My Funny Menopause

[EggysMom]

Just over two years ago, my body presumably ran out of eggs. Four months without periods. Then suddenly, in the back of a drawer in a forgotten cupboard in an ovary, my body found a few more egga. So my periods started again, ran almost to schedule for eighteen months. As I sit here two weeks late (and no chance of pregnancy) I'm wondering if that stash of eggs has now run out ...

Is that how it goes? Will my body hunt around again, potentially find another stash of eggs in a few months time, and restart my periods? Will I be in the precarious limbo of not knowing whether I'll be caught out by another period for a few more years yet? How do our bodies not know this stuff?

@EggysMom I have been having similar thoughts! My body obviously hasn't quite run out of eggs yet as I'm still bleeding but definitely changing. I think its barmy that we don't just have an 'off' switch we can press once we've finished procreating so that we can switch off all periods for ever without any of the horrid side effects of menopause

🤣

Ha, ha

Body: feeling safe? - i found an egg

Later on

No hot flushes for 3 months, you think they have finally stopped

Body: wiii found some more, we start all over again

And continue...

It's so weird. I know I have ten toes. If I lose a toe, I have nine. If I lose all ten toes, then I have no toes left. But when it comes to eggs in the ovary, nobody knows how many there are; nobody can say how many are left; and when you think it's all over, your body finds more hidden under the rug .... Modern medicine can help us manage the symptoms but does little for the cause.

‘Madam Ovary’ - a heart-rending tale of indecision with an ambiguous ending.....

I’m 8.5 months in with just occasional spotting (which I don’t count as ‘proper’ periods). Hoping very much that this is ‘it’.

nobody knows how many there are; nobody can say how many are left;

They do, actually.

If you go for fertility testing or to assess how many eggs you have left, they can tell you. Not to the actual number, but they can say you might be a year or two or five from menopause.

Modern medicine can help us manage the symptoms but does little for the cause

The cause is we are all born with a finite number of eggs. Over a lifetime they are used up or they die. When that happens, no more periods.

You’re not running out of eggs, though you have a lot less, it’s that the remaining eggs aren’t developing because they have become resistant to follicle stimulating hormone, and your ovaries produce less oestrogen and testosterone. It’s your body not producing hormones that causes the symptoms associated with menopause.

From the Womens Health Concern website

The menopause refers to that time in every woman’s life when her periods stop and her ovaries lose their reproductive function. Usually, this occurs between the ages of 45 and 55. In the UK the average age is 51. In a few exceptional cases women may become menopausal in their 30s, or even younger. This is then known as a premature menopause, or premature ovarian insufficiency.

The menopause is influenced by hormones – or more correctly, by a change in hormone levels. During a woman’s fertile years, her ability to produce an egg each month is associated with the release of three reproductive hormones (oestradiol, oestrone and oestriol), that are referred to collectively as oestrogen. Oestrogen is mainly produced by the ovaries, though small amounts are also made by the adrenal glands and by the placenta of a pregnant woman.

It is oestrogen which stimulates female characteristics at puberty and controls a woman’s reproductive cycle: the development and release of an egg each month (ovulation) for implantation in the uterus (womb), and the way in which the lining of the womb thickens to accept a fertilized egg. The monthly period happens because no implantation has taken place – there is no pregnancy – and the lining of the womb is shed.

As women get older, their store of eggs in the ovary decreases and their ability to conceive diminishes. At this time, less oestrogen is produced, causing the body to behave differently. However the body does not stop producing oestrogen overnight, and the process can even take several years, during which symptoms arise gradually. This gradual change is called the ‘peri-menopause’.

At around the age of 50-55 years, the monthly cycle stops completely – so no more ovulations, no more periods and no more pregnancies. This is the menopause.

Did your periods become more frequent and heavier before they stopped? Mine were regular as clockwork all my life but have got heavier. For the last couple of months they're only a couple of weeks apart, they barely stop inbetween (v light for a fortnight inbetween and then full on heavy for a few days).

Heavier, yes, but not more frequent (other than being randomly between 22 & 32 days apart). Okay, brainboxes who say it's linked to hormone production, what makes women of our age produce random amounts of these hormones, such that we can sometimes have a period and then go for a few months before the next one? How is hormone production that random, the suggestion above is that it's a slow decline not a sine wave ....

@EggysMom Not sure what you are asking...is this about the actual biology of menopause or about why it happens to women (ie evolutionary/ anthropology type query)?

Hormones are controlled by the pituitary gland and it's really quite complex. In menopause ova become more resistant to maturing because estrogen falls, so FSH is chucked out to try to make then respond. Sometimes this works so you have a cycle, sometimes it doesn't= missed periods= sometimes the cycle is incomplete so no progesterone part of the cycle = heavier period when it happens.

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