Naomi Watts was told she ‘would never work again’ if she admitted to being menopausal
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Watts was warned that drawing attention to your age after 23 years old in Hollywood is ‘career suicide’. Naomi Watts has said she was told she would never work again if she admitted to being in menopause. The King Kong star recalled how she was warned against revealing that she was menopausal due to the stigma older women face in Hollywood.
![[Billy Crudup and Naomi Watts attend the 28th Screen Actors Guild Awards at Barker Hangar on February 27, 2022]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2023/06/11/08/newFile-1.jpg)
Watts, 54, opened about her experiences of menopause, including changes to her sex life and libido, in her frank new book Dare I Say It: Everything I Wish I’d Known about Menopause. Watts said that she had long rejected the prospect of publishing a book on the subject.
![[In her new book, Naomi Watts talks about the ‘gory details’ of menopause]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2024/04/28/11/49th_AFI_Life_Achievement_Award_-_Show_13200.jpg)
“My fear was too great,” she wrote. “Besides, I still knew nothing – just that it was fast approaching and I was s*** scared.”. Speaking about the ramifications she would face in Hollywood as a result of speaking out, Watts said: “I’d been warned ever since I started acting that calling attention to your age – when that age was not 23 or younger – would be career suicide.
“I was told I would never work again if I admitted to being menopausal, or even perimenopausal. Hollywood’s lovely term for such women was ‘unf***able’.”. Perimenopause is when the body starts the transition into menopause. The actor decided to write the book after coming to the realisation that there “is nothing sexier than a woman who knows what she wants”.
“All good relationships at work and at home – and at the doctor’s office – require communication,” she said. “We can discuss without shame the details of menopause – how to navigate it, what the symptoms could be, and not just, ‘Oh, you might feel warm at some point,’ but the gory details.”.
