Kate: Hi, I'm Kate co-founder of Parlor Games

Kirsti: And I'm Kirsti the other co-founder

Kate: and our goal is to provide science, solutions and sisterhood for this menopausal stage of life, which for many of us has brought a lot of surprises, but not necessarily in a good way.

Kirsti: Before you got involved in the hormone work that you've done, what did you know about menopause?

Kate: Well, actually I knew very little. My only real experience of menopause was just having a vague sense that my mom had a terrible time with with menopause. She had a, a terrible time with mood swings around menopause transition and was incredibly overjoyed to be on the patch.

So that was pretty much all I knew.

Kirsti: Yeah. All I knew was from my mom was that she had hot flashes, like crazy. And brain fog, like she'd really struggle to find a word and it would drive her crazy.

What I've since learned is there's a laundry list of menopause symptoms that you may be experiencing that you didn't even realize were part of menopause.

Kate: The first of which is vaginal dryness,

Kirsti: painful sex,

Kate: loss of sense of self as a woman

Kirsti: thinning skin, all over

Kate: fatigue

Kirsti: brittle bones

Kate: increase cholesterol

Kirsti: hot flashes

Kate: cold flashes

Kirsti: night sweats

Kate: clammy feeling

Kirsti: heart palpitations

Kate: irritability

Kirsti: mood swings

Kate: trouble sleeping

Kirsti: irregular period

Kate: low sex drive

Kirsti: anxiety

Kate: depression

Kirsti: lack of focus

Kate: poor concentration

Kirsti: fault memory,

Kate: incontinence,

Kirsti: itchy, crawly, skin

Kate: achy joints and muscles

Kirsti: tense muscles

Kate: sore breasts

Kirsti: headaches

Kate: digestive issues

Kirsti: bloating

Kate: allergies can get worse

Kirsti: weight gain

Kate: hair loss or hair thinning

Kirsti: more facial hair

Kate: dizziness

Kirsti: vertigo

Kate: change in body odor

Kirsti: electric shock feelings

Kate: tingling extremities

Kirsti: bleeding gums

Kate: burning tongue or the roof of the mouth

Kirsti: chronic bad breath

Kate: osteoporosis

Kirsti: weakened fingernails

Kate: ringing in the ears or tinnitus

Kirsti: so first of all, what is menopause?

Kate: Menopause is that period in our life where literally our periods begin to come to an end.

Kirsti: And what are the three stages of menopause?

Kate: First off there is perimenopause, then there is menopause and then there is a long period of life, we hope, post-menopause.

So let's think about perimenopause first. It can actually start these days in women's early forties.

It's a period of time when the periods become irregular. Periods may get shorter. Periods may get longer. Periods may get heavier, but women are still cycling. But the routine that they had got used to is beginning to change quite considerably.

Then you have like the menopause phase or menopause transition.

And during this time there are much, much, much longer gaps between periods. At this point, there are a lot less hormones floating around that drive that cycle. And so women can go four, five, six, seven months between periods. Someone is in menopause when they have not had a period for 12 consecutive months.

So then there's post-menopause. And that is after they have had that 12 months without a period.

Kirsti: So what causes menopause? What triggers menopause.

Kate: So to understand what causes menopause, we have to understand what drives our periods. And over the course of a month, we have a surge of estrogen in the first half of this cycle that is responsible for building the uterine lining, building that womb ready in case a planted egg arrives.

Around the middle of the cycle, that's when we ovulate. And as that egg makes its way along the fallopian tube, it's called a little sack around it, called the Corpus luteum. And that is where progesterone comes from. And so we have a surge of progesterone in the second half of the cycle.

Now that that cycle goes on for years and years and years. But eventually we stop ovulating. We don't get the signal to ovulate. And so we still get the estrogen in the first half of the cycle. but instead of progesterone in the second half, we don't have it or we really don't have as much. And so that's when our periods begin to change, you know, they can get shorter and they could get longer because that signaling that the body has got used to has kind of gone away. we no longer have the signal to produce estrogen and we no longer have the signal to produce progesterone in the second half. That's when we find ourselves in menopause. So in summary, menopause is really a result of the natural decline in, reproductive hormones.

Kirsti: Let's talk a little bit about surgical menopause. If you could start by describing what surgical menopause is, and then talk a little bit about how that might be same or different from natural menopause.

Kate: Not everybody goes through menopause naturally. Some people have what's called surgical menopause. Now this happens when they have the uterus removed or if they have the, the ovaries removed. But the same thing happens. There is a drop in the signals that drive production of these hormones.

So we no longer get that surge of, of estrogen and the surge of progesterone. That will be a pretty severe shock to the system because a lot of those signals have just gone. And that's when some of the symptoms can be the worst, because this has happened suddenly instead of gradually,

Kirsti: How do the changes in hormone levels affect us.

Kate: So wouldn't life be wonderful, if all these changes in hormones have no impact on us whatsoever. We just sailed through menopause. Sadly, that is rarely the case because in real life hormones do fluctuate. They fluctuate quite a lot. We know that from, you know, having had PMS and changes in hormones, just over the course of a regular cycle.

So as progesterone levels begin to drop, they drop well ahead of, estrogen levels. And so you begin to get an imbalance and it's the imbalance that causes many of the symptoms.

Kirsti: And won't these symptoms eventually go away on their own?

Kate: Many of the symptoms will eventually go away on their own. A lot depends on somebody's overall level of health and some of the other lifestyle factors that can contribute to, hormone imbalance. There are some symptoms that are actually related to not having those hormones available anymore. So related to the loss of hormones.

CHECK OUT PART 2 HERE  → 

Hot Flashes, Weight Gain, 
Mood Changes. Learn 
Why We Experience These Symptoms.

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