Don’t Surrender to Menopause
By Tatiana Fleischman, MD
about it? Despite my background as a physician, I'm embarrassed to admit I failed to recognize my own menopausal symptoms.
W
First, I lost my sleep, the most I could get was 3 hours. I felt tired all the time. I stopped exercising because I didn't have energy and motivation. I gained weight. It was hard to make it through the day, even making dinner was an effort. I blamed it all on my demanding job and busy life. I grew irritable. One day I snapped at my mom over nothing on her birthday! Immediately I felt terrible but surprisingly she didn’t get upset. “You know,” she said, “I felt exactly like you when I started going through my menopause.” And that’s when it struck me - those were all the symptoms of menopause!
I was only 46 and although menopausal symptoms often oc-
cur in women at this age, I wasn't expecting them to happen to me. I wasn’t the only one. Millions of women dismiss the symp- toms or explain them away by working too hard, answering family demands or dealing with whatever else life might throw at them.
Symptoms of Menopause You may have heard that you are considered in menopause
when you haven’t had your period for at least a year. While this is true, the symptoms typically arrive 5-10 years before the periods stop. This is called perimenopause. Some symptoms are well known: hot flashes, night sweats and mood swings. But there are many more symptoms that are far less known. They are often misinterpreted and ignored by many women and even doctors. So, what are those symptoms?
Less Known Menopause Symptoms • Low energy • Poor sleep • Depression, anxiety • Weight gain
e’ve all heard the word menopause. If you are a woman, you’ve either been through menopause or are going to at some point. And yet, how much do we really know
• Memory problems • Brain fog • Muscle and joint pains • Thinning hair, crepey skin • Vaginal dryness • Low sex drive
And as if feeling moody, tired, out of shape and out of con-
trol weren’t bad enough, menopause carries serious health risks, because menopause means losing key hormones that protect us from many diseases.
Potential Health Risks Due to Menopause When your hormones start disappearing in menopause you
lose much more than a normal life. You lose protection against many diseases of aging:
1.Osteoporosis after menopause needs no introduction. It weak- ens your bones making them fragile. Breaking a hip makes you 3 times more likely to die within a year! And if you survive, there is a good chance you’ll end up in a nursing home.
2.Cardiovascular disease develops much faster after menopause because your heart and blood vessels are no longer protected by estrogen. This means many more heart attacks and strokes.
3.Alzheimer's disease and dementia have been linked to hor- mone deficiency brought by menopause.
When hormones are restored, the risk of these diseases drops
dramatically. Our body needs hormones to stay healthy and func- tion. However, once we stop making hormones, they won’t come back on their own. The only way to restore hormones after the production shutdown is to put them back into your body through hormone replacement therapy.
Hormone Replacement Therapy Hormone replacement therapy is the only effective treatment
available to reduce both the menopause symptoms and the risk of diseases. It’s truly a shame that over the last 20 years, so many women have been scared away from this potentially life-saving therapy by misinformation and media hype.
www.NaturalNutmeg.com 29
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46
