menopause Health
What is Menopause?
- Menopause is the time when you have not had a period for 12 consecutive months. The average age is 51-52 years but can occur between 45-55 years of age
- Peri menopause is the time before menopause; 40-45 years of age; you are noticing changes in your cycle length, amount of bleeding, among other symptoms
- Post Menopause is considered once you have no longer had a period for 12 consecutive months and for the rest of your life
What Are The Most Comon Symptoms of Menopause?
- Irregular periods
- Hot flashes and night sweats (vasomotor symptoms)
- Sleep problems
- Mood changes; anxiety, irritability, depression
- Vaginal dryness
- Pain with penetration
- Bladder/bowel incontinence
- Increased risk of urinary tract infections (UTI’s)
- Pelvic organ prolapses
- Brain fog, trouble finding words and difficulty concentrating
- Joint and muscle aches/pains, stiffness, weakness
- Difficulty losing weight/tendency to gain weight
- Thinner and drier skin, hair and nails
- Tinnitus (ringing in the ears)
Hormonal Options
Hormone Therapy
This is best talked about with your family Doctor or your women’s health specialist.
Menopause hormone therapy (MHT) does its best work alleviating vasomotor symptoms which are hot flashes and night sweats. Although there are different options, most commonly estrogen is delivered across the skin (transdermal) by either a cream, gel or a patch. Other delivery methods include pellets, vaginal estrogen, or oral options.
If you have a uterus you definitely must also use progesterone though many women’s health specialists believe progesterone is necessary whether you have a uterus or not because progesterone acts in other areas of your body, not just your uterus.
Testosterone, for women, is most commonly offered via cream to the skin, though it can be offered in a pellet form as well.
What Do Our Hormones Do?
Estrogen:
- In our vaginas: estrogen acts as a lubricator, it helps our pelvic floor muscles be able to contract more fully and helps protect us from UTI’s
- In our heart and blood vessels; estrogen helps our blood vessels be pliable so blood flows more easily and protects our heart against damage
- In our muscles; estrogen allows for our muscles to repair and regenerate, helps us gain strength and helps us reduce joint aches/pains
- In our brain; estrogen helps with our memory and our moods
Progesterone
- In our heart and blood vessels; progesterone helps to keep good tone in our blood vessels thereby helping our heart function more efficiently
- In our brain; progesterone helps us feel less anxious and can help us sleep better
- In our muscles; helps to maintain bone density
Testosterone
- In our heart and blood vessels; testosterone helps increase the size and strength of our heart muscle cells and can help relax our blood vessels to improve blood flow
- In our brain; testosterone helps us feel motivated and increases our overall sex drive
- In our muscles; testosterone can increase the size of our muscle fibers allowing us to have more strength
Non Hormonal Options
What we have typically been doing, even if we are a good weight and fitness level, may not work quite as well as it used to. This is very frustrating and confusing to most women. But, once we understand more of what has happened, we can start to make changes!
Stress
We all know how too much negative stress in our lives will eventually impact every part of us. This makes us feel not as capable, we aren’t as productive, we are more fatigued and we might even feel ill. When we are going through our menopause journey, we need to feel as healthy as we can and find ways to handle our stresses.
Sleep
How do you feel when you haven’t slept well? What about if it’s not just one bad sleep, but many? When we don’t sleep well, our organs, our brain and our muscles aren’t able to fully recover. Sleep is THE most important ingredient for a healthy menopause journey.
Nutrition
Are you gaining weight? Are you having a problem losing that weight? What we used to eat might need to change because our bodies have now changed. Without the assistance of our ever helpful hormones, we need to learn more about how to get the most important nutrients in our food choices.
Exercise
Are you exercising like you always have but are gaining weight? Losing lean muscle? Experiencing weird injuries? When we don’t have the protection of estrogen, these things may happen. But you can learn to tweak things and achieve the results you want.
Pelvic Health
Are you losing your sex drive? Is sexual penetration painful? Are you peeing your pants? Do you know where all the bathrooms are in your city? These are all very common symptoms but they can all be changed.