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Perimenopause 🇮🇪

Hello 🙂 here's a peri/menopause explainer 👇

Don't know about you, but I didn't have a clue about perimenopause, or menopause itself. Yes, your periods stop, and you get hot flushes. But what else? I didn't even think there was an 'else'!

So, in case you might not know as much as you thought you did, I've put together a thing...

WHAT IS THE MENOPAUSE?

Firstly, it isn’t an illness, it’s a natural progression through life, just as puberty was. It happens because your female hormones (oestrogen and progesterone) decrease over a number of years until, no more periods!

There are three main parts to the menopause. You may not experience these phases as clearly defined as laid out here, but here’s a brief explanation of what each phase is.

Peri-menopause

This is the first phase during which the hormonal balance starts to change. It usually starts a few years before the natural menstrual cycle and periods stop for good. Many women will begin to experience symptoms during this phase.

Menopause

The medical definition relates to the time that periods have stopped for good. It actually refers to a single day, when a woman hasn’t had a period for a full year. That’s not such a useful definition in some ways, as female hormones continue to fall and menopausal symptoms continue.

Post-menopause

The post-menopausal phase kicks in after two years without a period. By this point, most people’s hormones will have settled into a new balance, and the symptoms experienced in the first two phases will have tailed off. However, a few may continue with symptoms during this phase, and that can carry on for quite a few years after the menopause.

There is no set time-scale for this process. Everyone is different, and experiences can differ greatly. Your menopause is unique to you!

If you’re younger than 45 and experiencing menopause symptoms, get checked by your doctor. Your symptoms might be related to other causes (including thyroid function, vitamin D deficiency, or low iron).