Menopause Already? Discover These Symptoms Of Perimenopause

Menopause is the date of your final menstrual period. Since you can't tell it's your last period at the time, scientists define menopause as 12 months without a menstrual period where there are no other causes for the lack of menstruation. Menopause is part of a woman's natural aging process. Your ovaries gradually produce lower levels of the hormones estrogen, progesterone and others. Finally the hormone levels become so low that ovulation and monthly periods stop, and you can't become pregnant.

Menopause is not a sudden event like turning off a light switch - one minute you're menstruating and the next you're in menopause. Physical signs of menopause begin many years before the final menstrual period - much earlier, and more subtly, than most of us realize.

Perimenopause (literally "around menopause") is this transition period before and after menopause. During perimenopause, estrogen and other hormone levels gradually decline. However the transition is not smooth and these erratic fluctuations in hormones can cause a variety of physical, mental and emotional symptoms.

Post menopause is the time after menopause. You're post menopause for the rest of your life.

When perimenopause starts, how long it lasts, and the type and severity of the symptoms vary significantly from woman to woman. Most women's hormones actually start changing in their thirties. However the signs and symptoms of perimenopause usually don't become pronounced until the forties. Sometime around age 40, you might notice that your periods are different -- shorter, longer, heavier, lighter. Or suddenly you find yourself feeling very hot during the day or wake up in the middle of the night soaking wet.

In the early stages of perimenopause, symptoms can come and go. Your periods might be irregular for a few months and then become normal again. You might have weeks of horrible night sweats and then weeks with nothing unusual. This variation in perimenopausal symptoms makes it particularly difficult to understand what is going on with your body or what treatments are working.

According to the National Institute on Aging, the average age of menopause onset is around 51 years. Most women experience the onset of natural menopause around the age of 45-55. Perimenopause normally lasts for six to ten years before your menstrual cycle stops forever and ends about 1 year after your final menstrual period.

All women experience menopause, but each one in a different way. Some women go for years in this transitional state, whereas others sail through in just a few months. My friend, Barbara's periods just stopped one day and that was it. She had no other symptoms! And my mother said she didn't have any problem with it. I, on the other hand, suffered through almost 10 years of weird symptoms during perimenopause before things finally calmed down.

Everyone has different perimenopause symptoms at different times and at different ages. In fact, there is no blueprint to menopause. It's not easy to determine exactly when you started into the perimenopause phase or where you are in the process.