"My menopause went undiagnosed"

[PatatiPatatras]

This is popping up more and more in my timeline.
Maybe because IWD is upon us but it's nonsensical.
Menopause is not a disease. It's not diagnosed.
It's like saying my puberty went undiagnosed.
Women aren't broken. We might need support to get through the change but we're growing not failing.
Argh.
Rant over.

I think it's more that it's a life experience that women want recognised. I want help with my peri-menopause so I went to my GP, I guess that's where the "diagnosis" comes from. It's so poorly acknowledged by the medical community that no wonder women want it validated and want support.

Validation should not be synonymous with pathology.
It's telling that changes in women are recognised or validated if they are "illnesses".

She's suffering from pregnancy, menopause is undiagnosed, she's gone odd because of her period. Etc.

When the norm is odd then any abnormalities become more difficult to detect. It has taken decades for pcos, endo and fibroids to be diagnosed. This just makes things harder.

No other natural change in life is diagnosed. Children's teething is not diagnosed, neither are growth pains, nor is puberty or the greying and balding hair. It's just part of life. All of these things are also accompanied by other uncomfortable changes.

Women are not disease ridden.

I dislike the way we talk about normal processes as afflictions too. But I also think we need to not focus our time on tearing people down because of the language they choose. Can we not challenge the language while also reading the concern in the article and addressing that?

I don't think this is a language nit-pick.

I'm really beginning to think people see being female as a problem that is solved or provided medically.

Actually mine was diagnosed because it happened at 29 years old long before it should have. It's called premature ovarian failure and at one point while waiting for a diagnosis I was really ready to off myself.
Even after diagnosis (2 FSH tests 4-6 weeks apart) and my Gp surgery were still making me jump through hoops to get HRT I told the receptionist that if the GP didn't call me the second she was out her meeting that I'd be taking a strip of clomid I'd bought off line and deliberately cause myself serious damage and then explain to A&E why I did what I done.

When the norm is odd then any abnormalities become more difficult to detect. It has taken decades for pcos, endo and fibroids to be diagnosed. This just makes things harder.

This. When I went through peri-menopause I passed off any weird symptoms as "just peri", and all the while I was developing fibroids and uterine hyerplasia. It was only by chance that I was diagnosed and treated. I would have really appreciated some kind guidance to let me know what I could expect, and what would warrant consulting a doctor. Maybe the peri-menopausal equivalent of the kinds of pamphlets they hand out to children nearing puberty?

I’m really suffering- some days I can barely walk, all my joints hurt so badly;
sometimes the fatigue and aching all over is absolutely debilitating, like I’ve got the flu.

so, while I see your point, I do wish someone would “diagnose” my perimenopause, if that would lead to some sort of Plan to help the symptoms. It’s truly awful,

and when you live with it and no one has answers, it does feel like I’m walking around with some undiagnosed disease. :(

I think you cement my idea that if medical professionals find the normal female characteristics odd then they struggle to realise when things are genuinely going off the rails!

I've been diagnosed with many things over the years but it never occurred to me that I could count my 'Miss beetle has now gone through menopause' type letters as a diagnosis. But then I never assumed the notes on my medical file at 10 about starting my periods was a diagnosis either, just stating a fact that may be relevant to some questions a doctor may have.

So do I now get to say " it took forty odd years from my periods being diagnosed for my menopause to be diagnosed" (hopefully, please mother nature don't make me have to start the clock again) now I've entered a new phase of the joys of being a woman

If it's happening at the correct time of life surely it's just a statement of fact, if it's happening at 29 (💐@LSTMS30555 ) then yes that's a diagnosis because it's abnormal and of importance.

Unfortunately menopause is just a fact a life, you get to a certain age bracket and it's going to happen. I don't think peri menopause and menopause are given as much credit by doctors for the symptoms they cause, but I never thought of the statements the doctors had made about those things as diagnoses of illnesses.

I think that because there are so many different symptoms, different combinations of symptoms and different severity of symptoms that can accompany menopause, it can be difficult for medicos to immediately identify menopause as the cause. Women wouldn’t be better off automatically being treated for menopause if it was other things causing the symptoms. And even if symptoms are due to menopause it can be difficult to find an HRT regime that controls the symptoms.

This winds me up no end, maybe because I have a teenager who hasn't started her periods yet.

No one is attempting to diagnose her with puberty! Honestly that would be an absolutely nonsensical statement. No one knows if her various complaints are linked to puberty. And all the kids have various symptoms and conditions. Maybe some 20 year olds are still in puberty who knows?

After a certain age, menopause is to be expected end of.

If you break out in spots or sheer fatigue or exteme discomfort then let's make you comfortable.

Menopause is not a condition women catch. argh. Just like puberty isn't something kids need to be medicated through.

I'm borrowing the title of a Laura Bates book but what is desperately needed here is to Fix the System, Not the Women. If the healthcare system served women properly (e.g., paid attention to our reported symptoms and observations) then so many conditions would be diagnosed earlier and treated appropriately.

Our biology would be understood in its own right and not where it deviates from the 'male norm'.

There would be appropriate education, detection, where possible interception (to prevent something happening) and service provision.

We're not the problem: the skewed system is in so many domains.

I don't think it's so much being diagnosed, as far as I'm concerned, as a cause being identified for something.

I've had raging anxiety for quite some time now (along with equally-raging PMT, headaches, crap skin, flushes and fuck knows what else) and it's only recently dawned on me that this is quite possibly related to the menopause. I don't want a label or a diagnosis but the "Ah, so THAT'S what the hell is going on and now I can do something about it" is quite a relief.

I remember as a preteen being seriously hacked off with adults putting everything down to hormones and periods.

stomach ache? Could be your period starting
upset? It’ll be your hormones.
hungry? Your period could be due.
feel sick? Could be your hormones settling.

even I knew as a fucking 10 year old I was years off starting my periods as I had the total of zero signs, and that a first period in the absence of anything else would be extremely unusual. I was right as well, starting at 15 in the end.

but bloody hell, I could have had appendicitis, or my cat died, it would still be attributed to my period.

i don’t want “diagnosing” with menopause if the same thing is going to happen, where any and every genuine complaint is going to be met with “well that could be menopause”

I often wonder how many serious illnesses are missed because it gets put down to “woman’s issues”. I have read that this is part of the reason men are taken more seriously with abdominal pain etc, as they can’t just put it down to period cramps.

'i don’t want “diagnosing” with menopause if the same thing is going to happen, where any and every genuine complaint is going to be met with “well that could be menopause”'

Don't worry, when it comes to it they don't say that. They say 'it's all in your head'.

We must be kindred spirits. I remember exactly the same. I didn't even have my first period until about the same time as you, but I had my every mood attributed to my imminent first period from 12.

Then after that, everything gets attributed to PMT!

Is there going to be any point in my life when people will accept that I am pissed off with them because they did something to deserve it?

My menopause was dramatic, yes at 45, about 30 flushes first day, and severe sleep deprivation, nasty bloating, aches the lot!
Took about 10 years to be over, then hormonal depression and now mid stage Parkinson’s at 61.
Never been the same since☹️

With bells on top.

tbh i just think it's a poor choice of words. It is very clear (blood tests i think?) if a woman is actually physically in the menopause, and because you get that info from the doctor it's not a big step to "diagnose" it.

however - i want women to be allowed to be in the driving seat over "treatment" for the physical symptoms, etc. And adjustments at work (i got a desk fan after requesting every day for weeks, and had my desk moved away from the radiator and into the only part of the office that gets no sun ever)

I want it to be taken seriously. As seriously as age-related things that happen to men. Like erectile dysfunction (which also happens to some men earlier than others, in the way menopause sometimes happens with younger women)

OP, you are absolutely right. The medicalisation and pathologising of menopause is ridiculous (and I say this as a menopausal woman).
No wonder younger women are starting to get apprehensive about ageing, as they think this terrible "illness" is going to hit them. And it completely undermines the cause of equality for women, by implying that middle-aged women are all weak, feeble creatures who aren't able to function.
Menopause is a good thing - it liberates us.

Oh, and I have never had a blood test nor seen a GP (or other doctor) for them to "diagnose" me. I knew I was menopausal because my periods stopped, and stayed stopped!

Yes it most certainly can be an “illness”. I went into premature menopause aged 39. Went to the doctor with random symptoms and yes, it went undiagnosed. And bloody hell have I suffered with it.

some people need medication. HRT etc. it needs diagnosing and managing.

I agree in a sense. I think we are still in catch up mode as so many people are genuinely clueless still about it, especially peri. I know so many women who have been ‘misdiagnosed’ and had expensive tests done (Eg for heart and depression) until they worked out it was peri.

I'm not in the UK so i guess it's a lot different here (Germany) women regularly go to the OB/GYN for the pill etc, so it's very normal to get a blood test to see if you're in the menopause - but you'd get treatments/advice/discussion for whatever you were there for menopause or not.

menopause is not an illness.

Some children start menstruating at 7 or 8.

The question is, is there a condition causing "precocious " puberty or not? Most likely not. Can the child cope with such early onset puberty? Most likely not. they are too young. So let's get them comfortable until they can cope. This does not make puberty an illness!

The same goes for early menopause? 39 is young for menopause - is there an underlying disease should be the question! Not an assumption that you've "caught" menopause!?

We need to encourage people to be able to speak of the negative effects of womanhood and finding medical comfort without pathologising it.

Being female is not an illness!