CHAPTER 1

MOST JOURNEYS BEGIN WITH THAT FIRST STEP .... MINE BEGAN WITH A CROSSROAD

There is only ever one place to start in a story and that is at the beginning. For me that was when I was 25 years of age, a young newly registered nurse with a boyfriend and not many more plans about life than that. It was also 12 month after I had completed extensive radiation treatment for Hodgkins Disease (a cancer of the lymph system) centred in my left groin but having spread into my pelvis, and when I was informed that the radiation had totally destroyed my ovaries despite attempts at the time of the radiation to shield them. Yes I was 25 years of age and I was post-menopausal (confirmed through blood tests). All hopes of my ever being able to have children of my own (something I had always wanted) were instantly dashed.


I am sure you will appreciate that this was an extremely difficult time for me and I had to do some serious growing up and reality checks very quickly. Many life-altering decisions had already been made over the previous year but more were still to come, many more as it turned out, some personal and which I won't expand on. But there were many that resulted in where I am now, a very healthy and happy emotional, physical, and sexual women in her senior years and which I wish to share with you.


At the time, I really didn't need a blood test to tell me I was post-menopausal if the crash course in hot flushes I had experienced, emotional weepy periods, or unexplained loss of sex drive (something quite healthy prior to my contracting cancer) was anything to go by especially over the last 6 months or so. My doctor at the time strongly encouraged me to go on HRT (hormone replacement therapy) as I was way too young at 25 to not have these vital hormones circulating in my body. I was a bit confused. Remember this was the 70's and despite my being a new general trained nurse, education on women's health issues, especially gynaecological, was minimal to say the least. I truly thought the ovary hormones produced were only necessary for making eggs and babies. And this wasn't happening for me I had been told. But my poor doctor really had his work cut out for him that day and I was patiently enlightened that functioning ovaries serve many purposes throughout a woman's life apart from the role of egg production and fertilisation, and their shortage or absence can affect many systems in a woman's body at any age but especially when she is only 25 years of age. I'm sure you have all heard of some of them if not most but it's my mission to make your life even easier. Please push here to learn more about the side effects of depleted hormones in menopause,


So here I was 25 years of age and about to start HRT or 'the pill' as it was referred to then as this was the only easily available source of female hormones. Now I'm hearing some of you saying "But this has nothing to do with me. I'm not 25 years old and I've had my children. I really don't need my ovaries any more. I cannot be young forever!!!" Go on - deny you were thinking that. Well hear me out here as I must jump ahead of myself and depart momentarily from my story. But it is necessary that we clear up this misconception of "age" before going on.


One day it was inevitable that I would reach this same menopausal stage in my life - it's just that for me it came 20 or so years earlier than expected. And this is the whole point as to why menopause has to be better addressed nowadays. This crossroad in our life is no longer age defined. We women, irrespective of age have a whole lot of living still to be done and we want to do it with all our systems working efficiently. It's just so unfair to expect us to function, to be alert and energised, able to continue to be productive and an effective team player in a career and family environment, be sexually active and attractive to our partners..... the list goes on..... I'm sure you can all understand what I'm saying and where I'm going with this. It's just not tolerable or permissable to have to put up with such a hard ask in this day and age with our hormones lacking.


Evolution had women up until only a couple of generations back going through adolescence to woman hood, having babies and rea ring them to adulthood by which time the offspring took over the reproduction cycle and the maternal parent went through menopause and died soon there after. Life expectancy was low for most. But thanks to advances in modern medicine, we women are now living in the main to a very nice old age with many taking on the new role of grandchildren rearing whilst their children now both work to finance their electronic disposable lifestyle, (I can feel another blog subject coming along here). So many diseases absent or of low incidence a few generations back because we just didn't live long enough to develop them, are now plaguing us, some from lifetime choices, but many from the issues of non-addressed menopause. In going through menopause nowadays at around 45 years of age, a woman can expect to live well into her 80's.... so only through half her life when she experiences menopause. Half a life time without vital hormones, half a life time trying to function and cope with modern day stress urges and expectations. The male of the species does not experience this sudden hormone drop. Their life continues on with a steady decline of hormones into old age, their issues being more psychological in nature (a whole new discussion in itself).