The night was waning, but the moon was still out, and I was awakened with a start. A wave of intense heat was rushing over me, making me feel as though I was burning up from the inside out. In a moment, it seemed, I was covered in sweat and incredibly uncomfortable in my own skin. A momentary rinse in the shower, and I was clean, at least, although that did nothing to quell the anxiety that kept me awake for the next few hours until it was time to get up for the day.
With that began my first experiences with menopause. The first stage of menopause is the perimenopause stage, and it is marked with hot flashes, and I learned later that my experience that fateful night was my first one. Estrogen, which regulates the body’s temperature, begins to decline, and wild temperature swings are a result. I began to feel the other symptoms characteristic of this stage as well, including spotting and irregular periods, irritability, weight gain, and mood swings.
Not one to live my life dependent on synthetic drugs, I was aghast that my doctor wanted me to start hormone replacement therapy, since this requires ingesting a lot of synthetic hormones. Trusting my doctor, I told him I would think about it, although after two days of consideration, I thought better and opted against hormone replacement.
But as the hot flashes, night sweats, irritability, and anxiety worsened, I knew I needed to do something so that I could still function relatively normally during menopause without being slowed to a halt. I asked my doctor if there were any alternatives to hormone replacement therapy, and to my surprise, he recommended menopause supplements. He asked if I had heard anything about herbal menopause remedies, and, although usually quite diligent, I told him that Amberen was really the only menopause supplement that I had ever heard of. Fortunately, he said that was not uncommon, and gave me a lot of new information to consider about herbal menopause supplements.
The decision was easy for me to accept, since it seemed that the right menopause supplement would help ease my symptoms and there were no unwanted side effects. Technically, many of the supplements available on the market today do not require a prescription, but I was still glad to work closely with my doctor to find a solution. He recommended to me some supplements for hot flashes.
Three years later, I am in the postmenopausal stage and look back on my experience as a positive one, marking the growing and changing of life rather than a tough challenge to endure. I am glad to have had the support that I did, and I do not ever look back and wonder about hormone replacement. In fact, I still take herbal supplements to keep me healthy and active, so that I can enjoy this stage of my life to the fullest.
