Departure Coaching
for Autistic, AuDHD, and ADHD Menopause
A Roadmap to Meet the Next Version of You.Create enduring health change in the menopause transition.
Protect against burnout, honor your sensory system, bypass Big Menopause Wellness … and get your precious sleep.
🚀 Keep on scrolling for the Departure Coaching launch offer — available through 12/31/26!
If you’re spinning health wheels
in peri-/menopause, you’re not alone.
You emptied cart on the hot flash supplements, cooling sheets, and a hormone testing kit, yet you’re still soaking through a tank top multiple times a day.
You tried the sleep hygiene, shut off the phone, and applied the mask. The 3 am wakeups leave you feeling like a zombie the next morning.
The clink!clank! of partner unloading the dishes creates chaos at home. Masking strategies are down the drain for the sensory nightmares of perimenopause.
With a gracious nod in their office, you accepted the migraine program from your neurologist; that handout is somewhere under a pile of magazines.
You’ve attempted a new eating plan to improve high cholesterol, but threw in the towel after two weeks because your safe food list was nowhere to be found.
You have a tiny idea about what you want from this next phase of life, but it’s taken the back burner with all the new symptoms being tossed your way.
How do we make change happen that aligns with our values, with an ever-shifting body and so much outside noise?
Welcome to Departure CoachingImagine a clear path forward
where health changes align with your values —
without frying your nervous system or adding to overwhelm.
🌒 You’re not overhauling your life in a peri-/meno rage swoop (though, tempting!). You’re taking deliberate, manageable steps guided by capacity.
🌒 Depositing small changes in nutrition starts to stack up — this time over months, not a two-week frenzied sprint.
🌒 Your relationship toward movement begins to shift, with new understanding that consistency begins with matching your energy.
🌒 You might not notice it at first, but then you realize, you’re spending more time feeling grounded and acting from curiosity and compassion. You’ve nestled into safety with your sleep routine.
Totally new to health coaching??!! You’re not alone. Here are some of the strategies and ideas involved:
The Center for Medicare Services and National Board for Health & Wellness Coaching define health coaching as a client-centered approach involving client-determined goals, self-discovery and active learning, content education, self-monitoring and accountability, behavioral change theory, motivational strategies, communication techniques, and sustainable health behavior change.
Departure Coaching values meeting you where you’re at, is neurodivergent-affirming, gender-affirming, weight-inclusive and non-diet.
Meet Coach Melinda
Hello, hi!
I’m Melinda Staehling, MS. I’m an NBC-HWC-certified health coach, menopause health educator, and late-diagnosed AuDHDer. I’m the founder of Departure Menopause.
Since 2018, I’ve been growing and refining my coaching and values around nutrition and health, supporting hundreds of people on their path to change.
I’m also a human in perimenopause, living with the full scope of neurodivergent health diagnoses - migraine, POTS, endometriosis, mast cell. I know what it’s like to have a challenging health picture.
My coaching sessions are compassionate, supportive, and creative, with just the right amount of challenging growth.
I’m looking forward to working with you to close the gap between your health vision and taking the step to get there.
How We Meet
Your Future Self
The word “coaching” can feel a little vague and generic. At its core, Departure Coaching is health behavior change.
My coaching style is rooted in techniques like Motivational Interviewing and positive psychology approaches, while keeping your health and neurodivergent identity at the front and center.
Here are the specific action steps we take during our time together:
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WEEK 1Mapping Menopause — The Initial Values, Vision and Identity Session (Video Call - 75 minutes)
We’ll spend this session understanding where you’re at with your health and use my mapping process to sort your values, and the vision of where you want to head over the next 3-6 months.
You’ll leave this session with renewed clarity, new resources, and a few foundational ideas to begin the work.
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WEEK 2-4Meaning — Your First Month of Coaching
Next, we get curious in our first month of sessions and discover/uncover patterns, strengths, triggers, and where you might be masking or pushing through.
We build on your health vision and explanation of how your brain/body work.
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WEEKS 5-12 Move — Deeper Sessions & Experimentation
Then, we try out small experiments with built-in flexibility, using interest, novelty, ritual, and deep focus/monotropic designs. We let go of societal “Shoulds”. What works on a high energy/capacity day might not on a low one, so we make a plan that flexes.
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Three or Six Month Coaching Containers — Alternate Live and Written Check-ins each week with Coach Melinda
In our 3 or 6 month coaching containers, we have a touchpoint every week. During live call weeks, we’ll meet to reflect, review, and refine your process.
I encourage you to bring a notebook to sessions if you like some note-taking and visual space. We’ll use a HIPAA-compliant AI note-taker if you like.
On alternate weeks, you’ll submit a written check-in and receive my personalized video feedback (and celebrations!).
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Hand-Selected Coaching Tools and Resources (also known as, Homework!)
Each week, you’ll receive personalized resources and tools from my curriculum. Working on meal planning, balancing blood sugar, or sleep? I have Coaching Tools for that.
Curious about evidence-based solutions for managing hot flashes or heart health, and a pathway to implementation? Throughout our time together, I’ll point you toward resources for menopause, nutrition, and health while we work together, on your timeline.
Mapping Menopause: Initial Values, Vision & Identity Session
All clients begin with this session (75 minutes).
Before our call, you’ll complete a few pre-session forms (20-30 minutes) so we can start our call with a shared understanding.
We begin the session with clarity around where you’re at right now: your values, energy and capacity, neurodivergent identity, what’s working, sensory load, and the systems you already use.
Then, we map this onto your health pillars (midlife health, menopause management, sleep, nutrition, movement, and neurodivergent identity).
You’ll receive a follow-up with notes, initial action steps, and a few hand-selected resources.
After completing this session, you’ll have the option to select a package, or move forward with à la carte sessions.
The investment for this Initial Session is $250.
Departure Coaching is in its launch season!
Through the end of 2026, the initial Mapping Menopause session is half price: $125 (or 2 payments of $62.50).
Use Code: DEPARTURELAUNCH at checkout.
Book the Mapping Menopause session now, or through January 31st, 2027; no rush.
If you have questions, let’s chat!
Book a free Introductory Call.
All in?!
Let’s Get Started.
I’m so excited to support you.
By clicking through, you’ll have the option to select the initial Mapping Menopause session, or book a free Introductory Call.
Choose Your Season: Three or Six Month Coaching Containers
When you’re ready for a new chapter to make health change stick, I offer a three or six-month coaching containers, because evidence shows that habit and health behavior change take time.
If you’re seeking momentum and consistency and thrive on a deeper coaching relationship where we move together through the often messy middle of the change process, these packages are for you.
Coaching Package Details
Packages Include:
Live Calls include optional session notes with detailed follow-up plan (using a HIPAA-compliant AI Tool)
Alternate week asynchronous (written) week check-in with Melinda’s brief written feedback
Hand-selected Coaching Tools, Resources, and References from my curriculum
Homework, tailored to your current capacity
… and a final session where we celebrate your progress and wins, review your maintenance plan, and identify any gaps or challenges to set you up for your next season.
3 Months
Best for Working on 2-3 Departure Health Pillars
6 Live Calls (50 minutes) in 90 Days
Alternate-Week Asynchronous Written Check-In, with my Video Feedback
Melinda’s Hand-Selected Coaching Tools & Resources
3 Month Package -
$415/month
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6 Months
Best for a Deep Dive into the Departure Health Pillars
12 Live Calls (50 Minutes) in 180 Days
Alternate-Week Asynchronous Written Check-In, with my Video Feedback
Melinda’s Hand-Selected Coaching Tools & Resources
6 Month Package -
$385/month
Departure Coaching is especially for you:
You’re seeking a neurodivergent-affirming and weight-inclusive/non-diet menopause health coach.
You’re early, late, and/or self-diagnosed AuDHD/Autistic/ADHD, and food and body stuff have always felt weird, unique, or different.
You’re seeking change and growth around neurodivergent nutrition.
You’re ready to dig into your current values system and set goals for actionable health change using evidence-based menopause resources. You’re ready to work!
You know there are other parts to your menopause health puzzle beyond hormone therapy.
You feel resourced to sit with the discomfort of resistance and the internal and external factors around neurodivergence.
Departure Coaching isn’t the right fit at this time if -
You have an active eating disorder.
You’re seeking help for a newly diagnosed clinical mental health condition and/or aren’t currently supported by a therapeutic team.
You’re teasing out the difference between post-partum depression and perimenopause (this is out of the scope of practice for a health coach).
Your primary goal with coaching is dieting or intentional weight loss.
You’re better served at this time by neurodivergent life coaching
FAQs
What is the Departure Coaching investment?
The initial Mapping Menopause session is $250. Use code DEPARTURELAUNCH for 50% off through 12/31/26.
Three-month packages are $415/month (6 Live Calls), and six-month packages are $385/month (12 Live Calls).
Both packages include an alternate-week asynchronous check-in so we have a touchpoint each week of the program.
Coaching packages provide a container for you to commit to the health change process, and I commit to your growth and our partnership.
When do Calls take place?
Sessions are typically held Monday-Thursdays between 11am-6pm, PST. All calls are virtual.
What goals and challenges do we work on in the sessions?
Health coaching is a space to explore your health behavior change and goals through the lens of values, vision, creativity.
We examine health behavior change through the six Departure Health Pillars — midlife health conditions, menopause management, nutrition, movement, sleep, and neurodivergent identity, with the intention of creating lasting change through the coaching process.
I offer specific support and tailor my coaching around the strengths and challenges of AuDHD, Autistic, and ADHDers in the menopause transition. Throughout coaching, we explore change with the nervous system, executive function, demands, sensory support, and space for interest and monotropic time in mind.
When we’re meeting for the first time, we review your menopause care plan, including your symptoms, action steps, and healthcare team, to identify any gaps, goals, or next steps.
I work with people who are at the very beginning of their menopause health change journey in early perimenopause, and those who are changing their relationship with food and body image after years of chronic dieting.
I also work with people who are farther along on that path, including coaches and clinicians, who want to take actionable steps with a trusted partner to help make change stick.
I’m peri-/menopausal, and…busy. What’s the time investment?
Outside of coaching calls or written check-in time (30-45 minutes/week) you can expect to dedicate about 30-45 minutes a day toward habits, rituals, and learning. Much of this is stuff you already do - meals, self-care, healthcare.
Working through the executive function and sensory challenges of menopause is one of our core competencies, and my hope is that you come to feel like you’re getting time back.
Is anything off-limits?
While I welcome open discussion and will keep all information HIPAA-compliant and confidential, coaching is not medical, mental health, or medical nutrition therapy.
Melinda does not offer specific recommendations on the dosage of pharmaceuticals or supplements, advice on labwork, or personalized, medically tailored meal plans.
Departure Menopause will never partner with a supplement company for affiliate sales.
How long does coaching take?
The length of time can vary from person to person. The coaching containers are intentionally built around 3-month “seasons” because that’s the minimum time it takes for health habit change to stick. I have a high renewal rate, and I love to work with people for a year or more.
Some clients want a shorter coaching experience to address a few specific goals related to peri- or menopausal health, while others stay on longer to build relationship and connection and receive in-depth support.
What if I want to lose weight?
In a weight-centric world and at a time in life when body changes and body image shifts can feel overwhelming, I welcome discussion around the desire for and ambivalence around weight loss, coupled with the impact of weight bias and weight stigma.
If, however, weight loss is your primary goal, we aren’t the best fit for coaching.
Is coaching like nutrition counseling or therapy?
Health coaching is a framework for working through situational issues, like menopause, to build a coaching relationship and achieve specific outcomes and goals through reflection and the change process.
This work explores what feels most relevant to your life and health goals — through values, strengths, vision, and creativity.
I’m often told the work feels therapeutic because of the relationship we develop and the concrete improvements.
Coaching, however, is not a substitute for support from your mental health or medical team. Coaching does not provide advice on hormone therapy or act as a substitute for mental health therapy.
I’m ready. How do I book my first session?!
You can book either the initial Mapping Menopause assessment or a free Introductory Call by clicking the link below.