My Menopause Blog

A few months back I read something somewhere about the turtleneck being the uniform of choice for the menopausal woman. While still reading, I was struck by the impracticality of the idea. When internal combustion strikes by way of a hot flash, the last bloody thing I want is a death gripe of fabric around my neck. My own turtleneck collection, of which I have many, due to my historic membership in the “House of the Frozen Turd”, barely got a wearing this past winter. Certainly winter was lame compared to previous nipple freezing bouts we Canucks have endured. But mostly, I was just too hot to handle the turtle.

I repeat, because I like the sound of this sentence….I was just too hot!

By the time I finished the article I better understood the author’s reasoning for the high neck recommendation. Apparently the neck, my neck, your neck also take a wee slide into a different direction during the approach and subsequent landing on planet menopause.

Fasten your seatbelts ladies, your neck is about to go to the birds. Or is that turkey’s.

At the time, I immediately approached my most flattering mirror, the one with the bad lighting, and did a once over. Neckville appeared to be good and still firmly in place. Relief washed over me. I felt compassion for the article writer.

Fast forward to now. Yesterday I bumped into 3 female acquaintances, milling about downtown. With the dawning of spring in our fair town, skin is visible again. The necks are back out for the season. And true to the writer’s word, all 3 necks were noticeably different. And yet, the neck owners were feisty, funny and fabulously engaged in the world.

The dichotomy between the shallow….very, very shallow observation I am making of the physical coupled with the rich reality of these three women rocking in the most remarkable ways sits like a lump in my mind. I don’t want to care about my bloody neck. I want to laugh my butt off, do kick ass stuff, make a difference simply by engaging my imagination… a feature that does not decline but rather blossoms with age.

But I do love scooped neck tops. Necks are sexy to me. My neck is sexy to me.

I came home and did another check in. Neckville is still holding.

Sue Richards

Tags: My Menopause Blog, my menopause blog,blog,Sue Richards, peri-menopausal, menopausal, menopause relief, aging, information on menopause,baby boomer, menopause, funny blog, menopause fashion,The Change, womens health news, turtleneck, menopause symptoms , menopause, necks .

Every Wednesday, Stuart from Homefields Organics delivers pre-ordered organic groceries to my home and I feel blessed. Besides the obvious…. no trips to the larger than life grocery store that requires a navigational map, transit from the vast parking lot to the entrance and so much shit, processed food that my liver goes limp just walking down the aisles, I also save money, eat better than ever before and get to remember the good old days. The days when milk was delivered in glass bottles.

Allow me to introduce my milk.

I love my milk. Especially because it is organic ….. meaning not loaded down with growth hormones and other nasty crap that my body burden can do without. But I also love my milk because it comes in a glass bottle. Here’s why.

Over the last dozen year’s, I’ve learned about something called leachate.

As the Wikipedia definition suggests, leachate is the process of one substance mixing in with another. An example would be toxins from landfill garbage leaching through soil and contaminating the surrounding areas…that kind of thing.

Well turns out that plastics also leach toxins into stuff. Stuff like food for instance. Or water even. Milk for example.

The amount of toxic actually leaching is probably pretty low when you compare it to say breathing in car exhaust and industrial waste pollution. Still, I’m just not into toxins these days so when given the option, I go for the wonderfully inert, recyclable glass as my food container of choice.

This mine set is a direct result of my menopause. I feel less cavalier about my body. My parts are older. If abused, I believe they’ll wear out that much faster.

But there’s another feature of my body that strikes me as miraculous. It simply does what it does as though it know what it’s doing. It’s like a loyal friend sending me messages…dry mouth… must be thirsty….urge to pee….bladder needs to be emptied.

For year’s I’ve ignored those messages or been pissed off that I needed to attend to my bodies requirements. But now, NOW I see a different picture. My bodies needs, when fulfilled, are good for the whole me. Unlike my bossy little mind, my body tells me the truth.

Maturing with menopause. Finally.

Sue Richards

Tags: My Menopause Blog, my menopause blog,blog,Sue Richards, peri-menopausal, menopausal, menopause relief, aging, information on menopause,baby boomer, menopause, funny blog, leachate,The Change, womens health news, maturing, menopause symptoms , menopause, milk .

I’m having a flash back. This morning as I peered into the bathroom mirror, two nice sized zits stared back. I squinted to be sure. Wondered if I was dreaming. Then noticed the distinct puckering of the skin over my upper lip. Yup it was me alright. Pimples and all.

Perhaps, and this is a real stretch, the facial flare-up is a result of my plugged ear. Unplugged actually. But only just today. Since last Friday my left ear simply closed up shop. Several people advised marinating my ear with olive oil, which I did, rather clumsily. How one could possibly put oil in ones own ear without seepage and spillage is beyond me. But I digress. The oil dripped pretty much everywhere yet did help facilitate the loosening of the offending ear wax. Still did the spray of oil on my face give me the red pustules occupying my lower left chin?

All though my teens, I had a bountiful crop of pimples on my upper face. In my twenties my affliction took flight and moved from forehead and cheeks to chin and chest. In my thirties, the migration continued, this time heading around back to my arse. Finally at 40, I was clear. Almost clear. The odd rogue zit would arrive behind my ear or right between my eyes. Such a fetching look, that.

As peri-meno moved in my persistent acne moved out. “What a bonus”, I’d marvel every time I washed my face. My complexion, although never in league with the Ivory Girl or Dove Honey looked healthy….for me.

What greeted me this morning is mystifying. Is this my periods calling card? Did I olive oil myself into an outbreak. Maybe my biological clock has taken up daylight savings time, reverting my complexion back to the days of ‘the squeeze’.

Sue Richards

Tags: My Menopause Blog, my menopause blog,blog,Sue Richards, peri-menopausal, menopausal, menopause relief, aging, information on menopause,baby boomer, menopause, funny blog, acne,The Change, womens health news, flash back, menopause symptoms , menopause, pimples .

AGING GRACE

(Heather Bishop SOCAN)

1. It’s several minutes now and still I stare

At the telephone book til I’m aware

That I can’t read a single thing that’s there

I see fine don’t get me wrong

It’s just my arms ain’t quite that long

It’s just the same way I know I ain’t got grey hair.

CHORUS: It’s all a part of aging with some grace

A pot hole on the path that I’m to tred

My teenage way of trynna save some face

While my body has up and gone ahead. (more…)

So far, I’ve learned about a guy in Trinidad who got a whack of coin to study the issues facing menopausal guppies. Then there were 17 zoo keepers from various North American zoos who thought menopausal gorillas needed some observation. Finally, some dudes in Prague are getting it together with a study on beer drinking and women in menopause, the stand on your own two feet, homo-sapien version, generally found running free-ish in society.

I will not judge these studies any more than I already have with my slightly sarcastic, give me a break, opening. Instead, I want to do my own study.

I propose a study on menopause and humor. Does laughing provide menopause relief?

Now. The trick is to figure out who to propose such a beast to. I’d need BIG bucks. Or at least some bucks. And as funny as my town is, I think a study location in say Iceland would be hilarious. Dontcha think it would be cool to take part in a study of meno-girls, who go to Iceland, (which BTW is loaded with thermal pools, stunning glaciers and excellent people), have a laugh or several hundred and then see if they feel better?

Alright then.

This could be a tourism thing.

Sue Richards

Tags: My Menopause Blog, my menopause blog,blog,Sue Richards, peri-menopausal, menopausal, menopause relief, aging, information on menopause,baby boomer, menopause, funny blog, study,The Change, womens health news, money, menopause symptoms , menopause, Iceland .

In the 1914 best seller, Health and Longevity, published by the Home Health Society, beer drinking and menopause got a big thumbs down. I figured this likely boiled down to the boys, who set the medical tone of the day, being pissed off at the girls for being meno-moody. The fine fellows, who as we know were also in charge of the brew houses, did the equivalent of a snit fit in the sandbox. “They’re ours”, they glowered, grabbing all the malts and lagers, “bugger off you female firecrackers”. Then they put it in writing in a fancy thick medical book. ‘Beer is ill-advised during the menopause.’
Now, a short 92 years later, scientists are working on brewing a beer for menopause. Yes, you read that right. Meno-Beer…or if you’re a European beer snob, BeerMéno. (more…)

Way back prior to spring springing and grass greening, I attended a Symposium on Alternative Therapies for Menopausal Symptoms. So as not to turn into a droning blog of ‘do this, try that’, I strayed away from my diligent report. Allow me to stray back.

Dr. Carolyn Harvey Smith is a N.D. Naturopathic Doctor with a PHD in Zoology. Seems like a ‘cover all your bases’ kind of combo if you ask me. Her menopause presentation was most delightful.
I won’t ramble on in detail, given the sheer amount of detail that Carolyn offered but I will tell you this. I thought she was the hit of the Symposium. Her presentation style was warm and informed. The material was suitable for both the big science brains in the room and the tribe of girlfriends. She did not pretend to have a silver bullet solution nor was she doom and gloom.

Here’s what helped elevate her into that position. According to Carolyn the Naturopathic approach to menopause takes the following into consideration:

• Every woman is different.
• A lot depends on how you feel about yourself.
• No matter what your symptoms, age or medical history, you have an opportunity to improve your health during the menopausal phase of life.
• Menopause is a time of life when many changes occur: physically, mentally, socially, spiritually and emotionally.
• Your home and family situation play an important role.

The nature of Naturopathic medicine is to ‘do no harm’. The approach is customized to perfect little you, inside and out. Emotional and physical concerns are addressed together. Diet and lifestyle changes are part of the process. Acupuncture, supplements, herbs and homeopathy may be recommended. You get a package deal with your name monogrammed on it. Another words, the whole you is supported, not just your naughty, fleeting hormones.

Sounds like my kind of gig.

Sue Richards

Tags: My Menopause Blog, my menopause blog,blog,Sue Richards, peri-menopausal, menopausal, menopause relief, aging, information on menopause,baby boomer, menopause, funny blog, menopause symposium,The Change, womens health news, do no harm, menopause symptoms , menopause, Naturopathic medicine.

On Monday night, I joined a group of artists for a three hour improv workshop. It was intended to be part of a training program that I’ve been hired to facilitate for the Canadian Clay and Glass Gallery.

Earlier in this decade, I did a couple of lengthy courses of study with Second City in Toronto. At the time I worked as an Artist-in-Education in various schools around the country plus my own digs here in G-town.

Prior to Monday night, I would look back to those times, where my boldness, lack of self consciousness, and bloody courage seemed to know no bounds. I could whip a room of kids or adults into such a creative frenzy that at the end of the day, they would fly. Really. Out the window and right down the street.

But then life, in one of it’s ugly forms, happened and I took a dive. Down. Fairly low. Lower than previously experienced. Beneath below. I lost my edge. My cool froze. I seized up. I got scared.

This gig at the gallery has been one big step back for sweet wee me. Not back as in back, but rather back as in forward….moving, with some ease, into a head space that rocks my world.

One of the exercises, which I previous struggled with in the way one struggles when outside their comfort zone, was introduced by the instructor. Yikes I thought….feeling the conflicted state of a participant that happens to be one of the leaders. How will I manage this sucker?

The premise was simple. Two people go to the middle of the room and start acting out a very physical scene, say like catching a fish. Someone from outside the circle yells freeze, both players instantly stop in place, and the yeller tags one. The tagged leaves the scene, the tagger assumes the exact position and the play resumes. Except this time, the new player changes the scene. No longer fishing, they may now be hanging clothes on a clothes line.

The game moves very quickly, changes from soup to nuts in rapid succession and borders on hilarious.

Previously…as in earlier in the decade, I would hang back, stepping in only when the instructor would give me the hairy eyeball. Monday night proved quite different. Despite thinking that I was rusty beyond recognition, and that except for the instructor, I was the oldest person in the room by about 25 years, I found myself a regular stage hog. It wasn’t until I was ‘in labour’ moaning loudly and yelling at ‘my husband’ to ‘get that thing out of me’ that I acknowledged my own growth.

My mind was locked into the game. Completely focused. Nothing outside that room existed. No nagging niggly doubts. Nary a concern over my menopausal mind getting lost. Hot? Don’t know. Dry, itchy, balding? Didn’t notice. Laughing my lumpy ass off. Yes sir, that I was.

Mental-pause.

I was blissfully engaged in mental-pause.

Sue Richards

Tags: My Menopause Blog, my menopause blog,blog,Sue Richards, peri-menopausal, menopausal, menopause relief, aging, information on menopause,baby boomer, menopause, funny blog, improv,The Change, womens health news, Second City, menopause symptoms , menopause, mental pause.