For years I was insufferably pleased with myself about the menopause.
Friends would talk about hot flushes, sleepless nights, mood swings, and I’d smile and say something along the lines of, “Oh, I must have been one of the lucky ones. I barely noticed mine.” I said it more than once. I probably said it smugly.
Looking back, I wasn’t pleased because I felt particularly well. I was pleased because I thought I’d escaped something.
I hadn’t escaped anything. I’d just called it by other names.
I didn’t discover I’d been through the menopause at an appointment about the menopause. I found out at an appointment about cancer.
I was diagnosed at 47, and treatment started when I was 48. Before deciding on treatment, they run blood tests, partly to check whether you’re pre or post-menopausal, because it changes what they can offer and how. Mine came back post. I remember thinking, hang on a minute, nobody told me. Apparently my body had quietly finished an entire hormonal chapter without so much as a courtesy notice.
If you’ve read the tiredness piece, you’ll know I’d already spent most of my forties blaming my thyroid for how I felt. Anything unusual got filed under that heading and the case was considered closed. Meanwhile the menopause had been going on underneath it the whole time.
Looking back, the signs weren’t subtle. I just didn’t know what I was looking at.
The sweating was probably the biggest one, and not “a bit warm” either. Proper sweating, the sort that made me wonder whether my deodorant had quietly resigned from the job altogether. I ended up asking around what actually worked, which felt oddly embarrassing, as though everyone else had been handed a manual I’d somehow missed. Eventually someone recommended Mitchum. It worked. I still use it now.
The brain fog got filed under getting older. I’d lose a word halfway through a sentence, walk into a room and forget why I’d gone there, feel less sharp than I used to be, and never once questioned it. I just assumed that was life now.
Then there was the stiffness. Most mornings I needed a good half hour before I felt properly mobile. Sitting still for a while had the same effect. I’d climb out of the car after a journey and need a moment to unfold myself before I could walk anywhere. “Give me a minute, I need to loosen up” became part of my everyday vocabulary, said so often it stopped sounding like a complaint and started sounding like something I simply said, the way you might mention the weather.
The strange thing is I had an explanation for every symptom, individually. Sweating was sweating. Brain fog was age. Stiffness was getting older. Tiredness was my thyroid. I never once put them in the same room together. Meanwhile menopause was standing right in front of me, waving both arms in the air.
"I didn't miss the menopause because the symptoms weren't obvious. I missed it because nobody had ever told me they could look like that."
One thing I completely misunderstood was the idea that menopause eventually finishes. In my head it had a beginning, a middle, and an end. Periods stop. Symptoms disappear. Everyone moves on. Job done.
I’m 55 now, and somebody clearly forgot to send that memo to my hot flushes. They’re still making regular appearances, usually at exactly the wrong moment. For years I assumed symptoms stopped when periods stopped. They don’t always. Joint pain, hot flushes, vaginal dryness, and sleep problems can all carry on well after your periods have finished, something I genuinely didn’t know until it was happening to me.
The NHS also links menopause and perimenopause to a longer list than the one everyone talks about openly: weight changes, vaginal dryness and irritation, more frequent UTIs, brain fog, and joint pain among them. What nobody really tells you is that these don’t all arrive together, announcing themselves as a set. They sneak in one at a time, disguised as other things. That’s how so many of us miss what’s actually happening. I know it’s how I missed it.
If your deodorant has suddenly stopped doing its job, don’t assume it’s just you. If you’re stiff every morning and blaming age, don’t automatically assume that’s the whole story. If you’re tired, forgetful, sweaty, aching, or simply not feeling quite like yourself anymore, it’s worth asking questions rather than filing it away under something else.
Not everything is menopause. But menopause is much better at disguising itself than I ever gave it credit for.
Looking back, I wasn’t one of those women who sailed through it without noticing. I was one of those women who noticed every single symptom and gave each one a different explanation.
At 47, I was proudly telling people I’d had an easy menopause. At 55, with a hot flush in full swing and the window wide open in February, I can safely say I was wrong.
And the truth is, I’m still learning. Some of the symptoms are still hanging around. Some days are better than others. I’m still working out what’s menopause, what’s ageing, what’s aftermath from cancer treatment, and what’s simply life being life, and I’m not sure that line is ever going to be entirely clear.
I’d like to say the healthcare system has helped me untangle it. Mostly, it hasn’t. Every symptom gets sent off to be looked at on its own: the joint pain to one department, the sweating to another conversation entirely, the fatigue to a different appointment altogether, as though a body is a collection of separate issues rather than one person carrying all of them at once. Nobody sits back and looks at the whole picture. And when nothing shows up on a test, when there’s no tidy answer to hand over, I’ve had the distinct feeling of being looked at as someone who’s simply always got something wrong with her. The slightly weary shrug. The faint suggestion that maybe I’m just imagining more than is really there.
I’m not imagining it. I’m just someone whose body has been through a lot in a short space of time, asking reasonable questions that don’t currently have tidy answers, and I don’t think that makes me difficult, or dramatic, or a hypochondriac. It just means the system isn’t always built to look at the whole of a person, only the bit in front of it that day.
I didn’t miss the menopause because the symptoms weren’t obvious. I missed it because nobody had ever told me they could look like that. And I’m still, some days, waiting for someone to look at the whole of it rather than one piece at a time.
2 thoughts on “Designing for the Modern Era”
This modern aesthetic is absolutely stunning! The subtle cream backgrounds paired with bold navy headings bring such a refined, professional vibe. Looking forward to implementing some of these spacing guidelines in my next layout.
Agreed, Sarah! The 'Midlife Modern' tokens strike the perfect balance between organic warmth and structured typography. The 8px border-radius makes interactive elements feel friendly but still highly premium.
