After menopause, you no longer have a monthly menstrual cycle and can no longer become pregnant. Most women go through menopause in their 50s. Often, menopause involves symptoms that intrude on your well-being. Some symptoms, like hot flashes and mood swings, are widely known.
Menopause can also cause more surprising symptoms, like the ones we look at in more detail below. Dr. Leonardo Longoria and our team at Longoria OBGYN in El Paso, Texas, work with new and existing patients to ease their menopause symptoms.
This October, we’re recognizing World Menopause Awareness Month and sharing information about the health impacts of this significant life transition.
Some symptoms of menopause may surprise you. If they affect you, you might not even realize your issue is connected to menopause. But, treating your menopause may be what’s needed to give you relief.
The flushes and hot flashes that come with menopause often trigger the skin condition rosacea, causing redness and rashes in areas like your cheeks and chest. Rosacea may also be exacerbated by factors like wind exposure or alcohol consumption.
During menopause, the production of female reproductive hormones decreases. This affects your production of asexual hormones known as prostaglandins. This type of hormone helps with vasomodulation, keeping your blood flow even. The hormone flux of menopause increases your risk of developing rosacea.
Menopause, and the transition time before full menopause known as perimenopause, can pose challenges for your sleep. As a result, you may experience chronic fatigue during this time in your life.
Well-known symptoms like hot flashes and night sweats can disrupt your sleep. Many women going through menopause also report more generalized sleep disruption, with increased insomnia and lowered quality of rest. If insomnia affects you for more than a few days in a row, you may find yourself struggling with daytime fatigue.
In combination with fatigue, menopausal women may face debilitating and stressful brain fog. You may find yourself reaching for forgotten words or failing to remember small, daily pieces of information that usually don’t pose a problem. This symptom of menopause can be frustrating and embarrassing.
When you realize your symptoms connect to the transition of menopause, you can take steps to address the problem at its real source.
If you’re dealing with symptoms of menopause, you may benefit from temporary lifestyle changes, medications or therapies to reduce the impact of menopause symptoms on your life, or hormone replacement therapy (HRT).
HRT uses synthetic hormones to supplement and stabilize your natural hormone production, smoothing out your experience with this time of change.
When you know more about menopause and have an increased awareness of all the treatments available for menopause symptom relief, you and your OB/GYN can plan a path that’s right for you.
Symptoms of menopause don’t need to throw your life off kilter. Consult Dr. Longoria and learn more about treatments that support women going through menopause. For comprehensive menopause support, contact our expert team at Longoria OBGYN. Schedule your initial consultation by calling our office today or requesting a visit online anytime.
