Amy

41 and genuinely not sure where I fit. The menopause forums feel like they're not for me yet and my period app keeps asking if I'm trying to conceive which, no, I just want to know why my cycle went from 28 days to 34 to 26 to 38 in the space of four months. I've started keeping a rough notes page on my phone. Not organised, just dates and whatever I noticed. Woke at 3am, felt like I was vibrating with anxiety. Really tired by 2pm. Skipped breakfast, felt awful by 11. That kind of thing. It's already shown me that the days I actually eat something proper in the morning are noticeably less awful by lunchtime, which sounds obvious but I genuinely hadn't connected it before. I want to see my GP but I keep talking myself out of it because I don't want to sit there and say "I'm a bit tired and my periods have gone weird" and have her look at me like I've wasted an appointment. Has anyone actually managed to ask about this without feeling like they're being dramatic? What did you say? x

41 and I feel absolutely ridiculous even being in a menopause space. Like I keep waiting for someone to tap me on the shoulder and go, love, this isn't for you. But then I look at my cycle notes from the last eight months and something has definitely shifted. Periods arriving when they feel like it. Waking up at 4am with my heart going. Anxiety that doesn't match anything actually happening in my life. Crying in the Tesco car park over nothing I can identify. The period apps are useless now because they assume a 28 day cycle and mine is doing whatever it wants. But I also feel too young to fully claim the word perimenopause out loud. I've got a GP appointment next month and I'm genuinely worried I'll sit down, she'll look at me, and I'll immediately say "sorry, I'm probably just tired" and leave with nothing. So I've been writing things down. Actual dates, actual symptoms, how bad the sleep was, when the anxiety spiked. Not obsessively, just so I have something concrete to show her instead of going in and shrugging. Does anyone have tips for talking to a GP without sounding like you've diagnosed yourself off the internet? Because I have absolutely diagnosed myself off the internet but I'd rather not lead with that 😂

Right so I downloaded a period tracker last month and it kept showing me little flower emojis and asking if I wanted to log my "fertile window" and I nearly threw my phone across the room. I am 41. My cycle has gone from 28 days to anywhere between 19 and 35 in the space of a year. I cannot sleep. I am anxious in a way that feels chemical, not situational, like the feeling lands before there is even a reason for it. And yet every menopause forum I peek at seems to be full of women talking about their post-menopausal skin or comparing hot flush remedies and I feel like I have wandered into the wrong waiting room. I am not sure I belong here either, to be honest. But I found this room and it felt closer. I have started writing things down, mostly because I could not figure out what to tell the GP without sounding like I was catastrophising. So now I have a little notes page on my phone, just the date, how the day felt, whether my period showed up when expected, how I slept. Nothing fancy. But when I looked back over two months of it I could actually see something, a pattern I would not have noticed otherwise. The anxious weeks tend to cluster. The exhausted weeks too. I am going to show it to my GP next week and I am genuinely rehearsing how to say "I think something has shifted hormonally" without her just telling me I am busy and stressed. Which I am. But I do not think that is the whole story. Anyone else navigating this bit? The too-young-for-menopause, too-old-for-Flo bit? x

Jun 21 · Liked post

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52 and I have my GP appointment on Thursday and I am absolutely dreading walking in there and going blank. Every single time. I sit down and she asks how I've been and my brain just... empties. I come out having mentioned about 30% of what I actually wanted to say and then spend the drive home remembering the rest. So this week I've been writing things down as they happen. Woke at 3am Tuesday, heart going, couldn't get back off until nearly 5. Wrote it down. Wednesday felt fine actually. Thursday that low-level dread was back before I'd even got out of bed, no reason, nothing had happened. Wrote it down. I've got almost a week of it now and I'm going to print it out and just hand it to her if I have to. I've also written my actual questions because I know I'll forget those too. Mainly around whether the sleep stuff could be hormonal and whether HRT might help with that specifically, because it's the sleep that's wrecking everything else. The anxiety, the brain fog at work, all of it. Has anyone done this, just handed over a written list? Did the GP take it seriously or did it feel a bit odd? Bit nervous she'll think I'm being dramatic. x

Jun 20 · Liked post

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44 and I cannot work out if I am burning out or if this is peri and honestly does it even matter because either way I am sitting in meetings at work and the word just... goes. Like I reach for it and there's nothing there. Last Tuesday I said "the thing, the report, the... numbers document" to my line manager. She's lovely and she waited patiently but I saw her face. I saw it. I've started writing everything down before meetings now. Not like a to-do list, more like I'm briefing myself. Key words I might need. Names of projects. It sounds mad but it actually helps me get through without looking completely vacant. Whether that's a coping strategy or a red flag I genuinely don't know. I've got a GP appointment in three weeks and I want to go in with actual examples rather than just "I feel foggy" because I know how that sounds. So I've been keeping a note on my phone. Specific moments. The word thing. The time I sent an email to the wrong team. The time I sat down to write a report and just... stared at the screen for twenty minutes. Does any of this sound like peri to you lot? I eat a proper lunch now, protein, not just a sad desk sandwich, and that does seem to help the 3pm crash a bit. But the word thing is still there in the mornings too so I don't think it's just blood sugar. I just really miss feeling sharp. x

Jun 20 · Liked post

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47 and I keep going back and forth in my head between the patch and the gel. Not asking anyone to tell me which to pick, honestly I just want to hear what people's actual day-to-day is like with either. Like does the patch stay put in summer? Does the gel feel weird under clothes? My GP mentioned both in the same breath and then moved on before I could ask anything useful. Side thing: I've been writing down how many flushes I'm having each day because I kept underestimating when I tried to recall them at the appointment. Turns out it's more like 8 or 9 on a bad day, not the vague "quite a few" I kept saying. Sleep's a whole other chapter. Also quietly noting my caffeine and wine intake because both seem to make evenings worse. The coffee one is genuinely gutting. Anyway. Just curious about people's patch vs gel experiences, no pressure to give me a verdict on anything x

Jun 18 · Liked post

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Hi all. 58, post-menopause, finally feeling cautiously better after a rough few years. Here to listen more than talk but glad to be here x

Jun 17 · Liked post

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Right so I don't even know how to start this because I'm not sure I belong here yet. I'm 43. My periods have gone a bit... weird. Not absent, not dramatic, just sort of off. Last month was 19 days, the month before was 35. I've started writing them down because otherwise I'd never remember and my GP always asks and I always just go blank. But here's the thing. I'm also just. knackered. Like properly bone-tired in a way that doesn't shift after a decent night. And anxious in this low-level hum way that I can't really explain to anyone without sounding like I need to get a grip. My husband thinks it's work. My mum thinks it's the kids. My brain thinks it's probably everything and also possibly nothing. I keep googling at midnight and ending up on perimenopause forums and thinking "that sounds like me" and then thinking "but you're being dramatic, loads of women feel like this at 43, this is just called being alive." Do I even ask the GP? And if I do, how do I ask without sounding like I've self-diagnosed off the internet at 1am? Because I kind of have. Also on a completely different note, does anyone else's weeknight cooking just completely fall apart by Wednesday? I used to actually make things. Now it's whatever requires the least decisions. That might be related to everything or might just be Wednesday. Hard to tell anymore. 😩

Jun 17 · Liked post

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Right, 39 and officially losing my mind in the supplements aisle at Holland & Barrett. Every single thing has a before and after photo attached to it. Every reel is someone glowing and holding a tub of something. I stood there for twenty minutes last week genuinely paralysed between four different magnesium products, none of which I could afford all at once, and eventually just put them all back and bought some eggs. I think that's actually the thing nobody talks about, the cost of it. If I bought everything Instagram confidently tells me I need I'd be spending about £80 a month on supplements alone. I'm a 39-year-old with a mortgage and a broken boiler, that's not happening. So I've started writing down what I'm actually taking (currently just vitamin D, been on it since winter) and what I'm eating more of (more protein, more veg, genuinely boring stuff) because I want to be able to go to my GP at some point and have an actual list rather than just saying "I saw something online". She's lovely but I know she'll ask and I want to sound like I've thought about it. Does anyone here just have normal stories? Not transformation stories. Just... tried this, noticed this, cost about this much, didn't fix everything but maybe helped a bit? That's all I want. x

Jun 17 · Liked post

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Okay totally off topic but I need help. I have two teenagers, it's been a week, and I have approximately zero bandwidth left for dinner decisions. What are you all actually making on the nights when you're running on fumes and one wrong comment from a family member away from losing it completely? Bonus points if it involves minimal dishes. Double bonus if nobody complains. (I know. I know that's not possible. But a woman can dream.) Seriously though. Hit me. 🙏

Jun 17 · Liked post

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42 and I genuinely do not know where I fit anymore. The period apps are all pastel colours and ovulation stickers and "trying to conceive" tick boxes. I am not trying to conceive. I am trying to figure out why my cycle has gone from 28 days like clockwork to anywhere between 23 and 37 with no apparent logic. But then I come into spaces like this and feel like I should be older? Like I haven't earned the right to be confused yet? Someone at work mentioned perimenopause last year and I laughed it off. I was 41. Surely not. Except now I'm keeping a little notes doc on my phone. Just cycle dates, and whether I felt completely wired and couldn't sleep, or crashed by 7pm, or cried at something embarrassing on telly. Mostly I eat something proper in the morning and I've noticed I feel less unhinged on the days I do that. Might be nothing. Probably nothing. GP appointment next month and I want to mention the cycle changes without sounding like I've been down a rabbit hole at midnight (I have, obviously). Does anyone else worry about how to say "something has changed" without the doctor just nodding and saying stress? x

Jun 17 · Liked post

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I used to love Sundays. Proper reset day, batch cooking, kids doing their thing, felt like I was getting ahead of the week. Now by about 5pm there's this low-level dread that I can't really explain. Nothing has gone wrong. The week ahead isn't even particularly bad. But something in my chest just tightens and I feel sort of... braced. Like I'm waiting for something. I've started wondering if it's hormonal or just the cumulative weight of everything. Probably both. My cycles have been all over the place this year and I've noticed the anxiety tends to cluster at certain points in the month, though I'm not tracking it carefully enough yet to be sure. Anyone else find the weekends harder than they used to be? x

Jun 16 · Liked post

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43 and I genuinely don't know if I'm falling apart or if this is just... being 43 with a full-time job and two kids who still need me for everything. Periods have gone a bit weird in the last few months. Used to be like clockwork, now they're showing up early, then late, then really heavy for one cycle and barely there the next. I've started writing it down because I kept forgetting what had happened the month before and then sounding vague at the GP. The anxiety is the bit that's really getting me though. I've always been a bit of a worrier but this feels different. Like it's not about anything specific, it's just there when I wake up. And I'm SO tired but then I can't sleep properly and my brain is just foggy all day. I've been wondering if food has something to do with it because the weeks I actually manage a proper dinner instead of whatever's fastest feel slightly less grim. The thing is I don't know how to bring this up at the GP without sounding like I'm just describing being a tired working mum in 2024. Like, is that all this is? Am I going to go in there and they're going to look at me like I've wasted their time? I'm 43. I keep reading that's too young but then I read it's not?? Does this sound familiar to anyone here x

Jun 15 · Liked post

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58 and I have got an appointment booked for next week and I am genuinely sitting here trying to work out how to say it out loud to a stranger in a white coat. I wrote some things down last night. Actual words on actual paper. Dryness. Discomfort during sex. The way I now sort of brace myself. That my husband hasn't said anything but I know he notices me flinching and the distance that's crept in because of it. I never thought I'd be the woman who couldn't talk about her own body but here I am. I kept crossing out words and rewriting them. "Painful" felt too dramatic. "Uncomfortable" felt like I was minimising it. I've landed on "sharp soreness" which is accurate and somehow easier to hand over on a piece of paper than to actually say. I read somewhere that GPs respond better when you're specific so I've also written down roughly how long this has been going on (longer than I admitted to myself, honestly) and that it's affecting my relationship in ways that are hard to describe. I don't know what I'm hoping they'll say. I just know I can't keep pretending everything's fine when it isn't. Husband thinks I'm writing a shopping list. I am. Just not that kind of list. x

Jun 14 · Liked post

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Patricia, 46, peri. Can I just ask what people are actually eating for breakfast because I am so bored of myself. I have been the same weight for two years and then suddenly in the last six months I have gone up about half a stone without changing anything obvious and I genuinely do not know what to tell my GP when she asks. Like, has anything changed? No? Sort of? I don't know how to explain it. Anyway. I am not looking for a diet. I really, really am not. I cannot face another thing that involves a spreadsheet or cutting out entire food groups or spending forty quid on protein powder that tastes like chalk. What I am actually trying is just having something with a bit more protein in the morning rather than toast and hoping for the best. Eggs when I have time, which is not always. Sometimes just a bit of leftover chicken on toast which sounds grim but actually keeps me going until lunch without wanting to eat my own hand. Trying to keep it cheap because we are not flush and I have two kids who also need feeding. If anyone has genuinely budget-friendly ideas that are not a complete faff I would be so grateful. Nothing fancy. Just real food that doesn't cost a fortune and doesn't require me to become a different person. x

Jun 14 · Liked post

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Okay so I have to share this because two weeks ago I was convinced I would never set foot in a gym again without wanting to evaporate into the floor. I'm 53, I have not done anything resembling structured exercise in probably four years. My knees hurt, I gained weight, and every time I thought about going back I just pictured myself surrounded by twenty-two-year-olds doing things with kettlebells while I tried to figure out how the locker worked. But I went. I went on a Tuesday at 10am because I figured it would be quiet and honestly? It was. I did maybe twenty minutes total. I used two machines I vaguely remembered, I did not try to be impressive, and I left before I had a chance to talk myself into doing more and wrecking my knees. That was it. That was the win. I went back Thursday. Same low-key approach. I've been doing a short walk most mornings anyway and I noticed I slept slightly better on the days I did both, though I'm not drawing conclusions yet, just noting it. The thing nobody told me is that you are allowed to just show up and do a little. You don't have to have a program. You don't have to know what you're doing. You can just be a middle-aged woman quietly using a leg press and then going home. If you're on the fence, this is not me telling you what to do. It's just me saying the dread was worse than the actual thing. By a lot. ETA: I did eat something with protein in it after both sessions because I read that somewhere and figured it couldn't hurt. Jury still out but I didn't crash at 3pm so. Maybe something.

Jun 13 · Liked post

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46, postmeno, and I have been dragging myself outside for these little twenty-minute walks maybe four or five times this week. Not because I suddenly love exercise. More because I was sitting in a fog at 2pm and I genuinely did not know what else to do. Here is the weird thing. My mood is... better? Not fixed. My knees still hurt on the way back down the hill and I am still tired by 7pm. But something shifts. Like the fog gets thinner. I cannot explain it and I am not going to pretend it is some big transformation because it is not. The joint pain is what I actually want to bring to my doctor. It has gotten worse since everything stopped, and I want to ask whether that is related or just age or what I can even do about it safely. I feel like I have been putting that conversation off. Also I started eating something with protein when I get back from the walk, mostly because I read something here a while back and thought why not. Eggs, Greek yogurt, whatever is easy. No idea if it is doing anything but it feels like I am at least being vaguely kind to myself. Anyway. Not a fitness person. Not becoming one. Just walking and noticing things.

Jun 13 · Liked post

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Hi all. I've got a GP appointment in two weeks and I am determined not to sit there and go blank like I always do. So I've started a notes document on my phone and I'm adding to it every day. The bleeding is the main thing. I've been tracking it properly for the first time and honestly it's quite alarming to see it written down. I knew it had got heavier but looking at the pattern over the last three months, it's a lot. There are days where I'm getting through more than I'd want to admit and I'm timing how long I can leave the house without worrying. I feel about twelve again and not in a good way. I'm also writing down the fatigue because I kept dismissing it as just being tired from everything. But it's a specific kind of tired. The kind where you've slept and still feel like you haven't. I want to be able to describe it properly rather than just saying "I'm a bit knackered" and having it brushed off. I've added a section for questions I want to ask. Mainly around bloodwork. I want to know whether iron has been checked recently and whether there are other things worth looking at given everything that's going on. I've read enough on here to know it's worth asking rather than waiting to be offered. Does anyone else have things they made sure to include before an appointment like this? I want to go in prepared rather than coming out thinking of everything I forgot to say. Any details that felt useful to have written down, I'd really appreciate knowing x

Jun 13 · Liked post

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ok so I said I wasn't going to post until I had something actually useful to say and I'm still not sure I do but here goes I've had a better week. Not a perfect week, not a fixed week, just. better. and I want to write it down somewhere before I convince myself it didn't happen. Background for anyone who doesn't know me: I've been on HRT for about four months now, still finding the right balance with my GP, and about eight weeks ago I started being more deliberate about food and movement. Not a programme, not a plan with a name, just trying to eat something with actual protein before 9am and get outside for even ten minutes after lunch. That's it. That's the whole thing. This week I slept through three nights in a row. THREE. I haven't done that since probably 2022. The hot flushes are still there but they felt less violent somehow, like my body was doing them at a lower volume. Mood has been steadier. I didn't cry in the Tesco car park which is basically a personal best at this point 😂 I'm not saying any of this caused anything. I genuinely don't know. It could be the HRT finally settling, could be the sleep helping the mood helping everything else, could be that the weather was nicer and I was outside more. I'm keeping notes because I want to be able to tell my GP what's actually changed when I go back in six weeks. What I do know is that eight weeks ago I was frightened. Like properly frightened that I was just going to feel like this forever. And I want anyone who's in that place right now to know that things can shift. I don't know when or how for you, I really don't. But they can. Anyway. Logging it here. Back to my slightly cooler, slightly less chaotic life 🤞 x

Jun 13 · Liked post

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Right. Tamsin. 60. Finally posting. I joined a gym in January and I want you to know I have never felt more out of place in my life. Everyone else seems to know what they're doing with the cables and the bars and I'm just sort of hovering near the dumbbell rack trying to look like I belong there. The instructor was lovely but she's about 24 and I kept nodding like I understood things I absolutely did not understand. But here's why I'm doing it. I had a conversation with my GP a few months back about bone health, nothing alarming, just routine stuff after being on HRT for years, and she mentioned that resistance exercise genuinely matters for bone density as we get older. That landed differently than I expected. I went home and thought, well I walk, I've always walked, but that's apparently not quite the same thing. So now I'm attempting two sessions a week. Attempting is the right word. My knees are a bit unhappy about the whole project and I've started keeping a rough note of which movements bother them so I can actually describe it properly at my next appointment rather than just saying "my knees hurt sometimes". I've also been thinking more about protein because someone mentioned it in a thread here a while back and I looked into it and I'd honestly been quite neglectful on that front. More eggs, more Greek yogurt, that sort of thing. I feel slightly ridiculous at the gym. But I also feel like I'm doing something. Those two things can both be true I think. x

Jun 12 · Liked post

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Ok so I've been lurking for a while and I genuinely wasn't sure I should post because I'm 40 and every time I google my symptoms it either says anxiety disorder or perimenopause and I don't know which one to believe and honestly the not knowing is the worst bit. Here's what's been happening. My periods have gone completely unpredictable. I was like clockwork for years, 28 days, done. Now it's 24 days, then 35, then 26, and last month it just... didn't show up for 40 days and I did four pregnancy tests like an absolute muppet before it finally arrived. I'm not pregnant, I have a coil, I'm just apparently losing my mind. And the mood stuff. God. I don't even know how to describe it. It's not sadness exactly. It's more like this low hum of dread that sits behind everything. I'll be fine, doing the school run, making tea, and then something tiny happens, like the wifi going down or someone leaving a wet towel on the floor, and I feel this surge of something that is way out of proportion. I've been blaming work stress for two years. My job is stressful, that's true, but I've had stressful jobs before and I didn't used to feel like I was held together with sellotape. The fatigue is the other thing. I am so tired. Not tired like I need an early night. Tired like I've been awake for three days and then asked to run a marathon. I have two kids, eight and eleven, and keeping up with them after school feels like a genuine physical effort some days. I used to be the one suggesting weekend trips. Now I'm counting down to bedtime by 4pm. I mentioned it to my GP about six months ago and she ran some bloods and said everything was normal and that it was probably stress and to maybe try mindfulness. I wanted to cry in the car on the way home. I know she was trying to help. But I left feeling like I'd made it all up. I've started writing things down since then. Cycle dates, sleep, how I feel in the mornings, whether the anxiety is worse at certain points in the month. I don't know if I'm doing it right but it feels better than just showing up and trying to explain it from memory while she's already typing. I suppose I'm posting because I needed somewhere that might just get it without me having to justify why I think something has changed. Does anyone else feel too young for the menopause forums but too old and too tired for the stuff aimed at people in their twenties?? I don't quite fit anywhere and that's been its own kind of lonely. Anyway. Hi. I'm Hannah. I'm 40 and I'm exhausted and I'm really glad this place exists x

Jun 12 · Liked post

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47 and nobody warned me about this bit. My cycles have just gone... weird. Like 24 days, then 34 days, then 27, then nothing for six weeks and I thought I was pregnant (I am not). I have been a 28-day-like-clockwork woman since I was 15 so this has completely thrown me. I've started writing it down because I couldn't keep it in my head and I wanted something concrete to show my GP rather than just saying "things feel off". Also tracking when I sleep badly and how much caffeine I've had that day because I noticed the nights I have a second coffee after 2pm are the nights I wake up at 3am staring at the ceiling convinced I'm dying. And the mornings after those nights are... not good. Brain fog doesn't cover it. I basically need a proper breakfast or I'm useless until noon, which I never used to need. I keep second-guessing whether any of this is worth mentioning to my GP. Like will she just say it's normal variation? But the changes since last year are pretty stark when I write them side by side. So I'm going to bring the notes and see what she says. Bit nervous honestly. x

Jun 12 · Liked post

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52 and I've started taking a walk at lunch most days. Not a power walk. Not a "steps challenge" walk. Just... outside, moving, sometimes with a podcast, sometimes not. It doesn't fix the fatigue or the weight or any of the actual problems. But my mood is genuinely different on the days I go versus the days I don't and I can't explain it scientifically I just know it's true now. The thing I wasn't expecting is how much I dreaded it at first. Like even 15 minutes felt like this big ask when I'm already running on empty. Some days I still skip it. But I stopped waiting to feel motivated and just started going while I felt terrible, and that helped somehow. Also been doing this thing before bed where I just stretch a little, nothing structured, just whatever feels tight. My hips especially. It takes maybe 8 minutes and I sleep slightly less terribly after. Slightly. I'll take slightly. I do want to ask my doctor about the fatigue piece at my next appointment. Like where is the line between "normal tired from not sleeping" and "something is actually limiting you and we should talk about it." I don't want to be dismissed but I also don't know how to frame it. Has anyone had a useful conversation with their OB about this? What did you actually say?

Jun 19 · Replied to Community post

Thank you Susan, and everyone who replied. This is exactly why I posted. Reading these has made me feel much less ridiculous, and I am adding a few notes before my next appointment.

Jun 7 · Replied to Community post

Thank you Hannah, and everyone who replied. This is exactly why I posted. Reading these has made me feel much less ridiculous, and I am adding a few notes before my next appointment.