THE MENOPAUSE SHOWS HER FACE…
AND SO?

Elisas, Clarisses, Marilanes, Amélias...
Yes, we are at the same road. And we can be surprised, at any moment, after the thirty five years, for strong and intense perspirations, inexplicable depressions, loss of the sexual will, insomnias, forgetfulness, vaginal drying and the appearance of small stains in the skin of the body and of the face.
They are common also the increase of the physical fatigue and of the muscular flabbiness.
It is the pré-menopause patrolling us, calling us for a new life cycle. Life that can become a torment, to change in women that we never imagined to be. And you can be sure: this "pre" can last little, and soon, soon, show the intensity of the "menopause.
"A lot of times we played like this:
"Fulana! Oh, that can only be in the menopause... "
Comment that always sends us to such attitudes doubtful or eccentric of the tal fulana. But when we have to face that new hurricane in our lives everything is different. It seems that we were taken to a force for the tunnel of a time that we imagined always far, very distant of us.
But, almost always, when we noticed, she already arrived and there is no more as we separate ourselves of her.
It is in the phase of the pré-menopause and also of the menopause that the woman is more questioned, she puts to the proof of everything that happened with her during almost a whole life.
I met some that spoke about the arrival of the period as if the first absorbent had entered in her routine, yesterday.
And how many memories!
And how many questionamentos(conferir)!
They remember the first boyfriend. Of the first kiss. Of the first sexual relationship.
And they remind of more…
Of the abortions and of the children that could have had, or no, and that they were rejected, of the deliveries, of the false illusions, of the dreams that never passed of the imagination.
It is a time of analyses and personal evaluations.
After all, the menopause in the life of any woman brings to the surface of an idea, that is not true, that "I, as woman, ended. I am at the end of the line. My main function, the one of procreating, finished."
Since the first woman appeared in the world, she was born to procreate. It is religious function, biological and for many, unquestionable.
Therefore the menopause acts much more for us.
It is very larger of we can suppose.
Even for those women that never thought at the maternity and never imagined in the paper of the procriadora, when they arrive in this period of the life, they put in the wall.
They are interrogated.
They want to know if they really acted right.
The menopause is as if it was time of showing.
She has the power to bring to you everything that happened, the roads that the life took, the directions that you chose for your future days.
I don't know any woman that has not gone by that.
Sometimes they hide of themselves, but this to "cover the sun with the hard sieve" a limited time. Suddenly, they all come across the question:
Will it be that I made the right?
Will it be that I acted honestly with me?
I remember well of a woman very resolved with her same. Brilliant professional. An artist in her full energy. She was loving intensely. Her girlfriend, another strong woman, equally competent.
The two were committees for more than ten years.
They went by several loving crises, common to all the couples, and they got to overcome all.
To each due stage, the love still appeared stronger.
Yes,they had, interests committees besides the emotional and sexual. They possessed the same bank account, the same financial responsibilities, the same beginning of always honoring the commitments of bills to pay.
They didn't only divide the same roof, the same bed, the same checkbook…
They shared the life.
With close ages, they fell in the same black hole of what all of us are subject.
They had to face the announcements not pleaseful of the menopause.
Curious of what happened with that couple.
The two entered in deep existential crisis. And the same questions, the same questionamentos appeared.
The sign of the não-menstruação is disturbing.
The fact of they have not procreated, of have not given pursuit to the life, does with that this period is still more difficult, because it is when the body decides to put a final point in this possibility.
Many of the women that chose the homosexual relationship get to be deeply depressed.
And how it is difficult for them if they convince that the non maternity was a choice, in a certain time of their lives, full of conviction and honesty with themselves.
If today, with the development of the science and with the speed of the information, we still got scared before the ghosts that the menopause presents us, imagine you as they suffered the women of not "so formerly" like this.
The grandparents, that always have a good little story to count, tell that there for the forties, 50, they met a friend of the friend, a cousin of the aunt, a neighbor of the sister-in-law that, in a certain age, in the harmed of the "stocking age", got crazy.
They say them that the creature's madness was provoked by the rules, for the lack of the indisposition, finally for the flaws or the end of the period.
And a sentence always appears in those reports:
"She went mad because the rules arose for the head."
The effects of the menopause were treated like this.
What today we know how to be the increase of the irritability, of the sensibility, of the disappearance of the appetite to the sex and of the easiness with that the depression settles were considered madness by many.
The menopause as social and medical phenomenon just appeared in the second half of the XX century. That because the woman's life expectancy in 1900 didn't pass of the 40, 45, years - exactly the phases of the pre menopause and of the menopause.
The Second World War, believe, it enlarged not only the woman's possibility to live plus, but, also with better life conditions.
During and after the war new technologies appeared, the science expanded, we arrived at the era of the antibiotics and to know that was prevention.
Yes the prevention.
That word that made to increase the woman's life expectancy in at least 30 years, even in the countries still in development.
In a first moment only the wealthiest women had access to the new knowledge of the medicine. Little by little, the service was expanding and dropping taboos and centennial barriers.
Starting from 1960 the researches in search of the birth-control pill took the scientists to the synthetic hormones, the great combatants of the consequences of the menopause.
Already in the end of the sixties the science liberated the doctors the treatment of hormonal replacement to lessen the symptoms of the heat waves, of the irritability, of the insomnia, of the depression and of the vaginal drying.
They were years of great modernity for the woman's health but also of a lot of uncertainties and results not always that favorable.
In that time the women sought the doctors with the own complaints of the menopause and to them it was given synthetic hormones without the due control, as evaluations and periodic blood tests following a treatment criterion and attendance.
There was not the commitment of regular consultations.
A few time later the sad verification: the side effects of the synthetic hormones increased the incidence of the carcinomas(conferir), the malignant tumors, in the ovaries, in the endometrium and in the mammas.
They are bad news that still patrol us. It returns and stocking found somebody that reminds us an article, a comment, a diagnosis that moves us away of the clinics in search of an exit for so much discomfort. Many gynecologists still insist on not recommending the hormonal replacement. Others not only believe as they don't doubt of the results.
Before so much controversy, what to do?
How can we take precautions?
Which is the right age, or the exact moment, to seek for a doctor?
Which is the best medical specialty to take care?
Answers for so many doubts you will find in the next pages.