Come and explain the menopause to me...

[TheToffeeTruckinTown]

There's something I don't get. I used to think it went like this:
going through the menopause= hot flushes

But the perimenopause seems to have all this and more! Periods all over the place and am a crabby and anxious person. However, could I call myself 'going through the menopause' yet? Or is something bigger and more awful going to happen later on? And how long does it all last. I can't believe it's not talked about more really. When are you meant to find out?

The menopause section?

ITS much more variable than I think you imagine

Perimenopause was worse than menopause for me. I think often people mean lerimenopause when they say menopause as it’s when everything goes tits up.

The menopause has occurred when you have had your final period. You don't know you are post menopausal until you haven't had a period for 2 years (under 50) or 1 year (over 50). After that final period, symptoms e.g. hot flushes etc can continue for a while longer (in my case maybe 2 -3 years longer). That is the menopause.

Anything before that, and probably the part that most people think of when the word menopause is used, e.g. irregular periods, hot flushes, is actually peri menopause. I had some common symptoms and some not so common (ie, I can't find anyone else who had symptoms like mine!) And I hate to tell you but it went on for about 8 years. You cannhave a blood test which might suggest you are peri menopausal, but as I said, you can only know you have gone through the menopause some time after the event.

HTH

The perimenopause lasts up to ten years before actual menopause (which is when periods stop altogether).

There can be a lot of impacts which vary from person to person...hot flushes, night sweats, periods will be more and more erratic until they finish, anxiety, insomnia, irritability...

Worth researching if you're going through it...

I’ve not had a period for two years, my sleep pattern is still erratic and I get apocasio al spells of hot flushes - currently on to about my third day of them.
My skin is also allergic to many more things than it used to be.

Just to add, like Flamingchips, the peri was worse than menopause for me. Maybe because there was no way of telling how long it was going to go on for, whilst, once you identify your last period, you are already seeing a lessening of symptoms?

I still get the odd hot flush and other symptoms around a decade after my periods stopped. My mum was still getting hot flushes in her 70s

Tbh who cares what name is attached to it, it's shit.

Your body stops producing the hormones that make you 'you' and, as I heard Jane Garvey say the other day, life becomes 'a fug of despair' .

I'm sorry not to be able to offer any encouragement. Like you I'm floored by it and will never be the same person again.

Think of it almost as a reverse of puberty. Puberty doesn’t just happen overnight, it takes years.

Yep, the piri-piri menopause bit just keeps on giving!
6 years in and no signs of easing up. One of my sisters is done, last period at 52, and the other is nearly there (or rather, thinks she is) at 46. I'm 45 so hoping it might end soon.
I'd agree with previous post, the menopause boards are really good Toffee, it helps knowing there's somewhere to have a grumble and share new symptoms! Got a house full of males here so not a sympathetic venue for my occasional angry rants about how shit it is!

Very thorough explanation frangipane

If it’s any consolation, I went into a “false” drug induced menopause, came out of it, became peri menopausal again then back to menopausal. I still get the odd hot flush but nothing like I did.

I lied about my rants being occasional, they're frequent - usually only the cats are listening

Welcome to themagical mystery that is perimenopause, OP. How you travel through it is very individual, but if you are able to discuss it with your mum, that may give you a few clues about what to expect. The most challenging thing for me so far has been the way this time of life really does hit you hard with any unfinished business: nothing short of grief in some ways. What has helped has been running, therapy, changing my diet and stopping drinking. As I say, it’s highly individual as to how you experience it. My periods have been getting more and more unprefictable - I’ve found that bit weirdly sad in that something I usef to take for granted is slowly leaving me. My libido vanished for a while and now seems to be negotiating a comeback on its own terms. I am slowly trying to get to know the person I’m becomimg. As I explained to a male friend and ‘Dr Who’ fan: ‘you know how when the Doctor transforms and has to re-learn everything including tastes in food and clothes? OK that, but over weeks, months and years.’ He got it! It’s not all bleakness, OP but it is a hell of a trip.

Nice post Corvid, well put

I find it really interesting to read about older women’s feelings on the menopause. I don’t feel sad about it or as if I’m grieving anything - I am really pleased my periods have stopped because they caused me a lot of grief in my teens and it seemed unfair to still be getting them despite being infertile in my 20s.

I was really pleased when my periods stopped too. I always suffered from terrible period pains, and in my 30s started having migraines after most periods. What with the swollen boobs and everything else, there were only a couple of days in the month when I felt normal.
I was dreading the menopause because I had the most awful puberty, and thought it might be a replay, but it was okay really. The hot flushes were a pain for about 8 years. I had my last period at 47, 6 months after the previous one. Oddly, I used to really feel the cold, especially in bed, but since the menopause my temp. seems to have changed, and I am now a much warmer person, body wise, though I no longer have hot flushes thank goodness.

Can someone be kind enough to give a link to the menopause threads please. I can't find it. Thanks.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/menopause

Lot of useful stuff in there

Ifangyow go to the health section, it's listed on there.

Im 9 years into the perimenopause. Im a fat, hairy, achy, homicidal amnesiac.

Wow so many replies thank you all
I didn't know there was a menopause section on MN, will get myself over there.
My dm has passed away so there's nobody to ask. It really helps to hear other peoples experiences of it as it's a bit isolating and weird isn't it.
I can't wait for the bit where my periods stop! at the moment I am either having a long heavy period or having some kind of 'PMT plus' with no more than a week in between of relative normality.
I've also had, hot flushes, racing pulse, several random new allergies like pp said, weight gain (round the middle) lots of sneezing and blocked sinuses, random body hair and warts, but most of all to add to this delightful mix, just yes a sense of misery, doom, grief. With bouts of anxiety, and sometimes also the rage.
I can't even say for sure when it all began - maybe 3 or 4 years ago but it's gradually worsening?
Have to say I'm pretty horrified to hear of 8 or 9 years of it jeez.
But some consolation that this could be the worse bit - I was thinking wtf is the actual menopause then is that worse.
I suppose I'm lucky to have no aches... (yet!) and just like lucisky I am suddenly keep having to turn the heating down where before I was always the freezing one.