). And I also had a strong sense of: if not me, then who? This needs saying…

For two decades I had written in national newspapers about current affairs often combined with aspects of my life. I knew from that experience that things that were affecting me tended to also be happening to others. So I suppose that gave me some confidence that I wasn’t the only one finding midlife unbearably tough. Feeling done. Finished. And then when I first wrote about how awful I felt after redundancy the article got such a huge response I knew I was onto something. I discovered that when we - metaphorically - take off all our clothes, show our vulnerability - others can feel safe in being naked too. I also realised that there was nothing out there to help and encourage women to reinvent. To cheer us on in our Queenager years; so I thought I would BE the change I wanted to see. (And I’d already found an angel investor and set up the NOON website so by then I was committed to turning my hunch about midlife pivots hitting all of us into my next project.)

A eureka moment was our ground-breaking Rise of the Queenager research which showed me how many other midlife women were also hitting the same pinchpoints (over half). My curve ball was redundancy, but for so many it is a midlife collision of divorce, and bereavement, and looking after elderly parents, and the empty nest, and a teenager in trouble with their mental health, and of course our own health issues and a bit of menopause too. It’s like playing Queenager bingo when I go through that list when I make a speech; I see heads nodding along: yes, and yes and yes… so many of you have had the full house of midlife cluster fxxks.

But what I have learnt from my own experience but also from all of you in so many NOON Circles and events and retreats and trips over the last three years is that if we are going to start again, find our new chapter, become our true selves, be all that we can be at this stage of our lives - then that involves risk. It starts with making one first brave step. Moving out of our comfort zone. I have had this exact conversation with so many of you, particularly when you come to a NOON event for the first time. You sidle up to me and say: “See, I’m here! I did it! I was brave and came! I got out of my comfort zone.” It’s why I always hug everyone. I know how hard it is to do something new.

Many of you have been lurking, reading the newsletter, taking it in, biding your time and then – bang. Something changes, or there is an event near you or you just decide to take the plunge and you come along. It’s a bit like getting into cold water for the first time, uncomfortable for a minute and then delicious, heady, inspiring!

I have seen so much magic happen from that one small step: Jackie, my MD now at NOON, came along to a one-day retreat at Wasing (there is one in October) seeking adventure. Look how that worked out! You turn up at NOON as strangers and within hours are friends – you find your new tribe. Of course, making that change doesn’t have to involve coming to NOON (although I’d like you to!). Life only changes when WE change, when we do something different, change our patterns. Of course that is hard: change is difficult. But by breaking our normal routine, doing something a bit brave we open ourselves up to the possibility of something wonderful happening. When we open ourselves up to the unknown, to uncertainty - yes, there is a risk that things will go wrong – but there is also the new potential of something amazing coming into our lives.

“Isn’t it incredible what happens when we women start backing ourselves, believing in ourselves following our dreams, being brave!” my great friend and former editor Vic Harper texted me when my book came out. Vic ran that very first article of mine about being made redundant and then put her own neck on the line to print our Queenager research with the headline: Only a fool would ignore the power of midlife women. Together we moved the dial.

So, I know I took a risk but I was able to be brave because so many wonderful Queenagers all around me had my back and were cheering me on. I have taken so much strength from all of you. Whatever question I am asked about midlife I know I speak from solid experience and research – because I have sat and talked to all of you about your lives and issues and reinvention and sorrows over so many magical hours. I don’t feel scared when I go out there to speak out the book or NOON because I know I am speaking the truth; this book and this mission resonates with all of you, so I feel confident that it will connect with Queenagers who haven’t found out about it yet too.

And it isn’t the media interviews or the book which was hardest. Sometimes the biggest risks, the parts of this journey that took the most courage were the small things. Getting to grips with VAT and Xero the nitty gritty of business. Learning how to run a LinkedIn live or work Instagram (when I was a grand editor I had a whole social media team who did all that, launching NOON I had to learn how to do the technical stuff myself). That was hard. It is not my forte. I’ve learnt that Youtube videos are my friend. They show me how to do stuff. As a corporate executive I didn’t have to do anything for myself, I just had to issue commands: I spoke it and it was done. In a small start up I am the CEO and content creator and also the tech team and gopher (not so much any more as our team has grown) but for a long time I was. But there is beauty in the small stuff. So much achievement in loading a gallery of pictures onto Substack, for instance. I feel empowered by having learnt so many new practical skills. I am less impatient. I take my time and work it out.

In fact - I now think that the biggest risk we can take at this stage in our lives is to take no risks at all. To stultify. To diminish. To become small. To give up on ourselves and our dreams. Remember that in the 100 year life, 50 is only half way through. It is only lunchtime – we have Much More to Come (as the Olympic commentators keep saying… it always makes me smile).

Our NOON motto is: It is never too late and you are never too old. So ask yourself: what did you always want to do but haven’t got round to yet? What reliably brings you joy? What would you do if you weren’t afraid? What are you waiting for? What will you do with your one wild and precious life? If that feels too huge, then break it down. What could you do today, what tiny step could you take towards your Queenager renaissance? Maybe it’s coming to our events. Or perhaps it’s sorting out your finances, I know, frightening and boring – but the risk of not doing it is worse. If that’s nagging at you come to our Understanding Financial Risk seminar on August 20^th (sign up here it’s free). Or join up as a member on noon.org.uk or here on Substack and come to my online book launch next week or one of our events.

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Change is difficult. Doing something new is scary. But change will come whether we want it or not. It is the only true constant. How could it not be? In the great scheme of things we are briefly sentient beings, living on a planet spinning in space who exist for a blink of an eye in the time frame of the universe. The chance of us being here at all is incredible – risk is part of life. So be brave dear Queenagers, seize the day.

So much love to you all – and a massive thank you if you who have bought the book. I got such a frisson of childlike pleasure when I went into Waterstones on Tottenham Court Road today and saw it there! Please spread the word, or gift it to a woman who needs it. And if you could leave a review either on Amazon or Waterstones.com (there is still a 50% discount with the code Muchmore50) I would be super grateful… and thanks to all of you we made ir to number four of the Times list of bestselling books in the UK this week! I am beyond thrilled and so grateful to you all for your support.

Ps It is one of the Top New Non Fiction picks, which I am v proud about!

Lots of love

Eleanor