Although menopause is not considered a disease or a medical condition, its symptoms can certainly disrupt your life. This is especially true for women who suffer from the more serious symptoms of menopause such as depression and anxiety, in these instances; you should seek the advice of a doctor who can discuss some treatment options and some possible medications. In the case of some of the less life altering but just as annoying symptoms such as hot flashes, mood swings, and night sweats there is not a lot that can be done. Sad to say that the best you can do for most menopausal symptoms is to just cope as best you can and find friend to commiserate with.

In the mid to late 40’s, women enter into perimenopause which is just a fancy way of saying you’re on the road to menopause. Menopause usually starts between ages 45-55 in western countries, this is just an average. There are some racial and cultural differences with menopause, with some women going into menopause as much as ten years earlier and some racial groups experiencing less frequent and less severe symptoms. Smokers also tend to go into menopause at a younger age than non smokers. Menopause officially begins on the day after your last day of period bleeding and after one year of no bleeding you are no longer considered fertile.  

Common signs of menopause and perimenopause:

• Irregular periods and spotting between periods
• Sex may become painful (possibly due to vaginal dryness)
• Loss of libido
• Hot flashes
• Night sweats
• Mood swings
• Depression and/or Anxiety
• Needing to go to the bathroom more often
• Urine leaks when coughing or laughing
• Sleepless nights
• Feeling tired all the time
• Thin hair
• Problems concentrating
• Tender muscles
• Weight gain (especially around the waist)

As of today, there is not a lot know about how to treat all these different and varied menopause symptoms. Until a few years ago, Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) was recommended to most women. It has since been found to cause an increase in certain types of cancers and obviously this has caused HRT to fall out of favor. Currently nothing really reliable and safe has been found to take its place.

If you do feel like you are having trouble coping with depression and anxiety brought on by menopause be sure to consult with your doctor. As for the rest of it, try to keep a sense of humor about it and be extra kind to yourself. It’s really not all in your head, these are common menopause symptoms suffered by thousands of women.

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