Yes menopause is forever.
Re symptoms - there are two different aspects to this ( at least!).
Firstly there are the classic symptons that many women get when their ovaries start to fail and hormone levels first vary unpredictably and then oestrogen falls dramatically. The most obvious symptoms are hot flushes and night sweats but there is a myriad of other symptoms too. In some women these symptoms just last through the peri-menopause and early post-menopause and then they stop. Yay!
In other women the flushes go on for years and years, long into post-menopause and sometimes into old age. It is impossible to know whether you will be a short or long term flusher.... some women go onto HRT which carries them through the peri-menopausal period of unpredictability, then stop HRT and they remain free from flushes and sweats. Some women stop HRT and the symptoms return but then gradually decline so they become flush and sweat free, but for others who stop HRT the flushes and sweats gradually return and do not go away - maybe not so bad as in peri-menopause but there and annoying none the less.
Some women decide not to take HRT and then find that they still have flushes and sweats years later.
The second group of menopausal symptoms are those due to the permanent fall in oestrogen levels in your body. Some of these consequences do not produce obvious symptoms, instead there are adverse health consequences. Examples here are vaginal atrophy - sometimes develops or worsens a couple of years post-menopause, though earlier in many women. Osteoporosis - also is a long term health condition affecting many especially older women, though sometimes in younger women and esepcially those who have an early menopause and those with very low BMI/small skeletal frame. So some women with few or no peri-menopausal symptoms and who do not consider HRT, may develop osteoporosis. Genetics does play a part in the latter.
It is a choice obviously as to what you decide but bear this in mind - nowadays it is common for women to live into their 90's but may enter menopause in their late 40s or early 50's. This can mean almost half your life or say 40 years post-menopase and with depleted oestrogen.
Yes the body adapts to some extent but there is no denying these evidence based negative effects of oestrogen depletion.
Yes there my well be more health problems than first thought, that are due to menopause, but yes once that is accepted, for some things it can be put aside, and then get the condition properly investigated in its own right. Depending on age and stage, a trial of HRT may help.
Hurdity x
