The HerStack Journal

Evidence-led notes from the HerStack editors. Every post cites its sources.

• What astronauts teach us about bone through the menopause transition. Take the load off a skeleton and it thins fast. Spaceflight and bed-rest studies show bone changing on a clock of weeks, which makes them an unusually clear window on the same tissue midlife women are asked to protect over decades. (The HerStack editors, 2026-09-15)
• Endurance sport, iron and the transition: why the ferritin test matters more, not less. Women keep running, cycling and racing triathlon through the menopausal transition, and the assumption that iron stops being a question once periods end does not survive contact with the research. Training itself moves iron around: it raises the hormone that shuts iron absorption down, and it costs iron through sweat, the gut and the pounding of the road. The one study in post-menopausal endurance runners suggests the shutdown lasts longer after menopause, not shorter. (The HerStack editors, 2026-09-15)
• Menopause is not one experience: what the cross-cultural research shows. Symptom checklists built on Western cohorts can quietly become the definition of normal everywhere. The cross-cultural research is a useful corrective: what women report at the menopausal transition varies across populations, and the reasons are part biology and part culture. (The HerStack editors, 2026-06-26)