A woman who went through menopause at 29 is running for US vice-president

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Something that is getting next to zero attention right now: Nicole Shanahan, who independent presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr added earlier this year as his running mate, found out she was in early menopause at 29.

Shanahan was married to Google co-founder Sergey Brin at the time (they went on to have a daughter and have since split). When you hear about the quest to “end menopause”, and we hear that a lot these days, it traces right back to Shanahan. (In 2020 writer Bonnie Rochman wrote a feature about these efforts for US Marie Claire.)

Shanahan told Financial Review writer Hannah Kuchler in February it all started when she was invited to speak at a fundraiser held by the Hollywood power couple Norman and Lynn Lear. She was 31 and having hot flashes; watching her Flo app in terror as her fertility faded away. She was well aware of the Silicon Valley form of bro longevity, but she took the event’s cocktail hour to ask every expert she could find about repr…