I did not mean to peace out for so long, and I am sorry. It’s been a rough couple weeks, but I couldn’t bring myself to come here and write about it because I know what I’m going through is not an actual health crisis, that most women have to deal with it at some point, and so I felt I shouldn’t come here and bitch. I mean, I thought that was why I wasn’t coming here (especially when I was thinking about SHU so much and all that she’s been through with her very real health crisis), but now I’m pretty sure it was something else.
I think the real reason that I didn’t come here to write about it was because I really wasn’t sure what was going on. It seems so obvious to attribute hot flashes, horrible sleep and GI issues to perimenopause, but I struggle to know if I am even in perimenopause myself. I am 44, and have diminished ovarian reserve. I didn’t cycle for most of my 20s, and when I did my cycles were short 16-20 days and my “period” was just spotting. Then I got an ablation (because my prolapse prevented me from wearing a tampon and I like to swim), and stopped having even the erratic bleeding I used to experience. I did eventually have some spotting, and sometimes it would line up with other symptoms like moodiness, bloating and tender breasts (that was always a big one for me) which led me to believe that hormones were fluctuating in a way that at least mimicked cycles. I had some minor hot flashes a couple years ago and my mood was all over the place so I assumed I was in perimenopause then. And it’s been over a year since I’ve had any kind of cycle symptoms or spotting, so I assumed I was in menopause already.
In the last year, when my sleep went to shit, I assumed that was also menopause because I heard that was a common issue for women pretty much forever after “the change.” So I was super surprised when I started having hot flashes (way more intense than last time) and really bad GI issues (sometimes the bloating was so bad I couldn’t do anything but lay in bed for several hours) and I thought, what the what? But I assumed it was perimenopause again, since I didn’t have a real lack of cycles to prove otherwise, and started reading up on all the trouble it can cause.
Except the really bad shit started not long after I started a new medication. I assumed the new medication would be no big deal because I’ve been on Ritalin forever, and Concerta is so similar that when I first saw the name of the drug on the Rx bottle I assumed the refill was a mistake, and I had been given Ritalin again (I swear there were only hour letters difference in the two). So surely starting that would be no big deal. I have literally never had adverse affects with any drug, except I always get a yeast infection when I take antibiotics.
(This is another thing I wondered about! Because I just took antibiotics for the first time in forever in January, for the sinus infection, and I def had some GI stuff after that, because I started taking probiotics to try to improve them. So was the really bad GI stuff just a compounding of that issue?!)
And maybe it was the antibiotics, or the Concerta!! And I realized that it was the not knowing that was driving me crazy. It was the not knowing that kept me from writing here. Because every symptom I have can be attributed to the Concerta, or to perimenopause, or even a really bad imbalance in my gut biome. So what the fuck should I suspect.
Oh, and I started thinking that my GI issues were a new lactose intolerance, which is also linked to perimenopause, and antibiotics (but not Concerta?). I stopped eating dairy for a few days and the GI symptoms dissipated, but when I ate some Thursday, they kind of came back, but not nearly as bad as before (though I slept HORRIBLY Thursday night – I was up from 2-4:30am and I was wondering if that was because I ate dairy that day). Everything is a possible sign, and none of them point anywhere.
So basically I have no answers. And I hate not having answers. I can accept a lot of things if I know what I am accepting. I even accepted lactose intolerance when I thought that might be it, even though I eat tons of dairy and would have to overhaul my whole diet, and not eat foods I love. I’d honestly rather stop eating dairy, knowing it would manage my GI issues, than not be sure of what was causing it.
But now I’m not sure again. I really don’t know. And it’s driving me crazy. I stopped taking the Concerta, and am back on the Ritalin and I guess I’ll see how it goes. I am taking notes on what I eat and how I feel. My guess is will be like the dairy, a suggestion of an answer but not a definitive one.
And I’m sad to leave the Concerta behind because I really liked only taking it once a day, and I think it worked as well as the Ritalin, even though I was taking a lower dose. So it will be hard to not have a definitive answer.
In the meantime, thank you to all the new commenters who shared with me their experiences with HRT after less than positive experiences (unapproved comments do not show up in my email so I only saw them Friday night). If stopping the Concerta does nothing for my other symptoms (mostly the heat flashes and sleep), I will definitely talk to my OB again about HRT. Maybe there is a concoction I can handle! Or maybe the sleep deprivation will make me more amenable to other side affects. Or maybe I’ll ask about the non-HRT prescription for hot flashes. Or Wellbutrin! I took Wellburtin when I was depressed and SSRIs weren’t working and thought it was the most helpful thing I had tried. I’m not sure if I can take any of these while on ADHD meds, but it’s just good to know there might options out there and I REALLY appreciating people sharing with me. THANK YOU!!!!
So yeah, that is where I’ve been. It wasn’t really that I didn’t think my issues were worth writing about, it was that I wasn’t sure how to write about them when I was so unsure of what was going on. I’m trying to accept that there will be no definitive answer, but that I’ll have to see how my symptoms change. The only truly proactive thing I can do is track supplements, food, symptoms and how I’m feeling. That is the only way to recognize the patterns that might provide real information. So I’m doing that. And I’ll keep you all updated when I have more information.
But I promise I’ll post about something else – anything else – before then.
It’s frustrating to have all these symptoms and not know what is really causing them. Do you read the newsletter from Emily Oster’s team? It’s written by a endocrinologist. The content is excellent so I recommend checking it out! I haven’t hit menopause yet, but I read it to know what to expect and how to navigate conversation conversations with my physician.