Jo Franchetti

If this is something you’re going through too, you are not weak, dramatic, or failing. You are dealing with something real, significant, and too often ignored.

Happy International Women’s Day y’all.

So if you work with women in their late 30s, 40s, or beyond, please remember: they may be carrying far more than you can see.

We need more awareness.
We need better support.
We need workplaces that understand women’s health is not a niche issue.

It has felt humiliating, disempowering, and incredibly lonely.
And that is exactly why I’m posting this.
Because so many women are dealing with a whole load of this with little understanding, little support, and far too much pressure to keep performing as if nothing is happening.

I’ve been waking multiple times a night drenched in sweat, boiling hot or freezing cold, covered in sweat that smells like grave dirt. I have chronic hip pain that stops me doing the things I love, and gets worse when I sit too long. I’ve cried in front of my partner, my boss, and the CEO.

I’ll be honest. I’ve been having a hard time.

The brain fog, depression, and anxiety have hit me hard. I’ve felt hopeless and untethered.

Urinary frequency or incontinence, recurrent UTIs, brittle nails, digestive issues, allergies, tinnitus (ear ringing), IBS like symptoms, fluctuating appetite, longer recovery from infections

Irregular, heavier, or lighter periods, or skipped cycles. Vaginal dryness, discomfort or pain during intercourse, and reduced libido, labial shrinkage, breast tenderness and size change, increased chance of yeast infections.

Dry skin, crawling/itching feeling, acne, thinning hair on your head, itchy scalp, increased facial hair, more frequent bruising.

Hot flashes (sudden heat in face, neck, chest), night sweats, and cold flashes, increased blood pressure.

Weight gain (especially around the waist), bloating, and changes in body odor. Dry or burning mouth, dry eyes.

Heart palpitations, racing heart, dizzy spells, headaches, migraines, vertigo, altered sense of smell and taste, increased light sensitivity.

Joint pain (especially hip pain), muscle aches, decreased bone density, “zapping” pain in your extremities, foot pain, collapse in foot arches, decline in dental health, restless leg syndrome, frozen shoulder.

Insomnia, fatigue, night sweats.

Brain fog (short term memory loss, poor concentration), anxiety, mood swings, irritability, depression, or lack of interest and focus, PMS-like symptoms, increase in word loss and “tip of the tongue” moments. Feelings of “depersonalisation” and detachment. Crying spells without clear reasons.

Perimenopause can start in your late 30s and it can affect nearly every part of your life. It can also mimic other health conditions, like thyroid issues.

For neurodivergent folks, inc ADHD, autism, or AuDHD, symptoms can show up earlier and hit harder.

Here's a list of *some* of the symptoms:

I work in a heavily male-dominated industry, and I have very few peers my age or older who might have talked to me about what perimenopause looked like for them. On top of that, many of the men in my life had never even *heard* of perimenopause.

I turned 40 this year, and perimenopause seems to have hit me like a freight train. I'd like to talk about it this #IWD.

What’s shocked me is how little I knew about it before. We’re not taught about it so we’re not prepared. SexEd teaches us about when we’re fertile and just leaves it there!

If there is cake involved. I'm in.

Earlier today I put my butt-lifting leggings on backwards and didn't notice,because I have no booty to be lifted. I did however have a very snatched...

Yes, it has rained every day in the UK so far this year, but on the plus side, if this keeps up I may be able to live out my days as a bog witch.

Pickle the tabby cats is sitting in an open box that previously contained some 3D printing filament. She barely fits in the base of the box and looks slightly confused about being there.

My new Reprapper filament is weirdly furry...

I've been using the tunnels feature a lot already and it is super useful, especially for mobile testing. Like ngrok but with secrets and access to my local or staging dbs.

I'll be speaking about Gen and ProcGen AI in gaming at @NDC_Conferences London today in room 5 at 11:40. If you're a @deno_land fan come get a supercute Deno hoodie before they're gone!

Using AI to prototype games in the browser There's a lot of discourse around the use of AI in games (and elsewhere!) at the moment. It's...

I know it's a contentious topic, but I've been thinking about AI (specifically Proc-Gen & GenAI) for storytelling in game development.

Here's my write up on building a prototype in TypeScript with thousands of universes, characters and dialogue trees, all generated locally. dev.to/thisisjofran...

YouTube video by beyond tellerrand Jo Franchetti – RoleplAI – beyond tellerrand Berlin 2025

Next #btconf video is up. It is the wonderful @thisisjofrank.bsky.social and her presentation “RoleplAI”, given at #btconf Berlin 2025. youtu.be/EDpXdAKTydA

Oh wow, that's a typo and a half... White POWDER

If touching the stickers makes you feel good it is purely the joy of excellent design and not remnants of white power... I promise...

Would it be ok if I share the one of me on stage to Instagram? Do you have an account on there I can tag or repost?

beyond tellerrand Berlin 2025 This is my documentation of beyond tellerrand in Berlin, November 2025.

And here it is – in full monochromatic glory – my documentation of beyond tellerrand 2025 in Berlin: florian.photo/gallery/btco...

#btconf #monochrome #documentary #photography / cc @beyondtellerrand.com

Reposts appreciated. 🙏

Hope everyone has an incredible time at @beyondtellerrand.com today! So sad I can't be there, but had just the best day yesterday! 💖🦕