Mary G, tried to pm you as don't want to ambush this pot, but can't click on send message, doesn't seem to be working.
I can't help but wonder if I have had similar issues, I used ‘serenity' natural progesterone cream for at least 4 or 5 years before menopause, it was during peri meno that I started needing to pee more often and urgently, didn't know about oestrogen connection at that time.
Eventually spoke to gp, she recommended vesicare, I tried it for a while, but didn't want to take medication, so carried on without it, then about a year later I went back to gp and she suggested estriole cream, that did help bladder/urgency, but then six mo this later I had a light bleed, I was 14 months post meno by that time.
I was referred for hysteroscopy.... when I went fir appointment, the gynae said my cervix was closed, and that in her words I was ‘too young' for this, I'm guessing due to lack of oestrogen, any way uterine lining was thin, only 4mm, but she suggested Mirena coil so I could use oestrogen locally and systemically without any worry of uterine lining building up.
It was all quite a shock to be honest, and when I left the hospital with the coil, the estring too, but no systemic oestrogen, the first thing I did was contact my gp to ask for oestrogel... I started using it within a week, but only one pump as I was terrified of using HRT
I stayed on one pump and estring for the six months , then upped to two pumps as I wanted to try without estring....again due to fear of using too much oestrogen.
I stopped using estring in the September (9 months after the start of my coil/estring/oestrogel HRT regime)
All seemed ok, then in the March, while on holiday in the Lake District, I had what I though was a bad thrash attack, treated it with canesten, still sore and burning etc, treated it again with canesten, minor improvement, then put two and two together and rememberecid not used local oestrogen since September, so in my return from holiday I contacted gp and got estring...been using ever since, but the VA was bad, and so in September I started a course of Mona Lisa treatment....I had 4 sessions, the last one was December, I am a lot more comfortable, but it took a long time to settle, I was still sore and irritated 6 weeks after last treatment, and even now I have days when I'm aware of things down there.
I tried as an experiment, upping oestrogel to 4 pumps for a mo th, and things were much better, but I felt scared of using 4 pumps so decreased to three, and been a bit sore again, emu oil is helping, and upped to 4 pumps again fir last few days, I do think that I'm better in 4...I just worry myself and dread to think how I will cope if I have to stop using HRT in years to come, as VA is unbearable.
Apologies for long post and ambushing optimists post, I just feel maybe I had progesterone dominance and not used enough oestrogen to counterbalance it 😟