I’m post-menopausal and never experienced anything like you’ve described. I’m so sorry you’re going through this.
A person close to me suffered similar symptoms: vivid, sometimes frightening dreams and drenching night sweats. Blood tests were normal and they were going to chalk it up to perimenopause. Finally, her doctor asked her about snoring (did she snore at all or gasp for breath in her sleep?). Her partner said yes, though it wasn’t loud so it didn’t seem like a big deal. A sleep study confirmed sleep apnea! So, maybe that’s worth checking out for you.
Ok, this is so prescient - for the past few months I've been dealing with (mild) night sweats and mood swings and forgetfulness and all that other fun stuff. I'm about to turn 40 so I wasn't expecting this for a few years, and my mom had a hysterectomy in her late 30s so I can't use her as a guide, but the symptoms are definitely there. Like one of the other commenters, I've found that cutting way back on alcohol has helped with the sleep stuff, and I find that daily movement helps with the emotional and mental symptoms. Joy. 😒
I was literally at my gyno yesterday and had tears at the appointment because there were no answers to me “feeling off” and wondering what balance of hormones I need. I have premature perimenopause (or just plain menopause who knows?!)… due to infertility issues (note, after a long journey I do have one amazing kid)… I don’t have night sweats persay, but this article hit me so hard because I’m going through a lot of other menopausal-ish symptoms and there are no great answers. No major point here, but I feel the frustration. Thanks for writing about it.
The "no answers" thing is so frustrating. So we're just supposed to deal with all these annoying and sometimes life-disrupting symptoms until our uteri decide to give up the ghost?? Wonderful. 🙃
I was 42 when my night sweats and weird dreams started happening, followed by the mood swings, rage, and weight gain so my money is on perimenopause for you. I went back on a low dose birth control pill for a while which did help, but not dramatically. I did a testosterone pellet insertion and that helped some. I'm 46 now and the night sweats seem to have receded a bit although I'm still not in full menopause. Not great insights, just solidarity. What a (miserable) ride!
I had an IUD installed at 38 just after my daughter was born. I re-upped it after 7 years just to keep the hormones going into perimenopause because I had great results and I no longer had periods. Cut to me, at 47 getting tested after a couple of years of hot flushes, some low energy, weight gain, memory loss, etc. My amazing woman doc gave me a blood test and confirmed that I was solidly done, post menopause. She suggested giving me a testosterone and estradiol pellet. It worked like magic. No more hot flushes.
She also suggested I read Dr Jen Gunter’s book on menopause. She’s great.
Nothing you’re describing is abnormal. And women have different timelines and different symptoms. Just knowing that can be so reassuring.
See if you can find a doc that does pellets and menopause stuff. It’s amazing.
I'm so sorry. I'm 59 and those days are a blur. A few things that helped me - acupuncture and herbs by a woman practitioner. Some of the symptoms are lack of yin or too much yang, or both. Western med blew me off. Peppermint tea. Though she became a conspiracy antivax nut-case, I sleuthed my way to helping myself by consulting Christiane Northrup Wisdom of Menopause - specifically pgs 164-178 which, if you think of yin/yang & estrogen/progesterone there is a similar host of symptoms to imbalances. And it's horseshit for a doc to say 42 is too young for perimenopause. Most reputable sources will say it can begin late thirties. By the time I was finally taken seriously after years of complaints they tested my blood and I was 1 cycle from my last cycle ever at 49. I found it helpful to have a 100% cotton/cotton filled mattress pad. That we are crowd-sourcing solutions 40-50 years since Our Bodies, Ourselves first came out is appalling. May this generation really change things for the next.
On a semi-related note, I feel like I have to give a plug for the glory of having my own bed as a happily married lady. My husband and I have very different sleep preferences so I sleep on a queen, surrounded by a nest of carefully arranged pillows. He sleeps on a spartan futon (in the same room) with one sad flat pillow (his choice!) and it is the ACTUAL BEST. Sleeping next to him is like sleeping with a space heater and having my own bed means when I'm hot or having a hard time sleeping, at least I don't have another body in bed making it all worse.
Solidarity. I went though menopause early, around your age, and the night sweats were really my only symptom. My period did not wean or change around that time, it just stopped at some point. Can you get in with a good bio-identical / HRT person / menopause practitioner who will do more precise labs for you? Or run a two week experiment with taking DHEA 5mg (Integrative Therapeutics makes a good one) each morning, or even just Black Cohosh or Vitex? It’s ridiculous that we have to make ourselves into guinea pigs and research everything until we align with the right practitioner, but there it is. I do hope whatever this is resolved for you swiftly and without great expense.
During pregnancy, I slept on a terry-cloth towel and used another one for a pillow. It's the only thing that helped. But it did make a pretty big difference. It needs to be the right kind of towel though -- thick enough to be absorbent but not so thick that it kills the airflow. So not the super plush luxury towels, but one level down, like frontgate. And if it gets really bad in the night, you can flip it over and/or fold the pillow towel differently for a fresh surface. You could prob also try sleeping on a couple at once and ditching the top one as needed? Anyway, maybe you've tried that already, but that's my highly specific advice.
I am 39 (40 next month) and have two kids 8 and 6 … I have had bed-drenching night sweats on and off for eight years. All lab tests ‘normal’ … I had endometriosis so I had a hysterectomy last year and was sure that would solve the problem … fast forward six months post surgery and night sweats creep back in about once a month - severity varies. Being an alive woman at this point feels like a miracle and a joke cuz no medical practitioners (or politicians)seem to give a shit about exploring things to genuinely make our lives more manageable. Also I’m almost certain I’m experiencing some perimenopause symptoms because the rage and unpredictable moods have also made a reappearance. Fun times.
My mother went through menopause early, it was complete by age 43. I’ve been on a constant look out for early symptoms in myself. Is a specific experience of menopause or menstruation genetic? Who knows? Either way I’ve been giving every sweaty night, change in period rhythm, change in body shape and emotional overwhelm the side eye. It’s great to know that I can look forward to years, a decade or more of such vigilance as I await the inevitable.
I THINK this stuff tends to be genetic? My mom had a hysterectomy following the birth of my brother so her timeline doesn't really apply to me. But yes - constant vigilance!
Oh, oh, oh. Yes. I was about 43 when I started gaining weight (out of nowhere), and having foot/joint pain. And my eyebrows got thinner. And leaking urine a bit. And my armpits smelled weird. And insomnia. And I started occasionally having heart palpitations. Oh, and I never sweated like that but I did wake up with extraordinary anxiety and dread.
I was in a large city so I had ample health care but both my GYN and GP were like, "Oh, it's just age, oh just drink green juice, oh work out more, oh take a vacation and do yoga/pilates/kegels, oh you are too young for menopause, oh oh oh." So, I tried all those things. None of them worked.
I went KETO, I went Paleo, I did a triathlon, I joined a gym, I gave up drinking, I drank more.
It was dismissive, the attitude I got from doctors.
Five painful years later, I was on the west coast and there was a sort of...hippie-esque clinic mostly for middle-aged people, mainly cis-women and I had this amazing nurse-practitioner who did an exam and did blood work and she was like, "You feel terrible because you are in peri-menopause and you have several prolapses (that no one saw when they examined me?). I had a hysterectomy and a little uplift surgery. (WHY DON'T WE DO PELVIC FLOOR THERAPY AS A MATTER OF COURSE????)
I started HRT and things went much better for a while, until I got breast cancer and it was hormone sensitive and then that got cut off. I get it, but now I have full menopause, less drive, more joint pain, and I have to be very careful with how I exercises, how I consume, alcohol, food, and I guard my sleep like a dragon would treasure. And the weight, which I know we aren't supposed to care about that because it's all horrible phobic and patriarchal, but it's mostly just still there, and I can't even do running or dance because my ankle joints and tendons hurt so much. At 55 I've finally been teaching myself to just love myself fully as is for the first time.
It sucks, how we are treated. And I'm a very privileged white woman who had access and the time to advocate for myself. We are treated dismissively in our menarche (PMS isn't real), we are treated dismissively when we want pain meds for exams (um...no one does a colonoscopy awake), IUD's are PAINFUL AS HELL. We are treated dismissively as pregnant people (and BIPOC people have far worse outcomes during pregnancy and childbirth and are treated terribly), we are treated as if we are neurotic and hysterical after birth (when PPD/A is so risky-ask me I had it).
And then at our menopause, when we are "used up" they REALLY don't care. It's a wonder we haven't just blown all of it up.
I will say though, there is this kind of wondrous relief in menopause. It's a type of distance from giving a fuck. Not unlike AHP's portal, but once through that portal, there is more sense of rightness inside myself (even if I hurt a bit more and have to take more time to stretch and so forth). I suppose we don't blow it all up because we can give far less fucks?
I'll have to think about that, but for now, thank you for sharing this. We need to tell these stories much much more so thank you for sharing yours.
Oh my gosh Julie, thank you for sharing your story AND for pointing out how much more fucked comprehensive treatment is for people with marginalized identities. Also hell yes to guarding your sleep like a dragon - HELL YES.
I started experiencing perimenopause symptoms at 35 (currently 37) and it brought to light the fact that I have had ADHD my whole life…apparently a very common occurrence for women going through “the change”. All my labs were normal as well except my anti-Mullerian hormone level (related to fertility) was low AF. If you talk about perimenopause enough in the vicinity of your phone, the algorithm is gonna start showing you all the peri/menopause content including multiple celebrity wellness brands aimed at menopausal women. It’s (cue the song from Aladdin) “a whole new world” of fascinating motherhood culture to dive into.
ok never heard of the anti-mullerian hormone! will ask about it! and yeah there's so much to say about all the companies making menopause chic and aspirational lol
This happened to me! Dopamine is affected by estrogen (there are articles out there on it). Many cis women with Aud/AHDH can experience far worse PMS (PMDD) and Post Partum depression/anxiety. I had both, terribly. Menopause is very hard on folks with AHDH and this was when I was finally diagnosed!
There’s an irony that just when kids reach an age when it’s easier for you to sleep through the night without disruption, you can’t. That’s been my experience. It’s not just feeling hot during the night. During the day, I feel cold. The internal thermostat feels all out of whack, especially near the end of a cycle. I’m almost 50 and looking forward to my final menstrual period, which oddly feels similar to when I was 13 and anxiously awaiting the arrival of my first one.
I’m post-menopausal and never experienced anything like you’ve described. I’m so sorry you’re going through this.
A person close to me suffered similar symptoms: vivid, sometimes frightening dreams and drenching night sweats. Blood tests were normal and they were going to chalk it up to perimenopause. Finally, her doctor asked her about snoring (did she snore at all or gasp for breath in her sleep?). Her partner said yes, though it wasn’t loud so it didn’t seem like a big deal. A sleep study confirmed sleep apnea! So, maybe that’s worth checking out for you.
that's a good idea!
Ok, this is so prescient - for the past few months I've been dealing with (mild) night sweats and mood swings and forgetfulness and all that other fun stuff. I'm about to turn 40 so I wasn't expecting this for a few years, and my mom had a hysterectomy in her late 30s so I can't use her as a guide, but the symptoms are definitely there. Like one of the other commenters, I've found that cutting way back on alcohol has helped with the sleep stuff, and I find that daily movement helps with the emotional and mental symptoms. Joy. 😒
I was literally at my gyno yesterday and had tears at the appointment because there were no answers to me “feeling off” and wondering what balance of hormones I need. I have premature perimenopause (or just plain menopause who knows?!)… due to infertility issues (note, after a long journey I do have one amazing kid)… I don’t have night sweats persay, but this article hit me so hard because I’m going through a lot of other menopausal-ish symptoms and there are no great answers. No major point here, but I feel the frustration. Thanks for writing about it.
The "no answers" thing is so frustrating. So we're just supposed to deal with all these annoying and sometimes life-disrupting symptoms until our uteri decide to give up the ghost?? Wonderful. 🙃
solidarity ❤️❤️
I was 42 when my night sweats and weird dreams started happening, followed by the mood swings, rage, and weight gain so my money is on perimenopause for you. I went back on a low dose birth control pill for a while which did help, but not dramatically. I did a testosterone pellet insertion and that helped some. I'm 46 now and the night sweats seem to have receded a bit although I'm still not in full menopause. Not great insights, just solidarity. What a (miserable) ride!
solidarity HELPS - thank you!
I had an IUD installed at 38 just after my daughter was born. I re-upped it after 7 years just to keep the hormones going into perimenopause because I had great results and I no longer had periods. Cut to me, at 47 getting tested after a couple of years of hot flushes, some low energy, weight gain, memory loss, etc. My amazing woman doc gave me a blood test and confirmed that I was solidly done, post menopause. She suggested giving me a testosterone and estradiol pellet. It worked like magic. No more hot flushes.
She also suggested I read Dr Jen Gunter’s book on menopause. She’s great.
Nothing you’re describing is abnormal. And women have different timelines and different symptoms. Just knowing that can be so reassuring.
See if you can find a doc that does pellets and menopause stuff. It’s amazing.
I'm so sorry. I'm 59 and those days are a blur. A few things that helped me - acupuncture and herbs by a woman practitioner. Some of the symptoms are lack of yin or too much yang, or both. Western med blew me off. Peppermint tea. Though she became a conspiracy antivax nut-case, I sleuthed my way to helping myself by consulting Christiane Northrup Wisdom of Menopause - specifically pgs 164-178 which, if you think of yin/yang & estrogen/progesterone there is a similar host of symptoms to imbalances. And it's horseshit for a doc to say 42 is too young for perimenopause. Most reputable sources will say it can begin late thirties. By the time I was finally taken seriously after years of complaints they tested my blood and I was 1 cycle from my last cycle ever at 49. I found it helpful to have a 100% cotton/cotton filled mattress pad. That we are crowd-sourcing solutions 40-50 years since Our Bodies, Ourselves first came out is appalling. May this generation really change things for the next.
On a semi-related note, I feel like I have to give a plug for the glory of having my own bed as a happily married lady. My husband and I have very different sleep preferences so I sleep on a queen, surrounded by a nest of carefully arranged pillows. He sleeps on a spartan futon (in the same room) with one sad flat pillow (his choice!) and it is the ACTUAL BEST. Sleeping next to him is like sleeping with a space heater and having my own bed means when I'm hot or having a hard time sleeping, at least I don't have another body in bed making it all worse.
YES YES YES YES. I am the same!!!!!!!
Uuuuugh. So much rage, and despair. But at least we all have each other to share stories. As women have been doing, always.
I’m 42 and have been soaking up all the perimenopause info like a sponge, bc I know it’s coming. This book is definitely a go to for me - https://www.amazon.com/Menopause-Brain-Transition-Knowledge-Confidence/dp/B0CB93VXQZ/
And the whole other rant is about actually getting medical care, that is educated AND affordable. 🤦♀️
Solidarity. I went though menopause early, around your age, and the night sweats were really my only symptom. My period did not wean or change around that time, it just stopped at some point. Can you get in with a good bio-identical / HRT person / menopause practitioner who will do more precise labs for you? Or run a two week experiment with taking DHEA 5mg (Integrative Therapeutics makes a good one) each morning, or even just Black Cohosh or Vitex? It’s ridiculous that we have to make ourselves into guinea pigs and research everything until we align with the right practitioner, but there it is. I do hope whatever this is resolved for you swiftly and without great expense.
But also… if you have had your hormones checked and all seems stable, could it be that the intensity of your dreams is the cause?
And pure latex mattress topper for the bed.
During pregnancy, I slept on a terry-cloth towel and used another one for a pillow. It's the only thing that helped. But it did make a pretty big difference. It needs to be the right kind of towel though -- thick enough to be absorbent but not so thick that it kills the airflow. So not the super plush luxury towels, but one level down, like frontgate. And if it gets really bad in the night, you can flip it over and/or fold the pillow towel differently for a fresh surface. You could prob also try sleeping on a couple at once and ditching the top one as needed? Anyway, maybe you've tried that already, but that's my highly specific advice.
Yes!! I did the towel trick postpartum and it was the only thing that made me feel semi human. Still, night sweats are awful. No way round it.
i have NOT tried that! shockingly lol - will def employ this strategy!
The towels are vital. For postpartum and perimenopause, and also the weaning sweats.
I am 39 (40 next month) and have two kids 8 and 6 … I have had bed-drenching night sweats on and off for eight years. All lab tests ‘normal’ … I had endometriosis so I had a hysterectomy last year and was sure that would solve the problem … fast forward six months post surgery and night sweats creep back in about once a month - severity varies. Being an alive woman at this point feels like a miracle and a joke cuz no medical practitioners (or politicians)seem to give a shit about exploring things to genuinely make our lives more manageable. Also I’m almost certain I’m experiencing some perimenopause symptoms because the rage and unpredictable moods have also made a reappearance. Fun times.
what the fuckkkkkkkk eight years! were some of them baby-having related? can you imagine if MEN were night-sweating their asses of?
My mother went through menopause early, it was complete by age 43. I’ve been on a constant look out for early symptoms in myself. Is a specific experience of menopause or menstruation genetic? Who knows? Either way I’ve been giving every sweaty night, change in period rhythm, change in body shape and emotional overwhelm the side eye. It’s great to know that I can look forward to years, a decade or more of such vigilance as I await the inevitable.
I THINK this stuff tends to be genetic? My mom had a hysterectomy following the birth of my brother so her timeline doesn't really apply to me. But yes - constant vigilance!
Oh, oh, oh. Yes. I was about 43 when I started gaining weight (out of nowhere), and having foot/joint pain. And my eyebrows got thinner. And leaking urine a bit. And my armpits smelled weird. And insomnia. And I started occasionally having heart palpitations. Oh, and I never sweated like that but I did wake up with extraordinary anxiety and dread.
I was in a large city so I had ample health care but both my GYN and GP were like, "Oh, it's just age, oh just drink green juice, oh work out more, oh take a vacation and do yoga/pilates/kegels, oh you are too young for menopause, oh oh oh." So, I tried all those things. None of them worked.
I went KETO, I went Paleo, I did a triathlon, I joined a gym, I gave up drinking, I drank more.
It was dismissive, the attitude I got from doctors.
Five painful years later, I was on the west coast and there was a sort of...hippie-esque clinic mostly for middle-aged people, mainly cis-women and I had this amazing nurse-practitioner who did an exam and did blood work and she was like, "You feel terrible because you are in peri-menopause and you have several prolapses (that no one saw when they examined me?). I had a hysterectomy and a little uplift surgery. (WHY DON'T WE DO PELVIC FLOOR THERAPY AS A MATTER OF COURSE????)
I started HRT and things went much better for a while, until I got breast cancer and it was hormone sensitive and then that got cut off. I get it, but now I have full menopause, less drive, more joint pain, and I have to be very careful with how I exercises, how I consume, alcohol, food, and I guard my sleep like a dragon would treasure. And the weight, which I know we aren't supposed to care about that because it's all horrible phobic and patriarchal, but it's mostly just still there, and I can't even do running or dance because my ankle joints and tendons hurt so much. At 55 I've finally been teaching myself to just love myself fully as is for the first time.
It sucks, how we are treated. And I'm a very privileged white woman who had access and the time to advocate for myself. We are treated dismissively in our menarche (PMS isn't real), we are treated dismissively when we want pain meds for exams (um...no one does a colonoscopy awake), IUD's are PAINFUL AS HELL. We are treated dismissively as pregnant people (and BIPOC people have far worse outcomes during pregnancy and childbirth and are treated terribly), we are treated as if we are neurotic and hysterical after birth (when PPD/A is so risky-ask me I had it).
And then at our menopause, when we are "used up" they REALLY don't care. It's a wonder we haven't just blown all of it up.
I will say though, there is this kind of wondrous relief in menopause. It's a type of distance from giving a fuck. Not unlike AHP's portal, but once through that portal, there is more sense of rightness inside myself (even if I hurt a bit more and have to take more time to stretch and so forth). I suppose we don't blow it all up because we can give far less fucks?
I'll have to think about that, but for now, thank you for sharing this. We need to tell these stories much much more so thank you for sharing yours.
Oh my gosh Julie, thank you for sharing your story AND for pointing out how much more fucked comprehensive treatment is for people with marginalized identities. Also hell yes to guarding your sleep like a dragon - HELL YES.
yes, the palpitations! I was having so many I went to urgent care.
I did too!!! After a lot of tests, heart is fine! Just "aging"
I started experiencing perimenopause symptoms at 35 (currently 37) and it brought to light the fact that I have had ADHD my whole life…apparently a very common occurrence for women going through “the change”. All my labs were normal as well except my anti-Mullerian hormone level (related to fertility) was low AF. If you talk about perimenopause enough in the vicinity of your phone, the algorithm is gonna start showing you all the peri/menopause content including multiple celebrity wellness brands aimed at menopausal women. It’s (cue the song from Aladdin) “a whole new world” of fascinating motherhood culture to dive into.
ok never heard of the anti-mullerian hormone! will ask about it! and yeah there's so much to say about all the companies making menopause chic and aspirational lol
*TRYING to make menopause chic and aspirational
This happened to me! Dopamine is affected by estrogen (there are articles out there on it). Many cis women with Aud/AHDH can experience far worse PMS (PMDD) and Post Partum depression/anxiety. I had both, terribly. Menopause is very hard on folks with AHDH and this was when I was finally diagnosed!
There’s an irony that just when kids reach an age when it’s easier for you to sleep through the night without disruption, you can’t. That’s been my experience. It’s not just feeling hot during the night. During the day, I feel cold. The internal thermostat feels all out of whack, especially near the end of a cycle. I’m almost 50 and looking forward to my final menstrual period, which oddly feels similar to when I was 13 and anxiously awaiting the arrival of my first one.
ha! totally! a second adolescence.