Does anyone else get awful existential dread

[hedgheog]

I’m sure it’s when my oestrogen patch is wearing off or not working as well (mid abdomen below naval - have put it there sometimes due to irritation elsewhere and
I’m sure it’s doesn’t work as well there) I get this awful existential dread with irritability and it scares me, it’s such a dark feeling. Does anyone else get it? Sometimes wondering if it’s the time when progesterone should be rising as it has occurred twice on cycle day 12.

Suppose I’m just feeling alone today, another day of cancelled plans due to fatigue and not wanting to ruin others day with this awful irritability.

Yes, everything gives me it.

Last night, I laid in bed questioning why I was carrying on with all my health woes, and it's struck me that my family are the thing that's kept me going after a traumatic decade of head injury, post concussion syndrome, then being injured permanently by an off label antipsychotic that gave me a movement disorder.

I really need to stop navel gazing so much. I'm not on HRT but maybe I should seriously consider it. I'm in my 6th year of perimenopause and it's getting a bit hard now.

Sending hugs, I understand.

Oh yes. It's really horrible, I sympathise.

I wake early every morning after an anxiety-type dream (you know the sort - late for an important meeting, due to sit exams when you haven't been to the lessons etc) and then lie worrying about all sorts of things until it's time to get up. By breakfast it's all worn off, but I know it'll be rinse and repeat the next night. It's extremely wearing.

F

I'm 60 and have been having this night time feeling of 'impending doom' for many years, plus waking up shortly after going to sleep with a really powerful feeling that I've forgotten to do something... heart racing and feeling a bit confused....it's a really horrible feeling. It's quite difficult to explain it in words. I'm not on HRT or ever taken it.

Yes. It’s recently gone away now that I’ve been on HRT for 5 months, I didn’t realise quite how pervasive it was until it was gone!

same as the above, waking in dread and thoughts racing, but it being better once up and having had breakfast/coffee. but also at other times of the day/week.

I’d concluded it was just part of getting older to be feeling more negative about the world/life in general, and also a reaction to all the scary things going on in the world, but now I’ve had a month or so of it just not being here any more!

Yes every single morning without fail. Like a PP it does get better as the day goes on but think this is just my life now

Constantly. I am slow on the uptake (and no HRT) but it is connected to the hot flashes. So i'll get the stomach churn, awful feeling of anxiety/oppression then suddenly want to rip all my clothes off because too hot.

The bad news is... i have been having this for at least a decade and can't see an end. So i just make sure to try to think calm thoughts, tell myself it's my hormones doing it, and to remove any jumpers, cardigans, hoodies i may be wearing.

Thank you so much for your replies. I am sorry that other people feel like this but do feel less alone with it hearing it’s not just me as it can feel so dark and lonely. Well a few hours into changing this patch it is lifting.

I feel like I am in someone else’s body sometimes. Just alien. I was always very happy go lucky.

Yes that’s how I get a lot, like that urgent feeling of forgetting an important thing and yes the racing heart!

Yes. I use gel oestrogen but it's how I know if I need to up my dose or if I'm late with it (I apply in the evening).

No never. At 64 Ive done everything I want in life and if I died tomorrow Id be ok with that. I have conquered all my devils. I sleep well at night.
Menopause was pretty awful though. Hormones really mess up your head.

oh good for you. What a great supportive post, thank you @Gettingbysomehow

this is menopause related, not a bucket list thread.

Don't be ridiculous and childishly petulant. I was making the point that hormones mess up your head and its temporary.

I'm inclined to disagree. If it's temporary, then why do people take HRT to alleviate the symptoms? Surely if their symptoms were temporary, and lasted only for the perimenopause period (which for some that may be true), there's no need for HRT to relieve these symptoms.

Once hormones are gone, surely that's it isn't it?

This post kind of makes me want to think of something you still want to do and make you do it. 😐

You are def not alone ..... I really hope that although it is small consolation, you know a lot of us are feeling like you do, I wish you all the best. If it has helped you to share, it has helped me to read this and to know that I'm also not the only one who this happens to.... I have been on patches 4months and often wonder if I need to up the dose, then I change it and have a brief interlude of feeling 'better' but those feelings you describe are sadly all too familiar

Yes, just before a hot flash. More so before starting HRT, now I only get it during my periods.

I think that it happens early morning because everyone has a significantly higher level of cortisol on waking and in the early morning. It's designed to wake us up and get us going. That's why it wears off by breakfast when you come down the other side of the cortisol high.

I have found compassion based therapy helpful for managing the thoughts. Would recommend it.

It still wakes me up, but I can deal with the accompanying thoughts much better now.

I've always got it just before my period - I assume it's the hormone levels changing as it's always the day before it starts. I call it the Doom. It's horrible.

I'm also finding I wake with it in the night sometimes nowadays (I'm 44, not on HRT). It's not quite the same as the pre-period Doom, feels more like when I've had severe anxiety/panic, and sometimes accompanied with a hot flush.

i have this OP. It started in my late 30s. I ve been on HRT and propranolol since my early 40s and I had a GP appointment earlier this month to discuss changing my HRT to see if it helps. It’s a constant feeling of anxiety and impending doom, markedly worse before my period and honestly makes me wonder if I can get through the next 20 years until I retire. I can’t even enjoy things that used to, as I get so anxious about them. However, very few people would actually realise this about me. I work in a high pressure role and I’m a very good actress.

same as @thinkfast - feels like a total rewiring of the brain and being trapped in a bad episode of "faking it" except i m trying to fake being able to be professional me.

I've been struggling with this SO much today. Ive been weaving it back to how life changed in the pandemic. I had a good chat later with someone about the menopause and then felt much better, but it also came back so quickly. I was thinking- is this what I have to do - distract myself with human contact constantly so that I can cope with the unbearable anxiety from the knowledge that we are ultimately alone in the world 😆

Then I started to wonder where it all came from and that maybe I had a twin who was never born - so found myself googling vanishing twin syndrome. I then started to ponder the concept of self and how I feel this need to be with other people. I then had some kind of spiritual revelation 😆 that my self only exists in the presence of God (I've never been actively religious) or in the presence of others, and the ultimate integration of self is then to live my life in the service of others. FUCKING HELL perimenopause. The good news is that basking in feeling the presence of God has calmed my inner angst. Highly recommend it lol.

Also more practically - do things that bring you joy minus any guilt, feed your senses, rediscover things you love etc. Hug animals, children, or furry toys.

Quite hard work this peri meno reorganising of my brain so my bodily self requires takeaway curry.

(I also suspect the end result isn't really going to be worth the effort, but will just require more effort as my body slowly disintegrates 😆 but hopefully someone will have figured out how we cope with that when I get there).

I've also just increased my anti depressant today precisely to cope with the anxiety which may partially explain my euphoric insight 😆

yes, every morning waking up...for few seconds I am dreading it....flashbacks of a cleaner opening the dormitory door in the boarding school, and shouting to us to get up

Yes, this was why I started HRT in the first place. Felt like a completely different person as I’m normally very level-headed and optimistic. If you are having problems with oestrogen patches wearing off, would you be better on the gel? It works brilliantly for me.