World Menopause Day is on the 18th of October 2022. Lately, there has been a lot about menopause in the news, on TV, on Radio and on social media. Humans have gone through reproductive changes forever because they are stages of life.  It just marks the time when a woman can no longer have children, just like puberty was the time we could have children. So, why so much about it now? 

In the UK, there are 13 million women going through stages of menopause now. 

Approximately one in five will have very few symptoms and one in four may find they are really struggling with physical and mental health symptoms that impact day-to-day life including relationships, work and coping with things that used to be very easy for them.

If women have the information to better manage the symptoms, health and quality of life can be optimised. 

Medically speaking, menopause is the time when a woman no longer ovulates, thereby the end of releasing eggs. But for many women, the symptoms of menopause started years before in perimenopause which they may not even have recognised at the time. 

The main symptoms we often hear about are night sweats, poor sleep and hot flushes.  These can happen, but also there may not or there may be other symptoms a woman may experience.

But what's happening inside the body as we age, is that the level of oestrogen is decreasing.  This begins in our 20s but may not get low enough to cause many noticeable symptoms until our 40s on average.

Every woman’s body is different, so some may experience early menopause, some late.  On average in the UK, women go through menopause at age 51 and symptoms can last years, starting long before and/or continuing long after the end of ovulation (marked by periods). 

Awareness of early menopause, perimenopause, menopause and post-menopause can empower women to ask for help.

Perhaps to aid the loss of oestrogen with HRT, or to have support for mood swings with CBT. To normalise how they feel, or to get advice on getting better sleep. To learn what clothing may be more comfortable to wear or learn what support to ask for from partners, family or employers.

For more information, please visit the British Menopause Society website https://thebms.org.uk/publications/world-menopause-day-2022/ to #continue the conversation or visit Menopause and me https://www.menopauseandme.co.uk/en-gb