How To Predict If You're Going To Have a Tough Menopause
Photo by Mohamed Nohassi on Unsplash
Do you need caffeine to get through the day?
Have you used cortisone creams for long periods of time?
Have you ever had chronic fatigue?
Do you pour everything you’ve got into your career and then some?
Did you do copious amounts of ecstasy or speed in your misspent youth?
Have you experienced significant trauma that has left you hyper-vigilant and a little PTSD?
These are not the questions you would imagine me to be asking in relation to estrogen levels through menopause right? That’s because menopause is the time when your ovaries start to play more of a backseat role in life and your adrenals determine your quality of life.
That's right, contrary to popular belief, menopausal symptoms aren't so much about reproductive hormones, but adrenal health. After a woman stops ovulating her adrenal glands become the primary producers of oestrogen. This is why exhausted burnt-out women generally have such a tough time.
From a Chinese Medicine perspective, this burn-out is from a lifetime of running on Yang energy and not nourishing the Yin, so your normal adaptogenic herbs may not be well indicated. Instead, a Yin-Tonic and a deep commitment to honouring Yin modes of being are what I generally prescribe. This week a woman I worked with decided to name her formula “Honouring the Feminine” as she considered a whole new way of being in the world.
I see an increasing number of women entering menopause in their thirties, and some in peri-menopause in their late twenties! The trick is to get in early and start paying off some of that adrenal credit card debt with adrenal nourishing medicines and lifestyle practices before the interest rates leave you feeling red in the face.
Photo by Grace Madeline on UnsplashAs I told the woman this week, your menopause is like your menarche where the little girl died and the young woman emerged – now your old self and its life is once again being asked die, to allow for someone new to emerge.
This feels overwhelming at first, but like all such transitions, if you allow your soul to dream of what it truly yearns for, it can actually be a very liberating and very exciting process.
With Heart,
Jimi
