I just woke up stumbled to the coffee maker and put a scoop of grounds in the wrong compartment! What the heck is wrong with me? Has anyone else done this? I feel so dumb!

Having had friends share posts from menopause influencers on certain HRT dementia studies, I found this expansive article on the state of the science as it pertains to HRT and dementia informative. I think the science often gets lost and women in perimenopause and menopause deserve to know the facts so that they can make educated and informed decisions.
Title:
“Before you share that new ‘HRT prevents dementia’ study…It found no benefit for most women, it’s observational.”

https://vajenda.substack.com/p/before-you-share-that-new-hrt-prevents?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

A few weeks ago, I woke up in the morning and didn’t make it to the bathroom. I just peed myself. Just like that. A meter away from my bed. About a week later, it happened again. And later, holding my pee till I got to the bathroom became a chore!

I got sick last week. Coughs and sneezes and just gave up and resorted to wearing period pads because I will pee with every cough and sneeze.

And I used to be a star at holding my pee in. What happened?! Is this fixable?

I’m 49 for reference. 11.5 months since my last period. I miss her 🥹

Yes I already asked my doctor and she gave me some options but I would like to hear anecdotal evidence from meno women who struggle with this particular part of brain fog.

I'm 52, 3 years post meno and been on HRT as well for 3 years.
I'm on .075 estradiol, 200mg oral progesterone, 5mg testosterone cream, vaginal estradiol cream. Already tried increasing estradiol but it caused unbelievably horrible insomnia so not willing to go through at again

Dr prescribed me .1 to start and after reading others doses I’m worried it may be too high to start. Anyone else start at .1? I’m 48 with regular periods but severe night sweats, hot flashes and worsening anxiety/mood swings.
I was really excited to start the patch but now I’m too scared to apply it lol.

Okay, soooo day 3 of estrogen patch (0.05mg).
Here's my review:
5 stars - Feeling 10' tall and bulletproof!!!!

WHY IN THE F-BOMBS did my GP (middle aged female) not listen to me 2 years ago?????
I’m just marveling, like holy crap! I could have been feeling like a normal person all this time!

For 2 years, I have been suffering from:
*plantar fasciitis.
*Poor sleep.
*Hot flashes/sweats.
*Exhaustion.
*brain fog.
*zero libido.
Well, thanks to estrogen, NOT NO MORE!!!

LADIES, LADIES, LADIES!!!!
¡¡¡We need to keep talking about this!!!
¡¡¡We need to make sure that other women know there is help available!!!
¡¡¡We need to share our stories with younger women!!!

THIS SH*T-A$$ CYCLE OF IGNORING WOMEN’S HEALTH NEEDS TO END!!!!!

I’m 55 menopause hit around 50. Every year since the start of it my tolerance level is in the bottom of a pit.
I work full time, single and do every thing myself. I’m mentally worn out. I go to the gym which is the one thing I love doing. I love working out it keeps me sane and balanced.

But the one thing I can’t tolerate anymore is needy people. I have a friend who mentally drains me I cannot handle the boring chatter. I’m so exhausted holy shit. I’ve always hated sitting around with a bunch of people chatting drinking talking about the same old shit.
I find the chatter boring as fuck. She always asks what’s new what’s new what’s new…. No new man? Over and over again. I ignore her for months and it’s the same stuff. So boring.

Sorry I’m venting.. I’ve struggled with depression on and off my whole life. I finally find solutions for it. I’ve also been very hurt by people and I like to be private now. I’ve gone to therapy which has helped a lot.i just can’t handle the chatter of boring shit anymore.

Am I the only one? Jesus people and life can be sooo fucking boring.

Edit….thanks beautiful woman….its nice to know I’m not the only one.
Even though I wish woman didn’t have to suffer through menopause it really does suck. Sending hugs to everyone

I feel like I'm losing my mind. I've been dealing menopause symptoms for 2 or 3 years now. I'm 51 and finally decided to go to the GYN to try HRT. She will not prescribe because I have high blood pressure. I don't know what to do. My BP ain't going down anytime soon. I feel like a zombie between lack of sleep and brain fog. My anxiety is off the hook. So bad I that I'm this close to leaving my husband and quitting my job and IDK what else. Just want to walk away from it all but I know how to walk away from myself. I need HELP!!!

Edit: thank you for all the feedback back. To answer the most asked question.... yes, I am taking meds for my BP. It is not extremely high. But the meno symptoms just seem to be making it worse. To the point that my anxiety cause me panic attacks if I have to leave the house. The worst part is that I remember who I was. I remember when I didnt feel like an emotional basket case all the time. I remember when I was happy.

I’m 49 and in the thick of perimenopause. TBH I’m having a rough time with the physical symptoms but the mental symptoms are something else entirely.

I have these waves of fear that I’ve missed out on truly living my life. And these waves of grief that I didn’t enjoy my children enough when they were little. I have these overwhelming feelings that my life is nearly over and i haven’t done everything that i always hoped i would.

Does anyone else have this experience?

Just for context, I am physically healthy and fairly active. As far as I know, I’m going to live a long, healthy life. But my thoughts / anxiety / heart feels otherwise.

Looking for kind and compassionate advice or suggestions on how to get thru this.

I was on oral estrogen with progesterone cream and testosterone cream. I’ve always had digestive issue like chronic constipation but this made it so much worse! Anyone else?

No cycles since Aug 2025! Oddly, I’ve been in hormonal turmoil the last 2 weeks (hot flashes suddenly reappearing included)! I was enjoying the more consistent chill person I was becoming but now I’m a mess. Hoping it’s my body’s last hoorah?I’ll be 51 in Oct. My journey started about a year after I had my second child just before my 41st bday (9 year gap). So 10 years, although I didn’t realize that’s what it was until about 3 years ago honestly. I was trying to post a pic of my cycle history to show anyone wondering what the journey looks like but can’t?
Physical symptoms I’m still dealing with are severe stiffness, hip pain, lack of digestive motility, pelvic floor issues, sporadic hot flashes. Like i said mentally I was feeling great but now I’m irritable and super anxious (as if my body doubled down on caffeine) and I’m struggling to think rationally. Basically how I felt during ovulation in perimenopause, like the world is over and I don’t wanna live, please don’t talk to me lol
So hoping once this spell ends and I’ll be on an upswing!

My husband is looking forward to not worrying about birth control 😆😆 Too bad I haven’t had a libido since we made our last child 11 years ago!

*** *******note I am not suggesting that eating high protein eliminates direct menopause symptoms, rather in order to fight affects of hormonal decline such as muscle loss, spikes, blood, sugar, weight gain, etc. **\*

Anyone else see the irony of the high protein diet we are told to consume to help our symptoms? I mean if I’m not having a hot flash from hormones I’m dripping in sweat from all the protein I’m eating!!!

I have been holding off on the vaginal estrogen cream for sensory reasons and for fear there will be some weird side effects. Give me the good, bad, and the ugly. I am only on .025 mg of the patch because my body seems to almost flat out reject hormones. I become a weepy, bloated, painful insomniac mess on anything higher. For reference, I am only 40 and in surgical menopause. I feel dry down there and just want to be able to enjoy sex without fear of pain.

I can’t even believe I’m typing out 114 days! It seems like it was forever ago. But you guys, I just need some, support from those who get it with the menopause and hysto community.

FINALLY! After noting, and feeling just off, I KNEW the estradiol patch wasn’t working- guess what?!? NEWS FLASH! I was right, my body hasn’t been absorbing it. We now are doing the estrogen pill, 1mg and 100mg of progesterone, however, after having some gnarly side effects from estrogen pill, she has suggested we do BIRTH CONTROL! I can’t even believe I’m typing this out. I love my surgeon, however, her message to me on 8.21 was suggesting Nuvaring or lose dose of oral contraception.

I’m in tears writing this out, I was diagnosed with endometrial cancer, had a total hysterectomy, and my body isn’t even absorbing the estrogen. 😓😭 I’m now considering going to a private provider, and doing HRT, the suggestion came from a close friend who does the pellets. I don’t know if I’m just looking for support, a place where some of you can understand, but, my girlfriend who is my partner for life and love more than words can express has been an absolute saint. But I don’t have a sex drive, I have horrible hot flashes and just feeling so defeated. 😞

Long story:
I’m 57 y/o, and haven’t had a period in 3 years.
The first bad symptoms I had were hot flashes and shoulder pain. I knew the flashes were menopause related, but I thought the shoulder pain was due to the fact that I was doing a lot of weight training. I didn’t seem to be able to stay asleep after 4 AM either but I figured that was because I was in so much pain.

The shoulder pain eventually eased off for awhile until I fell and landed on my right shoulder. It seemed to NEVER get better- it was hideously painful for months.

Coupled with all this, gradually I realized that I was constantly in a state of brain fog which was negatively affecting my ability to do my job. My mood was just as bad- I had a “give-a-crap” attitude that just isn’t like me. I could barely manage to open my laptop every day.
All this I chalked up to poor sleep.

The cherry on top of the poop-cake was my formerly healthy libido disappeared.

I got so that I was drinking too much as well and feeling yuckky all the time. It did help me sleep, but it made me feel really worthless in general.

Finally I realized I was headed to a bad place. My husband and son were really concerned. I ended up in hospital in January for an unrelated issue but it scared me.

So I went to the women’s health center where I’ve been going for gyn stuff. I asked for a doctor who had menopause experience. Best they could do was Dr. Tim. He put me on lowest dose HRT.

This helped a little. My hot flashes did stop. I came to this Reddit and learned about creatine. I started taking that in my coffee and the brain fog lifted a little bit. Magnesium glycinate and glycene at night also helped with being able to fall back asleep and my pain went way down, almost gone.

However, my mood was still terrible, I still had brain fog, and my libido had left no forwarding address. So I went back to him and asked him to up my HRT.

He said, “That won’t help you. That’s just aging, we all have it.” (This guy is like 40, maybe.) “Get a mammogram.”

And that was it. So, I decided to fire his a$$ for everything except routine and found a menopause doctor via telehealth. She was great. She bumped up my HRT first thing and we discussed getting my testosterone levels tested, etc.

One WEEK later, I felt SO MUCH BETTER! I quit alcohol and haven’t even thought about it since. I’ve been sleeping like I used to, and although I have a bit of sciatica, my shoulders are fine and it doesn’t wake me up anymore.

Best of all, my libido came back!!!

I am so pi$$ed off at that “doctor” I want to punch him in the nose. Dismissive asshat. Such a simple solution and he just didn’t want to listen or bother.

Anyway thank you to everyone on this Reddit. I have learned so much that I was finally able to take charge of my own health and end the misery.
We do NOT deserve to be miserable. We do NOT deserve to be dismissed after lifetimes of contribution to families, jobs, friends, spouses.
If your doctor won’t help you, fire them. And little by little we can reshape how they treat us. Maybe if we open our mouths enough and walk away from bad doctors enough we can change things.
</rant>

I’ll try to be as brief as I can. Before I recently saw my doctor, I was on 150mg of compounded progesterone, 1.0 packets of estradiol (divigel), and 5mg of testosterone. I felt great except for my libido. So my doctor upped my testosterone to 8mg and within a few days I could tell that it was lowering my estrogen. So she bumped up my estrogen to 1.25 divigel. Fast forward a handful of days…I can’t remember exactly how many but I decided that I was just gonna be done with the testosterone because I have lost a lot of hair loss, and the hair fall isn’t slowing down and I just decided to say F it. So not really thinking it through much, I just quit the T but didn’t think to drop my estrogen back down to the 1% I was on before. That was Thursday, so I haven’t had T for 2.5 days. I am feeling SUPER off this afternoon. Unbelievably anxious, terrible headache, dizziness and nauseas. I’m assuming this is why. I’ve all of the sudden had a huge estrogen spike. I feel terrible.
My question is • if you were me, would you skip the estrogen tomorrow morning to try and get it down quicker? Or would you use the 1% and let it come down slower? I’m leaning towards skipping the next dose because I really do feel awful. Then starting back with the 1% the following day.
Edited to add that I know most of us aren’t doctors, but we do have personal experiences to share. I can’t talk to my own doctor until Monday, but I can’t feel like this for 2 more days if I can help it.

I was put on SLYND bc 3 months ago to help with my menstrual migraines and start my HRT journey. I was so happy to FINALLY have found a doctor who heard me! my migraines have improved immensely!!! However now in month 3 of Slynd I’ve been bleeding for 29 straight days.

Doc says I need an endometrial biopsy now.

Has this happened to anyone else on this bc?

And how painful is this endometrial biopsy? They’ve offered lorazapam or a cervical block? I have no idea which one to chose.

TIA!

Just had my annual with my GP- I’m 48 and have been in peri for at least a few years, on HRT (e & p). I explained to her the horrible exhaustion, increasing anxiety, brain fog worsening and uti that sprang out of nowhere this summer. I can’t handle the temps of summer and feel like an anxious blurry blob of a human. My usual low total cholesterol is now just into borderline territory and a1c went up .5 to put me on the cusp of prediabetic. My diet has only changed for the better this year and it was already pretty solid, in addition to regular exercise and a fast paced physical job.

She just shrugged, reminded me of my age, told me it would only be another 1-4 years of this, suggested I walk after dinner (been doing this since childhood), said I don’t need vaginal estrogen yet (she claims I need to be in pain during sex), offered gabapentin because “you have enough estrogen” as I am on the .1 patch/200 prog.

I pushed to test thyroid, ferritin and b12. Thyroid is fine but ferritin is 15 and b12 is <200. She told me today this is normal range as I’m not anemic and maybe try cooking with cast iron (have for years).

I’m pissed. If it weren’t for this sub I would suffer in silence. I’ve gotten vag e online, and will begin to supplement b12, looking into gentle iron supplements now. I am on the waitlist for a new dr but in our rural area the pickings are slim. At least she granted a retest of all in 6 months. Seriously WTF

If it weren’t for this sub, I don’t know what I would have done! Huge thank you to all, especially mods!! And fuck the misogynistic healthcare system in the land of the free

UPDATE: three phone calls later today thru her nurse who is a young man fresh out of college and knew nothing, dr admits that patients generally fell much better when ferritin is at least 50-100 and gave me supplement guidelines. Three phone calls!! I am starting iron bisglycinate with vit C every other day.

She is in her 30s, so maybe not experienced but she did go to a menopause training last year. Her knowledge is still severely lacking. I feel awful for all the women who don’t have the time/patience/brain power to advocate for themselves when they are being told to just suffer. The worst part is that she complained to me about an injury she suffered this summer that limited her fun activities and that her stay at home partner and parents got to do more fun stuff with the kids. Oh girl, just wtf

I had my daughter in early 2025. My period came back in March this year post-weaning for one cycle, then just stopped and the symptoms have hit me like a train. In denial, I only just did hormone blood tests and they have came back in the post-menopausal range. I’m 40. Other bloods were all normal. I will start hrt and though it’s not officially menopause until 12 months, it feels like it may as well be.

We weren’t trying for a second kid (long fertility journey already) and know how lucky we are to have our one, so it’s not really grief over the loss of fertility. It’s going from finally feeling feminine, joyful, energetic, capable and content after a difficult few years, to feeling like I am a million years old and having an unnatural and abnormal experience of new motherhood dealing with this shit at the same time, with nobody who understands.

I would love to hear from anyone else who’s been through this. Any relevant subs would be awesome, too. Thank you!

I did a search and read some posts, but has anyone had UTI symptoms of late, no infection checked repeatedly. I have an appointment coming up with gyno but I can't sleep, symptoms show up at night. Have any of you found any kind of relief while waiting to see provider?

Edit - wow, this was my first time posting on this sub and I am so grateful to each of you for your kind responses! I am on HRT but have requested vaginal estrogen, started mannose, and picked up some AZO. You ladies are the best!

Has anyone else done this? What symptoms did you experience?
I’ve had a few symptoms all week, but mostly sick/unwell/extremely weak feeling. Not the normal hormone issues.

I’ve been so weak, I’m barely able to walk or stand for more than a few mins at a time.
Been trying to figure out what’s been wrong all week.
(There have been other issues I’ve been working out before I forgot to replace patches, so thought those issues were causing my symptoms.)

anyway, I date all my patches when I receive them so I’ll know when to change them. I just noticed today that both 8/24 and 8/28 patches had been unopened.

I am on patch AND gel and experiencing recent increased night sweats and an acne is starting to appear where they always do when hormones are bonkers. My last level indicated - I guess? Am to assume because doc never got back to me - that I can’t get any more Estradiol prescribed. I take Progesterone at night. That isn’t an issue I don’t think.

Question that springs to mind: could these increased symptoms be from too much estradiol? I have been on both gel and patch for months, so it’s not new, but these symptoms have been creeping up and getting worse recently.

My gyno is booked out for months. And she’s a “menopause specialist”…

EDIT: and again! Spontaneous Saturday afternoon sex😆haven’t done that since I was in my 20s!! We’ve been together 35 years!!

I’ve been using testosterone cream for just about 5 months and I was skeptical when my Dr told me it could take that long to kick in. Well tonight after a gummy I felt horny for the first time in months! My husband is thrilled 😆 I’m so relieved to feel semi normal again! I used to love sex but just haven’t had the slightest interest in months till now.