In 2015 I was 48 years old and peri-menopausal. My periods had slowed down and become a bit erratic, but I didn't think much of this at the time, until everything began to be affected adversely, even my sense of self.
I was working a 50-60 hour week in a teaching role. I had become insomniac and had started to feel anxious all the time. After 2 years of not sleeping much at all, working long hours and drinking coffee to get through the day, I started to break-down. I don't mean I went loco and weird, but that my body started to react adversely. My eyesight became clouded and distorted at the edges, and my hearing became impaired. I'd hear what my students were saying, but on a 3 second delay - I'd see their lips move but no sound was coming out; it was really scary.
At about this time, I went on a much needed holiday alone to gather my thoughts. On the third night away, I couldn't sleep and I heard a noise in the street outside my room. I got up and looked out of the window to see a fight had broken out between 3 men. Oddly there was no shouting, just punches being swung. It escalated rapidly, and two of the men began to beat-up the lone guy, who fell to the ground as they continued to hit him. The two men ran off, leaving the third man for dead. I put on my shoes and a sweater and ran outside. The man was unconscious, barely breathing and in a very bad way. His face was a mass of blood and it was extremely distressing. I think it was 'the straw that broke the camel's back' moment for me. I actually felt something snap inside myself. I managed to alert the night reception staff, and an ambulance was called for the man. In the morning I had to answer some questions, then I cut my holiday short and went home early.
I was in a daze for weeks after and I couldn't teach. I told the school I'd 'hit a wall with teaching', said I was anxious all the time and reluctantly left mid term. I spent the rest of the academic year feeling really guilty to my students. I wasn't earning, so relying on my partners income and my anxiety got very much worse. I'd begun to totally lose all confidence in myself and to feel that I was a bad person: a bad friend and a very bad mother to my teenage children. I felt that no one liked me and I didn't deserve to be liked. My insomnia was though the roof, so I went to the doctors and was immediately prescribed anti-depressants and I got some taking therapies. My condition worsened, I had chronically bad driving anxiety and was sleeping for a few broken and torturous hours a night. I had begun to think, that perhaps it would be better if I wasn't around.
My partner was not helpful, disinterested even, and our marriage wasn't going well. He reluctantly let me use his private healthcare and I got more focussed help, and became a day-patient at a private psychiatric hospital. I was soon told I had PTSD and needed treatment for anxiety and depression. About this time, my 17 year old daughter was diagnosed with an eating disorder and my own treatment was put on hold as my partner and I dealt with that. Over the next year she gradually got well, thankfully. My own condition got a little better as I was able to be useful, and helped ferry her to various hospital appointments and she made a full recovery.
By now it was 2017. I'd come off the anti-depressants as I didn't feel they were doing much, but the low mood continued and I was still having negative thoughts. My periods had stopped completely, and I went back to the doctors and asked for HRT to deal with the sweats, which were becoming bad. I was prescribed Femoston pills and within 3 weeks everything had changed.
As those wonderful replacement hormones kicked-in, I got my life back. Actually it was more than that, I got ME back. The negative thoughts stopped and I could balance my feelings for the first time in many months. My shortcomings weren't dominating my every single thought now. I stopped looking inward and begun to focus on friends again; to be able to help my teens with Uni applications etc. Most importantly, I begun to feel happy again, which was a huge relief. I realised I had not been at all happy for about 4 years. I moved onto Evorel Conti HRT patches after a while, and continued to feel better and better. I began to be the person I had been before the menopause had started.
Later, I talked to many girlfriends about how the menopause was for them. I asked if they took HRT and if not, why not. I had at least 3 friends burst into tears on my shoulder telling me they'd been so low for many months and anxious all the time. They thought that everyone hated them and that their relationships had deteriorated, that they were not good people....sound familiar? I continued to gather anecdotal stories about women's experience of menopause and I suggested they speak with their doctor about HRT. Those that did go for it are in total agreement that it changed their lives for the better.
I went back to that same doctor who had prescribed the anti- depressants months before. I told her that in reality it was not the talking therapies or the anti-depressant I had needed, it was hormone replacement therapy. I asked her why she hadn't thought of this herself (she is my age after all) and we had a good chat about it. I tentatively suggested that next time a very weepy, depressed and anxious woman in her late 40s / early 50's presented, she might try to look into HRT first?
What I have realised is this: Menopause can alter a woman's sense of herself fundamentally. It seems to affect a significant proportion of women very adversely indeed, causing: chronic insomnia, day and night sweats, loss of libido, anxiety, depression and a sense that all relationships are doomed, and all thoughts are self-critical. Yes some women are unaffected, they have few of these symptoms. Or the symptoms they do have are manageable. In my case, I also had PTSD to deal with which made things much worse. I was over-worked, my marriage was breaking down and I had my daughter's illness to contend with. Out of all these pressures, it was the loss of my sense of self that made me feel utterly hopeless. HRT changed all this. It gave me back my personality, I became the person I had been before. I realised I really liked this new me.
I have a family background of heart attacks and thrombosis. HRT probably isn't great for someone with this history long term. So, I have myself checked out, they look for lipids in the blood, and monitor my cholesterol levels and they check-out my heart regularly. All drugs are a risk, and if you are someone who can't take HRT for health reasons and you have the bad affects the menopause can bring, I sincerely hope you have found some other way of coping and managing these debilitating symptoms. In my case, I'd rather be the rounded confident me, taking the risk of having HRT, than being miserable and living a tortured anxious life, doubting friendships and my sense of self.
Sadly, I wasn't able to save my marriage and we have divorced. The teens are at Uni and I live alone now. It's a whole new world for me, but I am mentally well, despite lockdowns and isolation. Some old married friends have fallen by the way-side unfortunately, but I don't blame myself for this like I used to. I'm still happy with who I am, even if I am a little lonesome at present and I will continue to live life and take HRT for as long as I can safely can do so.