My Perimenopause Journey

* Transcript created by AI – may contain errors or omissions from original podcast audio

 Today on the podcast, I want to talk to you a little bit about my perimenopause journey. It’s a bit of a vulnerable episode, and the reason that I am sharing this is to spread awareness. If you are a woman or someone with ovaries, you will go through perimenopause at some stage. So today I wanted to share a little bit about my own journey and what’s been helping me in the hopes that this will be helpful for other people.

 Before I get started on today’s episode of the podcast. Just a reminder, this episode is not medical advice. Please go and see your doctor or health practitioner for advice that is suitable for you. So I thought that a great place to start would be to talk about what perimenopause actually is. ‘Cause maybe you aren’t even aware. I know for me, I first learned about perimenopause from watching people online and hearing other people talk about it, so I knew what menopause was. I knew that you reached a point where you stopped getting a period, you started getting more flushes and things went a little bit haywire, but I didn’t really understand exactly what it meant.

So essentially what perimenopause is, it’s the lead up to the point of menopause. The definition of menopause is actually that you have been 12 months without having a period, and all the symptoms and things that we, you are probably familiar with, you know, the hot flushes, et cetera, actually happens in the lead up to that 12 month window that you go for the first time without having a period.

So perimenopause is the average age that women start perimenopause is usually around the early forties and often you won’t go through the actual menopause. That the process of going 12 months without a period until around the average age of 51 to 52. But like I said, the actual perimenopause can start in your early forties and can last anywhere from one to 10 years.

The average being four to six years that people are going through this, this journey of change. Now, some little stats that I grabbed here, 25% of women going through Meno perimenopause rather have zero symptoms. Like none at all. 60% have mild to moderate and 20% experience severe symptoms. So chatting to people of my age about this, some people are like, Nope.

Like my periods are becoming more spread out. But aside from that, nothing else is happening. Most people that I’m talking to are experiencing some form of symptoms and it can be really different depending on the person. And the severity also seems to vary quite wildly person to person. And I guess this makes sense because when you think about going through puberty, when you think about the actual process of, of having periods, everyone has a really different experience.

I know that a family member of mine experiences extreme pain every month. It’s a very volatile emotional time. I personally would, had been. You know, pretty lucky to be honest. It was something that kind of rolled around once a month. I might get some cramps, might get a bit emotional. I had very short and not too heavy periods.

So again, something that you know, 50% of the population is going through can wildly vary person to person. The, the severity, the symptoms, the length, the heaviness, it can vary. And obviously it’s the same with perimenopause. When you think back to puberty again, different people had a different experience of puberty.

Some people had extreme mood swings. Some people were like, yeah, kind of a little bit up and down. So everyone has their own different journey. Now, for me, I would say that I probably fall into the category of people who experienced severe symptoms. For me, it first started with my periods really changing.

Like I said, I’d been pretty blessed most of my adult life that it, my period wasn’t really a big deal. It was just something that rolled around once a month, and as I started to get older, they started to get heavier and heavier. I heard this term used in a, a Facebook group, and instantly I was like, oh my gosh.

That really resonates, which is called crime scene periods. Now, if you have been fortunate enough not to experience this. And if a, if you have a bit of a weak tummy, maybe you might want to push skip past this bit. But when I’ve described it to some other friends who have had the same thing, they’re like, oh my gosh, that sums it up completely.

So basically the periods were getting so heavy that it was going everywhere, like from the time I would jump out of the shower to quickly race to the bathroom. There was blood everywhere, like splattered on walls. It was crazy. And I started to get a lot of, you know, anxiety or anxiousness about going out because I was bleeding through heavy tampons.

I was having to, yeah, put multiple forms of, of menstrual products in place just so that I wasn’t bleeding through. And I realised, well, I’m gonna have to get some support with this because it’s really starting to affect my life. So I went and saw a gynecologist and she had identified that I was having, I can’t think of the word for it right now.

Let me pause this recording while I look at up. I had to pause the recording to go and have a check on what the term is fibroids. And so when I had the scan, she said, you know, you’ve got quite a few fibroids. One in particular is quite large and that’s probably what’s causing it. She said, fibroids itself is, is generally not, you know, a, a huge deal. But the reason why you are experiencing this is, is because of that. And so after doing some research, having multiple conversations with a couple of different doctors, I made the decision to have an ablation and have a marina inserted to stop the, to stop the heavy periods. So with an ablation, you are essentially burning off the wall of your uterus.

So they were, the doctor was making sure I was very, very sure that I did not wanna have any more children and I could, I was assuring her, that chapter of my life was definitely, definitely done. So, we went ahead and I had the ablation and the marina, it was a bit of a bigger operation than I was expecting.

I, yeah, was quite bloated and quite sore for a while and the symptoms didn’t disappear for me straight away. Unfortunately. It did take a bit of time for it to really settle down. I believe it was up to about six months and yeah, then it all kind of kicked in. I instantly noticed after having the marina inserted that my anxiety levels were had reduced and yeah, I’m really, really glad that I had that procedure done again.

That was what was right for me. And now my periods are an absolute walk in the park. I, you know, it, it’s, it’s really such a minor little thing that I am, yeah, I’m very, very grateful that I had that procedure done. So that was sort of the start of my journey, and then I started to transition into all of these other symptoms quite rapidly.

So this was in my early forties, and I started to experience insomnia. I’m someone who unfortunately has gone through periods of insomnia throughout my life, but never at this level of intensity. Usually when I’ve had insomnia in the past, it’s because something’s going on. I am lying awake, thinking about it.

This was just night after night after night for no reason. I was waking up in a state of complete panic. My body, I don’t know what was going on, but it particular, it seemed to happen at 3:00 AM in the morning, I’d be able to get to sleep fine, and at 3:00 AM boom, I’d be awake. And the first time it happens, you’re like, okay, weird.

Then it was happening night after night, after night, after night. And if you’ve experienced insomnia, you will know that a lot of it starts to become a real mind game because you start thinking, oh my gosh, I’ve got a big presentation today. I’ve only had four hours sleep. How am I gonna function on it?

Only four hours sleep. And so it kind of al also becomes a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy. I was take, I was like meditating, meditating, meditating, meditating. I was listening to recordings and it just didn’t seem to be helping me at all. Then I started to experience the hot flushes or hot flashes. I’m not sure what the difference between the two terms is, but I’ll just say flushes for the purposes of, of this episode where I would wake up sweating, like proper sweating again, at the start, I’d think, okay, I have the blanket on.

Then I think, have I got some sort of terminal illness? And then I realise, hang on, this is. This is definitely a, a symptom, a perimenopausal symptom. I also was experiencing during the day, and I think that perhaps if you’ve got older family members, you might see someone sort of fanning themself and saying, I’m having a hot flush.

The thing that I hadn’t realised with the experience of, of feeling hot is that you also get this experience of, like, for me, this was far worse than the hot feeling, the heart racing. It was a feeling like, oh my gosh, I’m gonna have a heart attack. And a accompanied by this overwhelming feeling of, of being really hot.

So this was happening to me during the night I was having the night sweats. It was also happening during the day where I’d sort of freeze. And have this moment of, oh my gosh, like, ah, it boiling hot and also my heart’s racing and I feel like I’m gonna die. Yeah, it was a lot. Then, but you kind of, you know, I sort of was wondering is this isn’t this, and then trying to brush it off and think maybe I’m, I’m not experiencing per perimenopausal symptoms.

Then I started feeling feelings of extreme, I guess. Rage is the best way to describe it over things that ordinarily, like I’m normally pretty chill, things that ordinarily wouldn’t bother me at all. So an example was, one day I was driving and a car cut in front of me and I lost it. Like my kids were in the car and I’m like, what’s your epic problem?

And I was so angry. This like it’s, it was a rage, completely not commensurate to what had happened. And I noticed that this was happening more and more frequently. Not always externally, but sometimes it was just internally like I’m like, I am so angry at that person in a way that again, just didn’t feel really aligned to how I have felt a lot of my life, and also in not in a line with what was actually happening.

Another symptom, oh my gosh, the list goes on, was my forgetfulness the brain fog became really paralysing. I would forget what I came into a room for, which, you know, as someone who you know, has ADHD symptoms that’s not in and of its own terribly unusual for me, but to the point where I’d get in, I’d be like, I literally, it wasn’t a temporary, like, what, what was I here for?

It was like, I have no idea why I’m here. I also had an experience. I remember that we were going down to see my husband’s family, and I was trying to remember the names of my nieces, and it wasn’t just like a little bit of a, a delay, like what’s their names again? It was blank. Like I literally could not remember their names, and it was such a, a terrifying, scary feeling.

So again, I’m very grateful that there were people sharing about this online and you know, all of the ducks were sort of there, but I still wasn’t sure that that’s what I was going through. It was a really strange out-of-body experience. I kept thinking, oh my gosh, you know what’s going on with me?

Some more symptoms I was experiencing. Yeah, it gets better. This is the gift that keeps on giving. So I started to experience a, a level of anxiety. Again. I’ve unfortunately experienced anxiety throughout my life before but never to this level. The anxiety that I was experiencing was. I shouldn’t say was because I, you know, I shared on the podcast that I was recently experiencing this again.

But the, the level of anxiety was so paralysing. I was having anxieties. I remember my husband said to me, what are you anxious about? And I’m like, everything. And in situations that again, wouldn’t normally make me anxious. I’d be going to do the school run and I’d feel anxious. Like, what if I run into someone.

What if I don’t run into anyone I know and I have to stand there? It was really, yeah, it was awful. And I started to experience this other thing, which again, I’ve never experienced in my life, but I read this term in a Facebook group and I thought, oh my gosh, that’s exactly what I’m experiencing, which is internal tremors Now.

What? What is an internal tremor? I want you like, we know what a tremor is. It’s where you are, you are shaking, right? I felt like my whole body was shaking. I felt like I was tremoring, but when I’d looked down at my hands, they weren’t tremoring. And when I saw the term internal tremors, I was like, yes, that’s exactly what I’m experiencing.

Like my body is in such a state of, anxious paralysis that I’m shaking, I’m shivering, but externally I’m not. Again, very, very strange. Other things that I was experiencing, my skin crawling, pain in my joints. As you can see, there was a huge range of things that I was experiencing, not at a mild level, at a really a level that it felt like it was taking over my life.

So at this point in time, I went to see a doctor and just went in, was like, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. All this is going on. First doctor said, Hmm, you’re quite young. I was 42 at the time. You’re quite young. Don’t think that’s what’s going on. Let’s run some bloods. They ran bloods and one of the, the blood tests that they check for is your, your hormone levels, your estrogen levels, and they said, Nope, come back.

All fine. And so I left with this feeling of, okay, maybe all of these terrible symptoms are all completely in my head, which now in hindsight doesn’t make sense at all. And. I am in a Facebook group, perimenopause Facebook group, and I, I had seen so many people advocating and saying, don’t get blood tests done, because that is no longer the gold class standard for how they check for perimenopause.

It’s symptom led because your hormones can fluctuate rapidly from day to day, hour to hour. And so even though your bloods might show that you’re not perimenopausal. Clearly you are because all of the symptoms are there. So they advised go to a different doctor. Thank goodness I had read that heeded, that advice. I went to another clinic it’s actually here at the Gold Coast called the her clinic. But there are, you know, I, I guess I just wanted to share that if you have been to a doctor and been brushed off or dismissed, find another doctor in particular, one that specialises in women women’s health. So I went to another doctor and straight away the doctor asked me some questions and she’s like, yep, you are perimenopausal.

She had suggested HRT. Now I have heard of HRT, which is now called MRT. And I had been very reluctant to try that because I have a very strong family history of cancer. My grandma actually died at my age, leaving my dad with no mom. My dad has had bowel and bowel cancer, a brain tumor and melanoma. My auntie’s had breast and bowel cancer. My uncle died in his forties from leukemia. Another uncle died from cancer. My mom has had a tumor removed from her kidney and BCC. So basically my family is ridden with cancer. And given that I’d heard about the the cancer link, I was really scared to try HRT or MRT, but I was at this point where I am, like, I cannot go on like this.

I was starting to feel really sad all the time. I guess you’d say that I was starting to experience depression and I thought I have to do something. So this doctor on the spot gave me, she actually gave me a, a free bottle. She’s just like, here’s a bottle. Take it, give it a try. I started on the a lowest dose that was available. And honestly, within weeks, my life had completely changed. I felt like, I’m sorry, I’m not sure if I just said what it was, but she gave me a gel, which is called Estro Gel. And the way that this gel works is that you just rub it on your skin. I started on the lowest dose. I’m still on a really low dose of it. You have to take, because it’s an estrogen supplement, you have to make sure that you also are having a progesterone supplement at the same time. So I had the Mirena, which was releasing progesterone, so hence why I was able to just start on the gel. But honestly, within weeks I felt the old me creeping back. I started sleeping. I started, all my anxiety started to subside. The internal tremors were disappearing, and I just, it felt like an absolute game changer for me. That was now over a year ago that I started on the gel. And actually I realised as I recorded the last couple of episodes, all of those symptoms were starting to return.

Again, I went back to this Facebook group. I’m gonna share the link for this Facebook group in the show notes for today’s episode ’cause it’s been a game changer for me. But in the Facebook group, I read something about how they have dodgy batches or batches that aren’t as effective. And so I threw away that bottle, went onto a new bottle, and guess what? I am feeling fantastic again. So I obviously just had a dodgy bottle, which was causing a lot of my symptoms to return. 

Whew, a big episode. I’ve, I’ve shared a lot and again, that the intention behind me sharing is that if you are going through this, if you know someone who might be, you know, going through this as well, to have a little bit of empathy for, for what’s going on for them, or to help understand what might be going on if you aren’t at that age yet, I just wanna warn you that this may be coming for you. Maybe you might be one of the, the lucky ones who doesn’t experience it. And I also wanted to, I guess, share this because, just a reminder to the outside world, most people would’ve had no idea what was going on for me behind the scenes.

I was still socialising, I was still showing up on my social media with my big, bright, smiley, shiny face. I was still going to events or I was internalising so much of this because I didn’t want to burden other people with it. I have now started particularly of people that it might be relevant to.

I’ve started sharing about my, my journey in the hope that it might help others, but. Just a reminder, you never know what someone else is going through. There can be someone who has the biggest, brightest smile in the room and behind the scenes they might really be struggling with their health, their mental health. Their relationships. You just, you don’t know. So it’s just a, a friendly reminder to be kind. And also I think the more that we can start to have conversations about mental health, about health, about women’s health. We normalise this. I am so grateful that there were courageous people who had been talking about this online, that there were Facebook groups, there was support, because otherwise, who knows where I, where I could have been.

I, I wouldn’t have even known to go and get support. Like I said, I was internalising a lot of it. One other thing that I do wanna share that’s been really helpful for me is that I also started on a magnesium supplement. And I’ve also recently started on creatine. Magnesium is meant to be really fantastic for sleep, and so I’ve started on a, you know, a, a, a big dose of magnesium.

And again, I’m sleeping so well these days. I look back and I think, I can’t believe that I was going without sleep and not trying to get to the root cause of it because it really, it’s a game changer in how you feel. And the other thing that I have recently started is creatin. I did start creatin for my training for lifting weights because I have been hearing that it can help you to be able to train better, build more muscle, which again, is very important.

As you are going through menopause to be able to have bone health and muscle density because they, they’ve rapidly declined. So you know, my weights training is, is very important to me. But also creatine. There’s some studies that show that it’s really beneficial in terms of brain health. So, yeah.

Look, this is not medical advice. I know for some of you you might be very anti traditional medicine and that’s totally fine for you. You have your own experience, your own journey. For me, this has been my journey and I am so, so grateful for the medical support that I was able to receive.

Like I said, it’s been a game changer for me, but. Please go and seek expert help. Even if you aren’t going through menopause, if you are experiencing mental health struggles or health struggles in any area, go on a mission. Make it your journey to say, I am gonna get to the bottom of this, because life is so short and when you feel miserable, it just, it you, you’re not living your best, most fullest life.

So thank you for joining me for this very vulnerable episode of the podcast. I hope it’s been helpful for you. Please feel free to send me a DM or let me know your thoughts. I look forward to sharing more and more on the podcast if I think that there are things outside of business as well that are helpful for you.

But of course, this podcast primarily will be about money and business finance. So, yeah, thanks for joining me, and I look forward to chatting to you again in next week’s episode of the Clare Wood Podcast.

* Transcript created by AI – may contain errors or omissions from original podcast audis