To think perimenopause can make you feel all over the place mentally

[Lifeswhatyoumakeit73]

I am 50 and well into perimenopause but am just about coping with the physical symptoms. It’s the mental & emotional stuff that’s really affecting me:

• overwhelm- at certain points in the month I genuinely feel like i cant cope with anything and I just want to take to my bed or run away
• a feeling of wanting to change everything but I can’t as I have 2 kids and that makes me feel a bit trapped
• can’t be arsed with anything- cleaning, cooking, my job- anything (that feeling tends to be worse when I have pms)
• Not wanting to work anymore!!! I have a lovely job supporting students at a university but have NO interest in it!
• Can’t cope with the kids problems - I feel overwhelmed by worry - I have a 15 year old and an 11 year old.

etc etc. I have days when I want to live simply without any responsibility, possessions etc!! I feel like it’s sending me a bit mad to be honest!

Anyone else?! It’s definitely worse with PMT and with the monthly fluctuations of hormones- I feel those more than I ever have to be honest.

Its the overwhelm though that really feels rubbish!

I'm just coming out the other side with all this.

Had horrible psychological issues with peri but found getting the right levels of estrogen and progesterone via patch/tablets/coil helped a lot.

Acupuncture, using essential oils, doing a CBT course, meditation, establishing a good sleep routine, exercise, reducing UPFs all helped too.

I can so relate to the 'meh' and can't be arsed attitude. What didn't help was imposter syndrome and the brain fog. So upsetting in a professional environment, I couldn't string a sentence together.

I would suggest a chat with your GP first, see what help is available

Ah, you ladies are my people. I’ve sailed through and never thought menopause would be a biggy . How naive I was and I empathise with so many of your experiences. I drive myself mad with the anxiety, short fuse, brain fog, lack of concentration, fatigue, weight gain, lack of interest in anything. I’m on hrt and it helps but I still feel I just want go sit by a beach with my cats and read a book.

Can I join?
I'm 53 and utterly miserable 90% of the time these days it seems. I have a 17.5 year old dd & a husband and I feel done with them all which is terrifying. I'm feeling more & more detached each day from the life I've always enjoyed.

I flip from being barely tolerant to boiling fizzing red hot rage in a split second. I feel like I hate my husband now.

I'm the main breadwinner with a full time high pressure job. He's a self employed creative who is very highly regarded but super flaky with money & often has huge long gaps between payments & periods of no work. We've been together almost 25 years & in these past 2 years i feel internally seething that I have sacrificed SO much of life to enable his creative ambition.

On the outside we look like a middle aged successful couple. In reality we're 90% of the time struggling for money & stressed out. Dh just got diagnosed with ADHD & while it's really only a validation of what I've long suspected I'm finding it difficult as the illusion that 'this next project will be better' has now evaporated. I spend A LOT of time propping him up in all kinds of ways

We have a teen & she's great but I honestly feel I dont have the bandwidth for guiding her too..

Parents beset with medical issues who truthfully have been an emotional drain fir 20 years now for one reason or another

I feel like my empathy is well & truly USED up & I have nothing left to give anyone. And I don't want to find anything to have to give anyone.

I am bone weary & having some health issues of my own.

I had 6 months between my last 2 periods & thought that was it, I was finished and BAM back into it with a hoffific 10 day heavy bleed that left me wiped out.

I long for a tiny, minimal but cosy pied a terre in some gorgeous city where I would live alone with my books.

Life would be going on all around me & I could open my door & visit a gallery or restaurant on a whim

We live in the countryside & while I've never loved it, I actively hate it now. Everything is a palaver.

I feel so out of control these past months I have actually worried for my own mental health .

I would like to have a break from marriage, to see if I’d be better alone. A lot of what he does and doesn’t do really pisses me off, I boil with rage at times.
I need to know if it’s him or me.

I'm 48 and got the coil 8 months ago after polyp removal. Since then I feel so emotionally unstable, anxious and angry. I'm not sure if is related to the coil or coincidence, but I hate how I'm feeling and never feel relaxed.

We cant all be wrong re weight gain. Doctors dont tell u that side of it. Im on 50 evorel. Big heavy hips now. My friend said her middle has got thicker. She on patch too. Its really frustrating.

Had it all , thought I was losing my mind or having a breakdown .upsets me to even talk about it , HRT saved my life . I have my physical and mental health back. I work out every day and do yoga twice a day , get plenty of sleep , absolutely no alcohol. Many people around me didn't really understand or care what I was going through with peri and it's the same for many women . I have patches and vaginal progesterone, I made a gorgeous box to keep them in and I call it my "Happy Box".
My mental health comes first now and if anyone around me doesn't like it well they can just piss off 😉

im in the same situation, turning 50 this month with two autistic children, and a depressed partner . I have also just had to have my beloved cat of 16 years pts . Life feels really tough at the moment .

God I don't want cats and books, I want to get pissed and have inappropriate sex with deeply inappropriate men and get tattoos and say fuck it to everything.

Books and cats are decades away, I hope. Then again it would be the safer choice; at the moment I am barely holding off lobbing a hand grenade into my life.

Reading with interest. I'm nearly 47, on hrt, but still experiencing the meh feeling. I don't want to work or parent anymore. I feel like I was sold a massive lie and the choices of the last twenty years are now condemning me to at least another ten years of service to others.

Yes. I feel unhinged quite a lot of the time. Other than for about a week after my period.

I think it might be time to go to the dr.

This has just made me question myself. I had the coil put in 3 years ago due to anaemia/heavy periods, I thought it made my rages better but now I’m not so sure.
Im frequently angry, feel like I’m always nagging, and don’t ever feel settled. Like I’m waiting for something to happen, but it never does.

Setting the hrt aside, isn't it normal at this age to gain weight around the middle. I started this way, always had a flat stomach then noticed it getting more plump and not going flat anymore. This was before I started on hrt.

Totally agree , firstly I read up on everything to do with menopause and HRT. I basically walked into my GP appointment and told her what I needed and wanted not the other way around . I have a great GP who really listens and when I have to go through something that makes me want to kill myself I want every damned thing that is available no excuses .

Same, but I'm 46, so have at least 2 decades to go 😩

I am peri but can't wait til it's all over and I no longer have periods.

Mine are every 3 weeks now and mega heavy. When I go for a wee, I feel like I'm wiping a cavernous hole.

Now you see, I had about two years of feeling like this at age 44-45....and then BAM suddenly I want books and cats. No thoughts of sex or alcohol at all. I want to be alone drinking a cup of tea with my cat on my lap, purring.

I hear you, OP. It is so hard. I feel like what is the point? Why bother with anything? Where is the pleasure? I hate myself for feeling this way.

🤣🤣 this should be the poster for menopause it's great .

Get pissed
Inappropriate sex
Fuck the lot of ya !

Thank you for your advice x

I relate to a lot of this.

I think it's partly the hormonal stuff related to perimenopause, and partly an age/life stage thing. I (very unreasonably) sometimes feel as if my entire life just consists of people making demands of me (job, kids, even my poor DP).

I think it's just a very busy time of life (late 40s), and that all the demands can make you feel like wanting to run away or hide. It's exhausting keeping all the balls in the air.

But what i really want to do, as I've said before on here, is sit at the window and stare out, like an old cat.

This is exactly how I feel. I don't want to do anything. Sick of rushing about everywhere and feeling breathlessly anxious about everything. Can't motivate myself at work. Can't be arsed to do all the repetitive household tasks. Can't even be bothered to read a book. I just want to sit down and do nothing.

Yes maybe this is part of it. I'd like someone to 'look after' me for a bit - bring me a cup of tea and chocolate or run me a bath. Instead of asking me what's for tea or telling me we've run out of toothpaste or asking for a lift. Plus in work it's 'do this, do that'. It's all the same.

It must be hormonal though, all of it, I feel utterly ruled by my hormones, like I'm at the mercy of my hormones at any given moment. Sometimes my feelings and thoughts change by the hour, from despair to numb to weepy, to mild acceptance.

I can relate to so much of this. I'm inching towards 50 and just can't be fucked with most people or doing anything, I get overwhelmed by the most trivial shit, I desperately want to just live in a cottage in the sunshine somewhere.

My emotions feel sort of numb and flattened, I'm not particularly weepy but I'm very irritable.

It’s definitely changed how I feel.

I care less about certain things but also a bit zoned out