My blogger friend Michelle recently wrote about her journey through (peri)menopause. As I’m going through this myself I thought it would be good to talk about this topic on 40+Style as well since it’s such a confusing subject with so many questions and obstacles that affects the life of 40+ women in significant ways.

So many of you have gone through perimenopause and menopause already and perhaps this article and the comments can become a resource where you can find solace, understanding and perhaps a few remedies that can help.

Coping with peri menopause | 40plusstyle.com

Here is what I’m experiencing sofar:

  • Mood swings and a hot temper
  • Feeling tired all the time but unable to sleep my usual 7-8 hours
  • Inability to cope with the hot weather (it’s getting harder the longer I live here)
  • Finding it harder to concentrate and feelings of overwhelm get increasingly frequent
  • Dramatic increase in headaches

Now it’s always difficult to know if symptoms are due to other reasons or the fact that I am too busy or putting too much on my plate or that they are related to (peri)menopause but with so many women experiencing these same kind of issues, I think it’s fair to say that menopause has a big part in this.

How do you cope with menopause? Share your experience! | 40plusstyle.com

A few years ago I started reading and learning about bio-identical hormones. Women like Suzanne Summers (who was extensively featured on Oprah) feel that we should not accept all these changes as just a part of life as they seem to be rather ‘outdated’ in a world where women could possibly live for 50 years more. In a way that makes sense to me. In the past, women were meant to bare and raise children and then their ‘function’ was over and they would be dead by the age of 60.

We live in a very different world now. We can possibly live for 50 years longer and many of us feel very active, have lots of plans and have no desire of slowing down. It becomes disheartening when the body and hormones then force you to do otherwise.

Does menopause really have a function anymore this day and age. What is the benefit of menopause in the first place?

There don’t seem to be very many upsides to menopause, both in terms of how you feel, your energy and also how you look. When it comes to appearance, here are just some of the symptoms associated with menopause:

  • Thinning hair
  • Hairloss
  • Hormone loss cause accumulation of fat around the abdomen
  • Dryer skin

I know for a fact that many women find these outer symptoms very difficult to cope with as well which accumulated fat in the abdomen the most mentioned (Find ways to hide your belly with clothes here).

How to cope with (peri)menopause | 40plusstyle.com

Accept and bear it or do something?

Now as I find myself in the middle of peri-menopause (my period is irregular but has not stopped completely) I’m wondering if I should just let nature run its course and bare some of the side effects or be a lot more proactive in either getting bio-identical hormone therapy or traditional hormone replacement therapy. (if you like to know about the difference, you may enjoy this interview I conducted with Dr Yeoh a while ago about the difference between bio-identical hormones and HRT). My adversity to seeing doctors and the fact that I’m very busy with all my new plans for this site and my new project has meant that I haven’t done any investigation or taken any action in this direction just yet.

But I don’t see why we should really accept this part of ‘nature’ when it seems to have been designed for a time where women lived a lot shorter and were kind of expected to just fade away.

symptoms of peri menopause and how to deal with them | 40plusstyle.com

50+ women all over the world are showing that they are strong and energetic and that they can make a real difference to this world. Many of you find an increased level of confidence and power to finally do the things that you love. You don’t want to be hampered by these kind-of outdated menopausal symptoms that slow you down. In fact in current times we need these 40+ women more than ever.

At the time I started reading books on this topic. Here are a few:

Now that I’m finally in the middle of menopause I may need to get back to these books and decide if it’s worth making the effort ‘to do something about this’ or just take menopause in my stride and let ‘nature’ take its course.

How to cope with menopause | 40plusstyle.com

I would love to know your opinion on this. Hopefully you can join the discussion and let me know how you are experiencing menopause. Even though I’m personally interested in this topic, your information will be very helpful to many women who may struggle with all the changes in their mind and body and who are looking to find strategies that can help them.

So please share:

  • Have you experienced menopause yet or are you in the middle of it?
  • Did you have severe symptoms?
  • Did you just let it run its course or have you sought medical help through bio-identical hormone therapy or HRT?
  • What helped you cope with (peri)menopause?
  • Which books have helped you cope?

I look forward to reading your comments!

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Sylvia

Sylvia is 40+style’s editor-in-chief and has been helping women find their unique style since 2011. An alumni of the School of Color and Design, she is devoted to empowering women of any age to look and feel their best. Read more about Sylvia and 40+style on this page.

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