04/14/2026
Peace Beautiful Ones,
I'm Priestess Yendys, Hmt Ntrt Yendys Nefer-Atum Oluwatoyin, holistic practitioner, Kemetic High Priestess, Ancient Blends ApotheCare Founder/Owner, and plant-based products Formulation Specialist, Pioneer of the Natural Hair Care Reclamation Movement, Herbalist, and the author of Living Like A Menopause Goddess: The Chrysalis Stage.
My work is rooted in guiding women back to themselves, through health and wellbeing, nature, ritual, breath, altar work and ancestral remembrance.
I created this offering, from a deeply personal place. My own journey through menopause was not something I wanted to just “get through” or silence, it was something I chose to allow, innerstand, honor, and transform.
Halfway through writing this book, I paused.
I had invited women to gather for “Let’s Talk Menopause”, an evening of holding space, sipping tea, and sharing fruit. I came with intention, with openness, with a desire to begin the conversation.
No one showed up.
In that moment, I quietly put my manuscript away… and left it untouched for nearly two years.
Then one summer day, during an Open Streets event on Tompkins Avenue, my editor, a brother, walked in with his arms raised and said, “Hey… are we going to finish this book?”
And just like that, something was reignited.
It was a man, one of our brothers, who called this work back forth… back into motion… and into completion.
I initially started writing this book because I felt divinely called to do so. I never knew that this topic would be my divine assignment. Over the years, I also saw how often menopause was approached and expressed with such discomfort, confusion, or dismissal, especially for Black women, who are so often underserved in this area. My spirit called me to reframe this experience as what it truly is: a sacred initiation… a chrysalis stage… a powerful threshold into deeper wisdom, clarity, transformation and self-possession.
My inspiration also came from both lived experience and decades of working with women in healing spaces, witnessing the emotional, physical, and spiritual shifts that arise, and knowing there had to be a more affirming, holistic, and spiritually aligned way to navigate them.
This space, "Living Like A Menopause Goddess Retreat at Sankofa Sanctuary" and this book are extensions of that knowing. This is a space for women ready to slow down, reconnect with their bodies, align with nature, and be held in a sacred container of transformation, sisterhood, and truth.
If you feel called, then trust that.
You're not just “going through” menopause, you're experiencing a transmission of our bodies that many, many, many other women didn't have language for, did not have safe spaces and completely miss the experience of this sacred elevation.
Welcome to The Chrysalis Stage. 📚🛍🦋🙏🏾📖
