The Ramblings of a Menopausal Woman

I originally wrote this on New Year’s Eve, but forgot to hit post. so here’s where my mind was a few weeks ago. Sorry for the delay.

If there is one thing 2025 has taught me, it is to never let my guard down. That, and maybe don’t get a tattoo on January 4th that says “resilience”.

The last time I posted, I really thought I was getting to the other side of this shit year. I literally finished writing it when we were sitting at the airport to go to Denver for our tenth anniversary trip. We had a blast on our trip. We went to see The Hives at Ogden Theater, took a ring making class so we could make our anniversary gifts, and even got to go up to The Stanley Hotel for a couple of days.

Then it was time to come home.

While we were waiting to board the plane home our pet sitter called. Our 7 year old cat had just collapsed and died. Me, coming from almost 2 decades of veterinary medicine and 911 dispatch, I just started talking her through CPR while we were boarding the plane. It was about a week later that I realized my cat’s name was Edgar (aka Ed). Sorry about that Denver airport folks, Ed was my cat.

Something broke in me that day. I think it was just the last straw in a whole buttload of straws thrown at me this year. Literally every time I thought I was finally on the other side of everything, something else would happen to knock me down again. When I spoke to my boss the next day I basically said “Either give me FMLA paperwork or COBRA paperwork.” I said it much nicer than that, but it was what I was thinking. I needed to take something off my plate and work was the easiest thing to remove.

So, I took FMLA for the first time in my life. I asked for the maximum allowable time. During that time I really tried to catch up on life, while trying anything to feel normal again. I just felt so broken. I was so tired of being in so much physical and emotional pain. My body literally hurt from how tense I was all the time. I have cried more this year than probably the rest of my life combined, at least that is what it feels like. It was bad y’all.

I’m hoping things are on an upswing now but I’m remaining realistic and cautious.

In the midst of all of this I was trying to get on hormone replacement therapy for menopause. I remember asking my primary care about it earlier in the year but they wanted to concentrate on the kidney stone issues and weight loss first. I don’t know if it would helped, but I think if I had known more about the possible benefits I would have pushed harder.

Here’s another super fun menopause fact I found out recently. Apparently, SSRI medications (like antidepressants) can be less effective in women without estrogen in their system. That would have been helpful information earlier in the year, and another reason I should have pushed for HRT earlier.

Since I had a uterine ablation in 2020, I really had no idea where I was in the whole menopause cycle. About a month ago I was finally able to get some bloodwork done and it showed no estrogen. That and various other hormone markers showed I am fully post-menopausal. Officially closed for business, even though my uterus never worked right in the first place.

Let me tell you, menopausal rage is a real thing. I don’t know if you have ever seen that movie Falling Down with Michael Douglas, but for the first time I really understood what that character felt. I have never been in less control over my emotions than I have been this year. There were times where I said to my husband “I don’t think I should be around people today.” I hated being like that. I was so fucking angry.

On the surface I tried to keep it together. My Instagram life probably looked great. On the inside I just wanted everything to stop, just a little bit. I wanted to stop crying. I wanted my shoulders to stop trying to hug my brain. I wanted to stop getting sick. I wanted to stop being angry. I wanted to stop yelling. I wanted to stop being me, because being me sucked.

In the time I was off work I did anything I could find to feel better. I started going to therapy voluntarily for the first time. It seemed like everyone I knew was in forced therapy when I was a kid. When I turned 18, I never went again until this year. I tried floats, massage, acupuncture. Anything I could find to relax. I did end up having to go back to the ER when I was vomiting back in October. Oh and I got root canal in December. My life is super fun.

On the surface I could have made this whole year look great. I had lost weight. Getting acupuncture. Stopped smoking. Pretty much stopped drinking alcohol. Look at her, getting her life together.

The reality of it was that I was done. It felt like every time I tried to stand up, life would kick me back down. It just sucked so much.

During the whole kidney stone thing I realized that alcohol made my hot flashes worse. So now I have to choose, cocktail or hot flash. When I got sick in October and ended up vomiting for 3 days, that last thing in my mouth was my coffee and a smoke. I have had zero desire to smoke a cigarette since. I have not even tried to work past that aversion. Still not a huge fan of plain drip coffee anymore, but I am not giving up coffee too! So I make fancy coffee. The weight loss? Who knows, but I have had blood work done several times since then and everything seems good and I am not still losing weight. I’m calling it a win.

It’s one of the first things I said to my therapist when I started. I told her that in order for good things to happen I had to go through significant trauma first. She told me that she appreciated that I looked for the silver lining but maybe we could find a way to reframe that. I have been more of a every silver lining has a cloud kind of a person this past year but I am working on it.

One thing that has not gone unnoticed is that life has sucked for a lot of people this year. And the world in general is kinda a dumpster fire but we are just going to have to keep pushing forward. Being on HRT seems to have really helped me in several mental and physical ways. I did not find it surprising that the age bracket of women with the highest suicide rates was 45-64. Especially since people are only beginning to talk about menopause. Why? Probably because GenX women like me, who will say the quiet part out loud, are going through it now. Y’all, we are not gonna let women through this alone again. That time is gone. You want to talk about women’s uteruses? Then we shall talk about the uterus!

Anyhoo, I’m going into 2026 with loooooow expectations. It’s like when I first moved to San Francisco in 1993 and I met my friend Angel. We were talking about earthquakes and she told me it was a lot like tornado safety, cover your head and such. She told me to just hold on and “Ride the Wave”. For some reason I have always remembered that. This year, I’m gonna do that.

At least I didn’t work at Food Network.