I welcomed menopause at 45 as a reward for my well lived life. The advantages of not worrying about becoming pregnant and being embarrassed every month while buying the accoutrema of active womanhood, are manifold. Nature knows best. Don't fight it.
9
This statement is inanely illogical: "Menopause as we know it today was born out of a particular time, place and profession: 18th-century Europe and the emergence of a new medical establishment."
Um, no, women have always experienced menopause and have no doubt always had difficult symptoms associated with it, some of them treatable or not, dangerous or not, tolerable or not.
If anything, "don't dread menopause" would leave too many women startled by the very real and extremely problematic symptoms many, many women unexpectedly face when it hits. Like a lot of things women get startled by and told to ignore.
The author has the sexism equation totally backwards here: just because menopause may have some upsides doesn't mean that we should be unconcerned about its downsides or blithely dismissing it as "great, no big deal" -- such an attitude will only leave its effects underresearched and undertreated when needed, leaving women underprepared and underassisted for this passage that does in fact prove difficult for an enormous number of women -- hence all those hits on symptoms from a web search. How in the world could it not be better rather than worse that women are able to get more info that that stuff is really happening and not somehow in their minds??
This article falls into the same ridiculous and misogynist vein as "Hey, pregnancy is natural, babe -- some women give birth in fields and go back to picking -- why are you making such a fuss?"
Just no.
29
Excellent article!
I am so happy to be free of sex drive. It seems like a gift — one that I totally deserve. And I didn’t suffer at all in the transition.
Now if they’d only figure out how to un-sag skin...
10
I never dreaded menopause not knowing what to expect, but I hate it! Horrid hot flashes, insomnia, memory loss , and the hair loss - I’m resorting to a comb over?? For a working woman who needs to be mentally sharp, well groomed/coiffed and on top of her game, it’s a nightmare. I don’t think our society talks enough about menopause: its signs, symptoms and how to overcome them. It’s all well and good if one’s retired or not in the working world and dealing with these symptoms. But for women in the workplace, muddled thinking, hot flashes and daily exhaustion due to insomnia are just another obstacle we don’t need!
23
Nonsense. A lot of things are over after menopause.
What is not to dread about losing your looks, difficulty maintaining your weight, hot flashes, painful sex and sleeplessness, to name a few realities?
It's different for every woman, for sure. My mother didn't have hot flashes; at its worst, I had four per hour.
I suspect some of the commenters breezing through menopause have not experienced the downsides and are in good health. That's the best case scenario.
Menopause is a prolonged hard time for many women. For some, it's for the rest of their lives.
12
Menopause is the greatest thing since sliced bread! Annoying as hot flashes and warm flushes are, it’s a whole heckuva lot better than bleeding every month. Making sure you have enough supplies when you go out for the day or away on vacation, knowing where the bathrooms are, finding an adequately large tree along the hiking trail.
Now technology has to catch up. The newest Apple Watch will have a native app period tracker, but nothing for menopause symptoms. Silly, because older women are more likely to have the disposable income for gadgets that younger women might not.
10
Obviously every women experiences menopause differently, but if you are one of the many who experience the hot flashes that keep you from sleeping normally or melancholia, it does interfere with life as we know it. I am 65 and still having hot flashes for ten years.
4
I'm fine with not dreading the inevitable, but in what way does realizing that renaissance misconceptions of a traveling uterus are incorrect assist me with not dreading something I empirically experience today? The argument put forward here is- do not dread air travel today because the designs of early aircraft from Icarus' wings to Leonardo's helicopter are deeply flawed. Regardless of the position of my uterus, I still have to grapple with no longer being young and all that entails, plus being so ridiculously HOT that you could cook an egg on my thigh. On the upside, I no longer get periods, but am constantly badgered about when my last one was by my doctor. If the issue here is to get women to think more positively about menopause, ehhh, you might want to talk about it more directly than this.
9
I never heard the negative side of menopause growing up and as an adult thought it was not a big deal. And women around me either had no problems going through it or refused to admit it.
When I went through menopausa it was truly a shock to the system. I felt disconnected from my body and did and still do have embarrassing hot flashes, anxiety and it is painful to have sex.
So this is all I my head? I suspect this was written by someone who sailed through menopause. Some women do. But a lot of women find it debilitating.
Maybe the truth is that not every woman experiences it the same way. Let’s be honest about that.
12
I read the comments and everything is relative. Plenty of women would of loved to reach menopause vs, dying from cancer or in our endless war. If women can get to menopause then they have a right to complain but in a country that overcharges for everything medical, the question becomes why doesnt the medical community have medical remedies that can address all of these issues. Once menopause begins, women become suspitable of other diseases that are life threathening.
The bigger issue is that women's lives do not matter in this administration and the Supreme Court , Trump has cut off Planned Parenthood which was responsible for cancer screening and a whole host of women's medical issues excluding the GOP favorite topic the " unborn". If you cant reproduce which is what Pence and the fake religious right care about the unborn, then getting cancer doesnt matter to them. Women are just a vehicle for reproduction and that's all. What happens to the baby doesnt matter just ask Liberty University where the CEO is dancing and drinking the night away with girls young enough to be his granddaughters
We live in a white male world that cares nothing for anyone else but themselves and corporate profits. When the medical community develops safe medical products that can address menopause there will be a saturation of the market place in the same manner that cancer causing hormone replacement was a favorite of the drs, 20 years ago till it was proven to cause cancer.
1
Menopause, just like menstruation, pregnancy, childbirth, even just life in general, is going to be so different for each person.
And, yes, menopause for some is going to be horrific. Often like a reverse-puberty of emotional rollercoastering and whack-a-mole physical maladies that can go on for decades.
Misogyny and sexism have been a huge problem in attitudes towards, and treatments for menopausal symptoms from both men and women. So many men and women see females only as sexual or reproductive beings. Redefining yourself in a positive way can be challenging, especially when many of the physical and mental changes do not seem beneficial.
I guess it is just like anything, your attitude, the support you get, the luck of the draw in how easy or hard it will be for you are what will count.
It's a good time for embracing an irreverent and humorous attitude. Use the change to make change and discard what is negative about your life.
3
The writer says her commentary does not mean menopause is all in our heads. But that is exactly what she means. I had my first hot flashes as a teenager when, believe me, I was scarcely aware of what menopause was. I started again in my late forties and I'm now in my 60s and still burning up. The NY Times had an article in 2016 about three types of hot flashers: Women who have virtually none at all, some who have them for a few years only, and a "new" category called "superflashers." This finding was allegedly based on "new research."
Here's the real problem, Ms. Mattern: It took until 2016 for doctors to know about the existence of superflashers. Have they just been tuning out their patients' complaints for 200 years? Have researchers perhaps been insufficiently curious about women's health?
When I first saw my new gynecologist, I told her about my hot flashes and she said, "Well, you're not hot flashing now," and changed the subject. The next time I saw her, I mentioned that was I experiencing a hot flash at that moment, and she said, "No you're not -- it's hot in here."
While it's not my nature to wish people ill, I can't help hoping my very young gynecologist will be a superflasher. Then she, too, can keep tee shirts in the freezer to cool down, and baby powder by the bed to alleviate the stickiness after a long day of sweat attacks.
https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/07/25/meet-the-super-flasher-some-menopausal-women-suffer-years-of-hot-flashes/
9
It's a change that women cannot control, and one that men do not need to experience. I want science to give women the choice to either go through menopause or not.
3
When I was 17, a female friend in her late 60’s told me that going through menopause was the best thing that had ever happened to her because it had freed her from making poor decisions that may have been, in part at least, hormonally-based. She explained that her mind had stabilized into a deeper mental clarity, much less obscured by emotion than when she was pre-menopausal. This enabled her to better focus attention on opportunities, experiences, and relationships that were significant and meaningful, while becoming adept at filtering out many the unimportant things that would otherwise have absorbed her time and attention.
As a teenager, this sounded terribly appealing. I couldn’t wait to experience it for myself. Now that I’m menopausal, I still feel this way. Sure there are physical issues such as hot flashes, a longer recovery time from minor injuries, or sneezes that result in a bit of pee. But these things are trifling, outweighed by a sense of mental discernment and agility that previously eluded me. My reactions to stress and crises are more thoughtful and muted, and I have a much clearer understanding of my impact on others. This is happening concurrently with something I’ve never before experienced -- second-guessing myself. The paradigm has changed and I’m learning and relying upon fresh internal sources It’s a time of reinvention, renewal, and yes - celebration.
6
Understanding the characterization of menopause as pathological requires that we recognize how sexual attractiveness is our yardstick for pre-menopausal women. Every day I see headlines telling me about "bikini bodies"--young, toned bikini bodies and "over fifty" bikini bodies," as if sexiness is anathema to middle age. We won't stop demonizing older women (like me) until we stop judging younger women on how toned, stacked, and "contoured" they are. It's all part of the same narrative. There's a lot of terror about being dried up because our society seems to have use only for women in their prime, and with makeup, lipo, and the Kardashians, we are fighting an uphill battle.
4
More like what if it were so insignificant we didn’t fetishize it and just stopped talking about it all together?
1
Let us be clear here: menopause is how we know God is not a woman--she would never do this to us. The process is brutal and, at least for however long it takes to complete the process, damages and diminishes intellectual powers and the sense of self. And, of course, there are the ongoing symptoms; while I had 8-10 hot flashes a night for four years, twenty years later it's down to two or three. And the horrors visited on the female body when hormones diminish radically are something that I'm willing to bet that Ms. Mattern has not yet experienced. This article is an insult.
11
I have never before wanted to comment on an article so badly. I am 48 and have never felt so continuously awful in my life. Panic attacks, lethargy, eyes so dry it hurts to blink. The worst insomnia of my life. Inexplicable, horrible rushes of adrenaline. A few weeks ago hot flashes began and to describe them as unbearable is not enough. They make me cry. This stuff is not in my head. I am not imagining this and the suggestion that I am is infuriating.
17
This woman clearly hasn't gone through menopause. The symptoms are real and frequently debilitating for many women.
8
I kept hoping this wasn't another article that leaves women feeling bad about things that are realistically quite problematic. Maybe your menopause hasn't been too bad, but mine has been pretty debilitating. I have suffered for a number of years from monthly hormonal migraines, that have at times included 24 hour bouts of wretched vomiting. Medication finally helped bring this under control, but it's an ongoing issue, and it's in addition to hot flashes, sweating, etc. For my point of view, menopause is definitely a dreadful collection of symptoms. Maybe I'll feel better about it when it has passed, but please, spare me the happy talk right now. It's making me even more irritable!!
6
Menopause is a dreaded condition in my opinion.
1
love this article! more like this!!
I didn't dread menopause and I'm glad all that menstruation mess is behind me. It's a natural part of life and a huge societal problem in the U.S., in my view, is the idea that getting older makes you 'lesser than' when just the opposite is the case. Don't perpetuate this nonsense.
2
Start celebrating it for what it is: freedom!! From periods and tampons and accidents and stains and cramps and contraception. Freedom from hormones running our lives.
1
I'm starting to question if the NYT's editorial choices are being driven by a misguided pursuit of inclusivity of any and all ideas as valid.
This article is an example of an intriguing and promising headline followed by a lot of babble of questionable relevance.
One reason menopause may not be mentioned in ancient or even more recent medical history is probably because women's issues simply weren't important to those male-driven societies. Dooh!
Post-reproduction has its good and bad, like every stage of life. Let's not serve up up yet another cutesy spin meant to re-package one thing as something completely different. Must we apply marketing and branding to every aspect of human existence?
Post-reproduction frees people from the sometimes disastrous rule of hormones in decision-making and consequences and can usher in a new kind of serenity, but it also signals a body in transition and those attendant challenges.
9
As someone who never wanted kids, I couldn't wait for menopause and the end of the hassle of contraception. Hooray!
1
I’m finally invisible, like men—I don’t have to worry about the constant, invasive looks from men, catcalls, added expense of birth control & fem hygiene products, bleeding for one week of every month for forty years, and let’s not forget the lower chances of sexual assault or rape that come with this freedom. Being out of reproductive years is like being freed from a prison. We should all embrace this gift.
2
Can't say I'm real happy about becoming a haggard old crone -- BUT -- I'm now a haggard old crone who for several years has experienced no crippling migraines. Possibly that consolation prize is attributable to roughly coincident retirement from the 9-to-5 and not just to menopause, but I tend to give full credit to the latter.
1
Reading the crazy uplifting comments by some readers, really? I can’t help wondering if it’s a collective denial or just too awful to cry about. All these ‘ I can’t wait’, ‘ the best thing ever happened to me’ , ‘ free at last’ etc, they sound so hollow or simply pathetic.
As if there is a common enemy called womanhood that’s finally terminated, now they can go on living as neutral and old people happily ever after. Such lack of self reflection and courage in the face of life’s challenges. Imaging being in a room full of these women!
4
Of course care around menopause is a fairly recent concept. Historically, women were viewed more as property than people. When my physical and mental health deteriorated so rapidly in my 40s that I couldn’t even work anymore, I begged my doctor to please please please check my hormones. After years of suffering she finally did and blandly announced, oh you are post menopausal (I was 45). Now, even though I pay 560/month for health insurance my HRT is not covered at 130/month. I would honestly be suicidal without the therapy. It’s disgusting how women continue to be treated in middle age in the medical profession. This article was just another slap in the face.
8
Who says this me and my friends are sooo happy to be through and done with menopause. Are you sure you are talking to the right women?
Oh my God. Really? I didn't dread it, was actually looking forward to crossing Tampax, birth control and jumbo rolls of TP off the shopping list. However, if I'd known I was going to get hot flashes every 45 minutes, 24/7, I would have definitely dreaded it. Blaming the 20th century medical establishment for menopause is like blaming Trump for a rainy Sunday - emotionally satisfying but lacking in common sense.
5
Please. Menopause is awful. Old skin, wrinkles, hot flashes, etc etc etc. Plus the added consequence of becoming invisible.
3
Oh, for heaven sakes. . .what if we didn't dread living ?
2
Hogswallow.
Just ask any woman who's had a difficult menopause and continues to suffer (yes, suffer is the word) from post-menopausal problems like chronic insomnia.
The writer sounds like an ivory tower academic, all words and theory and no actual research.
8
I would've welcomed menopause about thirty years earlier than it actually happens since it means the end of "monthly misery". The Dr.'s today will try and push the HRT on women today, which makes me think what did women take before Big Pharma came up with that, the answer is absolutely nothing and somehow they all lived.
I had none of the symptoms associated with menopause but know many women who did. This article suggests that it was all in their heads. That's nonsense and misogynist. Interestingly, four different gynecologists wanted to put me on life-long drugs to take care of menopausal-related problems I didn't have. I threw out their prescriptions.
5
Menopause has been awesome.
Im tired of women not aging, the Botox the diets it’s exhausting.
Menopause is welcome to me.
1
The author is 52. Is she even in menopause yet?
Seems like scientists are more concentrated on “the little blue pill” for men. And what’s with the male medical clinics popping up everywhere? NOTHING has been done to help women as they age. They even try to take away HRT.
Thank you God for making us the tougher gender....
1
Let's face it, we know that our bodies go through an emotional, physical and spiritual transformation during menopause; just as our bodies did during puberty.
While modern medicine and society hasn't embraced this concept yet (because they would prefer to write us off as emotional or crazy and make money selling us rx to cope with it), as women, we know the TRUTH.
The key is finding a way NOT to resist it because it is going to happen. Our mindset toward our changing bodies, minds and spirits is key to embracing the change. It is also a great time to put ourselves center stage in our lives and amp up our self-care routines. There are vitamins, herbs, exercise, lube, natural hormones and diets to help us cope with symptoms/changes. More importantly, we can also love, create, laugh, dance, travel, play and do whatever helps us embrace and accept ourselves during this transition. It is our time!
It is not easy to see celebrities in their 50s and 60s wearing string bikinis with no fat, wrinkles or gray hairs because that is not reality or aging for most of us. It is unrealistic comparison. We have explore what works for us, individually, to use the transition to become our true and best selves and led our best lives.
During menopause, women have become prime ministers, senators, presidents of Fortune 500 companies, wrote best-selling books, films, plays, started nonprofits and companies, ran marathons, swam the English Channel, etc.
Embrace, don't resist (and buy lube)!
5
Dread it?? I am looking forward to it. I am 54 years old and still get my periods. I want them to STOP. I cannot wait for menopause to finally set in and I can be done. Though, the hot flashes that now seem to be coming on a regular basis are quite annoying, but I look at them as a hopeful sign that I will soon be able to give away my stash of tampons.
1
Half the country (including men) are suffering a political menopause post November 8, 2016.....
What's to dread? End of migraines for me. End of messy periods. Treated hot flashed with hormones for a few years until the worst of that was over. It's been 20 years now. Good riddance. Not everyone gets to grow old. I consider myself one of the lucky ones.
1
This article is disturbing.
Although it denies it, this article is indeed positing the idea that menopause is "all in our heads", or simply a cultural construct. Such a view feeds the dismisive attitude our culture has over the very serious physical and pyschological symptoms of menopause. These symptoms are REAL. Women DO have terrible hot flashes, Night fevers, memory loss, vaginal atrophy, dryness all over, and bouts of pure insanity, along with depression and anxiety.
This article is dismissive of these very real symptoms. With articles like this it is no wonder that there is shockingly so little known about menopause. Menopause needs to be taken more seriously, not dismissed as this article does.
And the "grandma theory" is scary to the women who never had children. They are high risk for breast cancer and gynocological cancers because they never had children. Since they don't have grandkids, evolution wants to kill them off. Thse women were a waste in the scheme of evolution.
This article was misogynist.
436
The article is just saying menopause is not a disease. Women's life cycle is not a disease.
164
@Observer
That's like saying that age-related erectile dysfunction should be a badge of honor for men rather than treated as a condition. Trying to give menopause value is not helpful.
80
Not every women has menopause symptoms, for many of us it’s a non event. A little more maintenance to keep our looks going of course but it’s part of aging...
73
Fine. Just don’t get all fat!
let's just call it what it is: menostop. and get over it already.
2
What if we didn’t dread age?????
6
This is fake (health) news. Next week let's read about why erectile dysfunction for men is cultural and they should feel liberated not to have to perform anymore.
9
No muss no fuss no preggers.
2
Menopause is the best! I used to have one week a month of misery with my painful periods -- no more! Now I can have lots of sex without having to think of birth control -- my dreaded diaphragm used to be a such turn-off for me -- no more! This must be what life feels like for a man!
And even though I have my own personal climate crisis now --- I''l take hot flashes over menses any day!
1
Most of our historical records of anything were written by men. So this article lacks relevant historical data, and that means the foundations, the premises in this article are off-kilter. Bleh. I clicked on the article's title, hoping to find something new & worthwhile. Blehbleh.
5
I know that this will never be published . Be that as it may, an angry irrational women is intolerable. The problem is that it is not her fault! What is more intolerable is that modern medicine and the health care industry refuses to address this problem. The medical industry spends billions of dollars addressing male erectile distinction and pennies on women’s heath issues. It’s a continuing path of misogyny.
3
Just another silly article. Do women really want fertility after age 50? Doubtful in most cases.
2
Tell all of that to my hotflashes!
Will they ever end?!
3
I’m sixty years old. I’ve become a Hag – from the Greek ‘holy’ – a revered, wise, woman.
2
Firstly, to those of you who are suffering from this phase of life, I hope and pray (if that's okay) that you find solutions and feel better.
I had a few hot flashes, and that was it. I'm glad I don't have the "monthly business" anymore. Good riddance.
After one of my coworkers had gone through "the change", she walked over to the feminine hygiene products in the store, and stuck her tongue out at them. I laughed and laughed when I heard this!
1
Helpful to know that my symptoms are merely a cultural construct. I'll remember that next time I bleed through my pants.
5
I didn't "dread" it, because I heard too many different stories about how it went for the women I knew. I had some difficulties like excessive bleeding that resulted in anemia, among other things. But I tried to go with the flow (ha ha) and seek out information that pertained to the physical things that were happening to me and happened after the cessation of menstruation (it's only recently that vagina atrophy has gotten a lot of press), adopt healthy eating habits, use recommended supplements, and eventually got to the other side of it. It was a long process. I chortle with glee now that I can ignore the feminine hygiene products aisle.
But this article bothered me. I felt it made light of the real experiences of women in OUR culture to favor adopting some more supposedly enlightened cultural attitude. I wonder if Ms. Mattern has even experienced menopause herself. This was written by an academic and lacked compassion and possibly empathy.
6
With all due respect to the writer: after you haven't slept well for 12 years, get back to us, please.
8
As a 71 year old woman whose last period was 20 years ago, I have wondered lately about the negative press menopause gets. This is not to discount the experiences of other women. We are indeed each one of us unique. However, I still have "hot flashes" (called flushes in Australia) which last a few minutes and show up about six times a day. Sometimes a flash is preceded by a period of fatigue or even feeling cold. The actual flash I treat by removing as much clothing as possible in the circumstances. This works for a woman who is retired and puttering happily in the home and garden. For career women it is awkward at the very least. I hasten to add, without I hope sounding gross, that my husband and I like to keep attempting to have sex! This would sound possibly laughable to many, but there have been NYTimes articles and comments upon those articles which indicate we are not alone in this "hobby". In summary, I have had to wonder whether I am actually benefiting from not having medicated menopause, nor have I had a hysterectomy and that the connection to having sex in one's seventies is not entirely a coincidence. The problem of the dry vagina can be corrected with lubricant but what is better is sustained foreplay. Consider the similarity between a hot flash and an orgasm! You sweat for a while and then things go back "to normal". Furthermore there is a great benefit to the familiar partner who is not too dissimilar in age. That person has issues as well.
4
hahah!!! funny article Susan.....Tell us how you feel in 3 years.
4
If find that is people in the workforce between the ages of 23 and 40 who are the people who mock, insult, and otherwise trash women who are approaching, in, or past menopause. The menopause jokes and fears all come from them. The endless talk of "dried up" vaginas and the insults to "old" women.
This is the same group of people obsessing over the need for everyone to reveal in meetings their "preferred gender pronouns" and who feel insulted all the time at various transgressions of their idea of political correctness. Maybe it is time these brats reconsidered their own deeply embedded ageism, and maybe it is time menopausal women pushed back.
3
I don't know how old Ms. Mattern is, but something tells me she hasn't gone through menopause yet. I would have agreed with Ms. Mattern in my thirties - amazingly, I read multiple articles EXACTLY like hers, thirty years ago. My perimenopause began when I was forty, with severe migraines and MAV, the symptoms growing until I was fifty seven and the first year of the menopause began. These continued on for a couple of years and are not entirely resolved. Almost as bad as the migraines, were the panic attacks and muscle weakness. While I had no hot flashes, I drowned in night sweats and was severely depressed. OK, but this is what I learned: had I not been sub-clinically deficient in the b vitamins and magnesium, I would not have developed migraines or the panic attacks, resulting from the slight nerve damage I'd developed from these deficiencies, exploding at the advent of perimenopause. Because our bodies must make massive adjustments to the loss of estrogen and resulting imbalances, problems less evident previously can be pushed over line into debilitating symptoms. I will be taking b supplements for the rest of my life - b2 without fault - as well as magnesium and all others needed for these interactions to be effective. My neurologist prescribed the b2 and magnesium and the results have been spectacular. Younger women, if they feel any of these symptoms beginning, should really start taking supplements early, to offset further damage, and even prevent this hell!
6
I find it really disturbing when menopause is described as one experience which it is not. It is a highly individual and complex physiological experience. It is not some aspiration to achieve. Women are sold this message and most will inevitably fail the test left to feel isolated and lessened by their failure to achieve menopause nirvana.
9
I did not have any problems going through menopause at all. I believe it was because I was going to the gym everyday and was in great physical shape lifting heavy weights and doing aerobics. I'm happy I do not have to worry about getting pregnant, leakages, or pain.
3
Re the Grandmother Hypothesis: What about men? Who, as they get older, lose the considerable physical strength needed for chasing game on foot, farming with primitive tools, in general life in primitive society. And their calorie needs decrease too, especially when they can no longer perform strenuous labor. Maybe it's adaptive to have men stay in camp making new arrowheads and other necessary but sedentary activities. In which case, the Grandmother Hypothesis is blown because it has nothing to do with reproduction. It just means that older people of both genders, no longer in their physical prime, can perform useful tasks that have nothing to do with child bearing or child care.
7
I love menopause, as a scubadiver, I never have to worry again if my "protection" will last. I can spend hours on a dive boat traveling to a dive site. Too often, I've had to decline a trip when a marine head wasn't available.
2
We should mention fundal height (aka McDonald's rule). The growth of a woman's uterus in centimeters roughly corresponds to the age of a pre-born child in weeks. Someone had to figure that out. Just because you don't want the measurement to be true doesn't invalidate the correlation.
Your attitude about child birth might be more positive than your attitude about menopause. That doesn't mean the science about menopause is wrong.
1
My hands and feet stopped being cold year ‘round with menopause. I stopped needing a sweater constantly.
1
If this culture wasn’t so fixated on progeny and instead focused on zero population growth perhaps menopause would be a cause for great celebration! The only “symptom” I had was a month-long hot flash in the dead of an upstate New York winter which came in handy. I know of other women who were not so fortunate and have struggled and continue to do so. I for one love not having a period and I am totally enjoying this Crone phase of my development/existence. I am experiencing more joy than I ever have in my previous years.
5
When I stared menopause my reaction was ‘bring it on, let’s get this over with!’ I’m through menopause and couldn’t be happier.
2
Are you kidding! Menopause is great! Never been happier, freer. Everything good about my former life is better, more intense, funnier, more satisfying. And no, I was not miserable before. A few compensations, changes in attitude, emotions.
So, get over it and on with it.
6
What if we actually talked about it and prepared and supported women? I’ve been told by doctors that Vasomotor symptoms, severe sleep disturbances, breast pain, nausea, depression and other symptoms are something to just “get through.” That I should “do cardio.” You try doing cardio on 90 minutes of sleep a night. I’ll come over and wake you up repeatedly. Every night. For five years. Let’s go. Or, we can experiment with SSRIs which may or may not work. Female hysteria is not a diagnosis. Estrogen plays a vital role in many functions of the body including sleep, respiration, muscle, bone, etc. I am not overweight, I abstain from processed foods, I take vitamins. No herbs or teas have solved my problem. I not doing anything wrong. Stop blaming women for their medical- yes medical - problems.
29
Best thing that ever happened to me. Fortunately, all I needed was a big fan. No pills. Done!
1
As a Licensed Acupuncturist, I successfully treat many women in both perimenopause and menopause whose symptoms of insomnia, hot flashes, and new anxiety had been dismissed or diminished by their gynecologists (many of whom have had no training in menopause, https://www.aarp.org/health/conditions-treatments/info-2018/menopause-symptoms-doctors-relief-treatment.html . To counter the author's reference of the Grandmother Hypothesis, let's look at the economic impact of 8 or more years of insomnia for a woman age 47-55 and how that impacts not just the woman, but her productivity at work and her interpersonal relationships: every aspect of her daily life. For some women, they are thrilled to trade the premenstrual migraines for no more migraines, but for an equal amount of women entering perimenopause, they START having severe headaches and migraines. and they continue into menopause. I'm thrilled when women are feeling their best and so are those around them. But conservatively, menopause needs not to be dismissed as many women truly need to see their needs addressed. Fortunately, Traditional Chinese Medicine can do just this. Dana Hoffman, Licensed Acupuncturist, M.S. Oriental Medicine, Chicago, IL
11
Surely I'm not the only woman who's calculated the days, weeks, months of my life consumed by menstruation! The dripping-wet, clothing- and sheet-soaking hot flashes of menopause were awful (until I gave in to hormone replacement therapy for a few years), but being post-menopausal has been wonderfully freeing. It has made being old worthwhile.
5
I must not be spiritual enough, because I never understand these articles. When my mother was alive, I asked her once (before I had experienced menopause) what it was like. She laughed and said, "your period stops. What did you think?" End of story. Now I'm there and yep, that's about it. Sure, I have a few minor physical complaints, but who doesn't?
5
Maybe I should blame my perhaps "culturally constructed" symptoms of menopause (fuzzy brain, easily irked, no patience), but I found this editorial baffling.
So I'm supposed to supplant my dread of having days of debilitating symptoms every month with the notion that it's a noble phase that contributed to human "success"? Feel like my monthly migraines ain't so bad because, since the dawn of time, women used "spare energy" to enable their daughters and granddaughters to reproduce faster?
Well, I feel zero comfort in those ideas. In fact, they make me feel like a cog in an exhausting, pre-destined, patriarchal machine, the very thing I am most tired of feeling like.
What would be a comfort is finally feeling like our current society values women's pain as actual pain--not just some phase that we need to nobly get through--and invested the resources to find new ways (medicinal or otherwise) to treat it.
22
I went through hormonal menopause in my at age 34 due to surgical intervention. I refused hormonal treatments and, other than the bone loss, have never regretted that I did.
At around 60 years of age though, my husband was constantly busy building a business and moving us from place to place. I lived in a foreign nation without much ability to speak the language. My adult children still in the states had very little time for me and I had been their single parent for the majority of my young adult through to my early 50s until then.
I had a bit of trouble dealing with it all but I know for sure it was NOT menopause.
Yes, my interest in sexual engagement is all but benign. Perhaps to be expected when one is having the couple of surgeries I had? Or perhaps because one of my adult children, jealous and alcoholic, came to live with us in close quarters for 3 months. But I believe it is because my husband is more interested in his work-passion than he is with having a life with me. As such, I have found other interests that don't involve him or my children. This frees everyone to do whatever they want, including me. It seems to work pretty well, but one must remember that I was celibate for 22 years with the exception of a one month period. I realized that not having sex did not mean I was going to die.
Personally? Menopause for me has meant intensely enjoyable sex without the fear of another baby.
I don't like becoming old, but that has nothing to do with menopause.
I’m happy for the women whose post-menopausal lives are a time of freedom, but I don’t see them mentioning vaginal atrophy. Not dryness, atrophy, as in can’t use it AT ALL. No herbal or OTC remedy works. Prescription treatments are expensive and not covered by insurance.
10
I posted this in response to a commenter, but I'm repeating it up here because I think women need to know:
There actually is a medical treatment for hot flashes: small doses of gabapentin or an antidepressant (can't recall which type). My primary care doctor let me in on the secret when my gyno refused to discuss the issue. I do not take gabapentin (Neuronton) for hot flashes (I'm trying to reduce the meds I take), but I was on it for a few years for nerve pain and had no side effects at all. As I understand it, the reason these drugs work for hot flashes is that they affect your autonomic nervous system -- the source of hot flashes. This is medicine's best-kept secret, apparently.
3
I’m surprised at the author’s naïveté in assuming that, because traditional medical texts and lore in older cultures do not describe menopausal symptoms, that women in those cultures did not experience them. The author does not address the possibility that in strongly patriarchal cultures, women’s symptoms would not necessarily have been deemed worthy of attention.
28
Thank you. This was going to be my exact comment.
Aging is a privilege. Not everyone gets to do it. (Most people find it preferable to the alternative.) Too bad our culture has indoctrinated women to believe we're useless and disabled after menopause.
Not all women suffer during and after menopause. Many of us find it liberating and a huge relief, having gone through decades of menstrual cramps, PMS, and other challenges of fertility. Some of us even find our post-menopausal years to be the best years of our lives.
6
My menopause was easy at age 50. No more week-long migraines, and even my Crohn's disease remitted and finally disappeared altogether (so far, anyway) a couple of years later. I'm in my early 70s now and, aside from high blood pressure, controlled by medication, I'm in fine fettle. My daughter is going through menopause now and so far hers is like mine was.
2
My mother told me 20 years ago that menopause was a racket. She never had symptoms and told me I wouldn't either. So I didn't.
8
@Dee
My mother told me the same, and then I got hit by a Mack truck when it started.
2
Dread it? I welcomed it. No more cramping, no more throwing money away on "supplies" my IBS nearly disappeared. I was utterly thrilled and liberated. A couple of heavy periods; never had a hot flash and am just plain relieved. I had my three wanted children a very long time ago and was freed from ever worrying about an unplanned pregnancy. It was all good.
8
If men went through menopause shrines would be erected in honor of their bravery. Movies would be made so that we could exult in the strength and wisdom that this transition places upon the honored men as they feel the reverence that society visits upon them.
As menopausal men, their insight into the ebb and flow of hormones would be appreciated and fully researched by the medical professionals. Grateful for no longer being under the merciless sex drive that often led to poor, at times illegal or violent behavior, menopausal men would be held in high esteem and various pills and creams would be manufactured to duplicate the healing effects of this natural phase of life.
18
The author's implication that that modern menopause may be no more than a false social construct akin to nymphomania or female hysteria reminds me of women who dismiss morning sickness because they, personally, never felt better in their lives than while pregnant. For those of us privileged to maintain our health and vigor into our post menopausal years, we may indeed experience them as among our most productive and satisfying. My own mother, no longer burdened by raising five children while working and taking care of aging parents, emphatically considered her 60s and 70s the best years of her adult life. At 69, I'm happy to be past the worst symptoms of a long menopause with my enthusiasm for life intact, and able to enjoy the relative freedom and rich perspectives of maturity. However, unlike this author, who clearly has not yet gone through it, I believe we should be making every effort to recognize and understand the importance of menopause for all women, while seeking to mitigate its negative effects.
21
I have never dreaded menopause and, now that I'm definitely through it, it was one of the best things to ever happen to me. As a woman who bled so much I was usually anemic and even had to have blood transfusions on an emergency basis to restore a minimum level of hemoglobin, I can assure you that menopause was a blessing. I have not felt better in decades. Hot flashes were no fun, but those ended eventually, and I now have more energy than ever! Who would dread that?
4
I got to skip the uncertainty of perimenopause, via a hysterectomy at 52 (aka being surgically castrated). Aside from pesky warm flashes and intermittent insomnia, menopause is the best thing that ever happened to my health, thus ending 40 years of suffering from “estrogen poisoning.”
4
Menopause is outstanding! I'm blessed that I haven't had a lot of the downside issues, although 12 years in, I still have hot flashes. But not having a period with all the side effects every month, amazing. Break on through to the other side!
8
Please don’t write as if you are representing all women. I feel better and happier now during menopause than ever before. Sure my hair is thinner and I have insomnia some nights, but I feel free and powerful.
7
I am sorry for women who suffer terribly, but here’s the thing. I went into surgical menopause long before natural menopause age, when friends were still getting pregnant. If I had symptoms of menopause, they were disguised by the side effects of chemo and sheer terror of dying from ovarian cancer. I don’t remember having the symptoms other women complain about, and sometimes I feel cheated that I missed this rite of passage that seems to bind so many women.
4
Menopause has a lot of downsides, for me esp. weight gain. But I sure do not miss periods, cramps, taking birth control, etc. With women, there's always something.
11
This article seems like it was written 20 or 30 years ago when a view of menopause as a disease to be treated was much more prevalent. The history is interesting, but as a gynecologist and endocrinologist I can attest to the fact that today's health professionals are more inclined to help women best address specific symptoms and health concerns in the perimenopausal and menopausal years, rather than dictate one size fits all prescriptions. What remains troubling is that, in contrast to men suffering from ED, women seeking effective treatments for symptoms that cause painful sex often need to pay out of pocket.
32
Aging in both men and women leads to a loss of the hormones that make is either masculine or feminine. Valuing this change in a different way would mean a regression towards and androgynous mean. That might be desired by some people but the idea that any significant number of us would want to lose that sex appeal is too silly to have been given a venue for discussion in an influential paper.
4
@Middleman MD Hormones, and fertility, are not all that makes us masculine or feminine. Females are female even before puberty. They have female figures even after menopause. They usually keep right on wearing clothes, jewelry, hairstyles, and makeup that they consider attractive. Despite all the celebration of cronehood here, their personalities don't change in any major way. Increased maturity is due to more life experience, not to menopause. Wrinkles and other changes in appearance are due to being older, years of sun exposure, the quality of diet and exercise over decades of life. (And also, whether the woman has had cosmetic surgery.) Men experience those same changes and and may go bald in addition. There is no way you can tell by looking whether a 50-year-old woman is menopausal, or whether she is taking hormone replacement therapy, or how much she enjoys sex. In other words, menopause does not make women any more like men. I can't tell you from experience about the hormonal problems of older men, but I've never mistaken one for a woman. But I went through menopause at 47, I'm now 64, and my husband still thinks I'm beautiful.
5
@Middleman MD. True, but there's not much to do about it! There are no sexy 70-90 year olds, even if they feel like having sex.
1
I am sooooooo glad not to have debilitating cramps I suffered from since I got my first period at 12. I feel terrible that my teenage daughter suffers from them. now. Even in my late 40s I would get period related acne (with wrinkles, not fair!). All gone now! Menopause wasn't too bad for me (but I know it is for many). No more doing the math before going on a trip or making sure I have supplies in my car. My only complaint is my hair has thinned badly.
14
Well," Tra la la it was nothing !" was not my experience. I had an instance of terrible uterine bleeding for 6 weeks for one thing and that is not uncommon. For the last 2 weeks of it before surgery I did not dare leave the house it was so extreme. I had hair loss, I had and have hot flashes. I had and have insomnia. I did gain weight although I don't think this is the worst thing and the man in my life pronounces me lovely. For a while my sex drive was diminished but a combination of acupuncture, vitamins and just calming down has changed that. And being in a good relationship ensures that I still care about and foster that aspect of my life. And my hair came back . I am past 65 still working, still exercising, still enjoying my family and friends. At this age I do say that life is very good as long as I ignore the news-which I cannot. It is not very good for everyone. But this is a natural transition and one has to accept it. However this does not mean that these symptoms are a cultural figment. It has always been possible to induce women to deny what is going on all around them. This article feels like more of the same. From the same people who insist that childbirth is painless.
32
I only wish that my mother--and other women--had not tried so hard to make menopause into a "positive" experience, mostly by not mentioning the very real and awful symptoms that accompany it. In my instance, they were disabling.
Menorraghia (extremely heavy bleeding, constantly) is one of these. The cause? In my case, ovarian cysts and fibroids, as I found out after a few years of cramping and bleeding. Sometimes these are cancerous. In my case, without health insurance or enough money to pay unlimited sums out of pocket, I didn't have the means to find out. Twenty years later I'm still here, so I guess I didn't have ovarian cancer--which, no surprise, is very often "caught" too late for successful treatment. Let's not continue to teach women to put a positive spin on things that aren't all positivie. It's a ridiculous way to be human.
26
I too had fibroids which caused heavy bleeding in my late 40’s and even in my late 50’s. I’ve had three surgeries to remove them. It’s so strange for a woman approaching 60’s to be walking down the feminine products aisle to buy tampons and pads. I’ll have to say the products have really improved. I went into menopause in my early 50’s but still have the occasional break through bleeding from those fibroid, which my Ob/Gyn said still riddle my uterus. Next step: a hysterectomy.
1
Who is this "we" who dreads menopause? Who is this "we" who maybe should give it more respect? Who decided it was okay to write news or even opinion in first person plural? It always alienates us. We were eagerly anticipating menopause. We were fed up with periods since they started. We had minor difficulties with hot flashes, etc. We are happy to have the great privilege of getting old.
22
@Leander
True
I LOVE menopause!!
Even though I had pretty bad hot flashes, for years — over 10. (I’ve read that I was a SuperFlasher).
First of all, no more periods! Which were far worse than the hot flashes were. Very heavy flow, seriously painful cramps, the works. All my life. In fact, childbirth was no worse than the initial cramps of each and every period.
Secondly, when I found a partner, 10 years into menopause, no worries about birth control!! Fantastic!
Thirdly, no weight gain. In fact, just as I started menopause, I was overweight, and out of shape. So, I started exercising, and after a year, I was much more fit, but had lost no weight. So then, I changed my eating habits: I started practicing portion control, and making healthier choices. I was already vegetarian, but started eating less highly processed foods (junk foods) and more veggies and fruits. And I lost about 25 lbs. More recently, when I dropped the dairy products and eggs, switching to plant based whole food, I lost even more weight without even trying.
I even like my gray hair!
There are downsides to old age, but for me, menopause isn’t one of them, it’s all positive.
13
The discomfort of perimenopause, like childbirth, was forgotten as soon as I hit the calm, liberating and richly fulfilling period of my life known as menopause.
15
Menopause has been the source of an astounding amount of freedom for me. I was conditioned early in life to seek validation from others, especially the powerful men in my family's evangelistic church. I walked that fine line of being thin enough, attractive enough, meek cough, obedient enough, while producing babies and keeping my house the way it should be.
So many "shoulds".
Now, at 58, the bleeding is done, and I am 18 years post-exit from all things "church". It is SUCH a relief to no longer gauge myself on how I am "supposed" to be living (driven by the way I am "supposed" to be thinking and believing). Days go by without me giving more than a cursory glance into a mirror, both literal and figurative.
Menopause is a time to just "be" without a flicker of concern about what anyone else may think.
These are my halcyon days.
16
I wasn’t going to post again but I am an old lady now and I truly wish women in general would stop being so smug and dismissive of each other’s pain and experiences. Whether it’s the natural childbirth advocate clucking her tongue at a woman who chose an epidural because “the pain really isn’t that bad” or the breastfeeding mother shaming a bottle feeding mother because “breast feeding is not hard if you actually try” or the women who didn’t experience difficult perimenopause or a feeling of loss at menopause suggesting that “it’s been overplayed and is nothing”. I will never understand the hubris of believing your personal experience is somehow the norm and all others a deviation, nor the lack of empathy required to shame or negate the experiences of other women trying their best to get by in this world. My mother was of another culture and generation and she never spoke a word about menopause until she was very old. Not because she didn’t experience it, but because she was taught to suffer in silence, never, ever to complain and never talk about things having to do with the body, reproduction or women’s problems. You young women have choices that would have been inconceivable to my mother and I only saw made reality over a lifetime. Make your choices and then support each other.
66
I’d recommend this post twice if I could!
2
What if your assumption that every woman dreads menopause is wrong? What if the dread is caused by articles like this and our society that encourages us to have our children late? These days, even the late 40s is fine, so we can 'fulfill' ourselves in our careers and 'have it all' before raising a family. I think it's backwards.
I had my children young and was a grandmother by 50. I did not dread menopause. It came as a natural stage, along with my gray hair and, yes, I had a career that was necessary to help support the family, but I didn't start working until I was 30 and my children were in school. The hardest part was explaining to everyone why I was at home and not working. Acceptance of aging is not a sign of weakness, but an example of strength.
11
Although I had no real physical symptoms during perimenopause, I know women whose hot flashes were quite real and highly uncomfortable. Perhaps there isn't much reference to menopause symptoms in literature prior to the last few centuries because most things were written by men? I did experience memory problems during perimenopause in my late forties that I had never known before: leaving car keys behind, etc. Thankfully, those lapses cleared up once I entered full menopause. But the symptom was quite real to me, not a cultural artifact. This article seems rather dismissive of the reality of women.
Full menopause, years after the complete cessation of menstruation, has brought a great gift: calm. Men and women at the mercy of hormones swirl through highly changeable desires and moods; I know, I used to be there. But only women are lucky enough to evolve completely freed from that chaos! Perhaps cooler heads and the resultant wisdom advanced the survivability of human groups, which became more complex than those of most other animals, and hence the evolutionary rationale for menopause, which is unknown in most other species.
12
This is ridiculous. The average life expectancy in the 18th century was 36. How do you figure Abigail Adams lived to 73? Of course, women experienced menopause throughout history. Ancient Mesoamerican scientific thought was entirely dedicated to the examination of fertility. Beginning, middle and end. This is true throughout cultures and time. Infant and childhood mortality is what draws down life expectancy. Where children are more likely to live, life expectancy increases exponentially. Or, well, at least logarithmically.
Calling menopause a clinical syndrome is perhaps new. However, I'm sure the end of female fertility is not a surprise to anyone. Biology has shown fertility ends. I imagine most "pre-modern" cultures would look at you funny for asking about their statistical menstrual symptoms. Not exactly surprising the symptomatic data never made it into the historical record until after the European scientific revolution. You know? When European men started asking women about their menstrual cycles and recording the answers.
10
"...prehistoric ancestors, who do not use modern medicine and are isolated from the influences of modernization — has also found that the modal life span for humans surviving to adulthood is about 70 to 75 years. (Mortality is high in childhood, so that average life expectancies are low, but a child who survives to age 15 has an even chance of living another 45 years or so, and an adult of age 45 can expect another 20 to 25 years.)"
These numbers of yours are not * gender * specific ("humans"). Just stroll through an old graveyard and see how many women are buried there in their 20's & 30's. Mortality from childbirth was REAL.
On my Ancestry page many male relatives several generations back had 2 or 3 wives. Divorce was unheard of in those days, so where do you think caused all those young women to end up in the ground?
8
Awfully simplistic. I’m thrilled to be done but the road was rocky. I wanted a party on the other side. I was met by older women who couldn’t bring themselves to mention their experience. Victims of our paternalistic society. I’m detecting a trend of gross simplification on many health related issues here. Growing older is a mine field passing through menopause one part.
16
I didn't dread it; I welcomed it! I hated the decades of menstruation, cramps, mood swings, the high cost of supplies. Month after month for decades. I drank soy milk to treat the hot flashes and that was that. That was only for a short while. Menopause is much more manageable.
6
I am in my eighties now. The post-menopausal years were my most productive ones. I was fortunate to have had virtually no symptoms except for the ceasing of a very heavy menstrual flow which was causing an iron-deficiency anemia that sapped my energy. I certainly sympathize with those who do suffer, but to suggest that there is no relationship between the mind's expectations and the body's reaction is disingenuous and unscientific.
5
Menopause science moves forward all the time. If you can, find a practitioner adept with approaches. Some of my patients sail through; nothing to wrangle with. For others we dig deep into what benefits and risks they accept when choosing hormones to modulate symptoms. Also, beware or the hucksters selling unproven and even unsafe “remedies”. Some waste money only, others are frankly dangerous.
7
While everyone’s experiences of the physical and emotional symptoms of menopause seem to be wildly divergent, the one common denominator is the reality of culture at-large and most of western medicine ignoring at best, denigrating or dismissing at worst, those experiences (and thus having nothing to offer). As a fifty-two year-old, I am always the first to bring up the topic among my friends to ask how they feel and how they’ve handled it (and I wonder why my younger friends never ask—Embarrassment? Fear? Shame?) The books I’ve read have been neither practically nor philosophically helpful (and I do not have high hopes for this one either). What I find most exciting is this comments section, and I am heartened that others have found some respite with acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine, as I have. I have also—as I imagined myself as a cartoon mouse repeatedly and tragi-comically subjected to spontaneous combustion and incineration—taken heart in the words of a friend who thinks of the process as alchemical: our bodies are crucibles through the trial of heat something stronger and unexpected will be forged.
3
This author lacks any kind of insight or empathy. I feel as though she blames us for having a difficult time through menopause.
Just because she had an easy menopause, does not mean we all do. Many women suffer badly, both during menopause and forever afterwards.
Contrary to the article, I heard no horror stories about menopause because my grandmother and mother sailed through it. I, on the other hand, have not slept for twenty years.
28
Like so many natural occurrences, menopause has been blown out of proportion, overdiscussed and overtreated in the United States. Women in other parts of the world learn from their mothers and grandmothers what and how to eat and which herbal remedies to take to avoid the symptoms that plague so many Western women at this time of life. Traditional Chinese medicine is the way to go.
3
I can only guess that the author has not yet experienced the full pain of menopause. Of course there is no mention in history of this “women’s issue.” Medical science only started acknowledging women as whole human beings in the last 50 years. Menopause hit me like a freight train, and that was 8 years ago, and it’s still going strong. I experience night sweats, hot flashes, weight gain, dryness (vaginal, eyes, mouth, skin), and hair loss. I don’t think I’ve had a good nights sleep since it began. My friends are not fairing any better. I’m glad to be done with the torture of monthly periods but this new phase is no picnic, and it’s certainly not a modern construct.
29
I began hormone replacement therapy at the beginning of menopause at age 53 or so, right around the time the study came out that scared many women off it. I read the study carefully and saw that the supposed problems tended to happen in the first few years and were rare. I discussed HRT with my doctor and she said that she had many intelligent patients and was comfortable going with our judgments in either direction unless there were strong reasons not to.I’m still on HRT at age 73. My heart health is excellent so I have no reason not to use it, and it helps preserve my bone strength, which is important since I’m mildly disabled from childhood polio. I’ve never had a hot flash. My only experience with menopause was the ending of my periods.
11
Ms. Mattern assumes that we were all steeped in horror stories about menopause from childhood onward. In my experience, however, it wasn't talked about much at all. I'd heard jokes about hot flashes, but beyond that--no. I was utterly unprepared for the force of my own physical changes, and called my sister--ten years older than me--to ask her why she hadn't warned me.
If this was a cultural invention, it should have been a much larger part of the public conversation for a good long time. My contemporaries and I should have known about more than just hot flashes, should have understood the broad spectrum of experiences that are labeled as part of menopause. But most of us had no clue. Perhaps the writer believes that the medical and academic assumptions about menopause were reflected in the larger culture, but the fact is, nobody much liked to hear about menopause, just as nobody much liked to think about postmenopausal women. This is changing, and articles like this are evidence of that, but it is only the beginning of the conversation.
I'm absolutely embracing cronehood, but minimizing or dismissing the physical upheaval around it seems to be part of the problem. The dread has been around *talking* about menopause. The only way through that dread is to talk about it more, and understand it better--not gloss over the real, physical experiences of women.
17
@cm My periods stopped when I was 47. I wanted to know if this was hereditary. My mother refused to ever talk about anything remotely related to sex. I had to wring the information out of my father--yes, my mother was about the same age. Neither of them told me anything about her symptoms, whether she had an easy menopause or not.
2
God questions raised about how menopause is addressed today. Why so much concern now but not in written history of earlier centuries. The study of pre-agricultural societies of small communities shows an absence of many big health issues that seem to arise from Iiving a lot differently from our distant ancestors. Are we doing something that is causing problems after menopause?
I tend to think that the biggest factor is knowledge about human biology and improvements with healing and treatment of diseases. Anyone diagnosed with common older aged conditions knows that they had no significant symptoms. Before the tests were available even physicians would have not been aware of many conditions as early as they are now.
Human life expectancies before the early twentieth century did not exceed the mid-forties. A lot of conditions related to menopause would become moot given the mortality from myriad other causes ending he progression of those conditions.
In addition, child bearing has been a significant cause of death for women throughout history. Menopause meant an end to those risks.
The big concern is also due to the fact that the end of menopause correlated to big changes in risks of conditions more prevalent in men. In fact, risks for cardiovascular health risks are lower for women before menopause. So better data gathering and analyses contributes to the current views.
A quote from the article: “The point, rather, is that culture has a powerful effect on how, and even on whether, we experience menopausal symptoms.”
This doesn’t explain that all I knew about peri & menopause itself were that hot flashes & irregular periods would probably occur. Menopause hadn't been discussed much, if at all, by my mother’s generation - at least not within my hearing, even as an adult!
This article - despite saying otherwise, does seem to conclude that I, and other women, have basically conjured up a host of menopausal annoyances - many of them being large annoyances, disrupting one's life. Which is a rather dismissive attitude, from my own POV. My gyn, who is a middle-aged male, is actually more realistic.
I experienced not only the symptoms mentioned above - in abundance - but so much more. “Chicken liver” clots in peri, insomnia (which refuses to go away & is *really* annoying) - which kicked in the same month as my first hot flashes, hyper-acuity of sounds (which thankfully went away as suddenly as it had appeared), irritability - which took a while to disappear again, ‘phantom’ periods (all of the PMS symptoms, sans a period), etc. IOW, I was unaware of most of the possible symptoms resulting from one’s estrogen see-sawing up & down and plummeting during peri & then menopause, yet they showed up anyway.
Granted, there are some women who experience very few symptoms, but personally, I’d hate to go through peri & menopause again!
15
Having written a book about the funnier aspects of this time in a woman's life Gonepausal, I have come to realize that women of my generation , The Baby Boomers were not told anything about menopause by their Mothers. My own Mother said she went through it in one afternoon. Unfortunately in this country it is a symbol of age and we are all running as fast as we can from that! In the UK the women embrace this time of their lives and even call it "The Menopause." I believe the BBC had a menopause week. It is something that should be opened up for discussion and not denied or closeted. It's unavoidable and the more we share the more we will welcome this sea change.
3
@Gail Forrest
Would LOVE to see - The Menopause Week - in the media here- on cable, presented by the bright, nubile-pretty-young-things who are news commentators today (I'm happy to see women in these positions).
No surprise that menopause has been rarely discussed until recently. Even having your period was pretty much a "secret" in the 60's &70's. Discussing menopause? Feminists were but it was mostly considered a non-topic, as were mos "female issues."
A big compliment to "older" women in the public eye is now and has been for some time - they look the same (young). Thanks to hair dye, plastic surgery, botox, fillers, hormone "therapy,"etc.
Look at the fresh faces on the "age defying" creams advertised on TV ads and in magazines -
Age gracefully - if you can...
Rarely do articles on menopause mention that not all women have symptoms. So much so that most women don’t even believe it’s possible. I had late menopause (60) and zero symptoms. In my fifties, years before I had menopause, every doctor I saw systematically asked me if I had hot flashes, if I experienced dryness ... I just wanted to say to them, leave me alone, I’ll tell when and if it happens. I have friends who really suffer, so I don’t deny that some women have a rough time, I still believe that there is too much focus on the negative.
7
That’s because you haven’t experienced it. Imagine a person of some other group whose real grievances have been ignored for centuries saying that because they personally haven’t experienced these problems, that’s somehow relevant to those who have suffered. Women have been being told for hundreds of years, including in the subtexts of this article and your comment, not to complain. Good for you, that yours was easy. But a lot of women suffer a lot during menopause, and we deserve to have our truth respected and our medical problems tested as the realities that they are.
20
There are definitely some pluses to menopause, it can be liberating, but I would never dismiss it as a modern ailment. I have been lucky enough to not have hot flashes but I've woken from enough night sweats I felt like I swam the Atlantic. I also frankly, do miss having that estrogen. It's an energy hormone, at least that's my take. Most women sleep better with high levels, that deep restorative sleep. I still exercise the best I can, but I liked my pre menopause body better.
10
I was a life long migraineur with aura and during perimenopause they become so bad that I was frequently incapacitated. Because of the aura I was not a candidate for any hormonal therapy. I am well on the other side of this process now and I am migraine free, which is incredible, but I assure you the suffering during the process was very, very real.
8
If texts dating before modern medicine really did not discuss menopause in detail, I'm not impressed. There are any number of diseases and conditions doctors did not know about, and horrific treatments for some they did know about. There are plenty of diseases and conditions doctors don't know much about now. One under-studied, very painful disease? condition? is calcific tendonitis in one or both shoulders. Calcium deposits that form for no known reason and that cause very painful inflammation in the shoulder and arm. Calcific tendonitis can lead to a condition called frozen shoulder, where shoulder and arm mobility is severely limited for months. Frozen shoulder is quite common among women in their late 50s, but very little studied. The calcific tendonitis part often lasts for years. There is no known connection with menopause. On the other hand modern doctors don't know what causes it and apparently, aren't bothering to study it much. In my experience they just hand you a pamphlet with exercises that may help, and tell you to wait 12 to 18 months for it to be over. Perhaps because this is largely a disease of middle-aged women?
4
From reading the comments, it’s safe to say that menopause is different for everyone. I am peri menopausal and actually enjoy the hot flashes, especially during a cold Chicago winter :) What I don’t enjoy is the heavy bleeding that a lot of my friends have experienced. I bring it up because I think a lot of us don’t talk about it and doctors don’t seem to ask much. After finally talking to my doctor, I decided to try an IUD that delivers progesterone locally to avoid the risks of breast cancer. I’m not sure yet how it will work but it seems to be lessening the bleeding in the first 2-3 months. I’m hoping it may eliminate my period altogether, which is what it did for my daughter. I think we as a society need to have more open, healthy conversations about menopause, sexuality, and similar topics.
7
This article is lacking any insightful scientific information. I don't consider my menopause symptoms to be a pathology, but the impact of hot flashes at work, sleep disruption and tissue changes is real. My symptoms are quite mild and I'm thankful for that. I am choosing some interventions not to recapture my youth, but to keep my quality of life where I need it to be. My body might be changing, but my life is not slowing down.
8
This article is unhelpful to many women experiencing perimenopause and menopause. I am a professional woman who was lucky enough to live most of my life without health concerns, and I had no reproductive health issues until I entered peri menopause. One does not have to dig deep to know that women’s experiences have long been written out of history. Even today, many women do not like to talk openly about menopause For many, like myself, peri-menopause was debilitating. I experienced heavy uterine bleeding to the degree that my hemoglobin fell from 140 to 87 in a matter of days. I required hospital treatment, and two years of medical support to re-gain control of my life. With a drop in progesterone, some women do not have the “off switch” that the progesterone offered to signal the estrogen to stop building the uterine lining. This is not in the head. This is physical, and for some women it can put their physical and mental health at risk. I had to take time off work, and I had limited energy for my children and husband. I had to seek out my own information and resources. There is no women’s clinic in my city. Women need access to greater heath and community supports during peri-menopause and menopause. This article, with its “all in the head” speak does nothing to help women get the heath support they deserve.
25
If menopause became a known "thing" about the time the industrial revolution began, maybe the symptoms we associate with menopause are related to industrial-era diets, exercise, and stressors. Has that been explored? Do elderly women in the few extant foraging societies experience menopause in the same way as women in most modern-day societies?
1
@AJK Maybe it's because "female problems" used to be treated by midwives, and it's male doctors who wrote early medical texts. The midwives were specialists. The early doctors were not, as far as I know.
10
Many women suffer from severe premenstrual "tension," which interfered with my parenting and my marriage. I can't begin to explain how much better my mood is without changing hormones. Not that I enjoy a few of the side effects of missing hormones, but I'll take an even mood over minor discomfort every day of the week.
2
When my gynecologist just shrugged when I asked about menopause, I figured I was on my own. I was a floor RN and by the end of my shift my scrubs were soaked. I never got any medical support but I did use visual imagery to see myself as a furnace. The hair loss was the hardest part, I had not read that much about it. It did stop but my hair density never came back.
Beginning to end it was 18 months for me. I was 58. The most amazing thing for me was that after 45 years of menstruation, I never missed it when it was gone. I celebrated my freedom from fertility, didn’t look back.
3
For me, the best part about menopause is that I stopped being a patsy. When my hormone levels changed, I realized that I had been way too accommodating with certain people in my life. I'm standing up for myself in a way that I never have before, and I'm loving it!
13
I'm not looking for respect, I'm looking for relief.
And I'm getting neither from the suggestion in this op-ed that my menopausal experience is a result of my culture rather than physiological changes. My symptoms are real and totally obvious.
I'm a librarian, and I deal with people all day long who come to me to ask me for help. At least five times a day, in the middle of one of these types of conversations I have to have with a stranger, my face starts to turn bright red, my palms and neck start to visibly sweat, and I have to explain to the person I'm talking to that I'm just experiencing a hot flash and that it will pass. Some people are surprised at my forthright explanation, but all nod and continue to allow me to help them. I feel am getting respect for the process from the general public I interact with.
And I never approached menopause with dread. I always looked forward to it as it is freedom from the responsibilities inherent in being female. I just wish it would hurry up and finish. I'm tired of being warm all the time, especially here in the swamp of the DC suburbs.
26
@Jane- Yes! I also work with the public, and have hot flashes that I have to explain, as I’m literally pouring with sweat, while trying to do my job as an optician. I haven’t had what I call the “swooning flash”-where it overwhelms you from your toes to your hair follicles accompanied by waves of nausea, in awhile thankfully.
4
From a developmental stage approach, menopause (for many women) is a transition from middle age to “vital” elderhood.
Transitional stages are periods between stable phases and are often disruptive to the individual. Consider adolescence for example.
The grandmother hypothesis implies there is a net benefit to human groups, from having women living for a long period of time after they are no longer fertile. One aspect of that is that “vital” elderly might be “cheap workers”, consuming less food than younger adults.
My own speculation is they might require less food partly because their “support systems” work less intensively and require fewer calories. That means daily tissue repair is less rapid and effective.
As a consequence, the elderly have aches and pains.
This being a “normal” finding in the elderly, is reasonably characterized by (we) physicians as outside of the realm of disease and not something we are equipped to deal with.
Hopefully, the increasing interest in “regenerative medicine” will promote research into the “normal” afflictions of elderhood and lead us to understand how to better deal with peri- and postmenopausal symptoms and various other miseries of (st)aging in both women and men.
Stephen Rinsler, MD
1
Getting old is not for the faint of heart! We have much to be thankful for. if we've made it this far. Women in particular can be so afraid of aging--botox, plastic surgery that makes them look bizarre, drugs, hair coloring...Now more than ever is the time to live in the present, be grateful for what we have, do what we can, accept what we can not. It's only going to get harder, might as well start practicing now!
4
So many of the comments here focus on the question of which is worse - the symptoms that come with having your period, or the symptoms that come with peri-menopause and menopause? This entire thread sums up the dismal attention to women's medical care throughout history, including in the U.S. today. We spend over 30 years of our lives in various levels of physical and psychological discomfort for one week out of every four. When that finally ends, we spend years with a completely different set of symptoms, as bleeding and cramps are replaced by hot flashes and sweating. Instead of debating which symptoms are worse, or suggesting that we simply reshape how we're thinking about what we're experiencing, the real question should be why the medical community isn't actually helping us? Whether you're a 15 year old woman experiencing debilitating crams, or a 50 year old woman who hasn't been able to sleep through the night for a year, why hasn't the medical establishment found a solution for us?
16
@Michelle
I got my period at 11 (a shock to my mother who did at 16). I had heavy periods and became faint from blood loss and had the other "usual" symptomes, but never had to stop my daily routines and things leveled off in my 30's.
I went into menopause at 42 and I thought I was too young for that so took estrogen (organic) and progesterone, which was something - the medical establishment /science has done.
I felt great and had no periods for 10 years until the negative news came out about the dangers of estrogen therapy. I was in my early 50's then, so the time to stop seemed right to me.
Then I went off the HRT and had major mood swings and a few hot flashes for about a 6 weeks. I was - finished, and never looked back. I was a lucky one...
Women are so different in the reproductive aspects of our lives.
More recognition, appreciation, understanding and help with of all our experiences is LONG overdue
2
To leave the Western diet out of the cultural equation in discussing menopause seems highly remiss. It's well known that certain foods and drink women ingest regularly give rise to certain menopausal symptoms, especially hot flashes. So many women seem to think there's not a thing to do about their symptoms, even after experiencing them for decades.
It's time for the medical community to pay more attention to the often-dietary causes of menopause and advise their patients about highly consequential cause and effects resulting from food women eat in the mainstream Western diet. Even in the naturopathic community there is often not enough direct conversation or guidance on dietary changes that can help alleviate or eradicate menopausal symptoms.
While some women may not want to give up such foods as chocolate, wheat and alcohol, to name three favorites that are well-known to cause symptoms among women, give the crucial information - and leave it up to the individual whether they want to change their journey through menopause, learn whether medicine is needed at all. Sometimes it is, but often, it is not.
I am grateful to have learned and implemented dietary changes that have aided my own journey through an eventually symptom-free menopause. I wish that for every woman. If your own doctor isn't knowledgeable or forthcoming about dietary changes that might help, learn on your own, there's a wealth of reliable information out there that can be personally freeing.
1
@Anna I never had much trouble with premenstrual or menstrual symptoms. I also did not have menopausal symptoms except that my periods became increasingly light and then stopped (when I was 47). After that, I did gradually acquire vaginal dryness and my hair thinned somewhat. It's also harder to keep my weight down. I am now 64 and not sure what changes in my body are just aging, rather than menopause. But, I made no changes in my diet whatever. I've always did my best to eat a healthy diet, with meat but not an excessive amount. I'm not much of a drinker, but I've always consumed lots of wheat--and chocolate! Certainly some women may be helped by dietary changes. But I think with some of us, other forces are in play. Who knows? It's not like doctors seem to be studying why some women suffer more than others.
@Frances Grimble I agree with you, we women are not all the same. There are definitely varying forces at work during menopause from diet to genetics to environment to...? That said, there are many who can be helped with moderate to severe symptoms of menopause by changing their diet and I find it a shame so many women are chronically not getting the information they might need due to lack of guidance or knowledge on nutritional choices/changes from their doctor. Even this article doesn't address the dietary changes in history that became part of the current Western diet that might contribute to 'Western' symptoms during menopause.
So many women *can* be helped by changing what they eat or drink - I've witnessed it happen over and over again (while formerly working at a doctor's office, one who was big on nutritional information and "we are what we eat.".)
I'd just like to see every women getting proper information in an area that might be the trick for them - when so many just don't.
2
I may be an outlier but I miss my hormones.
107
@Lauren same!
1
@Lauren
I know what you mean. The total loss of my sex drive is something I would love to reverse.
2
@Lauren I miss collagen and don’t ever see myself “celebrating” elbow skin that reaches my knees.
3
The menopause part is not really a problem (I am 56). Lucky I suppose that I didn’t have too many symptoms. Getting older however I cannot stand and I envy all those who say this is their best and most free time. I wish I felt that way, instead I feel washed up and kind of unnecessary. I know this is wrong and my issue, but I can’t shake it.
5
@LFK
Those feelings can arise as a symptom of the hormonal changes. Maybe talk to your doctor about it, and don’t just accept it as a given.
5
You’re not alone.
@LFK
Aging women - washed up?
An American societal construct?
One realizes how much of the emotions were hormone-driven. It's freeing to be rid of them.
9
I think this essay needs more research on medicine, physiology, and anthropology. There is a medical definition of menopause and not all women have significant symptoms but don't write that hot flashes are THOUGHT to accompany these changes unless you are prepared to come up with a new physiological explanation (and why anti-estrogen therapy for breast cancer causes "menopausal symptoms"). There needs to be a serious look at life expectancies, not just the outliers, as many women died in childbirth and diseases easily treated today (look at why 65 was chosen for SS and Medicare). And there is the role of genetics and cultural expectations in symptomatology- sweating profusely in a tropical locale while working in a field may not be seen with the same dismay as being in a suit at a board meeting. And men have written most of the historical medical record which shows the evolving understanding of basic anatomy and basic physiology (blood flow,breathing, pregnancy) with interpretations that are always intertwined with cultural attitudes at any given time. Youth has always sexually valued and our ban on sexual relations with teenagers is a cultural, not biologic, norm. Some women are liberated by age. Others not so much. Ms. Mattern gets into anthropology to give the sharing of food an original culture positive purpose for older women but what is the train of thought to the present day? It seems to me the final takeaway message that is older women need to love themselves. OK.
4
Sure not having periods is very appealing, and a massive drop in libido, means that you dont care about what you are missing so have extra times on your hands.
But wasnt it in these pages I read that the plunge in oestrogen can cause mentals "pruning" and they think starts the alzheimers that more women than men suffer from?
Was it in these pages that I read about the insomnia, and then at the same time about the cancer risk of hormone replacements?
I found that we truly come into our power at menopause. No one tells us, but you feel better than ever. You are free to take risks and to support younger colleagues. Women as elders /crones are called to lead in this difficult time of rupture and opportunity... we are needed for our strength, wisdom, empathy, resilience and willingness to speak the truth.
4
@sbuie-please don’t refer to us as crones.
1
@Sbuie
THOSE powers should not come with menopause. Women should have them much earlier, as do men. The idea that a woman has to trade fecundity and attractiveness for power and authority is ridiculous.
1
I am 70, and found that we can truly come into our power at menopause. No one told us, but you feel better than ever. You are free to take risks and to support younger colleagues. Women as elders /crones are called to lead in this difficult time of rupture and opportunity... we are needed for our strength, wisdom, empathy, resilience and willingness to speak the truth.
5
I started menopause in my 30s but had no label for it. Even in the dead of winter I sweat through my clothes, outdoors. One specialist accused me of abusing drugs. I was incredibly anxious, and on-the-edge depressed. I was lucky--I found a therapist who saved me. It was the late 1980s and no one put the pieces together for me; I had to figure out menopause myself over the years. (My parents died when I was a child. It would have been great to have a mother with whom to discuss this. Instead, I felt isolated.)
6
I didn't dread menopause. I never wanted children, but I didn't dread my periods either, although, I was quite happy when they stopped. I never associated my worth as being tied to being able to have children. I exercise a lot. I didn't experience menopause until I was 57. I had hot flashes for about a year, then, they stopped. The first one, I thought, oh, THAT'S what that is. OK, unpleasant, but not debilitatingly so. I have one every once in a while now, at 60. I gained weight in my late 50's due to knee injuries and feeling sorry for myself. I've lost 50+ pounds between the age of 59-60 and am now a healthy weight. It wasn't that hard to do. Yes, harder than when I was young, but not prohibitively so. I've had ups and downs in mood my whole life, so I found even my worst peri-menopausal, want to get in a fist fight, hormonal swings kind of comical. Fortunately, I laughed at myself before acting out. I think we get old if we're lucky. I'm enjoying the journey.
9
This article is skewed to one side.
And asserts that because of the attitudes in western culture, the hype around menopause has all of us frightened of it.
There is a more balanced view.
Educated women about what menopause feels like.
It is a transition phase just the way menarche is, just the way pregnancy(ies) is(are), or even never being pregnant is, in a female's life.
Yes, peri- and post-menopause have definitely difficult symptoms but we have a lot of natural products and other methods to curtail them or lessen the severity.
Imagine what our ancestor females went through without any medical aid or help and they survived it well.
However, frightening women about its not the way.
It is a transition phase--accept it for what it is and address it accordingly.
I saw in Middle-East, women with children looked forward to menopause, and a lot of them would say, ah now I don't have to stop saying salaat (prayers), as they have to during days of menstruation. That was a big deal to them.
In rural areas in Japan, women had the same attitude but for different reasons. They wanted to be looked at as a matriarch and didn't want to be looked at as an available female anymore. Older women had more freedom in society, it is still so in traditional homes.
In places like Africa, tribal older females (Himba, San) enjoy a status they never see as menstruating women, they become advisors to the whole clan... menopause is kind of a right of passage to them.
8
Wish the author had mentioned that few medical professionals have ever studied the condition of menopause and post-menopause - a span in a woman's life that may encompass decades. So there is a great dearth of knowledge about some of the most productive and significant years in a female's life span.
12
Like puberty, pregnancy and childbirth, menopause will vary from woman to woman. Genetics likely play a part. In my case, my maternal grandmother, my mother and my younger sister all required a hysterectomy as they approached menopause. Mine turned out to be an emergency, as uterine fibroids suddenly got much larger, pressed on my bladder and I was unable to urinate. Following that, I did not take hormones due to the fact that my mother took them for 10 years and then developed breast cancer.
To facilitate getting through the first year or two of hormonal change adjustment, I found acupuncture a great relief. For a year, weekly treatments made them go away entirely, then I tapered it off gradually. The advantage of acupuncture is that it will either work or not work for you, but has no side effects. It is worth a try. Bear in mind you will need more than one treatment for it to have an effect. In my case, the hot flashes stopped after the seventh week of acupuncture. That and a vaginal insert with a small amount of estradiol got me through menopause (available online without prescription). 13 years later and I am more fit, sleep better and enjoy exercise more than ever before. Get off the couch and away from the computer. Exercise and a healthy diet will keep your bones in good health and your moods more stable. (And I no longer drink either alcohol or caffeine.). Very liberating.
2
Menopause? What menopause? I sailed right through it, with nary a symptom. I was delighted after years of uncomfortable, painful periods.
My mother, on the other hand, milked it for all she could. I think her menopause lasted for twenty years! And we suffered more than she said she did.
7
@connecticut yankee
Everyone has a different experience - a little more empathy for Mom might have gone a long way...
1
Yes, menopause is a part of life but the article is infuriating. I am still going through it but try being totally anaemic because you bleed 20 out of 28 days. You feel intense emotions which are difficult to control despite exercising 5 days a week. The physically debilitating symptoms which take a toll on you emotionally. Was I dreading it? No. I am still not dreading it - looking forward to the process completing. But for me and for a lot of others the process of getting to the other side is not easy. The one thing not considered is that women in a lot of cultures did not talk about menustration and related issues and that might account for the lack of literature. A combination of male doctors and a taboo on the subject. All of this is far more nuanced than the author wants to make it out to be.
15
This is exactly the problem. I had heavy and irregular periods during these years and they sometimes lasted for weeks. At times it was scary and more than once I went to the MD thinking it could be something else that caused the bleeding. Every girl knows what to expect for he first period but it’s a totally different game when you approach menopause. Googling symptoms was not always helpful and even the OBGYN who was in her early thirties could not tell me much.
1
Try uterine ablation.
So the author is making an argument that because cultures have completely disregarded this aspect of women's health throughout history, it must not really exist. There are lots of ideas and concepts that societies have not had a name for - until the people experiencing the impact of those ideas have the gain power to demand that society name them - and work toward a solution for their very real problems.
I've spent the past 5 years experiencing the peri-menopausal physical changes that Dr. Mattern is implying are all in my head. The last straw was a full month of hot flashes and inability to sleep. I avoided seeking medical care because I bought into this destructive trope that she's peddling - that my symptoms were not an actual medical issue. Once I finally made a call to my doctor, and got a single prescription for hormones (the exact same birth control pills I had taken for years), the symptoms went away within a week.
For all of the women out there who don't experience menopause symptoms, good for you. But for the rest of us, please don't demean us by saying we aren't actually experiencing what we think we are. And I sure hope the women from "traditional" cultures who don't have a word for the physical changes their bodies are experiencing are still given access to a full range of health care options in the societies they live in.
25
YES. I have had real and debilitating symptoms that are not “in my head.” I had no idea this was going to hit me at the age I started having symptoms, so it was not psycho (socially) somatic as this article suggests. It is a huge physiological change that affects some of us strongly. And we need support.
14
Thank you Sister! I honestly had to scroll back to the top of the article to see if this article was written by a man. Menopause symptoms seriously comprised my wellbeing and brought me to the verge of suicide until I finally paid a private doctor for HRT. Most ob-gyn doctors only know about birthing babies and zero info about menopause. It’s a disgrace.
2
It's important to note that not every woman experiences the menopausal symptoms that are constantly written about.
3
Everyone experiences menstruation and menopause differently. some being luckier than others. We must focus on those who are suffering the most, and try to find ways to help them medically, through diet and lifestyle, and especially through social awareness. This may be one of the most stressful phases of life for many women, who have to care for aging parents and likely have significant responsibilities at work. And we all know how stress adds fuel to the fire. Let’s find ways to support them.
3
Clearly, you have not gone through menopause yet!
I gained 20 lbs, had YEARS of no sleep, extremely painful joints, panic attacks, osteoporosis, and depression. Yeah, good times.
18
I struggle with hot flashes but with careful observation of myself understand the situations and stages these hot flashes go through . The rapid depression, the build up of heat ,the heat duration , than the cool down , and return to normal mood. All with in a few minutes. Amazing isn't it!
5
As in many facets of life, there are a range of experiences as opposed to 'one size fits all'. After suffering monthly debilitating PMS for decades (despite exercise, meditation, cutting out sugar/caffeine/processed foods), I went through menopause at 51. It felt like payback time, as I was lucky to have no negative symptoms. On the contrary, like others have commented, the freedom from the risk of pregnancy, nasty PMS gone, the pesky mating urge no longer turning my head, wow- I'm happier and more productive than at any other time in my life. Now, would I love to have more of the automatic energy and enthusiasm from my 20's - sure, but hey, as a tradeoff, I'll take menopause anyday!
3
As noted, everyone is different. My lower back ached constantly for about 35 years, and ached terribly about ten days out of every month, before and during my period. Once my periods stopped, my backache went away almost completely!
Yes, I had some other symptoms (hot flashes, vaginal dryness), but they weren’t terrible; definitely a small price to pay for getting rid of perpetual backache.
1
It's like regaining that kind of enthusiasm for free living and that we had as girls of 12! No longer concerned with monthly cycles, concern about possible pregnancies after you've already had your children: time to explore and do all sorts of things for the rest of your life! Not only your body, but your mind is free!
12
Yes! Beyond symptoms, menopause is a cultural construct. And, it's obviously related to the myth of the industrial eternal youth society; it's the profit motive of botox, plastic surgeries, and all kind of cosmetic elixir to stop getting older--menopause is the most obvious paradigmatic "fact" of aging. Related to the myth of eternal youth, there is an irony: menopausal women become, in our Western contemporary society "invisible", however, at the same time, they are extremely visible for negatively loading menopause with all issues related to our uterus. But again, we have an industry mounted around menopause and how to "overcome it": from the "estrogen" pharma to the Goop "magic potions." And, yes, we have a great amount of literature dealing with the "darkness" and mystery of women. Simone de Beauvoir analysis of how an almost forgotten author, Henry de Montherlant ,describes us , women, as cavernous, dark uterine creatures is a beautiful and brutal example of the Western negative construction of women based on their "sex."
2
@Maita Moto-it is not all a “construct” and that seems incredibly unfair and dismissive of people like me that are actually having issues. I don’t Botox, color my hair or get plastic surgery; I have children that I’m trying to be a role model for: being strong, taking care of myself and them, and our family, working through it, many nights with no sleep (like the last 2, for example). Trying to teach them that this is one of the many phases in life, like they are just beginning menses, mine are ending. I resent the lumping of the women who Do have symptoms as some sort of whiny Goop culture, to which I definitely don’t apply.
4
@Maita Moto You have a point. However, when I was in my 30s I experienced debilitating hot flashes, anxiety and suicidal ideation from out of the blue. We aren't taught to expect menopausal symptoms so young. Education is key, not gimmicks.
Very interested to hear about the Grandmother Hypothesis. One small questuion, would it not be the case that the Grandmother who was instrumental to the family and thus the community not be supporting her son's wife, rather than her daughter? Traditionally did the daughter not relocate to her husband's family home?
As a woman of 45, I cannot wait for menopause. And I say this as one who has had the great fortune of a relatively regular cycle throughout life, without the burdens of endometriosis, PCOS or other woes- frankly, I cannot imagine what that’s like, thrown atop the aggravations of cramps and bloating. Yes, I fully acknowledge that menopause will have its own frustrations, but to be free of this whole mess? BLISS.
11
If you can make it through the REAL AND DEBILITATING symptoms of menopause, then you are FREE from the monthly rollercoaster and can get back in charge of your schedule and your energy.
Exercise helps tame the beast at ANY phase of a woman's life.
10
I agree, once I made it to the other side, it felt like being a kid again.
9
I had begun birth control pills in late 60's, and soon found they improved my periods and allowed me to control when I had them. I dont know if this affected my response to menopause, but I never had hot flashes. At the time I was encouraged to use hormones to control symptoms and it worked great. Later, when it was found there could be bad effects and I quit, that is when I suffered vaginal dryness and hair loss. Even the hair loss has benefits since I no longer have to shave, tho I hate having thin hair! But since even men lose body hair in old age, they lose hormones too!
I am in the thick of this right now. I've had some physical effects (hot flashes) and it's become shockingly easy to put on weight. But, I see it as part of the arc of life, the way adolescence was, and the way (for me) pregnancy was. Both of those times included undesirable physical symptoms. My gripe is that menopause is treated in this culture as basically, a tragedy, and so far I am finding it a glimpse into a freer and wiser future. This is provided my health holds out of course, but I'm finding myself returning to interests I had before life got crazy in my mid-twenties and that is very exciting to me.
12
It's great to see women commenting on this article who didn't have any problems with the menopause. I know women who really did not experience any problems at all and who therefore felt almost 'abnormal', because our culture insists that all women going through the menopause suffer.
It's interesting to compare attitudes to menstruation. There used to be a widespread belief that all women suffered serious and debilitating problems relating to menstruation. By now, we've accepted the fact of diversity: some women have no problems relating to menstruation, others have terrible problems, and the rest fall somewhere on the spectrum in-between.
Attitudes to the menopause seem to have lagged behind. To help attitudes catch up, we need more women like MoonCake and pechenan to speak up about the fact that for a lot of women, in terms of symptoms, menopause is "a non-event".
This will actually help those women who do suffer serious problems-- by highlighting the fact that such problems cannot simply be dismissed as 'normal'.
6
Interesting that this author found no earlier evidence of menopause being difficult.
Infuriating that she tries to tell me how I should feel about the very real symptoms I experience: debilitating headaches, sweats, fundamental shifts in how I handle emotions.
Sure I am looking forward to my period ending, but these hormonal shifts that are wreaking havoc with my health, emotions and relationships are not imagined and are very much unpleasant.
It is one thing to report on anthropological observations. Quite another thing to think those observations should apply to me.
16
@Kathleen
Thank you for this. While I don't "look forward" to my periods ending, trite "anthropological observations" have no meaning to real people because they are extremely tone deaf.
It's like offering up anthropological psychobabble to someone who found out their spouse has been unfaithful.
5
Um, until you've been through it, please refrain from telling people not to dread it. My own experience didn't include one of the worst symptoms (hot flashes) that my friends and siblings had, but it was still pretty horrible. For about 10 years. The only good thing about it is that you no longer have the monthly trials and tribulations. That part is great, but nothing else is.
17
Aside from my ovaries and pituitary carrying on a war with each other, I was ecstatic. no more days where I had to stay close to a bathroom. I firmly believe many of the symptoms are more to do with the effects of living in an industrial society than what is native to natural aging. We are smothered with artificial hormones in our food and environment. Many pesticides and herbicides act estrogenic in our bodies. Hence we live most of our lives prior with a much larger hormone load than nature intended. Also in more traditional cultures aging is seen as yet another phase productive in life--wise women. In the U.S. it's made a disease to market yet more pharmaceuticals and procedures and products to buy.
15
Mary from Lake Worth.
It appears as if your analysis of menopausal and post-menopausal women that live/d in “traditional cultures” may have somehow missed those that shun/ned and shame/d, starve/d to death, burned as witches, or held sati to be the ideal.
I dont know about the rest of you men out there, but growing up with a hormonally unbalanced mother almost pushed my childhood over the edge. Menopause was a true gift.
3
@Bruce Savin More research needed to help females with physical discomfort and difficult emotional states due to hormonal problems! Menopause happens if we live so long, but it's not a remedy!
2
Being raised by a hormonally imbalanced Mother is like being raised by an alcoholic who’s in denial of their problem. Yes, they need help.
1
@Bruce Savin
Contrary to popular belief, hormonal imbalances exist in men also, and result in similar difficulties keeping your emotions on an even keel.
As happy as I am not to menstruate I could really do without the rest. It’s been 5 years of hot flashes and night sweats (every 20 min for the first 2 years) and of course sleep disruptions. And can we talk about the sudden unaccountable feelings of dread and nausea and that strange pain that runs from feet to head right before a hot flash? I’m sorry, I’m all for women of my age feeling vibrant, fulfilled and respected but the discomfort is real and it really makes everything in life harder.
33
@GF , you get the dread?! That's like the ONE unpleasant thing that has started to happen since menopause. I'll be drifting off to sleep, or just waking up from a nice one, when suddenly for no discernible reason my body goes into panic/fight-or-flight mode--sometimes what seem to be endless waves of it. It feels awful, as if I've just noticed that I'm in the path of a speeding train. Sometimes it's followed by a hot flash; sometimes not. I thought it might be kind of a PTSD from my son's suicide attempt six years ago (he's fine now, thank God), but I thought it might be hormonal as well. Maybe it's a combination of the two.
Either way, although I'm sorry it happens to you, it's good to know that (in this instance, at least!) I'm not the oddball with a bizarre reaction.
7
@GF, I wouldn't wait too long for older women to be respected.
Although it is true the term “menopause” only came into use in the modern era in China, it is not correct to say that menopause was not known and treated prior to this time. Going back over 2,200 years ago to the beginning of Chinese medicine, hot flashes, night sweats, irritability, sleep disruptions and other common complaints of menopausal women were identified and treated with acupuncture, herbs and lifestyle advice. It’s just that health concerns and diseases were often not named in the medical classics. Instead, patterns of disease and disharmony were identified. This goes with the concept of “same illness, different treatment; different illness, same treatment.” Migraines might be due to liver yang rising, yin deficiency or excess heat, for example. There is no such thing as a “migraine,” per se — just a constellation of symptoms around a person’s health status and constitution. Depending on a menopausal woman’s overall health, she might be diagnosed with kidney yin deficiency, possibly with liver yin deficiency, heart yin deficiency or heart empty heat. None of these conditions was considered an illness. Although the term “menopause” does not appear in the classical literature, this by no means indicates that it has not been recognized and treated for over 2,200 years. But you must understand the underlying understanding of the body, health and illness from the Chinese (or East Asian) perspective to recognize this.
20
@Diane Atkinson, LAc Thank you. Could you please go over and share this with the choir of angry commenters who are furious with the *historian* who wrote the column? I think so many are desperate to have their experience confirmed and blessed and find *answers* or answers to their questions or answers to their afflictions. They lash out at writers and researchers who aren’t doing that particular work, don’t have the answers to their questions and, let’s be honest, aren’t even asking the questions.
1
Although it is true the term “menopause” only came into use in the modern era in China, it is not correct to say that menopause was not known and treated prior to this time. Going back over 2,200 years ago to the beginning of Chinese medicine, hot flashes, night sweats, irritability, sleep disruptions and other common complaints of menopausal women were identified and treated with acupuncture, herbs and lifestyle advice. It’s just that health concerns and diseases were often not named in the medical classics. Instead, patterns of disease and disharmony were identified. This goes with the concept of “same illness, different treatment; different illness, same treatment.” Migraines might be due to liver yang rising, yin deficiency or excess heat, for example. There is no such thing as a “migraine,” per se — just a constellation of symptoms around a person’s health status and constitution. Depending on a menopausal woman’s overall health, she might be diagnosed with kidney yin deficiency, possibly with liver yin deficiency, heart yin deficiency or heart empty heat. None of these conditions was considered an illness. Although the term “menopause” does not appear in the classical literature, this by no means indicates that it has not been recognized and treated for over 2,200 years. But you must understand the underlying understanding of the body, health and illness from the Chinese (or East Asian) perspective to recognize this.
1
Reading these comments reminds me that, much like all other life changes, the experience of menopause is as different as the women experiencing it. I entered menopause early and abruptly after a second round of chemotherapy for breast cancer. Unfortunately for me, it was a very isolating time with little understanding on my part of what to expect, and almost no information forthcoming from my doctors or (the small amount of) material that I could find.
8
The way I always thought of menopause while I was going through it (I'm in my sixties now) was that it is a time when the body rewires itself–from a focus on nurturing others to a focus on nurturing yourself. Like all change, I found accepting the symptoms and figuring out what my body was trying to tell me through those symptoms (am I stuffing anger? am I rejecting the idea of change? am I afraid of the loss of youthful beauty?) made the process not only more comfortable, but extremely empowering.
21
@anne
Interesting and creative idea. However, I would like to think aging draws us closer to the suffering and needs of others. I know it has for me.
5
I have a suspicion that the western diet leads to hormone imbalances in general and makes menopause worse in many women.
8
@Anna
Agreed
I think I its very possible.
Coupled with lack of exercise.
1
@Anna Men also eat meat laced with hormones. Why do we never hear about any effects this has on *them*?
Menopause is how the female body ages: no more, no less. We should not overdramatize it nor should we neglect ourselves at this significant physiological transition. Let’s have less agonizing, and better symptom management.
11
This is typical cultural studies nonsense. The fact that aboriginal women in one particular place say they don't have bad symptoms doesn't imply it's a cultural construct! It could be due to a genetic trait; it could be diet; it could be a variety of factors that mitigate or prevent the symptoms; or it could be that they would never admit it out loud to whoever asked the question.
The idea that menopause happens so that older, non-childbearing women can help with new offspring is wildly speculative, and that's not usually how evolution works. It is inclined to favor the individual's genes, not the good of the group or the species. More likely: we menopause because nature thinks we're dead by that age, so various mechanisms slow down or stop.
Jumping to conclusions without careful analysis, confusing correlation with causation... And Dr. Mattern is indeed saying it's mostly in our heads. Just like PMS. Which was most definitely not in my head either.
35
Thank you!
1
Best years of my life. Loving it!
15
I had my children late in life. When menopause came, they were not even in their teens.
I had no symptoms except for irregular periods with diminished discharges. Yay! I was done for life, about the same time I was preparing the girls for menarche. I gave all my feminine products to my older daughter and proudly announced I was too old to use them.
Never had hot flashes or night sweats until this year when I started taking an estrogen blocker for breast cancer.
10
I dreaded it but then it was a nonevent. Periods just stopped, and now 12 years later I still have not had a hot flash or any other symptom. While I feel great sympathy for those who are not so lucky, suffering during menopause doesn't seem to be inevitable. Maybe it's genetic, neither my mother nor my sister had problems.
23
It is a profound passage. I think it is misunderstood. Anything that's natural is worth acknowledging and honoring. I am glad it is losing the stigma and shame as a life reality. I am older now but I really am more self-accepting, more compassionate, more myself, and more creative, than ever. Men have a version of it too...
7
It is a given that hormonal changes occur in menopause and this is non-variable across cultures. However, how one views menopause is not a biologic given, but is largely influenced by one's culture. So it's a good idea to compare how menopause is experienced across cultures. Check the web to see the variety of symptoms experienced by women in different societies.
As a pubescent girl, I heard accounts of menstrual pain and decided it wasn't for me. And I heard all the older women complain about hot flashes and other discomforts. That didn't sound pleasant either. As I went through menses every 30 days and had the hot flashes, I told myself I wouldn't let those symptoms interfere with what I wanted to do and I hate showing weakness by complaining. And the symptoms came and went without much discomfort. I know it's just me being stoic, but my experience is I can reject what society tell me I should be feeling.
4
I’m going through menopause now and think hot flashes are kind of fun, in a “Whoa! What’s my body doing now?!” way. Like menarche, pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding, it’s yet another time when women can really be in awe of their amazing bodies.
7
This article reinforces the decidedly MALE western medicine view of menopause as somatic. Medicine has always been taught and practiced using the white male as the standard. Each woman will have a unique experience during this part of their life, and to minimize the experience of another is damaging and disrespectful. The premise that this is a modern "invention" of western medicine is absurd and insulting to those of us who are experiencing the very real and unpleasant symptoms which are a result of the process. Enough.
20
It's not so much menopause but the changes that happen as we age. That's fine to take it in stride if you, as a woman over 60 (it takes about that long for residual hormones to leave) are fine with a grandma role, wrinkly skin, saggy breasts, mental confusion, aging bones, brittle hair and so forth. Your whole body needs those hormones including your brain.
But we do live longer and some of us work in a competitive profession and love our sex life with our younger boyfriend. I'm not convinced we are supposed to live that long after our hormones dissipate. I've been on bio identical hormones including testosterone for 20 years. I've never had a hot flash or any age-related issues including middle age spread. I love my life and function like a woman much younger. I'm on a plant based diet and have no health issues (except good results) from the hormones.
I have long lustrous waist length hair at 69. If you are happy fading into the sunset, so be it, that's your choice. Just don't complain,
6
Thank you for publishing this necessary article. As a teenager, when I complained about menstrual cramps, my mother told me to get off the couch and exercise, to stop feeling sorry for myself. As an adult, I applied her teachings to my daily life and some years later, it helped me “work with” menopause: eating well, exercising, journaling. These behaviors didn’t alleviate everything menopausal - and sometimes it was rough going - but they helped me acknowledge and honor, a life change. Then, and now, I refuse to let the media and Western societal “teachings” stigmatize a normal event in a woman’s life.
7
When I started menopause I wish I'd been able to find a doctor that actually knew about it. I went to several and the 4th, a female gynecologist of good standing in our community, told me "you know, this is your life now", regarding symptoms I was dealing with. This was in 2010. How does a gynecologist not know about menopause?? Her comment to me sent me into a downward spiral of depression. It took living through the symptoms before I realized she was wrong. It gets better, and eventually I came back to "me".
Menopause should be talked about. And I do believe that part of the reason why it isn't is because of ageism. I've never cared about my age, just haven't. And I love my birthdays. On my 65th birthday, I went to work to find my desk chair in my office replaced with a wheelchair borrowed from the healthcare office next door. And black balloons- lots of them- in my office. I loved it! Because I don't care- 65 is just a number. Or as a champion surfer once said, "I won't let the number of times I've circle the sun determine how I live my life".
We should celebrate age; all ages. If our society did that, menopause would be talked about.
12
I had a hysterectomy/oophorectomy at age 48, and immediately slapped on an estrogen patch. It completely cured my depression and all the suffering that came with endometriosis pain, brutally painful periods, monthly breast swelling, etc.
But, I now have chronic UTIs and vaginal pain that not even a top academic medical center and the best specialists have been able to cure. I am disabled by it. I suspect this will only get worse as I develop more vaginal atrophy. Sex in any form is out of the question, as well.
2
@Sarah
Please consider seeing a pelvic floor physical therapist. Vaginal atrophy and tissue changes can cause some of your symptoms. I do this work and have seen post menopausal patients achieve good results with the right approach. Physicians often don't have a good understanding of how we can help patients with these problems.
I too had a hysterectomy before 50 and am in my mid-sixties. There is very little left of my younger self and I avoid thinking about it, because I see my life as tragic.
I have no libido at all. Even if I did, my vagina is so dry it seems as if it was sewn shut. Every day brings another surprise--more anxiety, the beginning bouts of depression, exhaustion, weak skin, hair and nails, loss of carefree and joyous times, loss of optimism, unrelenting loneliness as friends of 40 years move away for their retirement, fear of injury partaking in beloved sports activities, an inability to access my short term memory which had been a strength in my younger years and the list goes on and on.
The article is completely inadequate and weak.
The worst of it all? All of these changes are a secret for some bizarre reason and therefore as they surprise you, you feel so very alone.
Sarah, I am so sorry.
The western world is structured around a whole collection of unrealistic and unhealthy expectations- meanwhile (in America, anyway) offering very little in the means of emotional, social or financial support (healthcare, anyone?). Women of menopausal age, and I am one, are often overburdened with care of family, a job, and looming financial worries about retirement. Diet, exercise, relaxation, stimulation and social bonds are very hard to maintain and these are the precise things that will make menopause easier to navigate. That being said- the difference from late forties (wicked hot flashes and insomnia) and late fifties (yes, it lasts that long and beyond) is profound, for me. I tell people no, I pursue my own interests as much as I am able and I love myself and my body. Women of our age are innovators and survivors. We are beautiful and deserving of respect and pleasure.
5
As someone who has had a fight on my hands in all phases of my female body, menopause has been about as dreadful as a few other very difficult changes, and I would prefer it be looked at MORE rather than less. The reason is obvious - a lot of stuff happens in this process, and the profession of medicine is almost on almost nne of it..It is easier to understand in terms of kidney stones - I had them, and still get them, and there is nothing in the literature that describes the kidney stone in the female system - all the examples are from men..The difference in experience is for obviouisl reasons, but I did not know that until experieincing this for more than a year and realizing everything described by doctors does not describe kidney stones in women..I can now recognize them for myself..I would be glad to tell you about it..But menopause is the same - the male dominated medical profession has no clue about the aging female body...No clue..It is not for ignoring,r for celebrating -o it is just one more asp ect of having a physical body that could benefit from some professional understanding..
7
Nature is wise. When eggs are past their sell-by date, females go into menopause which means no more pregnancy. And when sperm becomes more likely to create "defective" progeny, males experience ED so they can no longer perform the act which impregnates. No more condoms, birth control pills, tampax, Midol. Free at last, free at last, to express affection without intercourse. Thank you, Nature.
18
Menopause has it's downsides ... but decades of migraines ceased entirely. I'm happy to deal with what problems have accompanied menopause for a life now free of monthly migraines. I only wish it had started in my 40's when I was no longer interested in pregnancy.
7
I have actively worked for women's empowerment for more than 20 years; as the first female leader of my Upstate New York hometown of 25,000; and as a coach and facilitator of women's empowerment courses.
I have sat in many quiet rooms with women telling stories of harassment, abuse...and far worse. I have witnessed first hand the release of great suffering...and the embrace of our intrinsic courage, too.
I too have suffered sexual harassment (I was in politics, I'm just sayin') and also molestation by two family members as a child and teenager.
Here's what I have learned through personal experience and the honor and privilege of working with dozens of women over the years...
Our healing,our empowerment, our view of our bodies is ours and ours alone to claim; no one - no relationship no guru, no gadget, no nip or tuck - will heal or empower us...
...and when we choose to heal ourselves, with support when needed, how we view our bodies and how they actually "feel" changes, often dramatically.
I am not dismissing menopause; I've had all the symptoms...and then some for 10 years.
I am saying, when we are empowered by our bodies, by our gender...by the awesome power that we alone possess to carry, give birth and nurture children...we become warriors, not survivors.
And that powerfully and positively impacts us...emotionally, mentally, spiritually and physically.
We are the ones we've been waiting for.
10
Through out my adult life I have felt guilty the women in my family are fertile, my periods were mostly just an inconvenience and now my menopause is mostly uneventful. Damn I feel liberated after 44 + years of menstruation. It isn't something I talk about EVER because it is just another stage. Having admitted these thoughts however I must confess to thinking about death more...the odds are stacking up against me.
4
I was so happy when I reached this stage of my life and it wasn’t until I was in my 50’s that I could let go of my “nice girl” persona and use that irritability to channel my much stronger and assertive inner bitch. There is a huge amount of freedom in menopause that women should appreciate!
15
"Western culture has conditioned us to see the symptoms surrounding it as the most important thing about this transition. They aren’t." Wow.
The biggest problem with menopause is women are judged, and often quite harshly by other women, by the symptoms they have with it. For those who suffer very real physical, emotional or mental experiences with menopause, it can be a terribly confusing, frightening, depressing and lonely time, with absolutely no-one to talk to about it. Considering the entire process can last for up to a decade, defining that period, I would say the symptoms for them are in fact "the most important thing about this transition".
Just as women experience menstruation very differently, so do they experience perimenopause and menopause very differently. I have had few problems with either, but have two close family members who suffer terribly with their cycles. Both have been treatment for quite awhile, with no success. The effect it has on their lives, for more than fifty per cent of each month, is tantamount to living half a life. Clinics and specialists abound now for these problems. When is the medical community going to start listening to what so many menopausal women are saying, and start looking into it? We are least aren't thrown into insane asylums over it anymore, but that's about as far as the study of it went.
For those who sail through it unscathed, lucky you. Try to be kinder and more open-minded to those who don't.
5
Popular culture has perpetrated this negative view of menopause, but I do not know a single woman who has not looked forward to menopause with anticipation - myself included. It’s one of the freedoms afforded by “old age”.
6
I don't know about the rest of the older women out there but I, for one, looked forward to menopause. No regrets and no pregnancy. Liberation I say!
9
It would appear that the author has not experienced menopause. Those who have experienced it have no interest in its history. We just want to get through it without losing our minds.
12
Sorry, I have no regrets over menopause. Love it. I never had any issues as compared to the discomfort and pain of menstruation. Oh, and my sex drive has unfortunately not lessened either. It is just harder to find a functioning partner!
6
I am happy that your menopause was easy or that you are young enough that menopause is still just an idea. I did experience weight gain, and severe depression among other things. These symptoms were real, not the result of a medical western expectation that I would experience them. It is dangerous to tell women that the negative symptoms of menopause are all in their head.
13
Menopause is one test of true love in a committed relationship.
4
A HISTORIAN might realize that historically speaking given that so many women died in childbirth, most did not reach menopause at about age 50. (I would not have given this an "A" as an undergrad term paper.) The Virgin Mary was 14 when she gave birth to Jesus. (just use as a social fact about girls giving birth well before they turned 20). Thus a woman might be a grandmother at age 30. Women dying before age 50 would not have experienced menopause -- and many did die in childbirth. People attempting to establish themselves-- e.g. MDs (scarcely more than "quacks" for many centuries) might well give names to almost anything and society went along with it. Witches were REAL. (I expect the editors at The Times either to title articles correctly. This one better called "Viewing Menopause through Various Historical (Sociological, Anthropological) Lenses." ) The author does not seem to realize that hormonal therapy is less common today than before -- a rise in heart disease became associated with it in the 90's. I haven't kept up -- but yes some women have very bad symptoms which don't go away.. Rather like PMS which is also a dreadful condition for certain women to experience monthly for yearsl
5
Just as the author begins to explore a strengths-based perspective on menopause, the article is abruptly cut off with a weak cheer. The last three paragraphs could be part of an introduction to a next installment. The oppressive male-dominated medical model of yore is stale and boring, so let’s keep researching, rewriting and recreating rather than inflicting ourselves with the old sexist paradigm. For those who want to go deeper - naturally, scientifically and energetically - check out the work of both Susun Weed and Christiane Northrup.
3
I don't really remember menopause.....Didn't make much difference to me, physically or mentally. I can't be the only woman who experienced it that way.
9
Please, I willed it away. The very best loss that has ever happened to me. Now not being held hostage by hormones. I sang through the sweats. Cannabis is a real life saver through the process!
87
@Ms M.
"And the larger point is that when it comes to menopause, Western culture has conditioned us to see the symptoms surrounding it."
Big Pharma and Big Medicine made millions off hormone treatments for menopause only to discover that it increased the chance of breast cancer.
17
Menopause is physical, emotional and psychological, just one of the staggeringly incredible bodily changes women go through during their human lives on earth. To those of us who've crossed the Styx of menopause after bearing the next generation of people, congrats and laurels to us, and and welcome to feelings of freedom and liberty (no matter where we live)!
8
I have been experiencing menopause for some time now. I get the hot flashes and night sweats but I would rather have both than have the horrible, painful and heavy menstrual periods that I used to experience every month.
7
I hated my monthly "visitor." I had countless ruined pieces of clothing and miserable vacations (it always seemed to pay a visit when I was traveling). At 52 it had shown no signs of slowing down, so I had an endometrial ablation. That slowed it down but didn't stop it. I finally reached menopause at 55, fortunately with little more than hot flashes and night sweats. As I approach 60, I relish my freedom. Every woman's experience is different, but I'm happier now than when I was 40.
11
What if our hair didn't fall out? What if we didn't have night sweats requiring us to put on 3 different nightgowns in one night? What if our metabolism didn't s-l-o-w down?
5
I appreciate this article and especially appreciate the comments from women sharing their experiences. I am approaching 40, and gave birth to my last child a few months ago. Tho I suspect I have a few more years before undergoing “the change”, it struck me recently how it will be the next major milestone for my body.
I’ve been reading and hearing dire stories about the experience, but I am starting to wonder if it’s similar to the narrative surrounding pregnancy, childbirth, and post partum period. It seems there are article after article “educating” people able how horrible all those experiences can be—so much so I know women somewhat scared to go through them. In an effort to make sure people are prepared with what could happen, we are creating a narrative that makes those experiences sound terrible. Meanwhile, I loved being pregnant, and found the births empowering and the recovery not bad. Yes, my body is changed, but it’s not that bad, and I’m surprised by how little it bothers me (I guess I was more vain before kids!)
it’ helpful to hear a different perspective and to read the comments of women who found menopause a non-event or even a good thing. Like pregnancy and childbirth, I’m sure the experience is different for everyone, and who knows how I will experience when the time comes. But hopefully I can view from the lens of “this isn’t the end of the world” which is the message I’ve been receiving from others.
8
While there is a wide variety of reactions to this column, it was enlightening to me and put a brighter light on this time in my life.
Every age has its physical maladies, aging only amplifies this. I'm was happy to hear my role clarified so beautifully.
3
For me, the best thing my gynecologist did was to put me on a low-dose birth control pill (after being off oral contraceptives for years) when my normal like clockwork cycle skipped a couple of months. Perimenopause, but I also think work stress at the time contributed.
“You need to have a period,” she said.
So she prescribed a low-dose BCP, and I stayed on it for five plus years. No issues, but when I was approaching 50 and went for my annual exam, I asked my gynecologist “how will I know if I’m in menopause?”
She said “stop taking the birth control pill and if you go one calendar year without having a period, you will know.”
So I did. I stopped the BCP and never had another period... not even spotting. I consider myself fortunate that the only side effect I’ve experienced in the 10 years since has been midsection weight gain, but I think with diet and exercise I can reduce it.
I have since changed gynecologists and at the first visit with my new one she applauded the way I “rode out” perimenopause by using BCPs and said that is exactly how she plans to manage it for herself when that time arrives.
@Lisa
Glad that worked for you if you’re happy with it. BCP makes me sick as a dog...I had to take them for a couple of months to treat a problem and you couldn’t pay me to do it again.
1
I very much identify with the sentiment in this article. I am a 56 year old woman, and as I have gone through menopause, my focus has been to allow my body to go through whatever changes it brings without being influenced by so much negative opinion on the subject, especially from the medical community. The truth is that as women, the era of our self-definition through the lens of how we are of value to men is quickly evaporating, and we have only to let it go ourselves in order to experience even more freedom and fulfillment at all stages of life. I cannot speak to others' experiences of symptoms nor do I dismiss them, but the mind/body connection is undeniable. I think that the more we embrace natural changes and love ourselves, the easier life is. Thank you for this article!
4
Beautifully written historical account. I love the authors illumination of how medical knowledge evolves—how crude and naively barbaric our comparative past seems.
But that’s life..... and so are the many aches and pains with living to an age that we are evolutionarily not prepared to reach.
1
I was finally in the best shape of my life physically, mentally and spiritually at the age of 56 when I started having symptoms of approaching menopause. I had had a child at 42 and still felt vibrant and energetic. Pretty immediately, brain fog hit me so hard that it was difficult to function, especially at my demanding job. While many women suffer from this, mine was compounded by the fact that I have ADD. The various medications that had helped me for years no longer worked, even when I went on HRT for awhile. I hadn’t counted on this being an issue! I hadn’t dreaded menopause, and I thought I’d float through it. It made me wonder if menopause symptoms are why over the years I’ve watched so many accomplished women retire early. It always puzzled me why they would leave a successful career they always loved when they still seemed to have so much to give. I know I would have retired if I could have because I felt scared that I could no longer perform up to my best. But thankfully, I made it through. I’m 61 now, and still struggle somewhat to be as focused as before. The aging process sped up considerably after menopause. But I have adjusted!
6
Dread?! I've been looking forward to menopause since puberty. I'm in my early 40s and keep asking my doctor if it could be happening soon. She keeps telling me I am too young. I don't know why she has to rain on my parade like that.
I can't wait! Turn this thing off, I have no desire to procreate.
9
@Kate I loved "procreating" (at ages 39 and 42) but menopause has been lovely. Warning, though, it ain't lovely for everyone.
3
@Kate, I'll suggest considering other factors. For example, if you have a career, not everyone views a post-menopausal woman to be a preferred employee ... or, even employable at all.
3
@Kate, I definitely understand the inconvenience and pain associated with menstruation. Been there.
However, I'll suggest considering other factors. For example, know that not everyone views a post-menopausal woman to be a preferred employee ... or, even employable at all.
Every woman has a different experience, but the only indication of menopause I had was the cessation of menses. I wonder if there is a genetic component?
I don't know about the medical aspects of menopause, but I do agree that women past reproductive age deserve respect and a place at the table. That is my takeaway from the essay.
7
I guess I'm lucky, because I didn't really have any of the symptoms that many do. I just accepted it as my grandmothers and my mother did: It is what it is. It's just a part of life and not something to fret or stress about. But in my culture, women who have moved on from child bearing are respected and valued as elders, so maybe that had something to do with what was a fairly easy transition for me.
In my particular case, it was very freeing and has redirected my focus to the 1,001 other things I want to do. I no longer have to race to the drugstore to buy products after starting in the middle of my work day or worry about birth control and pregnancy.
Those here labeling this article as "misogynistic" missed the point. What's misogynistic is buying into male-dominated Victorian quackery that menopausal women are somehow defective and that there's something to fix. There's nothing to "fix." It is what it is.
7
@BothSides
If you suffer severe symptoms, this article comes across as incredibly misogynistic.
There's a strong suggestion that society is putting the misery in our heads and we silly females are falling for it. That's utter nonsense. I wish our male-dominated society would instruct our medical community to fix this problem that absolutely needs fixing. For once, I'd thank our male-dominated society for doing something useful for women.
While I understand that hormone replacement therapy carries risk, it is effective, and extremely hard to get. Even female doctors have zero sympathy. My own doctor described her experience as "getting a little warm once in a while" and wouldn't take me seriously. Let me assure you, for some of us the hot flashes and sweats, intense and at a rate of 20 per day, many at night disrupting sleep, is nothing to pooh-pooh. This writer is in full blown pooh-pooh mode. It's just shameful.
I have friends who moan and groan about hot flashes and other symptoms. While I have had a few hot flashes (I'm 64 now), that is the extent of my "symptoms." Before I went through menopause, I looked forward to it as not having to deal with periods anymore - and that is indeed how I have experienced. No downside!
7
I don't know how old Susan Mattern, I suspect she is premenopausal. With her focus on historical medicine and not clinical medicine she misses some important points. It's a lot more than not having to bleed once a month.
To mention a few negatives associated with the loss of systemic estrogen/testosterone :
Osteoporosis and lethal hip fractures
Osteoporosis and spinal compression and chronic pain
Urinary incontinence
Increased breast cancer incidence (NIH 2013,2015 WHI studies)
Lichen Sclerosis et atrophicus
Vulvodynia
Sleep disturbance - lack of rim sleep leading to depression
Rapid thinning of the skin and vaginal epithelium
9
@Samuel Tyuluman You did notice that she IS an historian. Right? And not an MD. Right? Many a commenter here is angry because Mattern did not write about the topics THEY want to know about.
I love menopause! So what if I get hot flashes or have trouble sleeping. I no longer care about dating or a sex life. Full disclosure I have terrible taste in men. Now I couldn't care less about attracting men. I am enjoying my independent life and freedom to use my time and money exactly as I please each and every day.
17
Menopause was fine - went quick, with no symptoms at all. Post-menopause, on the other hand, is horrible. Suddenly my body became old. I have always been athletic, but now my muscle mass is declining, and I am far more prone to injuries. My skin is now dry and bad, I feel cranky, and worst of all, I have lost touch with my romantic side, which isn't just about sex, but about a whole emotional side of myself. Gone, just gone. I know a lot of this is connected to simple aging, but it was so sudden, like a switch was flipped. I have heard similar things from many of my female friends in my age group. I wish there was more research on the trajectories of post-menopausal women.
215
@techie I have been in better shape than at any time since my 20's (when I was a jogger) via weight lifting/aerobics. Your body will still respond, I promise.
30
@RMS
You can’t promise that. Every body is different and responds differently to workouts. Speaking from experience of decades of diligently doing weights and aerobics and it still happened.
22
@RMS Perhaps in the time just ariund or after menopause this can be true. But menopause for most ushers in the beginning of old age, and as much as you watch diet and engage in plenty of exercise there are unpleasant and unattractive physical symptoms of aging that nothing short of surgery can counteract. Estrogen and progesterone do more than prompt ovulation, they also keeps the skin glowing, hair thick, bones and muscles strong and toned. The farther away you are from the time the "tap" is turned off, the more obvious those aging effects are. It would be less an issue were our society not so youth-obsessed.
42
Dairy consumption—and of animal products in general—is one of the big reasons for the most unpleasant symptoms of menopause.
http://jarvishealth.co.nz/health-tips/osteoporosis-the-bones-of-contention/
Consider this: there is no Japanese word for "hot flashes." Dairy consumption is largely a Western phenomenon, and dairy is entirely an unnecessary food group.
https://www.veganlifestylecoach.com/menopause
1
@Fallopia Tuba I'm a long-time vegan (for ethical reasons) and I had a terrible menopause. Veganism (plant-based eating) is a wonderful lifestyle that I value, but it's not a panacea and we shouldn't market it as such.
8
@Lori In my comment I don't refer to veganism as a panacea; I'm abundantly aware that humans all metabolize food differently, and also that veganism is more than a diet.
However, I mentioned in my original comment that there is no human need to consume the lactations of another mammal, and I stand by that remark.
Everyone is different and many women seem to experience very little disruption in their lives from menopause. Mine was horrible. I had intense hot flashes every 20 minutes, 24 hours a day. After 17 years, I still have a good 30 per day. For those who find menopause liberating, you likely did not go through anything like this.
8
There is nothing to dread about the cessation of menstrual cramps, no more blood clots approaching hail sized balls for days in a row, or enduring premenstrual mood swings, now codified in the DSM-V as a mental disorder named "PMDD." On the other hand, losing sexual desire 100% for anyone, including your partner; suddenly having phobic reactions to driving on freeways; requiring icy cold rooms to sleep (and still never sleeping normally again); being required to take serious medications for bone loss, hormone replacement therapy notwithstanding; and in general, experiencing a clear reduction in excitement over life - this all is a high price to pay. In the end, I respect myself for still getting out of bed and facing the day, not the process that made me love life a lot less.
3
Who dreads menopause?
Not the smart, pragmatic women in my family.
6
Maybe there were no ancient mentions to menopause because life expectancy left no room for menopause to happen.
2
@Guadalupe Ruiz Fajardo This is addressed in the article and, no, is not true.
1
@Guadalupe Ruiz Fajardo
No, there were older women, just somewhat fewer of them. If you survived multiple childbirths you had a decent chance of a long life. The low life expectancy is an average
1
I was happy to stop having periods..Now 25 years later, really happy to have gone thru the change...
2
Menopause is NOT the end of female fertility. Fertility for women ends a long time BEFORE menopause--perhaps ten, twelve or even fifteen years. Because I believed the myth that menopause is when you stop being fertile, I missed the opportunity to become a parent. Please stop spreading this lie.
7
So glad to get it over and done with!
3
In traditional Chinese medicine, the positive perspective is that women get to keep their blood. For those women who are “blood deficient”, they either have no cycle or very little flow, this can allow them to overcome their deficiencies and live healthier lives.
5
The phrase is actually, " has gotten a bad rap". That being said, if you don't read all of the negatives about menopause, keep your weight down, search out a good "personal lubricant", exercise and of course, dress in layers, you might breeze right through it!
5
Like some of the commenters here, I was glad for the change. I am surrounded by 20-somethings in my work, and I would not trade places with them. That said, the pervasive ageism in our culture and the continual emphasis on youth and cosmetic surgery to retain that youth are still forces that can help negate the pride and joy of becoming older, with all of its imperfections. Attitudes are slowly changing, but we have a long way to go.
10
Many years ago, I worked with the media on behalf of a client to educate young women about menstruation. I called it “the last taboo subject in America.” Maybe a bit of hyperbole, but the subject was definitely NOT something discussed in public. Our society has long been embarrassed and fearful of this natural process. Menarche and menopause are two ends of the spectrum. It is important to talk about this entire subject openly and honestly - and to not only acknowledge and celebrate the cycle that gives life to us all, but to actively provide women with the medical information and treatments they require!
7
I may have been fortunate but I went through about two years of multiple one minute hot flashes a day and then came out to the blissful other side. For the first time since I was fourteen, there is zero discomfort associated with being a woman. Why were we designed to go through decades of discomfort to have a handful of children? Once a month? Isn't that a bit much?
3
I love menopause! I had a total hysterectomy when I was 43 and it was one of the happiest days of my life. I'll never forget walking through an aisle of tampons and pads in the supermarket and realizing I would never have to use them again! No cramps, no mess. I'm sharper since losing estrogen and the weight gain I developed turned out to be from hypothyroidism, not lack of estrogen (estrogen in fact makes you gain weight). But the best part--I no longer have any sexual interest in men, and therefore have removed that troublesome area of my life. Those estrogen replacement therapies are mostly for women who feel a need to continue to please husbands.
14
Dreading and demonizing menopause is just another tired trope meant to diminish and devalue women as we age. Sadly, it’s often our own sisters (i.e., other women) who speak the loudest about the so-called tragedy losing their fertility and thus (in their warped minds) their desirability and vitality. Frankly, I’m sick and tired of it so thank you for this informative article.
8
Can we not ever take the middle ground and, while we’re at it, not point the finger? I had maybe two lukewarm flashes and no other symptoms at menopause. One month at 51, my period never came and that was that. No heavy bleeding and clots or on/off cycles. On the other hand, I had a tedious and at times unpleasant perimenopause for close to a decade. My friends with bad menopause issues range from a functional alcoholic to an informed, avid exerciser and healthy eater. Gay and straight. Married, single and with/without kids. No doubt not eating junk and refined carbs is helpful (as it is for every other health concern), but just like we all know a guy who smoked for 75 years and never got cancer, who can say why some women have worse symptoms?
13
Melancholia is a mere ghost from the past? Yeah, depression is hardly an issue we talk about.
The good author has a point about how menopause is a modern invention. The majority of diseases are socially constructed in some way or another. And she doesn’t go so far as to discount the existence of hot flashes etc (which my wife has been “enjoying” for eight blessed years).
The simplest explanation for the lack of a deep historical record for menopause in the medical past is because women have only recently been noticed as historical subjects worthy of attention. Most menopausal women stoically weathered the trials life brought their bodies and did not spend a great deal of time complaining about it to men. That they often lived in separate spheres and controlled childbirth away from prying male concern was upset in the late 19th century by the professionalization of medicine. So much of modern medicine is driven by what men think is necessary is probably the greatest factor behind western views of menopause. She might want to consider most women don’t have a problem with it at all.
11
This is a pointless article, unhelpful and completely lack of insight. Modern Medicine often is about treating symptoms the disease presents not philosophically identifying the problems as real or unreal.
Menopause is a label given for the convenience of identifying a collection of symptoms a woman might experience around age 50.
I remember my mother suffered tremendous insomnia and night sweat as well as depression when menopause kicked in, she was beyond miserable and the doctors weren’t that helpful. And I have gone through similar experiences myself decades later. Like pregnancy and childbirth the discomfort and pain are real, itself is not a medical condition.
I think of menopause period as a gateway to old age, it’s extremely difficult physically and especially mentally. And most of all a very lonely journey every woman has to endure while watching and feeling one’s body giving up and letting go of many of it’s known fonctions. I remember contemplating the left over tampons realizing The finality of never having another period in my life and was overcome by despair.
So yes it’s very real with or without a name, and like birth and death, no woman is immune to it. Whatever the outside perception and characterization, the suffering is inward and personal.
15
@Ruth Hard to imagine being "overcome by despair" over not having another period!
@Ruth “Unhelpful”? The author is an historian, not an obgyn with a practice. She’s recounted the trajectory of female reproductive history, over the arc of time. I am sure she knows that her findings and writings are not the final word on any of it.
@RMS
Then you don’t live life beyond the surface. Maybe reading some good books can help!
Yes, it's all very interesting...but doesn't negate in the slightest all the very real physical maladies associated with menopause for a great many women. Certainly not all, but many at some point or another.
Simply because these weren't noticed (due to more pressing issues?) or were less important because of different expectations around sexuality at an older age doesn't mean they aren't issues NOW for women NOW.
Menopause is not just "mind over matter" and in this context sounds like going back to the days of women just being called hysterical - that is not progress by any definition.
17
I experienced about five years of odd, sometimes alarming peri-menopausal symptoms, but when I ditched my stressful job, changed my diet to almost no sugar/meat and took up biking about 60–80 miles a week, I passed through "the change" with no debilitating symptoms at all. I don't know what a hot flash feels like, and though I gained some weight, I lost it again, despite all the articles I'd read that warned me it was "impossible" to lose weight after menopause.
I am completely relieved to be beyond the cycles of fertility and the insane thinking that accompanies it: that a woman must have a sexual partner and seek sex as she would seek food or she's somehow unnatural and monstrous. It's a hormone-driven "need"—and when that chemical engine disappears, that disappearance allows a calmer, more enlightened mind, and clearer perception of . . . well, everything.
13
I recently went through menopause but luckily escaped all the symptoms. Like another commenter here, it was a non-event. I eat a whole-food-plant-based diet (aka vegan diet) and stay away from junk food. My friends who also eat this way have told me they had the same experience. In the cultures you mentioned where menopause is barely noticed, I imagine they also aren’t eating the SAD diet (Standard American Diet) either. Time for some studies on this link?
6
@Vegan hiker
Hmmm. I had never linked diet to my easy menopause, but I had in fact been a vegetarian (never a vegan) for almost 20 years when I happily succumbed to menopause. I wouldn't call it a non-event, it was a cause for celebration. But perhaps you are on to something by linking this to diet.
But perhaps not. Because if that is the case, diet (in my case) would also have to be linked to the two decades prior. And I doubt you intend that, as it would mean that vegetarianism could be causally related to all the painful symptoms I had before menopause.
If diet has a causal effect, one cannot cherrypick the effects experienced.
2
@Vegan hiker I've been on a whole foods, plant based diet for over ten years and vegetarian before that. I had a terrible menopause. I agree eating plant-based can help with many health issues, but it's not a panacea and we shouldn't market it as such. I'm mostly vegan for the animals and when people expect to be cured from going vegan and aren't, they tend to go back to eating how they did before. Or G-d forbid, going Keto or Paleo.
6
Is it a picnic? It certainly doesn't feel like one, nor something to celebrate. You can bet if men went through this phase, ways to alleviate symptoms would be heavily researched and subsidized.
8
My thoughts exactly.... while I would never desire to go back to the years of 8-10 day menstruation cycles where a combination of tampons AND pads did an inadequate job of stanching my excessive flow, I find the author’s call-to-action ludicrous, as if embracing a 10-year period of self-combusting hot flashes and intermittent sleep cycles signals some kind of modern approach to this aptly-titled ‘women’s hell.’ Precisely because menopause affects women only, there is no effective treatment, leaving us to cobble together a combination of natural remedies and diet choices, that in my case were ineffective, or choose a hormone treatment that can ameliorate breast cancer, which was my mother’s choice.
1
I had a hysterectomy at age 50, and somehow even with that sudden commencement of menopause, I never had a single negative symptom. Instead, I was finally free of lifelong monthly abdominal pain at the onset of each period that was so severe it made me vomit. I'm thankful for my children but was so very happy when menstruation was done forever.
6
I don't pay much attention to pop culture, so I'm unsure I was affected much by its images of menopause. But I am writing to say that for some of us--or at least for me--menopause was wondrous. Free at last!
I speak as someone who lost one week a month from age 12 to sheer misery. When I was in my thirties, one doctor after another advised me to have the reproductive apparatus yanked, but I didn't trust doctors and no woman in my family had ever had a hysterectomy, so I held on. Thankfully, I did what a lot of childless women do: I went through menopause in my early forties.
I cannot overstate my gratitude. After decades of ridiculously heavy periods, very painful cramps, and skin breakouts, God or Good Fortune gave me a break. And it was so easy. I know that I had one hot flash. My main concern, frankly, was that I had company at the time and did not want the visiting friends to notice. I'm still unsure about the second incident, which was a maybe-a-hot-flash.
Otherwise, all was terrific, and although the experience did not make up for three decades of once-a-month misery, I was so grateful to have reached that time of my life.
I make no claims that this is a common experience. But it was mine, and if anyone ever deserved that menopause be experienced as a relief, I am that person. My life became far more enjoyable to me and remains so.
3
I agree with you. Menstruation was a horrible burden of monthly hemorrhages, and I begged my doctor for a hysterectomy, which she performed for me at 43. What a glorious solution, until I slammed into menopause and its symptoms without end, 10-years of hot flashes so searing I feel I am self-combusting like Red Woman Melisandre. So I fondly remember that time between hysterectomy and menopause as a wonderful respite, and wish I’d had the surgery much sooner as a non-menstruating, non-menopausal woman was Nirvana indeed!
1
@NormaMcL. I have a daughter who gets severe cramps monthly, now alleviated somewhat by BCP. When she was younger her doc at the time prescribed hydrocodone! Why hasn't modern medicine figured out the right way to reduce menstrual pain? Giving women hysterectomies may be right sometimes, but not for a teen or woman in her twenties. Add migraines to the mix, for my daughter at least, and at least 3 if not 6 days each month are down the drain, plus the pa, hideous pain. There has to be a better way!
1
While I agree we shouldn't consider menopause a pathology, and while I'm grateful to not have to experience monthly bleeding anymore, menopause has been very hard on me.
First there were the years of excessive bleeding, then the hot flashes (not really flashes, as they lasted most of the day), depression, anxiety, lack of sleep, and fatigued. Now that I'm through the other side, there is the lack of sex drive and the painful intercourse from atrophy. And constantly being warmer than most the people around me. I have side effects from estrogen, even topical and intra-vaginal, so I haven't found an option yet that has helped. Where I used to enjoy sex, it's now painful and causes UTIs. I've tried to find a gyno specializing in menopause to no avail.
So yeah, please don't tell me how we're supposed to embrace this. There needs to be a lot more research on how to help women feel better and do better in menopause, not the the opposite.
9
Years ago I read about the peculiar way in which menopause is thought of in our current, Western culture. The book (I’ve long forgotten its title), shared the wisdom that, in cultures not privy to our menopausal fears, the women did not dread menopause. They celebrated the freedom it gave them, and did not suffer from the symptoms we constantly read and hear about. These women were grateful, no longer fearful of getting pregnant, were given a chance to focus on other priorities, and it allowed time to lead and serve others in a new way.
I stepped into my 50s with this knowledge as a guiding light. I’m fortunate to be able to manage my menopausal life without help from my physician. I know some women are not so lucky. I don’t dismiss what other women choose to do to manage their symptoms. It’s great to have options!
If you’ve not yet read “Flash Count Diary” by Darcey Steinke, I highly recommend it. It is not the book I referenced above, but it shares similar insights, and made me feel a bit like a warrior with my ability to contain a fire, if you will, as I meander through my menopausal years.
5
When I started menopause I immediate started HRT and continued on it for 10 years. I never had any of the classic symptoms of menopause, and my life continued as before. I had regular checkups and mammograms and thrived during my 50s and early 60s. I stopped HRT a couple of years ago. Too many women allow themselves to suffer for no reason. For some, there are good reasons to not start HRT, but the majority could have symptoms alleviated if they chose to.
8
@Ms. Pea
Too many women have cancer in their genetic background, and hormone replacement therapy is the worst thing they can do to themselves.
I had an older neighbor who was unwilling to put up with hot flashes. This fit with her character: Everything had to be just-so for her. Unfortunately, doctors back then were pushing HRT very hard, despite the fact that research existed that it could cause cancer in genetically vulnerable populations (which seems to be all of us these days). My neighbor's mother died of breast cancer when she was 40, but given my neighbor's intolerance for anything bothersome, she was drawn to HRT. Within a couple of years, she too had breast cancer. And no, I will never believe this was coincidence.
I would never consider HRT, and in this day and age, I am amazed that anyone would recommend it.
4
@NormaMcL--In my comment I wrote, "For some, there are good reasons to not start HRT,..." I do not disagree with you. I also know women who developed cancer while on HRT. But, I did not let their experience influence my choice. I know my family medical history, and my doctor and I discussed this possibility and the risks and benefits. In the end, I made the choice I felt right for me, as did you.
4
I take from this another important point -- every symptom you have as you age is not due to menopause. There are actually many of us women who experience absolutely no negative symptoms from menopause. It gets rather tiring seeing all these articles and marketing materials making it sound like the world is collapsing when you enter menopause when in reality, many of us feel no different physically or mentally.
11
I don't know anyone, who after 40 years of periods, is not glad that they are gone.
38
This author clearly meant well and I applaud her for acknowledging that women past menopause are still valuable. Yes--has she gone through menopause? If so, she surely understands that both in societal and personal terms, it is a very difficult transition, with real physical impacts. As others have indicated here, the lack of a historical record is likely more due to a lack of regard for, or understanding of, women, than a lack of the severe physical side effects of menopause in many. And just as she slights the many challenges of menopause, she gives short shrift to the advantages enjoyed in non-Western cultures--leadership opportunities for women of knowledge, often denied in the West, as well as the opportunity for second careers in the West. Great intention; reframe please! :)
10
@Janet Hess: Susan Mattern got her PhD in 1995 [https://history.uga.edu/directory/people/susan-mattern], so would you say she's about 56? I found this article dismissive of women. It's hard to believe that a "Distinguished Research Professor" of history thinks [almost] 50% of the world's population share the same experiences about any topic at all.
2
@Janet Hess "It is a very difficult transition" for some women. For many of us, nothing could be further from the truth.
I feel lucky to have not suffered from menstrual pain until near the end of the cycle - the last 5 years of my 40 years of monthly cycles. I've always used a lot of herbs for teas and in cooking and read up on them and used tincures with chasteberry and motherwort. I had only a couple hot flashes, but found that when my diet was lacking in nutrition or I let myself become dehydrated or sleep deprived, that is when the flash would start.
2
I still giggle when I recall my 6th-grade (girls') "health" teacher, who was very nice but who could have been the model for the original Barbie, teaching us that we could remember the word "menopause" by thinking, "Pause, men." Even then the thinking there struck me as a little odd.
Life is one long chain of "phases," most of which, like menopause, simply come with the territory (this goes for death, too). Some phases are trickier than others, and some come with unexpected complications. But I never see any need to resent them (again, including death, unless it's the loss of a young person, or due to things like violence, war, neglect, etc.). That seems like a waste that, perhaps ironically, robs us of our ability to really experience "life." We are what we are, with all the stuff that comes from that, and we can learn from every step.
I've had a few minor "symptoms" of menopause, and I know other women who have had worse experiences with it. So I don't believe at all that it's "all in our heads," but I don't believe it's by any means a disaster or a burden that's somehow unfair.
Unless, of course, anyone else had the same health-class teacher and actually took her advice seriously. :)
2
I absolutely blossomed after menopause, as a person, as an artist, as a woman. "The cycle" with its monthly miseries was a form of tyranny. My menopause took a couple of years to complete, and I had my share of hot flashes, though nothing terrible. And I do realize that some other women have much less pleasant experiences. But for me, when it was all over at age 50 and I could finally throw away the Kotex and Midol after four decades, it was a glorious feeling indeed to be free at last.
35
Joining the growing list of women weighing in here. I’ve always maintained that if this happened to men in the middle of their lives, the scientific community would’ve long ago developed safe treatment for the symptoms. Can you imagine your average male CEO of a huge corporation putting up with this?
I’m nearly 50 and have had serious perimenopausal symptoms since I was 33. Doctors didn’t take me seriously until I was 45 and I was falling asleep in my car on the drive home because the symptoms interfered so much with my sleep. All kinds of things have changed for us modern women that likely have affected our menopause.
5
I guess I was lucky in that I never experienced a single problem when I went through menopause. Best of all was the end of menstrual cramps.
Sure, most of us older women benefit from small doses of hormones, and a high quality lube to keep our sex drives intact, but at 70, my husband and I still enjoy getting it on at least a couple of times a week. I'm still fit and feisty and there is no good reason why other women can't experience the benefits of being post menopausal.
Menopause should be celebrated. No more messy. menstruation, no more need for birth control, and no more painful cramps.
13
There is absolutely nothing to celebrate about menopause. The symptoms along with the general aging process range from simply annoying to humiliating and the majority of treatments that are effective may cause one cancer or another. Not my idea of fun.
11
Thank you for your fascinating article. Although I experienced a decade of hot flashes, I never resented menopause. It's another stage of life, and I'm fortunate to be here to experience it, in the scheme of things. I found your research about older women helping younger women interesting. Since I became a mother years ago, I've been happy at the prospect of becoming a grandmother and supporting my daughters while they're mothers. I also teach middle school students. So as an older woman, I find great joy in the idea of carrying on the ageless tradition of helping younger families.
8
This article seems to need more data before suggesting that menopausal experiences are cultural. For instance, what about the fact that exercise reduces flow? How does it affect menopause? Is that 'cultural,' or only to the degree that western culture since the eighteenth century has been less physically active in some classes?
As for me, menopause happened without me noticing not because I didn't have symptoms but because I thought I was steaming because work was such a misery at the time. Suited my mood, rather than made it ; )
Women can be powerful before, during and after menopause. Without the monthly interruption, moreso.
4
The 17th and 18th Centuries are rife with men theorizing on women and women's reproduction (or lack there of)- an almost obsessive focus on women's role as child bearer. This is also about the time that women's autonomy and self sufficiency was labeled as "witchcraft," a phenomenon which, as we know, had its roots in economic insecurity, aided and abetted by an evangelical revival.
Anecdotally speaking as a 60 year old woman, my hot flashes, etc, are/were the worst when I eat sweets made of refined or processed sugars, drink alcohol (which turns to sugar in the bloodstream) and eat processed/refined flour products. Add to this a sedentary work life. Most of these are modern inventions.....
9
@Harpla Yes, I noticed the same link between refined carbs and symptoms. Not 'cultural' but dietary.
All my life I heard the horror stories. My mother was impossible to live with and her menopause was alleged to have lasted over 10 years. All my friends shared their horror stories. At 52 when my period stopped, I panicked because I thought I was pregnant. Then in 6 months I had one more, then afterwards nothing. I never had a symptom of any sort. I was thrilled to never buy tampons again. I felt that my brain cleared and I became more rational and less emotional. No more PMS - ever. The most surprising part is that I am a semi-hypochondriac, so the fact that...nothing happened is still surprising to me. If I could have gone through the same experience at 20, I would have been thrilled.
13
I am welcoming menopause when it comes. For me it will mean the end of hormone related migraines that have disrupted my life for so many years. My mother also had migraines which went away after menopause. For me, it will mean I can enjoy life without the annoying fluctuations that interfere with my running routine, and life plans. More irritable, sweat and hot flashes? Hahaha. Are you kidding?
8
In my world, you sweat, you go thru some temporary discomfort and every male Dr. in the world wants to medicate you.
Seems to me that all those hormones and anxiety drugs were developed to keep us quiet and submissive.The symptoms pass and with it comes new freedoms and real insights.
Menopause gets blamed for the fact that as we women get older, we get tired of being told how to behave.
23
@Margot LeRoy
Nobody makes anyone take hormones, but they do prevent painful, vaginal dryness, lack of libido, and urinary incontinence. It should be your choice to take them, or not. I've been using small doses of HRT for 20 years and I'm willing to take any small risks associated with them. It's a choice and all women should decide whether or not they want to take them.
7
@sohy Your call and your choice......I just find the prescription pad gets pulled out a whole lot faster than a decent conversation about why we must solve a normal transition.......I appreciate the physical issues and respect your choices...Respect mine.....Estrogen gave me problems in an earlier phase of my life.
I haven't read all of the comments but exercise seems to lessen the symptoms of menopause.
In my personal case, I have nearly no symptoms of menopause and have been an avid runner for 30+ years.
http://www.261fearless.org/blog/l/running-and-the-menopause/
6
This article is written from a historical perspective, and doesn't reflect life in 2019.
More time and energy to devote to grandchildren?
I don't have children. I never wanted them.
So, no, my "wisdom" isn't being passed down to grandchildren.
I see the article as yet another attempt, in endless attempts, to convince women that menopause is simply a kind of "rebirth," instead of what it is: The continuation of the aging process.
Yes, you are one day closer to death!
That is the truth, and the reality.
No need for sugar coating.
25
@Kathleen Wow. I didn’t see the attempt to convince anyone of a glorious ‘rebirth’ at the end of conventional reproduction. But there is the question - for an historian, which is what the author is - “so what did they do next?” And she goes after that.
@Berkeley Bee
I never used the word, "glorious," I simply said rebirth.
Of course that is what the writer is implying by stating that menopause gives women "energy," and that physical symptoms, may really be tied to cultural outlook.
How many menopausal women, do you know, who have more energy now, than at age 22?
Hot flashes, thinning hair and skin, high cholesterol, and UTIs are REAL symptoms. They are void of culture.
What have women always done next?
They continue forward.
1
Well, aging men are closer to death every day, too, only they don't have the hot flashes to warn them.
Maybe if men had hot flashes, the ones who behave like narcissistic youngsters would stop doing so.
OK first off the author is a professor of history not a medical researcher or professor of biology and it really shows. Second, even if menopause symptoms aren't mentioned in traditional texts, it doesn't mean they don't exist, nor do people thinking that they don't exist mean that it's a made up thing in other people. Now with that said, women should be able to celebrate postreproductive years happily, and there are definitely some social tropes that could be lost around menopause, but to deny women the feelings they have due to their biology is caustic.
40
This article fails to mention the serious health risks of menopause. When the female body stops producing estrogen, bone loss starts and muscle mass declines which increases the incidence of falls, hip replacement and balance issues. The risk of heart disease and high cholesterol shoot up. To say nothing of collagen loss which results in thinning and wrinkling of skin and sagging breasts. Meanwhile, memory loss increases along with insomnia and fatigue. What a party!
33
Thanks you! I thought I was unusual for finding menopause great! I am a physician and had expected significant symptoms. Never happened. I had a rare hot flash at night for a month. My own physician seemed surprised that I felt no need for hormones. It was a non- event, and so much nicer without periods. 10 years later I’ve gained 10 pounds after previously being the same weight for decades, but other than that I highly recommend it! I realize others have a very different experience, but you might not have to dread it.
13
@SB
I never dreaded it. I never had PMS so I figured I was somehow exempt from the effects of hormonal swings. When it turned out that I was, as my endocrinologist explained, "on the extreme end of the spectrum" regarding menopausal symptoms, I was utterly dismayed at how little the medical community cared. It was a lot like the tone of this article--"it's a normal part of life and mostly in my head anyway."
What I dread now is going to any doctor for anything. After a lifetime of good health and little need of our medical establishment, when I did need help I got a blank stare. I didn't have an "approved" malady, therefore I should just suck it up. It took me a long time to find the endocrinologist that would help me--the Women's Health Study had just come out and doctors everywhere were scared to death to prescribe HRT.
My advice to you: don't give your patients the blank stare just because you had few symptoms. Refer them to a sympathetic endocrinologist.
Perimenopause is the pits. Menopause, however -- the time after the symptoms go away -- is glorious. Freed from hormone-driven emotions, we are strong and logical at work, calm and sympathetic in our personal relationships, and even and just in our public lives. Menopause is freedom.
35
@Colleen
That is a myth. Menopause commences one year after menses ends. I had five years of peri-menopausal discomfort, but my worst symptoms occurred after menopause and lasted for years until I found an endocrinologist that was willing to help me through the worst of it. I took HRT for three years, then gradually weaned off. I still have hot flashes and night sweats, but not to the excruciating degree I did before, so I'm just living with it.
I'm almost seventy. I hope I'm not dead before the gloriousness of menopause shows up.
6
Well earned freedom and peace of mind. I wish every woman well as she travels through this most amazing part of being a human woman.
16
Menopause is like all other exclusively female body functions. Not studied enough in the past to admit it really exists, and is not imaginary. Manifested differently with each person.
52
Menopause was absolutely miserable, and I will not give it any respect. Hot flashes kept me awake all night and made it impossible to work efficiently the following day. I carried a thick sweater everywhere, taking it on and off repeatedly throughout the working day.
As someone who never experienced menstrual pains or any other period-associated miseries, I assumed that I would be immune to the disturbances of menopause. Instead, it seems that all my early avoidance of menstrual symptoms boiled down into 2 years of menopausal misery. Glad to be done. I will not give it any respect.
5
That was perimenopause, not menopause.
4
@Yeppers
Nope. Those are not only peri-menopausal symptoms.
I'm exactly like Eddie--no pre-menopausal problems whatsoever. I also feel like it's some sort of cosmic payback time for me. Eight years into full menopause, which starts one year after menses ends, and the hot flashes continue.
@Eddie--I'm happy for you that you only had to endure two years. Be well, enjoy your life.
5
Menopause has been one of the best things that's ever happened to me. It's like a fog was lifted from my brain! I'm more confidant, less concerned with what others think, less concerned with my appearance, and interested in learning new things and engaging with the world around me. I highly recommend menopause!!
36
I jokingly say that God gave us menopause because when some of us postmenopausal women, like me, hold a baby we would like to have one but we can't.
6
Menopause = Freedom
12
I'm on the rag as I write this, after a four month hiatus. I'm not trying to have any more kids, so less mess is best.
1
I only have 2 words...estrogen patch.
13
Those with predisposition to possible hormone-based breast cancer would likely need to avoid estrogen..
2
This article reminds me of Tom Cruise criticizing Brooke Shields for experiencing a serious postpartum depression.
I'm glad that for many women menopause is easy and satisfying.
It isn't for all of us. For many women our sexuality changes radically when our hormones decline - and not for the better. I had a relatively early decline in ovarian function in my forties. After years of robust, satisfying sexuality my orgasm diminished radically. It was a very real loss.
29
@Todd Fox
I too have experienced a decline in my sexual sensitivity and response. I no longer feel the urge to engage in sexual activity, my body has shifted to into neutral as a loss of hormones. Yes, one can have sex without fear of pregnancy but the experience is nowhere near the satisfaction during the years before menopause. I feel the absence of estrogen has re-wired me sexually in a negative way.
10
Oh my goodness, I got on my hands and knees and gave deep appreciation for the end of reproduction! After years and years of unpredictable menstruation that negatively impacted work, vacations, life in general, I've now had 15 years of that weight off my shoulders.
18
I am an American Gynecologist who has spent a great deal of time in undeveloped nations.
Yes, the average life span is less in these countries, and thus the community discussions regarding this topic are diluted. However, one other aspect is important to consider. Cost.
These nations don’t have the resources to pay for HRT. Therefore, because of supply and demand they’re not available even if one were to want relief. This minimises community chatter about adverse symptoms, which reduces the psychological worry about this upcoming event. Without that added burden of doom to come, these patients do far better.
9
Best thing that ever happened to me.
I suffered for more than 40 yrs with painful periods, wild mood swings 2 weeks every month, PMS and anxiety and hormone-induced migraines.
I feel like a different person now in my 60s. Pain-free, relatively carefree and happy. I never knew before what it felt like to relax.
To everyone who is suffering through menopause - when its over, life is great!
Hang in there.
29
I have now accompanied three different wives through menopause. Each one was unique, and retained the characteristics of the individual.
I cannot generalize. I cannot come up with quirky stories. But I will observe that for those wives who had kids it was not a big deal, not a final foreclosure of fate.
2
@KxS
Cool thanks of you anecdotal data of...two?
Always refreshing to hear a man’s perspective on our reproductive/health issues.
10
@Left Coast Sarcasm doesn't work well in internet comments (I'm reading your reply as sarcastic). The first commenter clearly said they can't generalize (so your comment about "anecdotal data" is irrelevant), and just made an observation.
1
@David Konerding - this article describes the centuries and cultures in which menopause did not exist in historical data. I am not the only woman reading this article and thinking that menopause is missing from historical documentation because of patriarchal priorities of all sorts. KxS chose to put in his two cents anecdotally and Left Coast's response about his perspective is spot-on. It's additionally hilarious that he chose to share the minimum number of marriages he's had.
6
"...when it comes to menopause, Western culture has conditioned us to see the symptoms surrounding it as the most important thing about this transition. They aren’t."
While I was interested to learn about the cultural history of menopause, and that it's negative portrayal is a relatively modern Western development, I do detect a faintly classist attitude by the author in giving only perfunctory consideration to the condition's downsides (loss of energy, irritability, weight gain, etc) Indeed, the "grandmother hypothesis" --that post-reproductive women play a vital evolutionary role by providing food/nurturing to children and grandchildren--assumes that menopausal women are in a position to play only a supportive role in society. In today's economic reality--when many women can ill-afford to slow down and "support" younger offspring--it is often necessary for women in their mid-fifties to reinvent their careers after being downsized or made redundant through automation. To those women, the physical symptoms that result from menopause are primary, and they would, no doubt, take little comfort learning that the negative view of menopause is, in fact, mostly a cultural construct.
16
I was thrilled about menopause, couldn’t wait, and pretty much sailed through it with only some occasional hot flashes, usually at work ha ha. I never worried about it, and just continued with my life. It was such a relief after 40 years to be free again!!!
12
@JMC. I didn't have many hot flashes, but some of the ones I did have were at work. I remember that I stopped wearing a black dress that I had relied on for years because it was not of natural fibers and did not "breathe." I remember sitting at my desk wearing it and thinking I was going to pass out!
1
Menopause is one of the best things that has ever happened to me! Fifty-one years old, with three almost-grown daughters and a marriage that has survived the slings and arrows, I am about to get a PhD and live the next half of my life with some large degree of satisfaction about the first. Yes, I am older. Yes, I am sometimes unsure whether the thermostat is off or I am having a hot flash. But I am also relieved to not have fertility, childbirth and childrearing ahead of me. Happy to have survived it all, and ready for the next adventure. Will the world see the potential in a smart, energetic woman who has her life together? Will I someday have the joy of grandchildren? Stay tuned...
11
@C Jovanovic
And I am happy you survived it!
ps Having grandchildren can bring so much heartache and stress. It IS possible to find joy in life without having grand/children.
4
17 years of hot flashes 10-16 times a day sucks. Word is an aunt had it like this till her death at 84. Oh joy....makes five day periods with pain that could be managed by an aspirin seen like a walk in the park.
4
I am loving perimenopause. Seriously, I am. Listening to my body. When I get night sweats, that's a sign I am not on the right path. I course correct and take care of myself. Loving it. Loving that it only wants yoga and gardening for movement. Loving the change in desires (sex, food, intimacy, learning, goals, feelings, etc).
6
No more cramps. No more bloating. No more stains on underwear. No more tender, painful swelling of breasts. No more mood swings. No more putting off swimming or other activities because I might leak. No more worrying about pregnancy. Sure, I have times I sweat profusely but that's nothing compared to cramps that felt like I was having an appendicitis attack. Post menopause is great!
28
It seems strange to me that now, when research has been showing the detrimental effects of doctors disbelieving and downplaying women’s health concerns, that an anthropologist, of all people, would add to the mistaken perception that women’s symptoms are a socio-cultural phenomenon. Can a youth obsessed culture affect our feelings about aging? Of course! And I’m all for treating menopause less negatively. But implying that the symptoms of perimenopause are overblown takes us all backwards.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/03/well/live/when-doctors-downplay-womens-health-concerns.html
71
@Alice B When I was a teenager, my mother told me that the fairly severe cramps I had during my periods was "all in [my] head" and that I was either (1) imagining them, or (2) making them up as a sympathy-getting ploy.
5
I think menopause gets a bad rep! I had an early one at 40 which freed me from the migraines I had since I entered puberty at 10. A few hot flashes was a small price to pay to be rid of both headaches and menstuation.
12
I totally agree with the writer. Other countries cherish those who have reached a certain age in life, for their wisdom and experiences, etc. Here in America, the youth are cherished, and women try to stay physically "young" as long as they possibly can - and there's nothing wrong with that, if that makes you feel complete. But there's nothing wrong in admitting one's age either, and growing old gracefully. It's an achievement - not a punishment. I wouldn't trade the experiences and knowledge that I've accumulated for a smaller waistline and hair that doesn't require roots being re-touched every 3 to 4 weeks. I like who I am now, even with wrinkles and sagging skin that goes along with it. I have matured - inside and out - and I'm okay with that.
9
@Misty Martin
“Other countries cherish those who have reached a certain age in life, for their wisdom and experiences, etc.”
Nonsense. While I heartily agree with your overall summation about youth obsession, maturity and wisdom the data about “other countries” and aging is suspect and cliche.
10
Since you are so certain the commenter has presented a ‘suspect and cliche’ theory, where is the data to support your assertion that this is the case?
1
It’s very important to distinguish between perimenopause and menopause! Perimenopause happens first and sometimes for years, as the hormones are shifting to menopause, which is when the period has stopped for a year.
The symptoms that many women tend to talk about and suffer from (hot flashes, anxiety, sleeplessness, confusion, waking up nightly around 3am, weight gain, diminishing sexual desire, etc) correspond mainly with perimenopause. Once the period stops, those symptoms often drastically decrease.
9
For some of us, including me, perimenopause has been years of sheer physical and emotional hell. If you aren’t one of those people, congratulations.
64
I looked forward to menopause. No more irregular, heavy bleeding periods! No more feeling like crap for 7-10 days a month. I was a bit worried by hot flashes, but I didn't have that many and they weren't bad.
If I had known menopause would be that great, I would have done it earlier (ha ha).
14
I've been menstruation-free for about 20 years now and am SO GLAD THAT'S OVER! No more cramps, stained clothing, embarrassing odors, missed social functions, etc., etc.! Younger women, menopause is something to look forward to!
12
How could you dread something that you don't know if, when and how your body will react to it? It is going to happen no matter what. Deal with it when it does. Also enjoy the time before it and hope you can enjoy the time after it.
4
Due to menopause I can have sex with none of the fears of pregnancy that existed before. Vive menopause!
168
@Linda
Watch out there for the first couple years! (Said in a helpful and friendly way).
16
@Linda
Just please practice safe sex. There are fears, other than betting pregnant, assoc. with sex.
21
@Linda I keep reading this sentiment but seriously, are women in this day and age with so many BC choices continually AFRAID of pregnancy? I've never been pregnant and yet never, ever feared being pregnant. It's wonderful what an IUD can give you and I didn't have to wait until menopause to feel that way!
13
Royal Maca for hot flashes. They go away in a week. Tropical cultures know this and eat Maca but us white women are just hearing about it.
1
Never thought about menopause until it happened in my early 40's. My mom went through it much later...I blame a botched d&c because a few weeks later I was putting the ac up. Never a dull moment.
2
This article, like so many dealing with menopause, creates the impression that menopause starts around age 50 and continues for the rest of your life. No wonder young women fear it. While a small number of women may experience unpleasant menopausal symptoms for several years, for many if not most women the symptoms are mild and only last a year or two. And then HEAVEN! Being free from periods, PMS, post-period migraines, pregnancy fears, and perpetually stained underwear is bliss, well worth the transition.
17
Long ago I asked my vet why dogs didn't go into menopause after being spayed and he didn't know, said, "They just don't." Sometimes the transition makes folks sick, and sometimes the fear of growing old, loss of femininity and all the emotional baggage our culture dumps onto aging women makes them even sicker...
I had my tubes tied in my thirties so didn't welcome or bemoan the end of fertility when my periods finally stopped in my forties. Went thru menopause with minimal symptoms, no medical attention (I didn't have insurance or access to primary care), thought I was done with it in 2001 until, now in my sixties, I fell into a nest of "medical" providers who have blamed everything that's gone wrong with me in the last two years on "normal post-menopause."
They didn't treat a UTI, high BP, night sweats...and now claim I have kidney disease, which I could have predicted...
We toss hormones around like candy, male hormones to folks born female, female hormones to folks born male, avoid giving them to women in menopause, go figure.
(I was accidentally given a drug at the wrong dosage for a symptom I didn't have from the cystitis that, as a side effect, ended the cold night sweats instantly. Turns out treating hyperhydrosis as is done in men instead of blaming menopause worked, whereas throwing hormones at me in my 60s (no blood tests, no abdominal palpations or ultrasound) didn't. I think it would help if we'd treat women as actual people, instead of another species...)
23
@Tobi
Why don't vets know whether dogs go into menopause after being spayed? Because dogs can't tell us one way or another or complain to us about what they're feeling. There is evidence, however, dogs do go into menopause after being spayed because, overwhelmingly, they will being to gain weight, which is a symptom of menopause.
3
Good gracious, CD! What about all the skinny postmenopausal women out there -- who are emphatically not on diets?
3
@CD Actually, most dogs start gaining weight due to too much food and not enough exercise. I've had spayed dogs and was fortunate that I could always get them out for long walks all year and swimming in the summer. I also restrained myself from giving them too many treats. They stayed a healthy weight.
I am 66 years old and still have hot flashes. My mother and my father's sister had them until they were very old, mom until she died at 79 and my aunt until she was in her mid-eighties. But I have to say, being in menopause is much better than bleeding every month! I hate the heat, but love the not bleeding!
24
Dread menopause? I looked forward to it. No more hideous cramps, having “supplies” on hand at all times, emergency laundering of sheets/clothing, replacing items of clothing due to ‘bleed thru,’ rescheduling certain doctor visits because my period popped up at an inopportune time, and no fear of an unwanted pregnancy. It happened at age 51. I was thrilled. I never based my femininity or “worth” on being able to procreate. I, and my Sisters, are worth more than that.
97
Possibly the least helpful article on menopause I have ever read. As a recent menopause graduate, I can tell you that although it was a no-problem transition for many of my friends, I was not so lucky. The hormonal shifts that take place across 7 years of menopause can destroy lives for some women. I went through a pricey herbalist and 3 gynecologists prior to finally finding a fourth who was willing to help me treat the symptoms. I doubt fully that not dreading menopause would have changed any of that physical experience for me. Women's challenges and pain have been dismissed by human society since the beginning, and still are to a great extent. This article just documents that, and the suggestion that we go backward to a time of silent suffering but with a more celebratory mindset comes across as pretty dismissive.
115
Menopause is amazing. My fifties and sixties have been the best years of my life. There’s power in not being able to get pregnant. At 65, I can say and do what I want. Here’s to old age!!!!!!
45
@Old Woman I hope someday I can say same. I'm 62, and while I can't get pregnant anymore - meno-end occurred years ago - I also cannot "do what I want" which, if it were so, would be to find a job, be productive in the world, and make money. Not being able to do that hurts and is killing me. And many other older women.
23
Why can’t you find a job and make money, if not, how do you live? I still have kids in college and need to provide... menopause is a non event! I keep working and will for many years...
3
@MoonCake You have a job. I don't know your age but once you are in your 50's (and sometimes in your 40's) it is almost impossible to find work. It is age discrimination for both women and men.
12
When I went into menopause I fell on my knees and thanked the Lord. No more pain, no more mood swings.
And no, I did not experience hot flashes and irritability, depression, weight gain and all the other stuff. But that was probably because I have been on a plant-based diet for over a decade. And, yeah, I do work out four times a week.
7
Perhaps the all-male medical profession ignored menopause in European and American olden days not because it didn't bother women but because it didn't bother men...
They could easily brush off women's physical and emotional suffering, except when it affected the sexual attractiveness and availability of *young* women to meet the men's perceived needs.
93
@MLChadwick ...exactly what I was thinking. Older women simply become invisible as they age.
15
I swam at the Y this morning alongside a 93 year old woman. She's a breath of fresh air, trim and cheerful. We always chat she says this time of her life is the best. I have to wonder how many younger woman can claim that. Menopause has been marketed to us as a disease and yet I find so many older woman tapping into their experience and wisdom and claiming a well deserved contentment with life. (myself included)
67
@KP Love to hear stories like this!
If this were something millions of men experienced, the worst parts would be solved by now. For me, this has been no celebration - it's been 10 years of flop sweat, interrupted sleep and the sad, final nail in my infertility.
But there has been a shift in my viewpoint, as a result of not being seen as a sexual being or object, I'm invisible - other than the random "ma'am". This provides more latitude, which is great. But I do miss having regular skin.
17
As is clear from the comments, menopause has strikingly different effects on different women, just like pregnancy. I had terrible perimenopausal symptoms that completely disrupted my sleep and mood during a time that I was trying to manage an incredibly high-stress, all-encompassing career (oh yeah, and manage a family). Hormone replacement was the only thing that helped. Unlike the author of this piece, and some commenters, I feel strongly that the absence of those hormones, for whatever reason, has made my brain work differently, not necessarily for the better. I've changed careers, but I think it's important to understand that everyone's experience is different (again, just like pregnancy) and valid, and REAL. Culture may have a powerful effect on our perception of menopausal symptoms as bothersome or not, life-changing or not...but I disagree that culture has a powerful effect on WHETHER we experience symptoms or not.
73
@anniegt
Certain brain cells start dying off when we are about 29.. (Mathematicians all do their most impt. work before that age. The brain is mature only at about age 26. I noticed a loss of brain cells at ages 29 -- studying for oral exams for a year felt the facts dropping out as new ones went in, 40, 60, 65, 70.... and occasionally since at 74. Interestingly, historians' can only do their best work after years of reading -- ages 50-60 and beyond if they keep up with those facts.
Brain pruning is what allows people to be normal -- various disorders including autism I believe are associated with insufficiently pruned brains.. ) All sorts of things happen to the brain (and body) during adolescence, including brain pruning. Throw in Alzheimers and other dementia and you realize we know very little.
WE DON'T KNOW A LOT ABOUT LOTS OF THINGS. But confusing what we do know for the sake of publishing.. YIKES. A PhD should mean you aren't embarrassed to say "I don't know." (A PhD is about the limits of knowledge.)
4
I didn’t even notice when I reached menopause. It was my doctor who realized I’d gone 12 months without a period and was therefore postmenopausal. The 13 years since have been wonderful.
18
Thank you so much for this article describing what I always thought, that menopause is not a disease! So many women just stop having periods after a few perimenopausal years and have few problems. There's obviously a huge range, but it shouldn't be considered something to dread. The stigma of growing 'old' and 'unattractive' for just women is related to this viewpoint (obviously men age as well).
9
Hair loss, weight gain, night sweats still waking me up, now over twenty years later. But no periods, no need for birth control, no fear of pregnancy. On balance it’s still a good deal.
30
The ONLY symptom of menopause I had was that my migraines stopped.
It was and is glorious!
However, women are different. For some, migraines START with menopause.
16
@Rita Rousseau Yep, I was one of them with perimenopausal migraines. And hot flashes, every hour, round the clock. Thank heaven for sumatriptan pens and low-dose Effexor. It was several years of misery. And that was AFTER years of menstruation so painful I opted for an endometrial ablation (best thing I ever did!). Being female can really stink. As does Ms. Mattern's dismissive article. Can't wait to hear what her menopausal experience is / was like.
2
Well I can only speak for myself but 8 yrs ago when menopause started for me, I noticed I was oddly feverish at random intervals. Oh right, I said when my gynaecologist confirmed it. I had just turned 50. What I didn't expect was to be reduced to a puddle every 20-30 minutes 24 hrs of the day everyday for 3 solid years. Sleep? Not in my life. I was standing in a cold shower at 3am and barely functioning during daylight hours. Add insult to injury, I was diagnosed with estrogen positive breast cancer the same year so out went the hot flash dampening hormones just when I was getting some relief. "That'd be like throwing oil into the fire" the oncologist said as I wept in his office. The hot flashes and misery never left. Eventually after being offered anti-depressants (off label use) for the hot flashes (no it's not 1960 again), I decided my quality of life was far too valuable to waste and I've been on a low dose estrogen/progesterin ever since. Hello happier days and sleep filled nights. I'd gladly sacrifice a decade or two to be rid of the nightmare menopause was and still is for me. Turns out it runs in the family. Unfortunately, as far as menopause is concerned, I was one of the unlucky ones. If it wasn't for the sheer misery of the ridiculous symptoms, I'd be fine. To suggest it's all in our heads is wildly incorrect. It's physiological baby and the remedy is still hormonal.
129
That’s exactly what I did for the exact same reason. I remember telling my doc that I’d gladly give up some years at the end to have a normal life again in my 50s. Am now 75 and feel better than I ever have.
14
I'm so sorry for all you've been through. We need to make a distinction between all in your mind and all in your brain. Hormones get in to receptors in our brain which rules every function in our body.
16
@Caroline D I'm glad you got some relief. I was lucky in that once I had pretty much stopped menstruating my body stopped the 4-5 times a day hot flashes. Now I get them if I take a very hot shower or if I work up a sweat. My body seems to be less efficient at cooling down but that's about it.
What doctors don't realize is that for someone like you the risks of low dose therapy are worth it for the well being. Good luck.
1
The article has some interesting historical facts, I enjoyed these facts along with so many of the readers comments. We are all so different on our experiences with this stage of life. Embrace the change, at the same time, let's not forget that we need to help young women, especially those that are "period shamed"
3
I got lucky. I have no idea when I phased in and out of menopause because there were literally no symptoms. After my hysterectomy at 44, everything was easy-peasy. No PMS, no hot flashes, no sudden onset of insomnia, none of that stuff. But I am also overweight, and certain articles suggest that estrogen is stored in our fat cells. If that is true, and since it is true that our estrogen levels plummet when we are in menopause, it could explain why women naturally gain weight as we age so that we can stockpile our estrogen reserves. And it could also explain why I didn't suffer from any menopausal symptoms.
9
Can’t help but wonder if so many of the laments about menopause—hair loss, hot flashes, interrupted sleep—are due to difficulty adjusting to aging. Some age sooner than others. At 71 I look back on my years since menopause commenced and view them as my most content. I no longer view men as sexual objects. Either they’re worthy of my friendship or they aren’t. Escape from coveting and being coveted is an immensely freeing experience. I am grateful to have lived long enough to know it.
60
@Bett Post meno-end - it's an end, not a pause - I do often feel that I have regained the zest of my childhood. Not a thing wrong with recapturing the freedom and sense of "everything possible" of a nine-year-old girl.
But "escape" from "coveting and being coveted" is "freeing"? How so? Because it's messy and work? I missed out on the being coveted part when I was fertile and all those hormones were running. And I was married for 19 years. He actually coveted a GF from grad school! Wish I could have just one year or two of that crazy lust stuff for me, for him, for us - mutual and reciprocal - before I head off into the great beyond. Sounds fantastic.
6
@Bett
I'm a male who has experienced a precipitous drop in testosterone in the past few years. What is supposed to be a death sentence for a man is exactly the opposite for me. I am much, much happier without that hormone and would never want hormone replacement therapy with it.
I know exactly what you mean by feeling liberated from seeing women (in my case) as sex objects. I can now just enjoy my female friends and colleagues for the wonderful people they are without the complications of sexuality. People really do respond differently to changing hormone levels and it is definitely not just in their minds.
13
I find myself looking forward to menopause. Every 23 to 32 days.
51
I welcomed menopause, the end of backaches, requiring prescription NAISDs, extreme bleeding at the end.
I was and am active, normal weight, etc.
13
It was not 100% fun getting here, but from the vantage point of the other side I can say that I have never been more creative, productive, or happy than I am now. Certainly not everyone has the same experience, and we need to continue to seek solutions for those who suffer. While we're doing that, however, I think there's lots of room for getting the word out: The end of fertility is NOT the end of life; in fact, for some of us it might be the best part.
445
@Dawn Helene There is also that thing in which women in this culture are seen as only having value when we are young, beautiful and fertile. Women who are no longer young, beautiful or fertile are not as valued and might as well be invisible. The good news is that with invisibility comes a huge amount of freedom.
247
@Dawn Helene But that creativity is not because of a change in hormones, it is because of a change in your life stage - please don't conflate the two. If your kids have grown (if you happened to have had them) or you are now retired, etc. then that gives you TIME to be creative and learn and do new things, regardless of your menstrual status.
35
@Dawn Helene Definitely the best time of my life - so much more energy and no more emotional mood swings - always a happy balanced mood!
19
Please, we are all different and have different responses to this life event. I had severe symptoms at the beginning and still, after 20 years, have hot flashes. I never sleep through the night. Multiple doctors just shrug when I seek answers or relief. I have given up.
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@SUW That's horrible and you're right, just as every woman experiences menstruation, fertility and pregnancy differently, so do we experience menopause differently. I was lucky as my mother was. I started going through it at 50 and no more symptoms within a couple of years. The one thing I would suggest to women is NOT to go to HRT unless as a last resort. Cancer feeds off of hormones so best to leave those alone. I hope you find some relief, perhaps with natural "remedies"?
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@SUW
I hope you can find a doctor who will listen and actually hear you; it's not you, it's them. This is the nature of our health care providers - I have to go to a walk in ER because my primary care provider is either never in or cannot see me for months. Sometimes I think we have Third World heath care.
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@SUW Have you tried Chinese medicine? Acupuncture and herbs can be extremely effective to treat the imbalances that existed before menopause and haven’t been addressed. Menopause happens and makes them all worse.
So many people can’t imagine how tiny needles and herbs could help, but they most certainly can!
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Even in 2019, I've found it at times humiliating to admit to others that I have extreme symptoms stemming from early menopause (I am in my thirties). It would not be surprising if women of the past were similarly reticent to share. Does this mean that symptoms did not exist in earlier times? Does this mean that my symptoms are not real? This article dismisses menopause's connection with epilepsy - and I for one do get seizures now, as a result of hormonal imbalances occuring while my body adjusts to its new condition. The seizures are terrifying for me. This is a real issue for some menopausal women, and it is inaccurate and unkind to dismiss a menopause/epilepsy connection as some humorously misguided 18th century ignorance. Hopefully one day the seizures will stop, and the life-altering mood swings, and the hair loss. I am sure that they will. And then the end of my fertility can be celebrated... I guess. I did not get a chance to have children before menopause began, and therefore this, too, may not be cause to rejoice. At any rate, things are certain to improve physically for me in the years ahead. I know this. For now, though, it is difficult enough to go through this transition without articles such as this one. The difficulties I am experiencing are real. The seizures are happening to me. Why would the author be unable to accept the menopausal symptoms of her fellow women? And why seek to make others deny them, as well? Please reconsider.
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@Audrey Please tell me you were worked up for various autoimmune disorders associated with your premature ovarian failure. I am a Gyn who had her ovaries removed in her early 40s, so I am acquainted with the effects of losing estrogen abruptly and not slowly winding down over 15-20 yrs. Menopause before 40 is not normal and you should be worked up. You should be referred to a Reproductive Endocrinologist if you haven't already. I am not giving you specific medical advice, just the words to use so you can advocate for yourself. It is miserable to lose your hormones probably 20 years too soon. You are not being unreasonable, at all.
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@Audrey
When I went into perimenopause at 33, and began to lose my hair and my fertility, I was told that it was perfectly normal for some women and that I should just suffer with it. Suffer I did for SEVENTEEN YEARS. At times, the mood swings during PMS put me into the hospital. They were "life altering." I am now 48 and in menopause and it is a BLESSED RELIEF, but my health is destroyed.
I didn't know there was such a thing as a Reproductive Endocrinologist. But hie thee to one!
Thankfully, I had children early because had I waited...
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@Eve Levine Good advice, agree. Have known of several women who had early menopause. I had opposite problem, uterine fibroids which caused very painful and heavy bleeding. The surgeon almost removed ovaries but under sedation I told him not to remove them. He did not read his surgical instructions. I was 40 at the time and was able to have a normal menopause. I also did not have a stable job and healthcare to pay for ongoing HRT at the time. Audrey's condition is an exception and the seizures are NOT normal! I second your recommendation for a workup to Audrey. If the USA had universal healthcare many of these problems would be easily monitored and resolved.
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Are you kidding me?! Dread menopause? I tell very 20 year old i meet how much they are going to Love it!!
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@Mad
Amen to that. No more buying tampons, no more ruined clothes, no more worrying about where bathrooms are in a bleed out, no more cramps, no more planning around when your period might show up, no more birth control, no more of feeling like crap for a week out of the month. I love menopause, free from all the trappings of fecundity.
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@Mad Agreed! Though I was initially devastated to go through sudden early menopause, it turned out to be the greatest thing ever. I know everyone’s experiences are different, but for me it has been so freeing to go through life without constant debilitating pain and worry. I no longer feel like my insides are boiling with molten lava. I now feel light inside, and more vibrant than ever. Thought I initially mourned this new phase because I had internalized our culture’s messages that tell us we should hate/fear/dismiss any woman over 30, none of my fears have come to pass. Menopause really and truly marked a new blooming!
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@tjcenter
An IUD would have given you all of that much sooner without hot flashes, hair loss, sleeplessness, etc.
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How I miss my HRT.
A shadow & shell of my former self.
We weren't supposed to live this long.
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@jazz one. Get back on HRT like many of the rest of us—even quite a few of us with a history of estrogen-receptive breast cancer. Would you rather live a possibly (but not necessarily) shorter happy life or a truly miserable longer one?
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Society worships women who appear fertile. This is the reason woman spend so much effort to appear fertile.
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@Sutter
Sure but if you are lucky, you het to an age where you do not give a toss about what men or society thinks. It is quite liberating.
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@Left Coast
I completely agree. Certainly there is more to life than appearing fertile. It takes a conscious choice to make other things a priority. Our biology places tremendous pressure on all of us. Moving beyond the natural internal pressure takes effort. My dear friend who put career over having a child, finally had a child, and realized how important that was to her. In hindsight she wished she had done it sooner.
Clearly Menopause is a natural part of life. Men do have changes too. Embracing the changes and a healthy lifestyle for the "new" you is the best way to go. I am also experiencing changes. It is amazing how few calories I need now that I am older even when I am active.
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It’s like PMS and periods: it’s part of life, some women have a really hard time, most have a bit of manageable nuisance, and the bigger a deal you make out of it the worse it is or at least seems.
What I don’t get is the two competing narratives of secrecy and over sharing. “What nobody will ever tell you” is out there in the same cultural space as “Menopause, the Musical.” Could we make up our minds here?
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Oh pul-leeze! I did not "dread" menopause - meaning the end of my "fertile" years; I am no less a female now than I was 20 years ago when it hit me full on at 48. The DREAD as in DREADFUL is in trying to deal with endless hot flashes, night sweats, disrupted sleep for years (I still do not have what I consider anywhere near normal for my sleep cycle as I did before menopause), the drying up of bones, the fat going on around the belly area and thighs regardless of how "active" you are and regardless of how few calories you take in, the sagging and bagging. We HONOR fat, wrinkled, bald, saggy males and idolize many of them - but women - HA! Don't talk to ME about giving these real-life horrors that I lived through and still deal with every single day for the rest of my life as a female "deserve respect!"
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@Jan N Amen! I am exactly in the same position as you are. ~ Still dealing with hot flashes and insomnia at 68 (20 years and counting) Plus the other issues you have mentioned in your post.
That said; i am glad to be rid of the heavy periods and cramping.
Keep on keeping on!
Historical and contemporary disrespect for menopause and menopausal women is a direct result of disrespecting women. In some academic circles there is even a howling aggression towards the very idea that god used to be a woman. We can see ourselves in all aspects of the Great Goddess as Maiden, Mother and Crone
It is the aspect of woman as Crone that strikes fear into patriarchy because the Crone is of no use to men who control things. She is neither the sexually alluring virgin nor the useful mother of offspring who looks after the house.
The Crone is she who does not need men. She becomes the wicked witch, she is Babayaga, to be feared and burned to death. If she is not there for sex for men, what possible use could she possibly be?
I have great sympathy and respect who women who experiences severe disruption during menopause. Perhaps women researchers could come up with more perceptive medical remedies. Perhaps we need to develop a retreat where women can go and be welcomed in cool, serene surroundings, where they are freed of all obligations, allowed to explore what helps in several disciplines, and be honoured as wise women who have much to contribute, and who are cared for as honoured members of their communities till the end of their days.
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@MJM YES. Thank you for this post. The first thought was for the Crone, and was hoping someone would mention it.
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@MJM - in another time, "crones" would be respected members of the tribe, consulted for their knowledge of edible and medicinal plants, child rearing, craft skills, oral history and folk wisdom. Some would be shamans.
Today it's not just biology that makes older women irrelevant, it is socio-economic structure. On the other hand, when we are old and sick and become a burden, we won't be left in the wilderness to die. At least it hasn't come to that yet anyway.
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@MJM thank you. You’ve helped me pinpoint the source of my discomfort with this article. The article breezes over what is sometimes a brutal physical transition - almost dismisses it - like it doesn’t matter. It DOES matter.
At the same time, as you pointed out, there is a very real liberation that comes from not being a sexual object, something freeing about not being held hostage by shifting hormones. And something wonderful about our fellow wise women.
Both of these things are true.
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“All this is not to say that the symptoms of menopause are “all in our heads”... The point, rather, is that culture has a powerful effect... on whether, we experience menopausal symptoms.”
I’m sorry, but that is a distinction without a difference. Halfhearted stabs at comparative anthropology aside, this article *is* saying it’s all in women’s heads. Frankly, I think women hear that enough.
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Exactly! I’m reading this covered in sweat, having multiple hot flashes everyday. This article made me feel dismissed. There are a million reasons different cultures may discuss it differently, including lack of comfort talking about it. Different women experience it differently and maybe even different genetic profiles experience it differently, but tell this Korean/European American it’s all a cultural construct and I say, tell that to the sweat dripping off my face. My wife and I have been talking about could it be possible to slip an ice pack into my clothes without looking ridiculous... now that would be helpful!
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@Glen and Alice: Wow! Where did you get the "dismissive" stuff?
I read it and thought "huh! well. that's something!"
Also, remember issue of space and editing.
The views of and knowledge about the transition are constantly evolving. Still. I didn't see one insult in this piece.
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@Berkeley Bee DEFINITELY this author's premise is dismissive. If this article is representative, her book is predicated on how a lack of historical discussion suggests menopause is largely a cultural construct, a jaw-dropping faulty syllogism that truly minimizes how women's ailments, unique experiences, and contributions have ALWAYS been underrepresented in male-penned historical accounts. (See: Forbes's Top US Innovators list controversy. That's happening TODAY.) With due respect, if you (and Mattern) can't or won't see that, it's you, not us. Maybe her view was formed atop an ivory-tower research prof perch with few symptoms in her own menopause passage, but the serious annoyance of suffering women is a toll she'll justly pay. NEXT.
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Who, exactly, dreads menopause? Not I, nor any women I know.
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@Cynthia starks Uh, you don't know me, so your personal claim stands, I guess.
But it was not fun to go through - some 7 years ago - and I have not found a benefit to it. Yet. No periods, but otherwise? Waiting.
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I dreaded menopause mainly because of all the information I read and heard. I dreaded losing me “ womanhood” and getting old and wrinkly . Then it happened..a couple of years and warm if not hot flashes..but ,surprise, surprise..I love the results...no swinging moods, I am much calmer ,love mr grey hair...no time and expense spent dying, Iam in much better shape( mentally and physically) and sex is so much better..no worries about having a baby in my 40’s...Perhaps we need to hear and read much more positive articles..It is just another phase of life. Be positive about the upside and stop dwelling on how we get to this stage.It does not last for ever so get on with living!
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@Kate Woods, well for me it has lasted for 20 years and shows no ending. I was "technically" finished with menopause in under 6 months when I stopped menstruating, just like THAT, snap fingers and DONE. That didn't make all the other horrible symptoms and side effects of losing vital hormones lessen or stop.
19
I’m Sixty, and had “ late “ menopause, just like my Mother. The best predictor of when a Woman will go thru menopause is when HER Mother did so. Starting at about 57, I had a dramatic increase in anxiety and depression. I finally relented to my Physicians recommendations and started two anti-depressants, at low doses. It helped immensely, with no discernible side effects. Just DO it. It doesn’t mean that you’re weak, it’s an aid to get you thru. I’m now officially post-menopausal (no periods for over a year ) and I feel fine. Still taking the same two low doses, and plan to continue until we can move out of Kansas.
Seriously.
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I read nothing about menopause nor was it discussed by women in my family. And, in my baby boom generation, women grew up with the idea that nothing about our sex affected our abilities, so "culture" did not tell me to expect anything bad about menopause. Then, I hit menopause.
I have not slept through the night in 10 years, I perspire when no one else is, and in just a few years, my skin and body became creatures I don't recognize any more. I'm not going to get into the symptoms that one does not discuss in public. And, as my doctor reminds me, after menopause women lose those hormones that used to protect us from heart disease. Menopause may be as natural as rain, but that does not make it a good thing.
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@Concerned Citizen You need to do some medical research and read more carefully. I find your reply patronizing to women with menopause symptoms. If I were a candidate for HRT, I, and other women with these symptoms, are intelligent enough to know whether they are candidates for HRT. I am not. You need to know that, if not taken within a certain period after menopause onset, according to current medical studies, HRT raises risk for cardiovascular disease and stroke. Also, women with certain medical conditions should not take HRT. So HRT is not a miracle drug for menopause symptoms. Also, it is a medical fact that estrogen loss affects the thinness and dryness of skin, the production of collagen, and makes the skin susceptible to a number of skin conditions. There are other medical facts about impacts of menopause and loss of estrogen, including sleep, but there is not space here to list. Finally, I said the the symptoms began with menopause onset, not with "simple aging," and I did not say I expected skin of a "young girl." Give me credit for some intelligence, please.
A woman who does not believe menopause is responsible for these symptoms is either in denial, or is a medical oddity who should immediately donate herself to the AMA for further medical research.
More important, she should educate herself about the new medical issues she faces with the onset of menopause.
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@msomec Have you tried natural estrogen and progesterone creams?
If women suffered lifelong infertility, the author’s point may prove relevant. But it is the ability to reproduce and give birth that makes a women. Female human. It is a miracle of nature (or God if you prefer) that women conceive, nurture and give birth to our sons and daughters. To diminish the loss of this life defining gift is specious.
It is the center of a women’s being. Her entire body (almost literally) is designed to attract men, incubate babies and then feed and raise them. It is as beautiful as it is complex.
We should celebrate fertility. We do not celebrate aged athletes because the best of them is historic. We should share that prudent, self evident world view with menopause. It is a sad time to lose fertility.
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I'm afraid your understanding of gender and identity is simplistic and outdated at best, and I'm being kind.
There are multiple, complicated, uncorrelated hormonal and physical systems that together combine to make what we (modern western culture) considers to be "female" and "male." But not all systems develop in the same combination or at the same time in all people, and there are many, many exceptions to what we think of as "normal."
In the Dominican Republic there is a community where some female-appearing children drop testes at puberty; many go on to father children and live as male. They are known as "guevedoces."
There are people with XXY chromosomes, and XYY. There are people who are born with both sets of reproductive organs. There are people who identify as male but who are born into a female-appearing body, and vice versa--the brain systems that form one's identity as "female" or "male" (or neither, or something else) develop and operate independently of the systems that govern the physical characteristics of the body that brain inhabits...and who we are sexually attracted to is yet another system.
Among animals, there are dozens of species where sex is variable. Many species of fish can change from male to female; some can even change back again. Frogs undergo spontaneous sex changes. Gyandromorphism (being both sexes simultaneously) has been observed in butterflies, birds, and lobsters.
Beautiful and complex indeed, and more than you imagined.
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I love that I was able to bear children after struggling with infertility for several years, but now that they’re nearly grown, it’s like, been there, done that, got the tee shirt. Why do I still need to bleed every month? Bring on the menopause! And then, bring me grandchildren.
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Also, you do realize you are literally saying that any human who is physically unable to bear a child is not a woman.
You are saying a person born with ovaries and a uterus who is infertile is not a woman.
You are saying the mother of 16 children who can no longer bear children is an ex-woman.
You are saying a person with a uterus who conceives and carries a fetus, but loses every pregnancy before it can be born, is not a woman.
I have no words to communicate how offensive every one of those assumptions are.
And "the center of a woman's being"? Puh-leease. I have a conventionally attractive female form and have never had difficulty wanting, finding, or keeping a male partner, but have never wanted a child of my own for one second of my life. I'm 42, and while neither dreading nor looking forward to menopause, I am *actively* *thankful* *every* *single* *day* that I chose NOT to have kids.
Fertility is necessary for the continuation of a species, yes, but there's a lot more to life than mere fertility.
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Just a suggestion here but maybe it's not menopause that's the problem. Maybe it's contemporary society's views of older women and this same society's refusal to adapt to people's needs as they age.
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@hen3ry
So wise.
hen3ry, you're my favorite NYT commenter.
9
Having had my uterus removed in my mid 30s, while keeping both ovaries, I had no sympoms before, during or after menopause. I only knew what the hormone tests results were throughout.
We are each different.
6
Am 45, dealing with severe PMDD, and can’t wait. My psychiatrist who is treating my PMDD swears I’m going to feel much better.
9
Why cant it be both? Could it be that women's willingness to speak of their experience, especially such intimate experience, is very recent? Could it be that women were not listened to and/or their accounts of their experience were not given any attention or credence until recently? Could it be that different ethnicities have variations in symptoms? Yes, perspective is bound up in culture, and menopause can be wonderful in many ways, and for many women this is unequivocal. But articles like this erase or belittle women for whom menopause is truly awful, or even those for whom it is a struggle. The reason estrogen became popular was because no one had paid attention to the symptoms and struggles of menopause before. Lets not forget the days when women were diagnosed as hysterical, and treated with hysterectomies. I would argue that there is still very very little attention paid or comprehensive knowledge. In fact, I would say there is a lot of ignorance on the part of the medical community. It is only when you start to make whispered confessions to your dearest friends that the watershed of confessions come out. Women are still ashamed, and menopausal symptoms are still seen as weakness, even by the women forging through them. Congratulations you arent one of them. Truly. But can we welcome all experiences, not just the ones of the smooth-sailing oblivious who suspect her cohort are just constitutionally lacking?
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@Jessica
Jessica sums up a lot of great points very nicely. It isn't as if the history of humankind has been a tale of respecting women and cataloging their experiences kindly. I would add one more thing - my current job is physically demanding, and it was no problem just a year and a half ago before I started menopause. Our current work structures are not designed to accommodate the real, physical reality of the very real menopausal symptoms that many women experience. It would be so very nice if we could collectively flip a mental switch and change cultural attitudes toward many things - but I'm afraid I don't see people changing their minds and attitudes on a dime.
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Post-menopausal with no need for medical intervention. Very happy.
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This is an interesting history of cultural changes and expectations. Now I am feeling very grateful to the all older women in my life who appreciated every stage of living and dying and did not allow normal womanhood to be turned into a pathology. Thank you fellow old ladies for not being neurotic.
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We might not dread menopause if our medical community cared enough to provide us with affordable and effective options for hot flashes, hair loss, vaginal dryness and weight gain.
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Vaginal dryness isn't just a lack of lubrication. It's a lack of full arousal. Wetness for a woman is similar to "tumesence" for a man. It indicates readiness for sex and orgasm. Giving us a tube of lubricant doesn't really solve the real problem.
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@Karen
Low dose HRT works. Not everyone can use it, depending on history and vulnerabilities, but not everyone is highly vulnerabiie to breast cancer, and low dose HRT does protect against oseoporosis, UTIs, shows a correlational protection against Parkinson's,(breast cancer risk is correlational too - not causal), etc. Weigh your personal risks, HRT should not be demonized.
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@Karen Are you sure it's all from menopause? Hypothyroidism and bad eating habits were what caused my weight gain. I saw a nutritionist and began taking thyroid medication. I haven't lost any hair; or rather, none that I wouldn't lose normally from aging (men also lose hair). Hot flashes are sweating which is a normal physiological activity. As for the vaginal dryness, I just stopped using my vagina and that solved that problem.
For someone who hated her periods, I'd gladly take them back if I regrew all the hair I've lost (currently wearing wigs), got my younger skin back, and thought as clearly as I did in the past.
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