For some women the menopause is marked by just the occasional hot flush and tiredness. For others ‘the change’ can be utterly debilitating as they try to deal with a flood of symptoms, both physical and psychological.
But because many symptoms, such as bad breath, itchy skin and even irritable bowel syndrome, have no obvious connection to hormones, women may often not realise their problems are menopausal.
Today, we reveal everything you need to know about menopause symptoms, from the most common to the more unexpected. We’ve picked the brains of top experts to help you understand the sometimes unexpected things that are happening to your body.
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Some women are only affected by occasional hot flushes and tiredness during the menopause while others suffer from debilitating symptoms, both physical and psychological (file image)
The good news is that simple lifestyle changes can do much to ease all but the most severe.
In Saturday’s paper we outlined the food choices to ease your passage through this life stage. Yesterday, we looked at how relaxation therapies can help ease the stress and anxiety that can so often accompany the ‘change’.
Today, we highlight the menopause-busting power of exercise — and you don’t even have to squeeze into Lycra running shorts to benefit! Even a short daily walk can make a difference.
But, first, here’s our unique guide to your menopause symptoms to help you understand the often unexpected things that are happening to your body.
Many women will find they have trouble sleeping and suffer from night sweats during menopause (file image)
BRAIN
Depression, anxiety, mood swings: Oestrogen helps raise levels of the brain chemicals serotonin and dopamine, which are responsible for mood regulation. Low oestrogen can lead to low mood, and affect your ability to cope with stressful situations, triggering agitation, dry mouth, hyperventilation, rapid heartbeat and shortness of breath.
Dizziness: This may be caused by anxiety or panic attacks (erratic breathing and heart rate can reduce the flow of blood and oxygen to the brain), or is linked to the effect hormones have on blood vessels, making blood pressure fluctuate.
Sleep problems: These can be triggered by night sweats, but are also directly linked to oestrogen, which regulates our magnesium levels. Magnesium helps muscles relax, allowing us to fall asleep. Lower oestrogen also means the throat muscles become slack, leading to problems such as snoring.
Poor sleep is linked to lower progesterone, the hormone important for falling and staying asleep.
Brain fog: Forgetting things, poor concentration and inability to find the right words can all be linked to the drop in oestrogen.
Not only does the brain need oestrogen to help it function, but it also encourages blood flow in the brain.
During the menopause forgetting things and poor concentration can be linked to the drop in oestrogen that happens during the change (file image)
Other menopausal symptoms such as stress, night sweats and poor sleep can further affect focus. Studies show women may not be able to learn as well as normal shortly before menopause.
Thankfully, full mental function normally returns after menopause.
Tiredness/fatigue: Hormones help regulate how our cells use energy, so when levels drop, so, too do energy levels. Many menopausal women experience persistent feelings of weakness, tiredness and apathy, even after a good night’s sleep. However, these can also be a sign of thyroid problems or iron deficiency, so talk to your GP.
HAIR
Thinning hair: The loss of oestrogen leads to a drop in collagen, a natural protein in hair, so hair becomes more brittle. The natural rate of hair loss can also speed up (on the head and elsewhere) — the follicles need oestrogen to sustain hair growth.
MOUTH
Bleeding gums and taste changes can also be a side effect of the menopause (file image)
Bleeding gums and taste changes: Oestrogen is important for the lubrication of mucous membranes, such as those in the mouth. Lower levels mean the mouth becomes drier, allowing bacteria to flourish, causing tooth decay and making your gums bleed.
This can damage the taste buds on your tongue, setting off the pain nerve cells, causing bad breath, a bad taste or a burning sensation on the tongue.
HEART
Palpitations: Oestrogen deficiency can effectively over-stimulate the nervous and circulatory systems, causing a pounding, rapid and irregular heartbeat. See a GP to rule out a possible heart problem.
LUNGS
Allergies: Hormones and the immune system are inextricably linked, and menopausal changes can lead to allergies becoming worse, or you may develop them for the first time, particularly asthma, hay fever and dermatitis.
BREASTS
Breast tenderness: Fluctuating hormones can lead to an imbalance where progesterone temporarily dominates; this can trigger fluid retention, causing tenderness.
BODY TEMPERATURE
Hot flushes/sweats: As levels of oestrogen drop, the hypothalamus gland — the body’s thermostat — can be fooled into thinking you’re overheating; you sweat and flush to cool down.
Sudden heat or redness often starts in the face, neck or chest and then spreads; you will then start to sweat. Your heart rate may increase or you may have palpitations.
ABDOMEN/GUT
Weight gain: You may struggle to keep the weight off, as the body strives to retain fat cells, especially on the abdomen, as fat produces oestrogen.
As your testosterone levels drop, your metabolic rate slows — so women need fewer calories if they want to avoid gaining weight.
The stress linked to menopause raises levels of cortisol, which encourages fat deposits around the abdomen.
Bloating: Oestrogen is important for maintaining the correct amount of water and bile in your body. As levels begin to change, you tend to store more water, making you feel bloated. Because your body produces less bile, you don’t digest fats as well, leading to flatulence.
Bloating during the menopause is a common side effect, as are cramps and weight gain (file image)
Other changes in the gut mean food passes through more slowly, resulting in a build-up of gas as the undigested food ferments.
Bloating at menopause is more common in women who have experienced it as part of pre-menstrual syndrome (PMS), possibly indicating an increased sensitivity to hormonal fluctuations.
Irritable bowel syndrome: The muscles of the gut have oestrogen receptors, so the drop in oestrogen can reduce muscle tone, slowing transit time and triggering indigestion, nausea, diarrhoea or constipation. The stress of menopause can also affect the gut.
Cramps: Conflicting messages being sent by erratic hormones can lead to period-type pain in the lower abdomen.
SKIN/NAILS
Itchy skin: The body needs oestrogen to produce collagen (a fibrous protein that keeps skin plump) and for lubrication. So a drop in levels can mean the skin becomes dry, flaky and itchy; dryness can also lead to formication, a sensation like crawling insects.
The lack of natural lubrication during the menopause means that fingernails can become dry and brittle and will be prone to splitting (file image)
The skin also becomes thinner and less dewy-looking. Collagen loss tends to be most rapid at the beginning of menopause.
Brittle nails: The lack of natural lubrication also makes nails prone to splitting.
MUSCLES/JOINTS
Muscle pain and weakness: Oestrogen has a calming effect on the body; as levels drop, the stress hormone cortisol can dominate, causing the muscles to tighten and tire. All muscles have oestrogen receptors, so falling levels can trigger pain and affect muscle tone.
Joint pain: Oestrogen also has an effect on your joints — low levels during menopause can lead to increased joint pain or trigger it for the first time, known as menopausal arthritis.
WOMB/BLADDER
Hormonal imbalances can mean that periods may become heavier or lighter than before (file image)
Heavy bleeding: The hormonal imbalance can lead to changes in flow (periods may be heavier or lighter than before, and there may be clots) and frequency (with longer, shorter, or irregular cycles).
Oestrogen normally thickens the womb lining, and the egg that’s released produces progesterone, which reduces that thickening effect. However, if no egg is produced (egg production becomes erratic during the lead-up to the menopause), the thicker lining is shed as a heavy period.
Incontinence: The loss of collagen linked to lower oestrogen levels can mean the tissues around the bladder become thinner and less elastic.
The surrounding pelvic muscles may weaken, too, causing urine to leak when you cough, laugh or sneeze, or trigger a sensitive bladder (characterised by a constant need to urinate) or frequent bladder infections.
SEX
Low libido: Reduced oestrogen levels can affect the sense of sensation and the ability to orgasm. Falling progesterone levels lead to lower libido — progesterone stimulates testosterone production, and testosterone is key to sex drive.
Vaginal dryness: The mucous membranes of the vaginal walls can become dry, triggering itching, stinging or burning, and possibly pain during intercourse.
EVEN A LITTLE EXERCISE CAN MAKE DIFFERENCE
Being active really can help menopausal symptoms — whether you exercise a lot or a little. Research has shown that women who exercise have fewer and milder flushes, night sweats and sleep disturbances.
Meanwhile, the endorphins — feel-good chemicals — released during exercise can lift menopausal low moods and ease depression. One of the latest studies, published by the University of Applied Sciences in Tampere, Finland in January this year, found that 49-year-old women who exercised regularly had a better quality of life and reduced menopausal symptoms.
The women who did 2½ hours of fast walking or 1¼ hours jogging or running a week, plus strength or balance training, such as yoga, twice a week, were less likely to report anxiety, depression, memory and concentration problems and hot flushes. Exercise will also help you control your weight at a time when hormones are conspiring to pile the fat around your middle.
This is all the more important because being overweight can exacerbate menopausal symptoms.
Staying active can really help menopausal symptoms with research showing that women who exercise have fewer hot flushes, night sweat and sleep disturbances (file image)
So what kind of exercise should you be doing? The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists recommends regular aerobic exercise (such as cycling, walking or swimming) rather than infrequent bursts of high-impact exercise (running, intensive aerobics) as these can make symptoms worse. Low-intensity exercise such as yoga may also help hot flushes and general well-being, it says.
Even a little bit of activity can have an impact. Researchers from Australia found that women who do less than the recommended levels of exercise still experience benefits.
Even if you’re not troubled by menopausal symptoms, exercise has significant long-term benefits, reducing your risk of heart disease and osteoporosis (which rises significantly once the protective effect of oestrogen is lost).
One U.S. study showed that healthy menopausal women who walked for three hours a week or exercised vigorously for an hour and a half a week had a 30 to 40 per cent lower risk of heart disease than inactive women.
And it’s never too late to start. Women who become active only in mid or late-adulthood still had a reduced risk of heart disease compared with their inactive peers.
Meanwhile weight-bearing exercise — walking, jogging, dancing and aerobics — can prevent or reverse bone loss by 1 to 3 per cent a year in post menopausal women (the stress stimulates bone growth).
Exercise can also keep you slim, reducing your risk of type 2 diabetes and some cancers.
More active post-menopausal women have smaller waists and less body fat, researchers have found.
Additional reporting by Jo Waters, Amanda Cable, Fiona Duffy and Moira Petty.
I BOUNCED MY WAY BACK TO FEELING GOOD
Karen Goodenough, 57 (pictured), joined a fitness class to help herself get through the menopause
Mother-of-two Karen Goodenough, 57, is an accounts clerk and lives in Tamworth, Staffordshire, with her husband Bob, 55, an accountant. She says:
My mum had gone through the menopause by 40, so I knew there was a very good chance I’d be the same.
I’d already decided I wanted to avoid HRT. Then, when I was 41, our daughter Heather was murdered (her killer is now in prison) and my marriage broke down.
The stress was enormous, and four years later, when I was 45, the night sweats started.
To help me through the grief a friend suggested I join her fitness class, where they bounced on mini-trampolines to music.
It helped lift my spirits and improved my sleep, and the hot sweats just disappeared.
The menopause symptoms didn’t seem to affect me like they did my non-exercising friends. Ten years on, I feel great, and I think the exercise classes were the key. Exercising might be the last thing you feel like doing when you’re menopausal, but I can’t recommend it highly enough.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2997794/What-menopause-REALLY-does-body-tell-started-continuing-ultimate-guide-surviving-change.html#ixzz3UeiHtDNq
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