What symptom of meno really surprised you?

[menopausalfart]

I've had most symptoms associated with perimenopause, including some really nasty ones.
The symptom that surprised me the most was the memory loss. If I don't do something the moment it enters my brain, it's gone.
I've been taking HRT, vitamins, collagen, and I exercise regularly. This symptom, along with anxiety, has stubbornly persisted.

@QuaintPandanot under the NHS IME who tend to go by symptoms. I think the rationale (apart from limited resources in the NHS) is that in peri you can still be producing estrogen erratically causing peaks & troughs in symptoms fluctuating from month to month & so any test isn’t really representative of where your estrogen production is truly at. And so you can’t determine a suitable dosage of HRT because 1 month you may get way too much & cause worse symptoms that month & then different amounts the next. I might be wrong but that the gist I’ve got from reading on it. H’ever Louise Newson & lots of private menopause clinics advocate just trialling HRT & seeing how your symptoms respond & if it helps then it confirms that you need it replacing. They may use follow up tests as part of treatment with the aim of levelling out the fluctuations & getting them more in balance (hence the name of her App). With testosterone though the NHS do advocate testing your blood levels first (& private clinics will make sure you’ve got sufficient estrogen first too o’wise I think our bodies convert the supplemented testosterone into estrogen if there isn’t enough). So either see if your gynae will put you on a trial of HRT or find a new one. Louise Newson says women in peri are eligible for HRT & shld’nt be offered alternative meds or antidepressants instead - as is common here - for anxiety or mood changes for eg as they may well be hormonally driven & an HRT trial is easier to rule out first with no nasty withdrawal effects that SSRI’s etc are notorious for. Good luck!

Gynae history.....I have had 6 kids and am in double figures for miscarriages. Had my youngest at 38 and no pregnancies since. When I was having youngest I had hot flushes, never had them in any pregnancy before. Midwife said that she often saw it in women in their late 30's/early 40's, and although she didnt have any medical proof what caused them, she suspected that it must be connected to the changes women are starting to go through at that age. She would have been mid/late fifties at a guess so had probably been through meno herself at that point.
They were definitely flushes and not just normal pregnancy hot. That feeling that of being fine and then your internal thermostat going up to 100 degrees in seconds is unmistakeable.
Makes sense to me.

UTI’s at least once a month. So bloody fed up of it.

Sounds like my vestibular migraines: ears need to pop, muffled hearing, sinus pain? I’m on medication that has fixed it (betahistine). Get yourself referred to ENT.

I’m on betahistine (sometimes called Serc). They increase blood flow to your middle ear and they’re bloody miracle workers. I was given it as they thought I had Ménière’s disease but as I had sinus pain and face numbness the ENT decided it must be migraines caused by perimenopause. Your gp can prescribe betahistine, you have to take it three times a day.

The itching! Since starting HRT, the intense itching in my groin has gone but my back is constantly itchy, especially at night. Also, I had my first grey hairs in my early twenties, I stopped dyeing my hair a few years ago and have about 50% grey, but since starting HRT, some of the new growth is coming through dark brown again.

This was a long time ago for me but I suddenly became rheumatic! I could hardly move for pain, couldn't button my clothing and had to come downstairs on my bottom! I was sent for tests at the hospital and was put on painkillers. It was only after a female doctor suggested a blood test as she thought I might be perimenapausal that the cause was found. I was put on HRT and within a week I was pain-free and running around as normal. Apparently it's only about one in a thousand women who get this symptom (lucky me!) but it's worth knowing about.

@HippyChickMama My back, at night when I get into bed, is always itchy! I have limited mobility in one arm due to an injury last year that still hasn't healed, which makes it difficult to scratch it. Drives me up the bloody wall.

Memory fog
Eczema
Weak bladder, needing to pee ALL the time. I use predators but I don’t think they help.

The physical symptoms and changes are sobering and the anxiety is ridiculous. But the thing that has floored me above all else is the crushing apathy/lethargy/lack of motivation. I just can't really be bothered with ANYTHING.

I feel like I'm hanging by a thread at work. It can take me hours to do what should take minutes and I can't snap out of it. My work needs high concentration for long periods and is quite intense mentally, and I just can't.

We desperately want to move house. But I can't be bothered to get on with the things that need doing to facilitate that. Even though I've been dreaming of moving for years.

I can't even be bothered with things that require the most minimal of input from me. The boiler service was due in December. I didn't forget. I just couldn't bring myself to contact our usual guy and arrange to get it done. I still haven't done it. This will now have voided the warranty. I knew it would. But I still didn't do anything about it. I can't even articulate why.

I get the odd day when I suddenly feel like me again and I'm full of plans and energy. But I can't keep hold of it. It slips through my fingers like sand, impossible to grasp.

I keep thinking I must try to get an appointment to discuss this with the GP, discuss whether I can try HRT, do some research so I'm armed with the right information. But, I CAN'T BE BOTHERED.

I am 75 now and was on HRT for 25 years. It was great, no hot flushes, random crying or rages and memory much better, which meant I could work until 68. I had to stop HRT as I had a minor stroke, luckily with no brain damage. I wish I could still take HRT as menopausal symptoms returned.
I did a great deal of research into menopause as I was working with older women with learning disabilities and autism who could not explain how horrible they were feeling and in the past were put on antipsychotic medication. The able autistic women hated menopause and many had also hated puberty because of the “horrible feelings”. They are all able to take HRT unless contra-indicated. The female staff who took part in my training came up with many of the problems discussed here and were relieved that they were symptomatic of peri-menopause and menopause. We need more research and education for women (and men) in this whole area.
If you are working with disabled women who could be peri-menopausal please remember this thread.

The extreme tiredness (I used to get up and be in the gym at 5am now I can't even get up at 6am). Now I don't have the energy and can't be arsed doing half the stuff I used to. I don't go to the places I used to, even the likes of B&Q is too much like hard work.

The feeling of emptiness/sadness and anxiety, I've always been a glass half full kind of person, always the most chilled out person. Now I'm an anxiety riddled mess who just feels sad all the time.

I can handle the weight gain, I can just about cope with the memory issues and erratic periods but losing my spark and zest for life is a bummer.

This shows how naive I was but maybe the biggest shock was actually both the male and female GPs that I spoke to not knowing about menopause. The lack of research to evidence what might help women, is absolutely shocking.

The menopause experience happens to half of the human population! Why is it acceptable for us to be in the dark to this extent, when a lot of us going through it are at peak stress age for caring for kids, elderly parents and trying to hold down a job until we’re 67?

If governments were serious about equality or economic productivity they would be looking at women’s health and support. So many women are being forced out of jobs that they can ill afford to leave because of untreated debilitating menopausal symptoms.

This is lovely to read. Thank you for doing this amazing work. You’ll have changed so many women’s lives. x

The worst acne of my life. Painful, pussy, crust over and leaving scars. I keep telling Dr it is connected to my cycle but they don’t listen. One said it was the result of a steroid cream I hadn’t used in over a year and never on my face.
UTIs and a permanently delicate bladder.
Anxiety and lack of motivation. I wish I didn’t have to work or be in the shit sandwich generation. I used to have a nice clean house and a cleaning schedule, now I just do what I can when I can be arsed. Demented parents and children/adult children drain the energy from me.

I’ve been where you are and honestly, anti-depressants helped. I also suspect I have adhd (family history) and it can go nuts during perimenopause. There’s a lot of talk of women being palmed off with anti-depressants during perimenopause but I found them invaluable for that feeling of ‘I just cannot be fucked with this’. Apologies if I’ve read you wrongly, your post just stood out as really relatable!

@TokyoKyotoi am starting to think that I may ask for anti depressants. I’d always resisted it, but my low mood persists despite all efforts to help myself. I was driving home the other day, anxious and panicked because I was so worried I was going to be diverted onto a road that I hate driving on, thoughts rambling through my head, and just feeling like I cannot live the rest of my life like this. I feel like eyeore- no matter what I do, there is always this little black rain cloud of worry and sadness over me. It’s so utterly exhausting.

@thenewaveragebear1983 Oh that's the feeling exactly. Do go and see your doctor. It doesn't have to feel like that and you'll be glad you did xx

Thank you, that's really interesting to hear. I had wondered about whether anti depressants might help.

I did have depressionan many years ago but it was different in that whilst I had no motivation during that time I also felt sad and everything seemed bleak and pointless. That's not the case now - I do want to get on with things and enjoy life, but it feels almost impossible due this underlying apathy that I just can't shake off. But maybe anti depressants would help with that.

I really need to summon the energy to make a GP appointment!

I'd caution you against suggesting anti depressants @ScaredSceptic
Nice guidance is that HRT is first line treatment along with CBT or counselling if appropriate. There has been a very big drive to stop GPs prescribing ADs for peri and meno symptoms- it's outdated treatment and often doesn't work.

In the past, millions of women over 50 were being given ADs (which all come with their own risks and side effects.) They don't give any of the other benefits of HRT like bone health, heart health and reduction in bowel cancer.

Guidance is HRT first, tweak the type and dose after 3 months if necessary and only offer ADs if there is a sound diagnosis of clinical depression.

Is that right? I have a prescription for anti depressants sitting in a bedside drawer at home. My main problem is overwhelming health anxiety. I dont know what else to try.

The reason I went for ads was I had such anxiety I was not coping. In addition to the apathy. I did try HRT but I couldn't get on with it, and I didn't have the resources in myself to go through the 3 months of this progesterone, 3 months of that one. By the time I'd settled down, I was largely through menopause.

(Absolutely planning to go back and see what is beast health wise, and maybe now can make an appointment, which is what I couldn't do before!)

I totally understand this won't be appropriate in a lot of cases but it has been for me.

It's in the NICE guidance and has been for 10 years since 2015.

Dr Louise Newson has a lot on her website about women being misprescribed ADs- interviews with women.

www.balance-menopause.com/menopause-library/antidepressants-and-menopause/

Have you tried HRT at all and tried to get the type and dose right?

It's GPs who are at fault for not following guidance.

@TokyoKyoto One of the biggest issues is that most GPs are not menopause trained and this often means that women are given the wrong type of HRT - or certainly not the optimal type - right from the word go. There are many options, types and doses, but at the moment GPs do seem to prescribe a one size fits all of gel /patch and Utrogestan which many women find they don't get on with.

Yes, that's my experience. I'm sure it could have been better handled.