Oh my goodness, Annie! That sounded like a nightmare with the sickness and headaches. Wee soul!
I wish they could come up with a magic formula - none of us would be here then! I like to think at some time in the future, people will look back on how we treat menopause and think how crude our efforts at hormone replacement were because things have by then moved on. Maybe then someone will have discovered a way to bypass the menopause completely! Or else in the very distant future as a species we will evolve so that it's not part of our biological ageing.
To be honest, I wish personally I hadn't even started HRT. Maybe my Consultant Gynaecologist was right when he said I could manage without it. I went over a year without, and only really went on it because depression was starting to cripple me and none of the AD's my GP had tried had worked. And because I panicked because there was a lot coming out in the media at that time ahead of the new guidelines being released about how HRT is needed to maintain good health. Mainly in the Daily Mail, I think. I don't read it now (a move in the right direction, I think)! I had joint pain for a few months during this time, but this had started to ease quite a bit. I was sleeping through the night, no hot flushes. My hair was good, skin only a little dry as to be expected with ageing. I also felt more like 'myself'. On HRT I always feel weirdly unlike myself and a bit strangely 'possessed, if that makes any sense.(Crikey, that makes me sound like a weirdo)!
Since all this HRT experimentation, I have felt much worse in so many ways. The best I have felt really during this time was when I was on a nominal dose of 0.3mg Premarin and when I evened out again on nothing at all following my hormone crash when I had to come off the Estrogel the first time after the chest pains developed. During both these times I had no mood swings, and although I had developed hot flushes for the first time I felt they were 'rebound' after stopping the Estrogel abruptly and they started to lessen. But then I went back on HRT again.
I couldn't go through another hormone crash again right now as I feel too fragile mentally, but if my Psychiatrist is able to help me with an AD that suits (he's thinking Venlafaxine) then I may very well try to come off HRT again completely in the future (with the exception of vaginal estrogen as needed - but so far I haven't needed this. Touch wood)!. I know it safeguards bones etc. etc. but seriously - this whole battle has taken me to such dark places this last year and I still feel totally pants. I don't think I can get my estrogen levels high enough that I can tolerate to get the Testosterone, and for me delivery methods that fluctuate madly are a killer. I'd need an IV of estrogen strapped to my arm drip feeding the stuff for me to ever feel stable, I think!
