Supporting women's wellness this month

October is a dual month of awareness when it comes to women's health. It's Breast Cancer Awareness Month and it's Menopause Awareness Month. They're both big topics, often intertwined, and to a greater or lesser extent, impacting all women (I am mindful that breast cancer also affects some men).

Wellness impacts us all

I think perhaps one of the biggest lessons I've learned from being a provider in the wellness industry for more than 15 years, is that whether you experience a particular aspect of health yourself, there's an element to which we're all involved. That might be because it will happen to us, it could happen to us, or it will or could happen to someone we know. Helping to make the ebb, flow and change in an individuals' state of wellness a bit easier, whether we know them or not, is a kindness that will benefit us all.

If we're fortunate enough to age as women, then we will come up against the changes that menopause brings - even if we experience them differently. We hope that none of us ever have to manage the rigours of breast cancer (or any other cancer), but even if we don't face that particular challenge, it's part of our lifestyles to seek to prevent where we can or remain aware and hopefully catch these things early.

Personalised pampering and wellness

Advice, guidance and support on health and wellbeing is changing all the time. Menopause has had a spotlight shone on it in the last two years, and more conversations are being had to support women at work and at home as they experience menopausal symptoms. If you can be the employer that makes it easier for a woman to manage her hot flushes by changing her desk set up and her workplace flexibility, that's a wonderful thing.

At Spabreaks.com, the spas we work with are filled with incredible therapists who always want to help. Over the years, we have helped to create pathways, navigating the appropriate protocols to ensure safety and quality, but also to provide holistic support for cancer patients, women in menopause and more. That journey is not, and will never be complete, but with every year that goes past I am delighted to see that willingness to keep moving forward and doing more.

Our work bringing our Safe Hands for Cancer collection to Spabreaks.com started in 2012, and it continues to embrace more and more spa destinations that offer personalised spa experiences that are safe and supportive for anyone who's had a cancer diagnosis. This year, we have also welcomed many menopause specific packages to the collection, each offering beautiful experiences designed to target the specific symptoms that a client might be experiencing.

Spas with products and training from TEMPLESPA are increasingly delivering the brand's gorgeous therapies using a combination of CBD, green mandarin and Himalayan salt rich in magnesium, potassium and calcium. Renowned trainer, Jennifer Young, introduced her MPlus training for spa therapists; Ireland's famous VOYA brand has their therapies for three separate ‘tides’ to address the different symptoms of menopause, and GenM is a powerful collective of brands committed to supporting women in menopause in multiple different ways.

How we think about health is changing

Crucially, I think this acceptance of ourselves, our desire to acknowledge the realities of wellbeing as an ever-changing part of our existence, and our drive to support one another practically as well as emotionally, is also a profound move forward in our perception of beauty. As a brand, we have always talked about spas as a safe space for self acceptance, but we are making more and more proactive moves towards that, not only displaying that in our product and language, but by creating our own imagery as well, to show the spa world as we know it to really be.

This month is a reminder that we are all human, that health and wellbeing are precious and constantly shifting. Taking care of our health should be fun, and it's something we should take pride in sharing with others, supporting one another, whatever stage we find ourselves at. I hope that as an organisation we can do our own small part in providing access or ideas on ways to feel your best, and this month, that especially applies to anyone managing menopause or breast cancer.