Is This Menopausal Brain Fog Or Am I Losing My Mind?

KQED's Forum

KQED

News, News Commentary, Politics

4.2 • 727 Ratings

🗓️ 8 January 2026

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

When writer Anna Holmes began to get forgetful, she wondered if it was middle age, menopause or dementia-inflected memory loss. The brain fog made her reflect on not just her health, but her mortality. Having watched her mother slip away from dementia, she wondered if it was now happening to her. We talk to a neurologist and Holmes about her recent piece in the New Yorker, “My Mother’s Memory Loss, and Mine.” Guests: Anna Holmes, writer and editor; her latest piece in the New Yorker is titled "My Mother's Memory Loss, and Mine" Dr. Niyatee Samudra, clinical assistant professor of adult neurology, Stanford University Medical School Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Support for KQED podcasts comes from Landmark College, offering summer programs for high schoolers that support executive function and transition to college skills. Learn more at landmark.edu slash summer.
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0:46.0	From KQED.
0:48.8	Welcome to Forum. I'm Alexis Madrigal.
0:51.7	Over the last half decade, as I've eased into my 40s, I've heard an
0:56.0	increasing number of complaints from my age cohort of women about one big thing, brain fog.
1:03.5	According to one study, up to 62% of women in midlife report experiencing brain fog, which,
1:09.1	as Anna Holmes writes, in The New Yorker,
1:12.1	is a non-medical term that's used to describe reduced mental clarity, difficulty concentrating,
1:18.1	forgetfulness, and trouble with word retrieval.
1:21.3	While the more physical changes that come with aging can be destabilizing too, brain fog
1:26.2	seems like a direct strike on the self,
1:29.0	an erosion of who people thought they were.
1:31.5	So our team was excited to read this new piece by Anna,
1:34.1	which is a bruisingly honest essay about her own brain fog,
1:38.5	and its uncomfortable parallels with her mother's cognitive decline.
1:43.0	Anna, welcome to Forum.
	...

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