The 40 Portal – Details, episodes & analysis

Becca and I spent last summer voice-memo-ing each other deep questions and raw answers in the weeks before we each turned 40, two days apart from each other. Somewhere in those exchanges I felt it — a collective quickening.

Real women standing at the threshold, telling their stories. Worthy not because of what they’d accomplished or achieved or could put on a resume. Worthy simply by virtue of being here. That’s what became The 40 Portal Podcast.

This episode is foundational. If you want to understand what the portal actually is — what liminality means, why this threshold matters, what’s on the other side — this is the episode to send your friends.

In this episode, we talk about:
→ What the portal actually is — liminality, the birth canal, the hallway, the messy middle — and why 40 is not a day, it’s a journey
→ Fawning, conflict avoidance, and outsourcing your worthiness to what others think — and what it actually takes to stop
→ Learning to give less f*cks about being misunderstood, judged, or unliked — and how to practice that in real life
→ Decoupling “feeling younger” from “feeling vibrant” — there are other words than young
→ Smutty romantasy, Dipsea, All Fours, and so forth ;)
→ The fear about disappearing as we get older and wisdom from The 40 Portal that BLOWS that fear wide open (you don’t want to miss this convo at the end!)

TW: we mention death of an animal during birth and Epstein & pedophilia re: the beauty standards we’re done with.

ABOUT BECCA: Becca Piastrelli is a land steward, storyteller, and gatherer of community living in the Hudson Valley. She dreams of a world where we eat slower, respond to emails slower, sleep on decisions, and create space for the full spectrum of emotions to be felt. She’s a mother and a daughter, a deep and present listener, and the host of the podcast Belonging: Conversations about rites of passage, meaningful community, and seasonal living. 

Find her: @beccapiastrelli | beccapiastrelli.com

THE 40 PORTAL NOTEBOOK: The call-and-response you'll hear in this episode came from the handwritten notebook I passed around my 40th birthday party. Women wrote their questions, their fears, their wisdom — and sometimes they wrote back to each other without knowing it.

You can add your voice to the Portal right now: the40portal.com/submit

SHARE THIS EPISODE: If this conversation moved you, share it with another woman who needs to hear it. The more of us who refuse to disappear, the braver and more beautiful this world becomes.

JOIN THE 40 PORTAL RETREAT: A gathering of women in the Hudson Valley, June 17-19. ALMOST SOLD OUT!

CREDITS: Hosted by Catherine Zack | Guest: Becca Piastrelli | Edited by Ruwantha Gunasinghe © 2026 The 40 Portal. All rights reserved.

There's a photo of Dinah at age one, in Syria visiting family. Her hands are full of freshly peeled orange, juice glistening, about to drip off her chin. Direct eye contact with the camera. Fully present. Her zest for life started early — hands always full, finding the sweetness, already deeply committed to connection. She hasn't changed.

Dinah Susan Alobeid is 39, turning 40 this summer — and she is asking the question many of us are thinking but not many of us have the guts to ask out loud. 

"What if I'm living the wrong life?"

She has the job. The kid. The husband. The whole resume. And yet — this persistent, devastating question burning through her heart.

But here's what you need to know: this is not an hour of existential doom. This conversation is bold, spicy, creative, and genuinely fun. I laughed till I cried in this episode. Dinah is one of those people who makes the big questions feel survivable — even joyful — because she's living her way into her answers in real time.

A tender trigger warning: we mention miscarriage and infertility.

In this episode, we talk about:
→ The question no one wants to ask out loud — and why asking it is the bravest thing
→ Music as medicine and creativity as resistance
→ Why sharing intergenerational women's stories is a radical act right now
→ Deprogramming the messages we've been fed about female value, desirability, and aging — and what it actually takes to unlearn them

ABOUT DINAH: Dinah Susan Alobeid is a VP at a tech company, a mom, a writer, and the host of Play This at My Funeral — a podcast at the intersection of music and existentialism. She's a Cancer sun and moon. She's turning 40 this summer. And she is standing at the threshold, letting us all watch. What a fierce f*cking almost-40-year-old. Here’s the playlist Dinah made for the episode.

Find her: @dinahsusan @dinahsusanalobeidwrites @playthisatmyfuneralpodcast

SUBMIT YOUR WISDOM: Your voice is needed in this podcast. If you're over 40: What have you learned, earned, and burned? What do you wish someone had told you? If you're under 40: What's the open question you're living? What longing, desire, fear, or dream do you want to put out into the universe? Add your voice here: the40portal.com/submit

SHARE THIS EPISODE: If this conversation moved you, share it with another woman who needs to hear it. The more of us who ask the real questions out loud, the braver and more beautiful this world becomes. New episodes drop each week - subscribe, leave a 5-start rating & review. You're the best!

📧 Substack: substack.com/@the40portal

🌐 Website: the40portal.com | catherinezack.com

📷 Instagram: @the40portal

CREDITS: Hosted by Catherine Zack | Guest: Dinah Susan Alobeid | Edited by Ruwantha Gunasinghe © 2026 The 40 Portal. All rights reserved.

GET THE GUIDE: ARE YOU IN A PORTAL?

JOIN THE NEXT PORTAL RETREAT: June 17-19, in the Hudson Valley.

Life is full. Your plate is full. You're doing the dance.

In this conversation, Clara Artschwager and I talk about what it means to navigate the fullness of midlife — the work, the kids, the relationships, the inner reckoning — without emotionally freaking out all the time.

We met four years ago. Clara wasn't married yet. She didn't have kids. We clicked on business stuff. Now we're walking through multiple portals together: motherhood, marriage, creative work, the midlife squeeze. Our friendship has grown with us through voice memos, those timeless-yet-totally-2026 conversations that feel like we're back in the 90s with the phone cord wrapped around us.

In this episode, we talk about:

→ Female friendship in your 40s: How friendships can grow with you as you move through different life stages
→ "I'm doing the dance": The fullness of midlife and holding complexity without losing yourself
→ How women solve the world's problems through voice memos alone
→ "There's no there there": Letting go of "if I can just get to THIS point, then I'll be happy"
→ Contentedness in your 40s: Being delighted by what you already own
→ Doing the inner work in community: Why Portal work is better together

Clara and I talk about how Portal work is better together. The reckoning with yourself doesn't have to be done alone.

I'm gathering a small group of women in the Hudson Valley for The Portal Retreat | June 17-19, 2026.

A few spots left → the40portal.com/retreat

📧 substack.com/@the40portal
🌐 the40portal.com
📷 IG: @the40portal
🛠️ Tools & Resources: the40portal.com/tools
Host: Catherine Zack
Guest: Clara Artschwager
Editor: Ruwantha Gunasinghe

© 2026 The 40 Portal

You start to see with your ears and listen with your belly.

That's how my first guest, Kate Schmieding, describes what happens when you turn 40.

Forty is your sixth sense — you begin to recognize what you already knew but can now KNOW. Really know.

In this conversation, Kate and I talk about:

→ Friendship in your 40s (her 3-strikes rule, why reciprocity matters, how to stop forcing connections that aren't reciprocal)

→ Being cool because you're YOU (not performing, claiming who you've always been, "I recognize the cool in me as the cool in you")

→ Creative work without overnight success (Kate writes pop culture poetry — staying in the "low hum" instead of chasing viral moments)

→ You're not a late bloomer ("I've been blooming this whole time, my friends. I just haven't given it a name.")

→ Doing things because you WANT to (not because you're supposed to — this is your permission slip)

→ The midlife squeeze (parenting, work, everyone depending on you — and how to navigate it without losing yourself)

ABOUT KATE:

Kate Schmieding (rhymes with meeting) is a writer, poet, creative leader, joiner, hand-raiser, and hard-conversation-haver. She writes pop culture poetry, and her work studies the intersection of the mundane and the meaningful. She is the Creative Operations Director for NYS. Kate loves the 5 Ps: people, poetry, pop culture, push-ups and parmesan. She's also one of the most generous friends I know.

Find her on Instagram: @kateschmied | @pop_culture_poetry

SUBMIT YOUR WISDOM:

Submit your voice to Portal & your words might just anchor the next episode of the podcast.

Send your wisdom here: the40portal.com/submit

IF YOU'RE IN THE MIDLIFE SQUEEZE:

Work. Kids. Aging parents. Everyone depends on you. You've fallen to the bottom of your own list.

Your 40s can break you or they can shape you.

I'm gathering a small group of women in the Hudson Valley this June for The Portal Retreat | June 17-19, 2026.

Three days to write and tell your own portal story. To do this inner work in community with other women who are deeply committed to the bit of becoming themselves.

Space is limited. A few spots left.

Learn More → https://www.the40portal.com/retreat

🎙️ Subscribe: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube
📧 Substack: https://substack.com/@the40portal
🌐 Website: the40portal.com | catherinezack.com
📷 Instagram: @the40portal

CREDITS:

Host: Catherine Zack
Guest: Kate Schmieding
Editor: Ruwantha Gunasinghe

© 2026 The 40 Portal.

00:00 Welcome
02:44 Meeting Kate
06:24 The 3-strikes rule for friendship
11:46 What friendship is actually about in your 40s
18:23 Who are you without job titles and accomplishments?
22:39 Writing poetry at 40 (alchemy and magic)
28:17 Holding yourself so you can hold others
33:54 "I'm cool because I feel like myself"
41:45 Not being an overnight success
44:57 "I'm not a late bloomer—I've been blooming the whole time"
49:35 Reciprocity
52:46 The 40 Portal notebook origin story
58:00 Kate's poem: "40 Is Your Sixth Sense"

Welcome to the trailer episode of The 40 Portal podcast, a coming of aging story, told by 40 real women.

Host Catherine Zack shares the origin story: how a sketchbook at her 40th birthday party turned into something bigger. She asked inspiring women to write their wisdom in her notebook instead of signing a card. What she got back was raw, honest, beautiful — the kind of truth that doesn't show up through the algorithms.

That notebook became the catalyst for this podcast.

Over 40 episodes, Catherine sits down with 40 different women (ages 20s-80s) to explore the portals they're walking through — divorce, turning 40, career changes, loss, or the well-known "everything looks fine but I'm dying inside" feeling. These are threshold moments. These are the portals real women are walking through.

This podcast is about what happens when women tell the truth — not the polished version, but the REAL stories. Because when women's real voices get heard, it sets us all free.

Life is cyclical. Portals are natural. And a woman who knows herself is one of the most powerful, magical, and creatures on earth.

Welcome to The 40 Portal, babe.

Learn more and submit your wisdom and questions to The 40 Portal Podcast at the40portal.com
Substack: https://substack.com/@the40portal
Instagram: @the40portal

Keywords: 40 Portal Podcast, women's stories, portals, threshold moments, midlife transitions, turning 40, Catherine Zack, personal transformation, women's wisdom, handwritten wisdom, authenticity, coming of age, real stories, women in their 40s, portal stories, life transitions, becoming, conscious aging, women's voices, storytelling podcast, portal work, self-knowledge, real talk, vulnerability, women over 40, midlife transformation, feminist podcast