Hot flushes, middle age spread, not feeling like you used to? what’s going on? The menopause maybe, but you think your too young ?
Think again fellow females it could be down to the Perimenopause, no its not a typo, the perimenopause is a real thing and it comes before the menopause.
To clarify, the Menopause is the day that you have stoped having periods for the past 12 consecutive months.
The Perimenopause is the lead up to Menopause and can cause all sorts of changes in your 40 something body.
Perimenopause until recently wasn’t a word I certainly was used to hearing. I even wondered if it was indeed a real thing or a made up ‘new age’ trendy thing only read about in health magazines.
Until recently changes in a woman’s reproductive health were just not talked about, they were taboo. Hot flushes and the change were what we were told about the menopause and that was it, end of embarrassing topic of conversation.
Luckily things are changing and we now have more information and treatments available to us.
The perimenopause being the lead up to the menopause was not discussed. Thankfully times are changing.
I know from my own experience that friends of a similar age all discuss our various fortysomething symptoms such as irritability and not sleeping openly now. Cultural changes are certainly moving in the right direction when it comes to being more open about what is happening at this time of our lives. Were encouraged to talk openly and not bottle things up, even though we still have some way to go.
People in the media are writing books, articles and blogs about their experiences of the perimenopause which is helping to pave the way to people being better educated and able to seek help for the wide range of symptoms brought on by the perimenopause.
Workplaces and men need to be better educated so that perimenopausal women can be supported. I’m sure its only a matter of time before we see acceptance and openness becoming the ‘norm’ for all women.
It would be useful for school children to learn about the perimenopause and menopause just as they do with puberty. Only when people start discussing it openly will the perimenopause cease being shrouded in mystery.
For a full list of the many symptoms often experienced by women during the perimenopause head over to…….