03/04/2023
Ladies... lets talk menopause.
I have a few friends beginning this challenging stage of life, so I thought it may be helpful to share some insight, and my personal experience.
Average menopause age is 51 years old per Mayo Clinic. Perimenopause is the months or years leading up to menopause, which is clinically diagnosed after 12 months of your missed cycle. It is considered early menopause if this occurs prior to age 45 (5% of population), and premature menopause if prior to age 40 (1% of population).
Why does age matter?
One answer... overall health. Menopause is a natural biological process where your body begins to make less and less of your reproductive hormones (estrogen and progesterone). Your fertility begins to decline and eventually your ovaries stop releasing eggs and your periods stop. This process can also be surgically or medically induced (I know all about this 😝).
How does this affect overall health?
Estrogen is not only vital to regulating a womans cycle, but it plays a significant role in many other long-term health factors. Estrogen is important for cognitive function, bone density, sexual health, metabolism, and heart health. The younger you experience menopause, the higher your risk for complications in these areas due to your body being stripped of estrogen for that many extra years. For example, a woman who goes through premature menopause under 40 like me, her body is nearly 2 years older biologically than someone who goes through menopause at the average age of 51. She also has an overall shorter life expectancy.
Why is this important to know?
Unfortunately, up to 85% of women experience perimenopausal symptoms, with a sizeable number of these women reporting significant impact on quality of life. Hot flashes, insomnia, mood swings, weight gain, and sexual health are some of the top complaints. When you are forced through this stage very quickly due to surgery, or in my case cancer treatment, it all happens within the blink of an eye and is over before you know it. For most women however, these symptoms can last months. Eventually, many women seek medical advice and protocols to decrease the effects this period of life is having on them. This is where the conversation of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) can come in.
Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) - what is it?
HRT is exactly what it sounds like, a prescription of estrogen and/or progesterone (pill, patch, cream, etc) that a woman would take to substitute for her body eliminating it. This is done to alleviate the intense symptoms being experienced. HRT came on the market in the mid 1900s and became very popular in the 90s. By the early 2000s however, we started to see a significant correlation with HRT use and breast cancer diagnosis. Up to 80% of breast cancer is hormone positive, meaning it feeds off natural and synthetic forms of these hormones.
HRT is controversial but I'm not posting this to scare anyone or to tell you what you should or shouldn't do. I want to be a source of data, and advise you to have these discussions with your doctor before you jump into a routine that has potential to put you at a higher risk of breast cancer. It's extremely important that you weigh the pros and cons of taking HRT. It's important that you are taking your age, symptoms, and overall risk into consideration. Your life matters and I want you to understand it's much more complicated than just taking a simple pill.
The same goes for hormonal birth control, but that's a message for another day.
Please reach out to me if you have questions and I'd be happy to provide more resources and research citations.
❤️ Ashly
