What the F is happening to me?

Me, now.

 So when I started this blog about 20 years ago it was a way to share my journey becoming a parent. I now have a 20 year old heading to university and a 15 year old in high school. Although I am far from done with parenting. (In fact it has got more complicated and confusing really.) I have also done this absolutely awful thing called aging. In a short 6 months from now I will be 48 years old. That is basically 50. WTF? How is that even real? Over the last 3 years I have stepped it up. I have lost 50 pounds, I have been consistently going to the gym 5 days a week and even started lifting weights 3 times a week. Despite all that hard work (and let me tell you it is really really hard work) I still managed to age. Grey hair, wrinkles around my eyes, and the worst of all was entering the horrible hell that is perimenopause. 

And to say I was not prepared for this is a huge understatement. (shout out New Found Glory) First off I haven't been having those typical sitcom symptoms. When you think of women going through menopause you think of...

• hot flashes
• ridiculously low sex drive (complete opposite) 
• mood swings (okay maybe I have this one)
• no periods

For me my periods have been like clock work for the last 5 years. And regular periods are new to me. I went through most of my "womanhood" having very very irregular periods. But once J got "fixed" and I was able to get off any kind of birth control things finally went normal. Like my Apple watch is always always right on. Also for the first time I am experiencing cramps. Those are fun. So having a normal period made me think that the other things I were going through were something else entirely. 

The biggest and scariest of the symptoms I have had for probably the last 8 months or so is severe depression and intrusive thoughts. I have started calling them the "dark days". About a week before my period starts I get that fun irritability. Like everything (even J) annoys the hell out of me. Then that moods melts into sadness. Like everything makes me cry. A song on the radio, a commercial, every single movie I watch, any book I am reading. There was a time when my boss sent me home because I couldn't keep it together. There have been days where I could not get out of my bed. As these "dark days" progress, the intrusive thoughts in my head get louder and meaner. My self-esteem hits a all time low (shout out New Found Glory). How bad can it be you ask?

• your children would be so much better without you
• your husband never loved you and settled for this awful life
• no one in your life has ever liked you. 
• you are ugly, fat and no one would ever want you physically

Let's put it this way. I am not allowed to have the key and combo to the gun safe. 

Each month is different. Sometimes it's not so bad and I can get through it pretty easily. There are other times when I am not sure if I will get through the next few days. Even the anticipation is tough. As the big red dot on my calendar gets closer I start to have anxiety over how bad it might be. Then it hits and the week passes and its just over and I am back to normal. Until I am a week out from "p day" and it starts all over again. 

But did you see a doctor about all this? 

Yes. For someone who will make any excuse to not go to the doctor, things got so bad that I made an appointment. I wanted to get my hormone levels checked. All the research I had done said that perimenopause can be helped by balancing your hormone levels. I was honest with the PA (because of course seeing a doctor would have taken months!). He nodded and took notes. Then he told me that a hormone panel would not be beneficial because at my age it would just show imbalances and that's just common. He explained how hormone replacement therapy is too risky for women and should only be done in the event of things like a hysterectomy. He told me to explain what I am going through with my husband and to lean on him when I'm sad. He handed me a prescription for Prozac and told me that I could take it when I started to feel down. Then he told me that he was going to refer me to a psychiatrist. 

I left that appointment so disappointed. I felt like I was unheard. That my concerns were not valid. That only my husband was strong enough to deal with this.  When this all started I thought I was going crazy. Then after some research, and speaking with my own Momma, I realized that it was perimenopause. A completely normal thing that women go through. Then I left the doctors (sorry PA's) office again feeling like I was going crazy. J and I talked about it and I decided to not fill the Prozac prescription so we are just rolling with everything as it comes each month. 

From what I am hearing this wonderful stage of last only lasts about a decade.