Halle Berry, Actor, Director, Producer, Advocate; Founder, Respin
Interviewer: Michal Lev-Ram, Fortune

Most Powerful Women Summit 2024: Real Talk About Women’s Health 

Conferences

Welcome, Hallie. Thank you for being with us. Thank you. Hello, everybody. It's great to be here. Thank you. I love a room of all women. It's amazing. OK. So it was mentioned in the intro, but I wanna hear more about your little trip to Capitol Hill. You went last May, you stood right by the steps and you yelled out a statement and I wanna recreate it here for everyone. Bye. I mean, how liberating is that like that is that was so liberating to stand there in Capitol Hill and say that and you should have seen all the men. They were like what the what? No, that's a secret. You don't say that lady. So it was, it was really great to go to. I think it was actually I'm in menopause, ok? Wasn't that what it was exactly that? Something like that? Yes. So you were there not just to raise awareness but also to help unveil a proposal, which pretty incredible has bipartisan backing for 275 million to be set aside for research, training, you know, all sorts of things like that. And you again, we're joined by a bipartisan backing here, Senator Murray and Senator Murkowski, a democrat and a Republican. Can you talk a little bit about just how these conversations even started and how you were able to get bipartisan attention? Well, when I realized that I was in menopause and I realized what a dearth of information there was out there, that there was nothing, it was like a desert and I realized that my own doctor didn't really understand what was happening with my menopausal body. You know, I was 54 years old. I had probably been in perimenopause for maybe 10 years and nobody mentioned the word to me. Um I realized that the reason I didn't know is because doctors um only have a chapter in medical school of education. Only 13% of doctors are NM certified or understand the menopausal body. And I started to go, hm, this is, there's a problem here and then I dug a little more and I found out, well, there's no money. The NIH doesn't fund menopause research. It goes to many other great, amazing issues. But menopause has been historically left out as if it's not a thing, but we know that it is a thing, right? Yes, you can. It's a huge thing in a woman's life and no woman escapes it. So I realized the only thing I could do use my power and to go advocate for myself. And by doing so I knew that I would be advocating for all of you and for all women, right? That's what we do when we stand up for ourselves, we stand up for others. So when I got there, I went first to Senator Murray, I knew she would be a friend of the court of the court. She was a friend of a woman that works at my law firm. And I went into her and I told her my story of how I found out I was misdiagnosed with herpes, but it was really vaginal, you know, dryness, uh vaginal atrophy. And I told her the time that's been said on the stage here, I think so. I don't. Yeah, I had razor blades in my vagina after a great night of sex. And I went to the doctor and he told me, oh, this looks like the worst case of herpes I've ever seen. And I thought, hold it what he said, yeah, this is herpes. And then I realized, you know, after I took the test, no, I did not have herpes. And when I dug a little, a little digging, it was vaginal atrophy. So I said, told this story to Patty Murray and she totally understood. And she said, I agree, I agree has been historically overlooked this issue. I've gone through menopause and you're right, we need to band together. And I said to her and I know this is, this will be a big election year. But I said this is one issue that should not be politicized. This is a human rights issue. It affects every woman that's half of our population. And if we're, we live long enough, which is a privilege, we will all face these years and we deserve more. We deserve health care. We deserve to have doctors and health care professionals treat us that. Understand what's happening to us. Not tell us. We have herpes when we don't or we have Sjogren's disease when we have dry mouth or misdiagnose us or just really not know what to say or to tell us. Right? So she said, I agree. So I enlisted her help. She wrote the bill for $265 million. And she said the only way we get money for menopause is to our own stand alone bill. Otherwise we will continue to be overlooked. And she and I then joined arms. And I said to her, I have a goal to get every female senator on both sides to back this bill. And let that be a allowed statement to our government and to congress that we really mean business that we really are demanding as women uh dollars so that we can live our best lives in midlife. And right now, out of the 25 I have 18 senators, there's still a few I have to get over the line but uh iii I will not, will not stop. So um I wanna get to resend your company but, um, just real quick before we dive into that. Um, you are out there spreading the word on menopause, not just in Congress. Uh I heard that you spoke to Mike Tyson about it recently in the green room at the Jimmy Kimmel show. I just want to know what that conversation, how that started. Mike understands. I mean, I've known Mike for a while and when I saw him at the show, I hadn't seen him in a while and he was sitting there with his wife. And so right away when I said hi to Mike, I saw his wife and she said to me, oh my God, talk about this menopause. And I was like, are you there? And she was like, not yet, but I want you to help me. And then Mike right away jumped in and he said, oh, please tell me it's not going to mess with my sex life. I said, well, Mike, I'm sorry to tell you if your wife doesn't like, know what I know it possibly could affect your sex life. So let's talk about it. And we launched into like a 20 minute conversation and by the time it was done, Mike was telling me and telling everybody that walked in the room that he knows all about vaginal atrophy and that he is not going to let this happen to his wife and that he is going to support her and he is going to, you know, understand her mood swings. He's going to understand when she floods the kitchen, when she forgets why she walked in a room. Like he was really going to be really supportive. So who knew that Mike Tyson would be like our advocate for the menopause, you know, but he also understood how it affects men too. You know, we're laughing about, you know, Mike caring about his sex, but he really understood that it's really an issue. It's a human rights issue. It affects all of us because every man knows a woman loves a woman has a mother, has a daughter, has a female coworker, right? So men are affected just as much as we are. Ok. Tell us about resin. What, what is it, what can you tell us? And I know there's like a bit of a relaunch happening and some of it is TBD. But what can you share? Well, the original brand resin, the idea I had, it was just a very broad um health platform and the idea was res spinning everything you thought you knew. And I wasn't really quite sure what I was doing with it, but I knew that I had an idea and that the idea was germinating. And when COVID hit, I sort of launched it out there because, well, during COVID, what else was there to do but try to put out a business at home, right? Like duh. So after the COVID years and when I found out that I was in perimenopause. It occurred to me one day, what topic deserves a resin, menopause deserves the biggest resin of all right, rethinking everything you thought you knew. So then when I got singularly focused and decided that resin would be a, a brand that deals with women sort of at the perimenopause stage. That's their entry point. But that we would hold their hands throughout menopause, postmenopause and through the rest of their life, through midlife until hopefully the end that what it is, it's a female longevity brand where we have community, we have technology, it's science backed, doctor backed. And we realized that while, you know, that study of, you know, years ago really was probably the single most important study that I think derailed us as women that turned us all against H RT. Uh I think H RT isn't the answer for everybody, right? There's still women who are afraid and it'll be a long time. I think before we really change the way we as women think about H RT, right? That stigma is sort of stuck with us. So I know that we need more than H RT. And I think what we need is community. We need a place to talk about what we're going through. So we don't feel alone and we just did a sort of MVP um program at REIN and two thirds of the women uh had uh improvement because they just were talking with their health coaches and understanding what was happening to their bodies. And this time of our life, we lean out of our health care instead of leaning in. But when you can talk about it with other people, kind of like Weight Watchers, you now are accountable to yourself when you have a support system. Right? And it's actually, it's actually working. Um, I'm gonna go to you guys for questions in a second, but I'm curious for a show of hands. Um who in the room here had their doctor, whether it's your gynecologist or your your, your general practitioner, um talk to you about perimenopause or menopause without being asked without being asked. OK. But that doctor is female. OK. Um That's actually more than I was expecting. Is that surprising to you? Um No, it was a minority. It wasn't the, I don't think it was the majority for sure. But no, but I would question how much they know they might bring it up because if they're a woman, they know what's happening, maybe it's happening to them. Most doctors have heard about menopause. It is one chapter in medical school. So they have heard about it. But do they know all they should know about it? Is the question, right? And I think that's where the gap is. OK. Here we go. Questions for Hallie. Please raise your hand if you would like to ask a question or you can also just air some grievances if that, you know, feels right to you. We've got one over here. Ok. This is a great subject. So what is your recommendation on good sources to get information? Because actually doctors aren't that good? Well, I would ask you to come to rein and what we are going to do is we want to gift everyone in the room here today, like a special access to be able to come to resin and sort of try it out and be a part of our launch. I really wanted to do that. But we have doctors, we have seminars, we have scientists, some of the leading scientists in the space that are talking about, you know, what hot flashes do to our brain and why it's not just a hot flash. Because what I've learned along my path of midlife is that every time a woman has a hot flash, it's almost like having a little mini stroke. Like there's these nodules that become uh apparent on our brain. And when you look at a brain that's in Alzheimer's, this is what the brain starts to look like when a woman has hot flash after hot flash. And Doctor Mackey is one of the leading scientists um out of Chicago has this study that she's been doing and she uh has a device that she's devi devised and she puts it on a woman and we can find out exactly how many hot flashes she's having. So you might not even know you're having hot flashes because while we were there with the first lady visiting her, she had a subject that was being monitored and this woman thought she had five hot flashes. She really had 50 hot flashes. She didn't feel 45 of them, but that hot flash is still doing what it's doing to her brain. Right. So, I think it's really important that we understand how to stop ourselves from having hot flashes and HRT isn't for everybody. So there has to be some other therapy, some other answers, which is why we need money for more clinical studies and more research. The question back here, I love your ambition to get such bipartisan support. Vicky. Can you introduce yourself? I'm sure I'm Vicky Med Beck from the Kellogg School at Northwestern. I love your ambition of getting such bipartisan support. You mentioned there are seven senators who are not yet on the bill. I'm sorry if you might want to share their names, his political power. Do you know somebody who knows somebody? I think we all probably are voting. Well, you can talk to me after. OK, come find him. That's my goal to call out other ladies. But there are still seven that are, are, are need some more and, and, and, and I will say this, it's not because they don't believe that this is an important topic, but the more conservative members of our government just feel like we should not spend any more money. They don't want new appropriations. They think there's enough money already in the pot that should be moved around and we should get our due. But we know that men never gets it to do because it never rises to the level of needing money because nobody really has ever acknowledged that. It's a real serious moment in our life. Right. So that's really what it's about. It's not that they don't believe that it's, it's worthy, they just don't want to spend the money. New, new appropriations. Got it. Got it. Question over here and then we'll come to you. Hi, Ellie, Bet Madani Herman, Senator Ernst. Get her. I'm a health care executive. I'm the global head of research at Phillips. Uh, if you are launching this, relaunching it as a consumer health, uh, or, uh, specifically to individuals, but you are looking at expand beyond that. What are some of the barriers and partnerships in the entire ecosystem of health care? You're seeing aside from the political side that you wish you could tear down, uh, some of the barriers you're asking. Well, I think it's about getting people to understand that this is a real issue and sort of join forces with us. And one of our issues has been, you know, we're venture backed, but when I was out trying to raise money, it was really hard. You know, I went, you know, to Silicon Valley and I was trying to raise money and it was really hard to get uh people largely men at some of these big, you know, venture capital companies to believe that, like I just said that menopause was a real thing and that menopause deserved a company that was built in the framework of what our company is. That was while it's, it's very holistic in nature, right? It was very hard for them to see that they there is the way I put it for the reason for this company to be. So that was probably one of my biggest barriers was getting really people to believe that this was a worthwhile venture, especially with what our approach was. So it's still at such a basic level, it's awareness, urgency and it's community based and it was really hard to get people to understand. Well, you know, how do you sell community? How do I make money with that? You know, too many people are thinking about how do they monetize it? And I really was coming from a place of, but how do we as women just get the help we need? It's not about selling them product after product. That's not what our company is about. So that was the barrier to get people to understand. Well, then how do you scale it and how do we make money if we give you money? Right? I had to really make them understand that this is a really good business model, if you think of Weight Watchers and you think of this the same way, but it's Weight Watchers from menopause. There is a model there community really does sell. And after a time, once you get your community together, they're going to need things to support their journey. And then if we provide them products in a very thoughtful way that's born out of what they're asking for, then you have a business that's viable at serving a community and it's also a viable business. At the same time. Cheetah. Hi, Sheeta Bena from uh insignia. I'm going to do a quick share. And then a question, I, I went through my hot flash period, right when Viagra was being advertised every week and I'd have to explain that to my young kids. So I decided that in any meeting I was in where I had a hot flash. I made a point of everyone knowing about it because if I could hear about how they couldn't get it up, they could hear about how hot I was at the beginning, they were a little uncomfortable and I considered it like a one woman crusade to educate and to that point, if men went through this, this problem would have been solved a long time ago, long time ago. Um I, one thing I would want to know how you are planning on handling or if you're cognizant of, you know, for years, decades, centuries, the reason why women weren't given positions of power with people who were afraid we'd be going, having our periods and we'd be moody and we'd make decisions, bad decisions. So, when you just said about the hot flashes actually affecting the brain, how do you, how are you planning on contextualizing that? So, it, there isn't a backlash around women can't now be trusted when they're going through menopause because it makes them crazy. Well, you know what I'm talking? Yeah, I do. And this is exactly what we have to destigmatize it. That's a big myth that just because we're having a hot flash or we get a little forgetful that we can't run a company and then we can't make brilliant decisions. You know, we still do all the things. But that's the reason we need this kind of education so that women can start taking this time of their lives into their own hands and they can figure out therapies that they need to minimize those hot flashes, minimize that brain fog, minimize the raging because that's just how we, that's just how we get it. Right. So we have to start figuring out how we treat ourselves, how we can be treated. So we go through that time of life in a more seamless way. Right? So that's the story. That's why we need, oh, we, we always have the right certainly. And we know that as women, we know part of the, the part of the campaign is awareness. And don't you go using that against me because I can manage myself very well. Thank you. So that there isn't a back, a back now, you know, um scientific reason to say our brains don't function. Well, yeah, I, yes, I do understand. But at the same time, you know, men can't actually, you know, purport that their brain functions well, all the time either. First of all, I know some men that do some real dumb shit and I don't need to say the name of the men. Well, we all know. So I do think that's part of the, you know, destigmatize what menopause is as women. You know, it's that Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers thinks, you know, she goes backwards and heals. We can do all of that and we always have right. We've raised our Children, you know, we've been working mothers and we've working mothers and we have done it all and as women, we're able to do that, we're able to multitask in ways and I'm sorry that men just aren't, they're not built that way. We're built differently. That's what makes men, men and women, women, in my opinion. Hallie, we are so appreciative of you coming here and speaking to all of us elevating the subject and going out there going all in on menopause in the halls of congress with Mike Tyson with whoever will listen. So, thank you so much for coming. Thank you. Thank you for having me.