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[Rhubarb]

Article I found today about a US study on hot flashes in menopause.
Briefly mentions HRT, it's risks, and alternatives.  Interesting since we just had the thread on US vs UK differences in attitude toward HRT.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/17/health/hot-flashes-can-linger-as-long-as-14-years-study-finds.html'smid=fb-share&_r=0

[Petra]

I, too, noticed the very thin mention of HRT in that otherwise utterly depressing (14 years' of hot flashes!!!! Aaarrghhh) article. I lived in the U.S. for 15 years, now back home in NZ and recently went back on HRT because primarily of miserable sleep deprivation brought on by endless, repeating night sweats.

The way HRT was given such short shrift in the article annoyed me, as did how -- to my mind -- hot flashes/sweats were treated somewhat lightly. I suppose not everyone is as crippled by them as others and yet somehow it all still seems a bit ha ha at times...one woman talked about not being able to wear silk, anymore. I don't mean to belittle her symptoms, since she also said she needed a fan on her desk at work, but if not being able to wear silk anymore was anywhere close to an issue for me, then I'd be happy as a clam, really! But getting no sleep night after night and feeling utterly depressed and barely functional as a result... That's my experience of the sweats.

[CLKD]

What does 'seminal' mean exactly 

[honeybun]

adjective

potentially capable of development
highly original, influential, and important



There you go CLKD

Honeyb
X

[CLKD]

   only heard it in the context of being referred to 'Leige and Leif' by Fairport 

[Mary G]

I really don't get it.  Are these women seriously expected to live for years with these dreadful, embarrassing and life ruining symptoms when they could so easy transform their lives by rubbing some gel onto their bodies?  Can you imagine being one of the unlucky ones and living like that for 14 years?  OK, there are some people who either can't or don't want to take HRT for various reasons but what about the millions who do want to take it that are being denied it or simply put off by outdated information?  I also fear these women will face all sorts of other problems in later life with brittle bones etc.  The now discredited million women study did women a huge disservice and these poor women are paying for it big time.

[Greenfields]

I think that's the thing - people don't get what it's like to live with really debilitating symptoms until they experience them ... I know I didn't.
I started perimenopause last year and really it wasn't that much of an issue until I got sick and, as a consequence, stopped exercising (which I now realise was keeping my hormone levels and stress levels in check)... then my perimenopausal symptoms ramped up spectacularly and I didn't know what had hit me and ended up with a hormone related breakdown.

However, if the milder symptoms I had been experiencing prior to getting really ill had continued, I wouldn't have thought that menopause was that big a deal.  Now I know - from having my own horrendous personal experience - that it can be hugely debilitating and completely up end one's life ... but I never saw it coming and if anyone had described what happened to me as what could happen at menopause, I never would have believed them.

There needs be much more awareness and education done around the whole issue of menopause and a lot more compassion towards people having a rough time.