When Is Menopause:
You may experience changes in your bone or heart health, your body shape and composition, or your physical function. If you think you’re in perimenopause or menopause, talk with a healthcare professional. A simple test can tell you for sure based on hormone levels in your blood. If you experience any of the symptoms of depression, talk to your healthcare provider. During your conversation, your provider will tell you about different types of treatment and check to make sure there isn’t another medical condition causing your depression. This major change in your hormonal balance can affect your sex life.
Also don’t take it if you might be pregnant or you have undiagnosed vaginal bleeding. Menopause starts on average around age 51 when it happens naturally. The age at which yours will start is mostly determined by your genes. But it can also stem from surgery, treatment of a disease, or an illness. In these cases it can be called induced menopause, surgical menopause, or primary ovarian insufficiency, depending on the cause.
Menopause is a point in time when you’ve gone 12 consecutive months without a menstrual cycle. This is when a lot of women or people assigned my sources female at birth (AFAB) start to transition to menopause. They may notice changes in their menstrual cycles or have symptoms like hot flashes.
Speaking about making the leap from actress to businesswoman, Paltrow said the one thing she would want other women to take from her experiences would be “not being afraid to ask questions”. Linked menopause before age 45 to a 9 percentage point drop in workforce participation once women entered their 50s. You will still need to protect yourself from sexually transmitted diseases.
Similarly, older women may not consider themselves at risk of sexually transmitted infections, including HIV[iii], or may not be counselled by their providers to practice safer sex or get tested. In addition, for some women, symptoms may include aches and pains, headaches, and heart palpitations. Because menopausal symptoms may be caused by changing hormone levels, it is unpredictable how often women will experience symptoms these details and how severe they will be. Psychological and emotional symptoms of fatigue, irritability, insomnia, and nervousness may be related to both the lack of estrogen, the stress of aging, and a woman’s changing roles. The transition phase before menopause is often referred to as perimenopause. During this transition time before menopause, the supply of mature eggs in a woman’s ovaries diminishes and ovulation becomes irregular.
Individuals should also consider speaking with a healthcare professional if their menopause symptoms are causing distress or disruption to their lives. If they are having difficulty sleeping, finding it difficult to work, or experiencing severe mood changes, some treatments may help. Therefore, it does not automatically require any kind of medical treatment. Primary ovarian insufficiency (POI) occurs when the ovaries stop working normally before age 40. POI is not the same as premature menopause; people with POI may still get occasional periods and may even become pregnant.
Your healthcare provider may be able to prescribe a medication to help you (hormone therapy or an antidepressant). It may also help to just know that there’s a name for the feelings you’re experiencing. Support groups and counseling sell are useful tools when dealing with emotional changes during menopause. Your cycles will become irregular, but they haven’t stopped. Even though you might notice symptoms like hot flashes, you can still get pregnant.
If you can’t or don’t want to take menopause hormone therapy, there are also effective non-hormonal prescription therapies available for troublesome hot flushes and night sweats. The greatest concerns about menopause hormone therapy have been about breast cancer and an increased risk of a deep vein clot which might cause a lung clot. The most robust guidelines do not stipulate women must have hot flushes or night sweats to be considered as having perimenopausal or post-menopausal symptoms.
Or, it may be triggered by surgery to remove your ovaries, cancer treatments like radiation or chemotherapy, or autoimmune diseases. Hormone therapy (HT) involves the taking a combination of the female hormones estrogen and progesterone during perimenopause and menopause. However, estrogen can also be given by using skin patches and vaginal creams. Although the average age of menopause is 51, menopause can actually happen any time from the 30s to the mid-50s or later. Women who smoke and are underweight tend to have an earlier menopause, while women who are overweight often have a later menopause.
In some cases, menopause occurs early from surgery, radiation therapy, chemotherapy, a pelvic injury, or other factors affecting the reproductive organs. If you’ve already been through menopause, it doesn’t always mean you’re done with all the symptoms. An estimated 40 percent of women ages 60 to 65 still get hot flashes. The transition stage, or perimenopause, can last about 7 years, but for some, it can last as long as 14 years.