What were your early signs of menopause/early menopause

[Rubyshoes12]

Can you please let me know your early signs of starting the menopause

A) Rage! From nowhere. It’s a wonder that I didn’t get myself into some dangerous situations. Started in my late 30s.
B) Anxiety - awful and hasn’t really gone away despite taking a step down from a very stressful job. I have always been anxious but this is next level.
C) Libido had disappeared but seems to be making a slight comeback, possibly related to lower stress levels.
D) tolerance for mansplaining is non-existent.

Mine got more frequent as well as really heavy and sometimes longer. Then I would miss one from time to time but this stage dragged on for 3-4 years.

Chin hairs.
Itchy ears.
Now: insomnia.

The most horrendous night sweats from head to toe. I’d wake to find the bed and duvet and me soaking wet like I’d stepped out of the shower. I’d have to lay towels on the bed, strip off my wet nightwear, move the duvet around to find a dry area, sometimes swap the duvet for blankets. It was unbearable. I was late 30’s when it started and lasted years before I was aware of other symptoms and queried peri. I’d wrongly presumed it was due to another health condition. Hrt eventually stopped them.

I have a double whammy of peri and long covid so that’s fun. Apparently one of the post covid infection things that happens is amplifying the symptoms of peri.

I remember begging my (female, middle-aged) GP to try HRT. She told me I still had regular periods so I couldn’t be perimenopausal. I asked her what she’d suggest to someone without long covid (there are overlaps, but some help better than no help). She said most women are fine without HRT and I burst into tears! She said she could give me anti-depressants, but I refused as I I wanted the actual cause and symptoms treated. If I’d have done myself in, I guess she would have said I had signs of depression, rather than depriving someone desperate for help, of some actual help.

I struggled on a bit more and eventually got another appointment. This time with a male GP. I was expecting a fight, and was armed with info, but didn’t need either - he just agreed I should try HRT and gave me a prescription. The chemists in my area were out of bloody stock. My lovely husband sat on the phone ringing round until we found somewhere. The female GP is the supposed menopause specialist in our practice which is frightening.

I never really knew what was horrible PMT and what was perimenopause/ menopause tbh.. I just know that mid to late 40s I started to have horrible bloating, sore breasts, headaches, nervousness, and generally feeling awful for about 4 days before my periods started. Hadnt been like that before. In terms of nights sweats I had almost none of that, andI literally had about 2 hot flushes in my whole life. Had normal actual periods all the way through and then one month...nothing....and that was the end of that.

Honestly honestly honestly.....it gets better later. You lose that youthful things as you age obviously but the feeling of freedom.later is really nice . You can have a whole new lovely kind of life when you get older. Trust me.

Periods gradually got shorter and closer together — first 26 days, then 24 / 25 days instead of my previous reliable 27.

My hair started to get very dry. Then it began to thin on top.

I started to have problems getting to sleep, which I’d never had before.

I had some episodes of unexplained joint pain, especially in my hands.

In hindsight though, my first symptom was palpitations. I went to the GP with palpitations and heartbeat issues about two or three years before I really started to notice the other things. I had tests done which didn’t find anything and the (male) GP told me it was just stress. Later on I realised that palpitations are a menopause symptom and they were appearing around the same time my cycle first started to shorten.

Very, very mild hot flushes - well, warm flushes not hot! But I twigged that was the start of it and it was, they grew more intense over the next few years. Was the only symptom I ever had though.

The media obsession with HRT really gets me down and pisses me off .

Fabulous for those can take it and rediscover vitality and vigour 🙄 but not all of us can take it .

Not if you are the sandwich generation and care for unwell older parents. its just shite hormones, anxiety, worry, no holidays and caring for everyone (apart from yourself)

*Low mood
*Overwhelming anxiety
*Night sweats - just totally soaked
*Vulval eczema - really nasty
*Smell of my wee has changed - yukky
*Urinary incontinence
*A depressing amount of weight gain
*such itchy skin ☹️
*such dry skin ☹️
*shortened flooding periods

i can’t take HRT 😢😢

I do care for a very unwell old lady. My mum. But I feel a lot happier than when I was younger.

Exhaustion, brain fog, weight gain, heavy 3 weekly periods, aches

Terrible insomnia (2hrs a night, every night), and night sweats. That went on for eighteen months before I had a late period and the penny dropped.
That same month I had sudden extreme irritability, a potty mouth, and brain fog. Got HRT. All symptoms improved.

Flooding
Sore boobs
Rage
Frozen shoulder
Itchy ears

I’m also intolerant of the heat but have never liked it to be honest!

Regular very heavy periods (think flooding for first 2 days) needed a hysterectomy in end
health anxiety
strange numbness in face (found out since they were a type of migraine)
brain fog

I think tiredness and forgetfulness, but in retrospect heavy periods too. I’d had my last baby in my early 40s so I just put it down to that.
The hot flushes only started when my periods stopped. Now I’m through that I feel better although still tired!

First noticeable sign definitely hot flushes. Barely sweated in my life, then, suddenly, like a switch, becoming shower-drenched in seconds.

At around age 46, irregular, unexpected very heavy periods (flooding). Then very unpleasant night sweats. I tried HRT but I then experienced creepy crawly skin sensations which stopped when I stopped HRT.
For several years I used to have hot flushes in meetings, which made people think I was shy. (I’m not shy!) My periods stopped at age 52.
On the plus side, it’s only from my mid sixties that I’ve seen any significant skin or body changes, dryness etc. Every woman is different!
My mother maintains that she had no symptoms whatsoever and that her periods stopped also at age 52 and she was fine.

Sudden anxiety, like someone flipped a switch and someone else's anxiety was flooding through me.

Rage.

Weariness - waking up and thinking "is this it? Shower, school run, work, cook, sleep forever until I die?" General feeling of existential dread.

Brain fog

Heavier and more frequent periods.

Drop in confidence of all types. Sudden and damaging.

Tiredness

Also feeling I woke up and had swelled slightly bigger all round. Like I was a puffier version of myself.

Thankfully, HRT has resolved most of these. I still DNGAF what other people think, but more from feeling confident in myself rather than ennui. Am still puffier though. But at least I dont feel like the world is populated by incompetents and I dont cry if I have to go round a roundabout.

Early 40s I started with
awful rage and emotional crying outbursts I. The week before my period was due
periods closer together, heavy and clotty. Even more than normal.
now I’m 48 I’ve noticed over the last few years that I’m aching all over, can’t shift the weight, my face has aged, shoulder hurts, having heart problems, some hot flushes.

last year my periods stopped for six months, I thought yes that’s it and then they started again. Had 3 now ffs. But during the period free time I was very stressed, also physically and mentally I’ll and my diet and excercise was non existent so that’s probably contributed.

I am 43 and I this is what I have noticed and assume due to peri?

Itritability / rage. Snapping when I wouldn’t snap before. DH noticed late last year and I’m trying so so hard.

Lack of patience / tolerance especially in work (could be related to boss)

No sex drive.

Starting sentences and getting mixed up / struggle to get words out / forget words. Results in long rambles to get to the point in work in an attempt to cover up. Worse at certain points in my cycle.

Periods - regular in that 24-30 days but vary so much from very heavy with flooding to fairly light. Now 4 days proper period and a few days light versus 7 days proper before.

Waking during night.

Aches and pains

Loss of confidence / questioning ability in situations previously confident in (could be linked to hopeless boss)

unclear if linked - Ive recently had lots of issues down below but not sure what’s going on - burning, aching, pinching. Then a stubborn UTi which has caused me significant anxiety.

Irregular periods. I could normally set the clock with my cycle but it started getting a bit longer between, occasionally shorter, I’d miss a couple months, and the period itself was shorter. That’s it! No hot flushes, no aches or pains, no brain fog, no mood swings.
Out of my 7 closest mates it was the same fur three of us, one had quite bad symptoms and went on HRT, one had symptoms enough to go on the lowest dose, two had symptoms but felt they could handle them. But almost half of us had none. My mother had a terrible time (flooding etc) so I was dreading it but am so grateful I got away lightly! Also started my periods when I was 11 last one was at 55.

•Anxiety
•Rage
•Weight gain and loss of tone. I’ve only put on 5kg but it looks like a lot more because everything is flabbier.
•Increase in insomnia