About a year ago I noticed my periods getting longer, shorter apart and heavier. They start, get really heavy, then stop and then start again lasting up to 10 days. I also got PMS and pains that I had not had before children. In addition to this I got occasional night sweats and tiredness. I've always had some bouts of insomnia but since then I have had some very serious sleep issues.
I've always been someone who gets stressed out easily and who has had low level anxiety. Also someone who ruminates and turns over things in my head. However, I have not needed to do anything about it as it was manageable. I have always had a healthy diet and did a lot of exercise.
I went to the Doc last year and then went to see a private Menopause doctor who told me that I was showing peri-menopausal symptoms but seemed to be on top of it. Now I do not feel like I am.
I do not have a problem with the physical symptoms. They do not bother me at all, well yet anyway. It is the increased anxiety that I cannot cope with. For example, a year ago it manifested itself as not wanting to be held in e.g. seat belts on a plane or in a traffic jam and even sitting in a hairdressers chair for ages. That lasted a while and dissipated. For the past few weeks though it has taken another turn. I've had a few nights when I have woken up at 3am and had horrible intrusive thoughts that have scared me a lot. I've then spent the next few days in a state of anxiety thinking about what I have been thinking with part of my brain is telling me that I must be going crazy and may be carted off in a white van never to see my family again. To coincide with this, on both occasions this has happened, my period started that night. Since this happened to me 2 days ago I have felt really down, like I am losing my mind. This happened last month too and I got over it and then wondered what the hell I was thinking.
I had blood work done last year and it said I was borderline peri-menopausal. Three years prior to this a medical said I wasn't peri menopausal or anywhere near it, so the report last year is a drop in my hormones. I literally know nothing about this and have no one to talk to. No sisters, mum or aunty. I see telling myself that I am probably peri-menopausal but then my tired, unslept mind plays tricks on me and tells me that maybe I am just going crazy which upsets me as I have a couple of young children to look after and I don't want to walk into my doctors and present myself as a crazy lady. I will be 49 in a couple of months and started my periods when I was 13. I've always had short cycles e.g. 23 days and had to have fertility treatment in the past for polycystic ovaries.
Thanks for reading and for any comments. I am feeling so lost and scared.