Louise McCabe had spent decades as a writer, teacher and performer. But in her fifties, she made a decision that would reshape her working life entirely: she retrained as a counsellor, completing a Graduate Diploma of Counselling in 2024, followed by a Master of Counselling and Psychotherapy.
Now practising in North Adelaide and online, Louise works with women over 50 who are navigating some of life’s most challenging transitions. Her client list reads like a map of the pressures many women in this age group know intimately: relationship breakdowns, caring responsibilities, workplace ageism, health concerns, financial stress, and the psychological upheaval that can accompany perimenopause and menopause.
“I’m passionate about supporting women through change,” Louise says. “After all, it’s the only certainty in life, but we often resist it.”
A personal path to practice
Louise’s decision to retrain wasn’t purely academic. It grew from her own experience of profound grief, one that many women will recognise but few speak about openly: involuntary childlessness.
“I grew up in a really big family,” she explains. “I always assumed I’d have my own kids. In fact, by the time I was eight I was choosing names for them all. I was going to have a ‘small’ family of three.”
But as an adult, the right time never came. In her late forties, single and entering menopause, Louise came to terms with the fact that motherhood wasn’t going to be part of her story.
“I fell into an almost inconsolable grief,” she says.
It was counselling that helped her through. “It was such a relief to be deeply listened to, without platitudes or unhelpful advice, and have my pain acknowledged and understood,” Louise recalls. “Through counselling I built a trusting and safe relationship with another woman. She supported me through my grief and helped me pick up the pieces and find joy and meaning again.”
That experience now informs her own practice. Involuntary childlessness has become a special interest, and Louise brings both professional training and personal understanding to clients working through similar losses.
“I’m in a place now where I’m at peace with not having kids of my own,” she says. “I love being an auntie and I have kids and young people in my life, which brings me a lot of joy. But it was a process to get here.”
Why women’s mental health matters
The statistics paint a stark picture. According to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, about 45 per cent of Australian women have experienced a mental health issue in their lifetime. Life transitions and disconnection are major triggers.
For women over 50, these triggers can arrive in clusters: a parent declining, a marriage ending, a career winding up, a body changing. Louise sees clients dealing with anxiety about retirement, grief and loss, stress from caring responsibilities, workplace bullying, health issues, and what she describes as “loss of identity, meaning, purpose or independence.”
Mental health symptoms that emerge during perimenopause and menopause are another area she works with closely. For many women, this stage of life brings psychological shifts that can be disorienting and isolating, particularly when the focus is so often on physical symptoms alone.
A return to Adelaide
Born and raised in Adelaide, Louise left for Sydney as a young adult to study. She returned in 2019 with her partner, settling in the western suburbs with their border collie.
It’s a homecoming that has come full circle. The creative life she built in Sydney, the personal losses she weathered, and the professional training she undertook have all led to this point: a practice dedicated to helping other women move through their own difficult chapters.
“Change is the only certainty,” Louise says. “But you don’t have to face it alone.”
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