Writer and performer Kat Lyons will present Dry Season, an intimate, questioning and humorous show based on their difficult experiences of premature menopause, as part of Stroud Theatre Festival, at The British School Hall from Friday 16 – Sunday 18 September.
Menopause? Seriously? Kat thought they were far too young to worry about
menopause; biology thought differently. Now their hormones are going haywire, their diary is full of NHS visits and sleep is a distant memory. Join Kat on a journey featuring anxiety, insomnia, and self-conscious jogging as they explore their changing identity, question societal expectations of age and gender and do their best to navigate the first chaotic year.
Interweaving music, movement and medical texts with original poetry and animation, Dry Season is a witty, honest and intimate spoken word theatre show about questioning assumptions and learning to rewrite your story.
Dry Season was written in response to Kat’s diagnosis and early experience of premature menopause at the age of 39, following 18 months of undiagnosed symptoms including chronic insomnia, depression, and paranoid anxiety.
Through internet forums, surveys and interviewing menopausal women, Kat discovered that their initial feelings of shame, isolation and ignorance were shared by countless others.
Despite being an experience shared by half of humanity, due to systemic ageism and misogyny, menopause is widely seen as something embarrassing and shameful. If it is mentioned publicly at all, then it is often the punchline of misogynistic jokes. Dry Season was created in an attempt to counter this.
Kat uses their autobiographical journey to explore societal expectations of age and gender, and to create space for open discussion and wider representation of menopause.
Dry Season aims to generate knowledge and empathy between people of different ages, genders, and experiences.
To find out more about Dry Season, visit: Kat Lyons – Writer & Performer
