As I sit at my desk in my office I am on fire. Not literally, mind you, but burning from the inside out. It doesn't happen all the time, just occasionally. Although occasionally seems to signify once in a while and lately these internal fires are happening several in an hour.
Hot Flashes. That is the term that is used by medical professionals, but they have no idea the cause. Doctors nod, say the "M" word, wave their hands around in the air and shrug. It sucks, but that's the life of an aging woman and well, we can't help you.
When I took over as the caretaker of my medical issues, I chose all women doctors. My primary was a woman. My OB/GYN practice was all women. I even had a woman dentist for a long time. My feeling was I wanted someone who knew exactly what I was talking about when it came to my body, and frankly, a man, doctor or not, was not going to be on my wavelength. (I've had multiple conversations on this topic with my BIL who is a GYN, but he loses every time.)
For a while, I cruised with all of my doctors, but then my primary doctor retired and I discovered that the new crop out there was just newbies. "But you're so young," I said upon meeting my new primary, sounding like every cliche on television. Suddenly I was the one offering up advice on pregnancy and parenting as she had one child and then another, leaving me in the hands of subs who were even younger. Now that I'm fifty and experiencing all of these crazy changes in my body this woman with a medical degree doesn't have a clue personally what I'm experiencing. She will eventually, but that doesn't help me now.
It started, much like my body's downhill spiral began after forty after my mother died and then I hit fifty. First I noticed a change in my periods. I could set my clock in regards to my periods, and while the first three days have always been heavier, now they were even more so. It was like a murder scene every time I pulled down my pants or flushed the toilet.
Then they started disappearing every other month or so leaving me counting days and weeks and wondering is this it? I would get different thoughts from different people. "So and So's doctor told her that if you go a year without periods you are done and in menopause." "So and So went twenty-two months without a period and then got one."
No periods actually sounded great to me, but then another friend said she was thrilled each month when she did get one because it meant she was still young and viable. I wanted to still be young and viable and so I would remind myself of that when I tossed the evidence in the trashcan each cycle.
Next came the hot flashes. They weren't really noticeable at first. I'm a Mason and we Masons sweat. We sweat when we work out. We sweat in the heat. We sweat walking to the mailbox in 30-degree weather. So, when they came I didn't understand them at first. I live in Florida. I'm overweight. I'm a person who sweats.
You can see how I misinterpreted them.
By the time I realized what was happening they disappeared. In their place came an increase in my size. Suddenly my clothes weren't fitting and my belly looked like maybe I was getting ready to produce another kid. I didn't feel like I was eating more than normal and no matter what I did to counteract this issue it didn't work.
In May, everything really went to hell. It began with my breasts. They were swollen and aching and I felt like any minute they would lactate. After two weeks of that, I got my period. It was the worst thing I have experienced. I had headaches. I had severe cramping that I haven't had since my teens. The amount of blood that was flowing from my body had me going through all the shorts in my drawer and had me bedridden because I was afraid of standing. I needed a cork.
I went to my doctor. She nodded, typed it into my computer chart, and told me most likely I was in the beginning stages of menopause. She ordered an internal ultrasound and some blood work. "Just to be sure," she said, "but I have a feeling this is your body getting ready to stop having periods." There went my youth and viability.
The ultrasound didn't turn up anything earth-shattering. The blood work showed I needed some iron and that I was perimenopausal. No one I talked to seemed phased by the amount of blood coming out of me or the length of time that I had the period.
And then just like that, the period was over. I barely had time to blow out a sigh of relief and the hot flashes returned with a vengeance. They came, creeping from inside of me, hot, hot, hotter, until my whole body was aflame. I began sweating like I'd just broken a fever, but the rest of me felt like I had a fever.
Now, it comes when I least expect it. It comes when I'm expecting it. It comes in the morning. It comes in the night. It comes when I exercise. It comes when I'm sitting quietly. Sometimes the flashes bring sweats. Sometimes they don't. I've started showering three times a day.
The Internet told me to write down when they come and write down what happened before, what I ate, etc. to see if I can find the trigger. Uh-huh. Spicy foods are a trigger, but then again I have them with nonspicy foods.
Remedies include "sipping cold water at the onset of a flash" or "exercise". One friend told me she sticks her head in the freezer. I carried around a small fan for a while, but I had to replace the batteries every other day and decided that wasn't feasible.
I keep a fan on my desk and turn it on when I have a flash and off when I don't. I keep a fan in my bedroom much to my husband's dismay and it runs all night.
The only saving grace is that other women over the age of 50 (and some under) are with me in solidarity. They too have the same experiences, the same stories, the same flashes. My SIL, whose flashes started early due to her chemotherapy treatments, discovered that paper plates make great fans. We decorated them and carry them with us. Female shop keepers nod knowingly when I suddenly stop and begin fanning myself and they point to the spots under the air vents and direct me there to stand.
I haven't had a period since the last one in May. I don't expect it to be my last, but maybe it was. Part of me wonders if I do have another will the flashes disappear again? The other part of me says stop wishing for that. Older women nod at me and tell me they still have them even at eighty years old! 80!
I need to find a cure. But not yet. I need to climb inside my refrigerator. I'm having a hot flash.
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