To feel lied to about the menopause

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I’m struggling hideously, cry at the drop of a hat and want to scream with frustration.

Why does no one tell you this.

I remember clear as day being told at school that one day when you’re about 50 your periods will stop. Fantastic I thought one day this hell of monthly inconvenience will cease. And cease it did, brilliant. But then. The past three years have been the worse years of my life.

I tried HRT and it didn’t seem to help, it made me irritable and experience anxiety that was difficult for me to cope with. That was a year ago. I’m now in the same place. Someone please tell me it gets better.

"The research would have to be blood tests or lifestyle questions for decades on each woman before menopause etc etc etc.
What's the point in trying to predict how you will be? The issue is how to manage it."

I think knowing the reasons why would also be helpful.

How much research money is poured into viagra? Why can't women's health get some of that attention.

I don't think it's right to be telling women they need to go private either. They pay taxes and should get proper healthcare on the NHS. There's an opportunity for change now with a different government so we should be campaigning for that to improve.

I guess for the same reasons some of us experience an awful time during our periods, pregnancy and post pregnancy stages, peri and post menopause affect us individually too. We have different reactions to the different hormones and naturally have and need different levels of them to function well.

Does HRT not help with this?

I am in perimenopause. A couple of years ago, my peri symptoms were ramping up but also, in the background, my ferritin was dropping. A combination of those two really had me searching for words and not sleeping.

Now, my perimenopause is still ongoing but I have been on iron tablets for some time and do feel better (have not had ferritin levels checked in the meantime, but it's not my first time with iron deficiency). I think my case is not rare, and these two processes can synergize to cause significant quality of life issues; just something to keep in mind.

even if that was true, not quite sure how you can be so confident in those numbers, we are talking here about 25% of roughly half the world population. Saddening to see the "I am allright, who cares about others" attitude amongst women.
I know women in their 40s who are suicidal because of early menopause and hormones goung wild. Are we supposed to say ehh it's only a few, who cares? What if that was your sister or your daughter?

Thank you!
Yes, fingers crossed all is well! Now it's just general old age making me fall to bits!! 😃

I don't think they need training per se, as really it is just case of depleting hormones causing very well documented problems. What they do need is to keep up with NICE recommendations and guidance so that they're all singing from the same songsheet.

Yeah I dont think those stats are particularly accurate. I've found this from a quick google search:

• 77% find at least one menopause symptom ‘very difficult’
• 84% experience trouble sleeping
• 73% experience brain fog
• 69% of women experience difficulties with anxiety and depression due to menopause
• 44% of women experienced three or more severe symptoms

I wouldnt call that "most people" sailing through it

No, but the point is menopause is not one size fits all - it is categorically not universally awful, and for quite a large percentage of us.

I didn't make the numbers up, those are the oft-quoted stats from researchers and gynos and people who know.

I think it really is pot luck. There is no doubt some women have a terrible time while others sail through.

I’m in the peri and the only symptoms I had were fatigue and aching. I went on HRT before the symptoms got any worse and for now I feel completely normal.

As others have said, HRT isn’t a one size fits all and it might need tweaking. But I would definitely persevere.

Might be an irrelevance but I never had trouble with periods ever - not painful or particularly heavy, regular as clockwork. That might just be a coincidence. More research needs to be done!

I wrote 25% sailing through, actually, that's not "most people" - but if you add the 25% sailing through to the 50% got through it ok crowd, that is 75% for whom the menopause is not a horror story.

I think that is important for younger women who are frightened by all they are hearing in the media to know.

Oh, and I didn't get those figures from "a quick google search", by the way.

But what would the point be of the research? What would predicting an easier or harder menopause do for anyone? I don't see the logic in that at all.

There are effective treatments now for menopause.
The money (from pharma) is being spent on some new types of drugs that won't carry the same (small) risks as HRT.

Research is only done if there is a pharmaceutical trade-off for the investors.

Viagra? No research is being done and it's a very simple drug that works on the 'plumbing'.

I don't think it's right to be telling women they need to go private either. They pay taxes and should get proper healthcare on the NHS. There's an opportunity for change now with a different government so we should be campaigning for that to improve.

I agree. It might not be 'right' but you need to be pragmatic. Waiting to find a 'good GP' or spending years feeling crap isn't going to be good, even if it's 'morally right'.

Even within the current system women can close the gap between a specialist and a GP by doing their own research and asking their GPs for different types of hrt.

GPs have access to cheap training in menopause and HRT. If they choose not to take that up, it's their fault, not the government. The only way forward with that is for the training to be mandatory which it should be. There are also zillions of online guides for GPs to 'learn' how to prescribe HRT. If they can't be bothered, the buck stops with them so women need to ask them why.

Thank you for that. It is hard to know exactly, because you have to look at what sample was used, how good the research is etc. And it varies wildly between countries. The time I spent in orher European countries including receiving medical care opened my eyes as to just how bad it is over here.

'I feel very strongly the NHS should offer sessions (a bit like ante natal classes) for everyone in early 40s to talk people through peri and menopause'

Women need to take responsibility and read up on it. Every day on the meno board we see 'I'm 47 might I be in peri?' Yes you'll be in peri at 47. Or, i can't sleep very well or I'm putting weight on but eating the same as i did when i was 20.

There is a plethora of info about the menopause online. We don't need the very stretched NHS to provide classes for what is a very well documented issue.

There isn't one experience of menopause. My menopause was great, liberating and the end (well 90% end of migraines) the end of cold sores every month (maybe one every couple of years now.) I don't tell everyone that is how their menopause will be because I know it isn't like that for everyone but I'm not lying to say that is how it was for me.

Hormones and the effects on individual women can be similar, also unusual & totally different. You can't generalise & say this is what to expect. An example is the common belief all women dry up, atrophy & lose their sex drive. At over 60 now I'm the absolute opposite of this in every way. In fact my sex drive is still as strong as it always was possibly more so & I've never been on HRT. I had awful PMS for two weeks every month including terrible breast pain. My menopause symptoms were bad in many respects although I never once had a hot flush or sweating. My point is it's no wonder Doctors have a hard time treating menopausal symptoms when no two women are the same. HRT is basically experimental every time it's prescribed & excellent for those who benefit from it. Those who don't benefit from it is not the GPs fault. To call them useless if it's not working is simply wrong.

of course it is not a one size fits all but the comprehensive educatiin and most importantly real support and good treatments should be available so that women who need it can benefit. Stats figures without additional info don't mean anything, and as a scientist you lost me at "people who know"

My mum is now 81 and can not tell me about her menopause experience as she has Alzheimer's and has a 2 minute memory. She never spoke to my sister or I about this stage of our lives (I am 52 and dsis is 50), we have both suffered a lot with perimenopause symptoms. We both have endometriosis too and have been advised not to take HRT due to our gynae issues and mum's breast cancer.

I do remember my mum crying all the time when she was around my age and she used to get the most awful headaches but she lost her mum when she was 48 and I just assumed it was grief but looking at it now I imagine peri was playing a huge part. in how she was feeling, I just wish she had spoken more about it to us but I was in my early 20's and out enjoying life, I feel bad about that now.

I don't think stress helps the menopause at all. I don't suffer from any hot sweats at all but I have the most awful anxiety, gut issues, awful life changing depression and my body no longer feels like my own and at 52 I could put it all down to perimenopause but caring for my mum (who is also bent over with osteoporosis, has heart disease and breast cancer), the stress from that as well as being a mum to teens is not doing my mental health much good.

No amount of healthy eating and exercise (I do it all) is going to take the stress away so I feel I am stuck with it for the time being.

Honestly it’s written about constantly. So nobody has lied to you. There’s also a load of funding that goes into it and it’s become its own industry now. But it varies between individuals and I think that the absolutely debilitating experiences people sometimes describe really don't reflect what most women experience. It’s like periods themselves- some women suffer every single month with pain, moods, bloating, heavy bleeding (so it’s not like life is a bed of roses pre-menopause either). But most women don’t find periods particularly debilitating and most women also cope okay with menopause.
I must also say as someone who hasn’t gone through menopause yet that the recent focus on perimenopause and making out that it’s the most awful experience ever and will last for 20 years is NOT actually helpful. It’s terrifying to keep hearing that you will essentially become a quivering wreck with loads of horrible physical symptoms. It would be like telling all young girls that when they get their period, they will cry incessantly, pass huge clots and be in excruciating pain every months. Some of them will but most won’t and it’s not that helpful to emphasise the negative.

The 50% who got through it is subjective. That figure needs to show the number of years of peri and post meno symptoms and it's somewhere like 7 years or more.

Also, one really important point, is that many women who 'think' they 'got through it' have symptoms that they do not relate to menopause - often long term diseases like osteoporosis or early heart disease. Or anxiety etc.
1 in 2 women over 50 have osteoporosis. That is a direct result of loss of estrogen.

There are women here on this thread who don't recognise many of their symptoms relating to menopause or know how they can be treated.

"Got through it ok" is not a very well defined parameter. What is "ok"? I have got through many things "ok" looking back but they were hell at the time. It also very much depends on how women have been socialised not to make a fuss or feel that their concerns have been minimised. This is from menopausesupport.co.uk by the way.

I didn't call them useless, I simply pointed out it is fairly well-known they get very little time in their years at medical school learning about either nutrition or menopause. The few hours mentioned, are from what I recall, pretty accurate - ie not a joke.

Im 37 and have heard so much about how awful menopause is (from work, Mumsnet, social media etc) that I am dreading it and really scared. I can’t say I think it’s being underplayed.

Isn't the breakdown you've quoted on the meno board at various times something like 33% for each category?

I am merely quoting what I have read in well-researched books by fairly well-regarded women who have worked for many decades as gynaecologists and have written on the menopause. I don't think they plucked those numbers out of their arses.

"But what would the point be of the research? What would predicting an easier or harder menopause do for anyone? I don't see the logic in that at all."

Preventative care? Someone mentioned people's different experiences of periods and pregnancy above. I think there are reasons behind those as well.

I thought a hell of a lot of money had gone into viagra. Maybe I was wrong then.

Yes, I agree that at an individual level if you are advising just one woman having problems NOW, maybe the best advice is to go private. But in the medium term, we need to campaign for better NHS care. And I don't mean people complaining to their own useless GP, but complaining to the surgery, the trust, their MPs and national campaigns to the UK and devolved governments responsible for health funding.