Why does the older generation judge you for taking HRT?

[BonnesVacances]

I'm peri and started HRT as soon as I found out. My life is shit enough without struggling through the menopause as well and there are no prizes for being a martyr. I also read about the health benefits of doing so, so it's win win as far as I'm concerned.

But I'm so irritated by DM and MIL's vocal opinions on this.

DM happily keeps telling me the menopause was easy for her and she didn't need HRT. MIL tells me that they all had to just get on with it and we have to stop whingeing.

I wasn't whingeing. I was talking about how interesting Davina's programme was and that I realised I had more symptoms than I thought so probably needed to increase my dose.

But apparently we're supposed to put up with symptoms and feeling shit, and make life difficult for ourselves for some reason. Obviously it's my irritability that makes their attitude so annoying, but so much for support and experience from supposedly wiser older women.

OP I think you do have a point. In my family no one took it and they say they sailed through. But that’s not how I remember those years (my mum was horrible for years) and the older women of the grandma generation have had serious health problems such as osteo.

I think don’t discuss it with them really. I’m more surprised by younger women who seem worried about it. (Yet happily drink loads but don’t worry about that link with cancer)

You literally can not open a paper or turn on the Tv without someone screaming from the roof top about menopause and the wonders of HrT. It’s getting to the point where it’s almost too much.

so either your MIL and Mother are ostriches OR they see that pretty much everyone is going on it - and no one shares their views and that they’re a little…. Perhaps wanting in the logic department

I’ll take a pun
you Don’t generally have a positive relationship with these women?

It’s probably a bit of jealousy that they never took it. They will also be very aware of the breast cancer scare.

As irritating as all that sounds, just nod and smile. You don’t need their validation. They don’t need your input if they don’t want it into their own choices either. Pick your battles. You don’t need to get a medical history from your own mum to get your own HRT sorted out and your MIL views on any of it are neither here nor there.

Good for you taking it already. Wish I had!

I suffered the peri and menopause from hell for over 10 years until a wonderful, young locum - who had specialised in gynae - said I would be mad not to try hrt so I relented.

Within 3 weeks I felt years younger and so much healthier. I have now been taking it - reduced to half dosage - for 9 years. Unfortunately I now have a GP in her 50's, who obviously sailed through hers, and is dead against me taking hrt because of the "Risks.". I have now tried coming off it 3 times over the past 4 years - once for 6 months - and again felt absolutely dreadful. I saw another gp in the practice who was happy for me to go back to hrt and I have requested she add to my notes that I intend to stay on it for life. It's quality of life rather than quantity! Who wants to live to 110 and feel like shit?

I’m 67 and had a difficult menopause. I practically begged my GP for HRT but they would never prescribe it or give me a reason why not.
I don’t judge anyone who takes it but I am very jealous!

I do get on with them both ok tbh.

I was just telling my MIL that I'd had a particularly difficult week as I'm a full time carer for DD(20) and had also realised that what I'd put down to Long Covid was likely more peri symptoms so was going to speak to the GP about increasing the HRT dose.

So I was hoping for something more than "Well we just had to get on with it" as if I was some weakling who wasn't coping. When in actual fact I've coped far better with DD's illness than she has and often have to prop her up over it! And am far from a weakling!

I may well have been coping better with peri, if my life was in a better place and I hadn't had to give up my career to look after DD for the past 6 years while her DS gets to continue with his fulfilling one!

But I bit my tongue. I know by now that an opinion formed is not an opinion changed. I just find the lack of sisterhood or support shit tbh and agree it's misogynistic.

I'd also like to ask those who are older and who DO moan about menopausal women not just getting on with it, if they got their university education for free

For goodness' sake. About 5% of the population went to university in the mid 1960s.
Most of these older people left school at fifteen.

1. Ignorance. As PP have said, often people who claim to have "sailed through" the menopause didnt actually and the mood swings were obvious to everyone around them but them. Rose tinted glasses at play here.
2. The older generation can be quite stuck in their ways. I was told by my nan that bottle feeding was best and no matter how many studies I quoted at her and the fact that you know, theyre designed for it, she wouldnt have it and insisted that in "her day" they all knew better.
3. Jealousy- I seriously think some people know deep down that they are wrong but are just jealous that we have the help they never did and so stubbornly insist we dont need it instead of admitting its sad they didnt get the help they need.

Whatever the reason its just plain rude to tell you how to manage your own medical/hormonal needs and I'd have told them to shut up.

My mum said "I didnt take HRT, I have calcium tablets instead".
Fine, of course, her choice, but it seems she hasn't had a full night's sleep since her late 40s, and has been pretty moody and snappy since then. I agree that some seem to see it as a weakness.

I recently started it myself and feel so much better.

My bloody GP is well into the crap that, 'I expect your mother and grandmothers didn't take HRT and they got through it and were fine in the end'.

No, love, none of them were fine. Osteoporosis, heart disease, mental illness, misery.

Maybe they're just jealous that they 'had to get on with it' as they weren't offered an alternative.

The problem isn’t the older generation, it’s your DM and MIL. I’m at the end of it , was put of HRT by a male Gp ( cancer risk etc) and am still wondering whether it might help this late in the day. I’m all for any help you can get.

My dm was really proud that she didn't 'need' hrt. However, now that it's widely accepted that hrt reduces women's risk of osteoporosis, heart disease and dementia my dm is asking her gp to prescribe her hrt.

I don't think it's generational. Read these threads to see what women in their 40s and 50s think today. There's one running at the moment about taking hrt if you have no symptoms.

My late MIL alluded to 'needing' something for a few years. My Mum asked for hrt in her 60s because she was still suffering and her GP then told her she was too old. This was many years ago (25+) Her close friends had issues with anxiety and insomnia and took Valium and amitriptyline but no connection was ever made with meno. Now, most of her friends, younger than her, have osteoporosis and diabetes, and problems with 'their bits'.

Really sad isn’t it

i understand the treatment options for osteo are hrt so the irony is if they’d been given it earlier they might have been better protected.

this all needs to improve

It's similar to having childbirth with no pain relief - why would you ? Go to the dentist and say "no anaesthetic please" No thanks.

Well @RitaFaircloughsWig you might reject pain relief bc you think it's best for you. Or it might be too late. I didn't have pain relief because that's what I wanted and it suited me. I wouldn't dream of thinking I was better or disparaging someone else's choice (like you just have!)
Choice innit?

Well I am of an older generation, (70 plus) and I did have symptoms, hot flushes etc., My GP prescribed HRT which I gladly took for about 5 years, and then I got diagnosed with breast cancer on my very first mammogram.

I'll never know if it was the prolonged taking of HRT, but the niggle remains in the back of my mind, what if I'd never taken it? I imagine things are more closely monitored now, but I would have been more reluctant had I known the outcome.
Just " what if's ? " really .

I just find the lack of sisterhood or support shit tbh and agree it's misogynistic.

I suggest you don’t look to your MIL for “sisterhood”

I'm 43. My mum is 64, Aunt's and her friends are aged up to late 70s.

All very pro HRT.

Maybe it's your circle rather than an older generation thing?

Doesn't really matter though, it's your body and your experience so do what you need to do.

At the end of the day, it's none of their business.
Stop talking to them about it and speak with your friends instead.
I do hope you feel better soon

Well, I’m the older generation too (68), and just about all my friends took HRT.
I wouldn’t have got through the menopause without it (total hysterectomy at 33), I literally couldn’t have functioned without it!
i think there’s an element of jealousy that they didn’t have it, my mother certainly was unpleasant about me taking it. It was definitely a touch of ‘I suffered so you should too’!

Never heard of that. My mum (70) took hrt and advises me to do the same when it's necessary.