At 44 I thought I was doing pretty well. I suffered with depression at a very young age, but got over that in 3 months. I then got depression after my dad died. It didn’t seem to lift, until I went on Seroxat years later, but also around 1999/2000 I bled a lot. It was crippling pain and I was passing blood clots. This did not help the depression at the time but I thought it was all connected so basically battled through it.
For the last few years I’ve woken up in the middle of the night sweating. It’s wasn’t regular sweating either, it would drip off me, my heart racing, my skin clammy, and then I’d freeze. This went on every night for a week, usually a week before my periods started, to which then I could sleep soundly and comfortably. This was starting to irritate me a little, waking up freezing cold but clearly been sweating like the proverbial pig, drenched.
And I was coping up until last month. All of a sudden I felt scared, frightened, very, very nervous and jumpy. Black clouds descended around me and I would burst into tears about anything. I’d hide myself away in the bathroom and just cry, and cry, and cry until I felt sick. But the head rush that made me do it didn’t seem to go away.
I battled on with this for a week, then my period started and within 2 days I was happy again. 4 days later I started getting scared again. My legs kept turning to jelly at the thought of doing anything. Anything at all. So I took to google with my symptoms.
Perimenopause stared at me from the search results. OK, I’d heard of menopause because my mum said she started her menopause early at the age of 33, but I’d never heard of perimenopause before, so after doing research it seems it’s exactly what I have the symptoms for. Oh gawd and has it played with my head.
I don’t feel 44 years old. In my head I’m still 20 something. But I’ve got to that stage in life where it’s time for “the change”. It’s put pay to me wanting to have a baby. It has put pay to me feeling young and has bought on feelings and thoughts of death and illness. My stomach flips now even writing this. Why do I feel old at 44? If we wanted to adopt, we still could, or we could get a surrogate so my yearnings to become a mum could still be realised. It’s made me question so much, and I really didn’t want to have to question anything because I was doing quite well without all the worry.
The anxiety that I’ve had has been as bad as when I lost my dad and I can’t seem to shift it. So I’ve tried a few things to try and bring me back out again. Menopace Plus (I really hoped this was the miracle cure to all but it wasn’t). I’m not sure it’s done anything at all. I’ve also tried Fermarelle. This I thought might work too but I only tried it 2 weeks. I’ve had 1 day this week when I’ve felt ok and that I think was a fluke.
So I wrote to my doctor. He’s put me on Prempak C. I did mention to him that mum went through early menopause and was prescribed Premarin. She found it wonderful.. I’m day 4 on Prempak C and I’m not sure it’s working yet. They say to give it a few weeks at least but I feel like I’m drowning in mud and can’t shift my mood. I’m hating it more and more each day to because I want to feel normal again and I don’t.
Prempak C will probably be ok as I used to take Norgestrol as the mini pill back in 1990 and it took my moodiness away (I was getting quite violent without having something, so the Norgestrel took that anger away) I’m hoping that it starts to take the sadness and anxiety away soon because I’m struggling to cope.
What I have noticed about the perimenopause is the amount of time I’m having to spend in the bathroom. It’s like someone’s turned a tap on as I can’t stop weeing, and it’s also driving me nuts. Spots are also a problem. I have spots on my boobs. I never ever suffered teenage acne, so this is not going down well with me at all. I’ve also got what I think is some kind of infection in my finger which comes and goes. This worry though all started when I had a lump under my arm in my armpit. My doctor came out and said it was nothing but it was getting bigger. Freaked me out that I had cancer. Took my sister 2 days to convince me it wasn’t. But I worked myself up so much I’ve made myself ill with worry.
The lump has now gone. I changed my deodorant from Soft and Gentle to Bionsen and within the month – totally gone. I just have such a fear all the time and it’s niggling away at me. Going to try hypnosis next, see if they can trance it out of me.
But I am trying hard. I’m trying not to let it worry me any more than it does already. I’m trying to cope. It’s just no-one tells you it’s going to be this hard, and no one ever tells you that you go through this. Well I’m telling you now. You will. It’s ain’t funny. But I’m going to battle it with every medication going because I’ve had quite enough of it ruining my life.
The Perimenopause and Me
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