Early menopause and identity, social connection and future plans

Just after I had my hysterectomy and oophorectomy, so at 33, I then became celibate for 14 years. Because I think when you, well, for me, I’m not sure about anyone else; but for me when you’re so young and you have a hysterectomy and an oophorectomy it changes the way you think about yourself and your potential desirability. Your … I want to say utility [laughing] but that’s a very kind of stark word. But I guess your sexual identity, And how desirable or otherwise you feel to a potential partner. And then when you have a breast removed in addition to that, you know, it’s even worse really [laughing].

So these are the things, I guess, that you mightn’t often think about but that impact in other ways in terms of life. Yeah. So at 46 I developed a relationship with a man that I’d known for 20 years and we’re now married this year, so I think it’s, like, six months that we’ve been married, which is awesome. But sometimes it takes a while to kind of get there. Yeah.

And I think psychologically, too, because I’d thought from a very young age that I wouldn’t be able to have children, I’d always felt kind of damaged, you know. But I think the hysterectomy and the oophorectomy then had a finality to it. And I think that you can often make decisions with the best intentions and project how you might feel after you’ve taken a course of action, but I always think once it’s done it’s different, you know. Like, there’s no going back. Yeah. And, look, I don’t regret having it.

I couldn’t have lived with that kind of, you know, chronic or repetitive pain all those years. So I think in lots of ways it was the best decision for me to make given the circumstances. Yeah. But it is a big decision. And I think psychologically that’s probably a big contributing factor to why I didn’t have a relationship for so long. You know, because of all the, ‘Well, you know, who would want me, I can’t have children,’ you know, what if I get into a relationship and, you know, someone expects, you know, children; all of that sort of thing. Whereas – and I think as an older person kind of once you get to kind of your mid 40s and onwards that’s no longer an issue in relationships.

You do definitely feel a lot older. Your body feels a lot older when you eventually, you know, have kind of really gone into menopause totally. You have to work so much harder at keeping fit, so much harder at looking after what you eat and everything. You know, you can’t get away with [laughing] drinking too much alcohol and eating too much rubbish. It seems to affect your body just so much more.

I think I’m quite a vain person [laughing]. I always used to think I wasn’t, but as I’ve got older I’ve become more vain because those things I’ve realised actually hold a lot of importance to me. I like to feel good. It gives me confidence if I think I’m looking good. So I look in the mirror a lot less these days [laughing]. I’ve been really shocked with how much, like especially on my face I’m starting to get, you know [laughing] saggy cheeks and I feel like, ‘Oh I’m only 46, you know. I shouldn’t be dealing with that.’ I mean, I was always going to be wrinkly because I smile a lot so I have lots of lines anyway and I always raise my eyebrows [laughing] so I have lots of forehead lines.

But yeah, the skin tone thing actually bothers me a lot. Not to the point that I go out and spend lots of money on creams and stuff though [laughing]. So I mustn’t be that vain, [laughing] and I definitely wouldn’t look at cosmetic surgery or anything like that. It’s a journey that I’m having to come to terms with, yeah, and you know, having to dye my hair a lot earlier than I thought I would have to. Yeah, losing my breasts was quite confronting. I never had much anyway, apart from when I was breastfeeding [laughing].

So yeah, the things that make you feel feminine, there’s a real sense of loss there and you realise that you’re kind of stepping into that next stage where I don’t want it to be about image or to be hung up on that, but there’s also that sense of, ‘I want to feel good about who I am.’ Yeah, so it’s just making peace with yourself that, ‘Okay, this is happening to me and it’s not what I thought I was going to look like in my late forties.’ [laughing] ‘I thought I’d hold onto my vitality a little bit longer but it’s okay.’ Yeah. So yeah, I’m coming to terms with it and yeah, if I – that’s another good reason to try and keep… eat healthy and exercise too, because I definitely feel better about all of those things, yeah. [Laughing]

I’d been young and fit and healthy before I was diagnosed. And you know I worked in trades, so I was carrying about big bits of timber and all that sort of thing and I was very strong. And post treatment and post menopause my body lost its fitness, lost its bone. I’ve still got decent bone strength, but the menopausal side of it basically emotionally meant that I was no longer young. My peers were people like my grandmother. And I’d sit down and I’d talk with her about some of the symptoms I had both from menopause and cancer treatment. And some of the symptoms she got when she sort of hit 80 and it was sort of like I’d gone from 39, instead of turning 40 I’d almost turned 80. So I’d sort of skipped 40 years and I know it sounds bizarre, but it was a big jump.

I’m now 45 and I think I’ve probably… my real body age I think has dropped from say 80 which it was you know four years ago when I was in the middle of treatment, and when I just had my ovaries out to probably about maybe 50.

Now probably two or three years on from when I had – close to four years on now – I’ve been through most of the changeable symptoms and I’m now settled back into my body. And I’m happy in it now, but yeah there were times I wouldn’t trust myself not to… for my body not to fail me. It was a really, really, really hard, hard, hard thing to do, as part of the whole treatment and menopause, was to actually accept that I can’t do what I used to do. I can’t you know [lifts arm] hang out washing you know above my shoulder, because it you know… I can’t pick up 20 kilos without thinking about it. You know, I can’t go for a walk around the block without feeling like coming home and having a nanna nap, you know.

As you go by, you just sort of adjust your lifestyle and you realise that you just don’t have the same flexibility you used to, you know. Picking things up off the floor, you know bending down it’s just little things like that. But you know it’s one of those things that you just learn to live with eventually.

And now it’s second nature, that’s just you know there’s pre 40 and then there’s the post 40. Or there’s the pre menopause and post menopause. So you know the first young half of my life is over, now the [smiles, raises eyebrows] mature wise elderly part of my life is just starting. But you know I’m not that old and I’ve got hopefully enough years left to see my kids grown up and oh maybe one day grandkids, see how they feel. But you know in the meantime it’s just dealing with the body that I’ve got and waking up and realising I’ve woken up each morning and being happy about it. [smiles]

I hadn’t had children. So I think I felt like if I’d have known in my 30s or 20s if I was going to go into early… I might have gone and frozen some embryos or eggs or whatever. Maybe. Perhaps. I think it’s taking away… I felt I’d had my choices taken away. I just felt I was just not there. I still had another 10 years or something like I felt old. I felt like I aged overnight. And you don’t but it just feels like I’m going into this part of my life where you start thinking about retirement or something and I think it’s these societal things that we put on ourselves around all of that. But I felt I was ageing early, far too early and in fact you are because internally, you know, estrogen protects you from heart disease and all these other things.

I would have had to have gone on some sort of treatment to protect yourself from these sort of things and I learnt a lot about that as well. So that’s probably an upside about it. You learn all this stuff you didn’t know. But I guess for me it was the ageing part and the taking away my choices, about your self-esteem and your self, your selfness and your self-image yeah most definitely. I think that goes back to that feeling old and being perceived that way.

I think it’s because I feel like I’m doing something that an older person does and I’m not. I’m not old. And again that comes back to a self-image thing and then when I think like that I can sort of like get too far ahead and then start putting again limitations on myself. Oh it’s like being, you know, acting in a way that’s limiting to me and it’s, I think, I don’t know if it’s self-preserving or what it is. But it’s certainly just a self-image thing and a confidence thing and a self-esteem thing as well. You feel fragile and you don’t want to become invisible and disappear and it feels like I’m prematurely doing that.

I did certainly feel that quite strongly at the start that, yeah, taking that ovary out had sort of removed some part of my womanhood. But I guess in a way I still feel that a little bit because, you know, people do sort of expect that even if somebody doesn’t want to have kids there’s still the option. But I have worked through it a bit that, you know, I don’t feel it anywhere nearly as strongly as I did. And I’m now, yeah, a lot more… I’m not quite comfortable but more comfortable [laughing].

Just that it doesn’t mean that I’m not a woman, that I don’t have ovaries. It’s just [laughing] it’s just a bad thing that happened. And, yeah, it’s made life a little bit more complicated. But it’s, yeah, I’m still a woman it’s just a [laughing], I used to sort of be, like, you know, I’m a woman but a kind of a damaged goods sort of [laughing], you know, pieces missing. [laughing] But, yeah, now it’s sort of – I’m a woman but, well, I can’t have kids but there are other reasons as well why people can’t have children. It’s not just menopause so, you know, it doesn’t make you not a woman. It’s just a little bit more complicated. [laughing]

It’s quite funny, I was whingeing to [the psychologist] and then she said, “I know, but think about it, you can wear white again.” I said, “I don’t care about that. I just don’t want my life to feel like it’s ending.” She said, “What are you talking about?” and then she said, “Lots of people have menopause early on in their lives. Their lives don’t end just that way.” [laughing]. … and I was saying, “Okay.” Because I think as a society we just over-emphasise so much on the whole youth and vitality and, you know, your abilities … that the wider society sees you in contributing.

I guess menopause happening was really hard to talk about with my friends because all my friends are having babies this year and I can’t judge them for that or begrudge them because I was planning to have a baby this year as well. So it’s a very tricky time because they are all just quite happy that I survived my first round of cancer and not too concerned with the fact that I won’t be able to have kids now, which for me is, is a pretty big issue.

And weird things, like at our age, you know, we’re not in our 50s, we’re not expecting menopause. So I had all these boxes of tampons and pads and stuff and I just looked at them, like, “What am I going to do?” I gave them away to my sister. You know, it’s just… You’re not prepared and it’s very unnatural at our age to be feeling unfertile. I just wish I could have read more experiences about young girls with menopause because it’s embarrassing when you’re the only person in your group. So my funniest story is I was out with some friends on a rare moment when I was well and I said, “Oh my gosh. Is it getting really hot in here?” and everyone just looked at me and went, “No.” It was my first like, ‘I’m doing what my mum does, you know, I’m an old person going through menopause’ and now I’m really careful. I don’t ever ask that question out loud, “Is it hot in here?” Because it’s embarrassing because I know it’s probably just me. [laughing]

So you said that you feel like you’ve got more in common with your mum and your aunties and older women but do you talk to them much about it?

I will joke around with my auntie and my mum and, you know, if they say something about a hot flush or staying up at night, I like that I can joke and join in. So I’ll say, “Oh yeah, you know, my last hot flush was blah-blah-blah…” [laughing] So I do find a bit of the humour in the fact that I can share common physical experiences with them. But I don’t talk seriously with them because they can’t understand, they’ve all had their kids and stuff so I don’t know if they would understand the loss. The problem is at this age, the loss is so great, the grief and the loss that come with early menopause is really big and it’s at the same time that all your friends are having families. So it’s a bit hard to process that grief and loss when it’s continually around and I don’t feel that talking to older people who have had children is really helpful for that because they can’t understand.

And then, then at work, in work places, or whatever, and I might be out for dinner with some friends and someone will say something, and because I’ve got friends who are around 60, you know, this topic can come up. And yeah, and she says, “Oh, I’ve been through that all,” and I said, “So have I,” and yeah, it’s amazing now, that there are people around.

But what gets to me is that they’ve all got kids. And that’s painful for me because like I feel for them, and certainly they’ve probably gone through, they’ve gone through that adjustment. But part of me thinks, ‘But you’ve got kids and I went through it when I was going through adolescence,’ you know, yeah, that’s hard. That is hard. And even on a website, you know, if you had, on the online things, some people already had kids, so it’s hard to relate. But yeah.

Not having kids, it, it affects your life so much. I don’t think people understand. And so when I came back to Australia after having a fairly good time for 10 years overseas.
And I was say in my – how old would have I been? So I left when I was 26, 27, so mid to late 30s, I came back, and I didn’t know where the women my age were. I just didn’t know. And so I’m in a new town with a job, because I move where the work is, and I’m thinking, ‘How can I meet people?’ And all the people I work with, if they’ve got kids they rush off, because they’ve got obligations.

So I found a friend who’s, you know, say 10 years older than me who’d got divorced, has kids but they’re leading their own life. So we would meet after work, because we were the only two who had no-one to go home to. She was divorced and and so my other friends are 60. And luckily I’m in that gap, well, some of them have got grandkids now, but they’re not over, overly busy with the grandkids. So it’s really, it’s very difficult. I don’t know where the women my age are. And I’ve started to think, ‘Okay, soon the women my age will have, their kids will be left home.’ So at the moment I’ve got friends who’ve got kids at school and they’re very busy. But there’ll be that time when they’re not, and they’ll have time, and maybe I could, there will be people to socialise with more. But then the grandkids start, you know.

People I know are a wide range of like people, ten years younger than me and certainly up to my mother’s age and certainly beyond. I think in part, how much do women normally talk about menopause? In as much they do, it’s got to normally be a cohort of similar aged women who would do this, right? The same way as like teenage girls might talk about getting their periods and women who are having babies around the same time or wanting to, or something like that, or not wanting to, would have that conversation.

And I would assume that women who are going through menopause naturally don’t assume that I am. My manager is a woman who’s my mother’s age and she’s sort of said, ‘Oh, I’m just too hot, can’t deal with this. Can you open a window?’ And she’s sort of open without, without naming menopause as such. She’s clear that that’s what’s going on but I don’t know that she recognises in me that I totally empathise and I’m not sure if in a work situation I would get drawn on that.

Women who go through this naturally at a different age have a cohort of other women. Maybe they have more other people who are sympathetic or have some tips or something for them. Whereas I’ve just experienced this on my own because the default is that, like, who else am I going to draw in? People who are 10 or 15 years older than me? I have one of my closest, closest friends is 15 years older than me and it just occurs to me, you know, I’ve never [laughing] actually talked to her about it.

But often like at work they might be senior to me and I don’t think we’d have that conversation. I would like women’s lives and bodies to be public, I like that idea. But in practice I’m probably not going to be the one who’s going to just like drop the bomb, ‘Menopause – let’s talk!’ So I don’t know, I don’t have any sort of community.

I think some of the… I think the biggest thing, you know, I’m struggling with is just trying to get back to a normal life that I once had before I had cancer and I’ve only just realised now that that’s not going to happen again. There probably will be another type of normal but at the moment I’m not sure what it is. I find that I just get overwhelmed too easily these days and that’s honestly what brings on a hot flush for me is I get a lot of anxiety about where my life’s going; what am I doing now?

I get upset that I can’t work as much because I don’t feel as well. I probably have sort of lost who I am a bit. I was sort of a very strong healthy, fit, ambitious person and now I find I can sit on the couch for a whole day and have no idea where that time’s past because I’m just going in and out of anxiety and I get bursts of passion and I want to do this and I want to do that. And then all of a sudden it’s just… anxiety will come back over me and that hot flush will start again and that just puts me back at square one, so yeah, I definitely feel like I’ve lost my idea of what I was and where I was going. Absolutely.

And that’s both cancer and menopause…

Cancer and menopause, yeah. I mean, cancer at the start because it’s such a huge shock and menopause now because that’s what I’m going through now. Like, if it is all the side effects of early menopause. Yeah, it’s debilitating day to day and mentally it’s a little bit hard to know that that’s what you’re going through. Yeah.

So they’ve really made me kind of step back and look at – if I’m not playing the role of mother, what do I want to do with with my life? And I can’t – and, you know, do people actually… if it’s not to a child, then do I want to use those kind of mothering instincts, I guess, in some way. And do I need to – does the world actually want someone who’s all of those things? Because I’ve tried to sort of think about, well, ‘From a career perspective what do I want to be doing? And from a community perspective what value do I want to add?’

Can you share your thoughts on how…

Yeah, I’ll be honest, I’m still a long way from working out what that looks like. I’ve kind of realised that those instincts are needed but it’s just how and how do I do it in a way that isn’t exhausting for me too? And then I’m getting energy from doing it. And so that kind of symbiotic relationship is important for me. So I’m still trying to work out, well, how does that play in the real world? And how to do you get money from that? Because you kind of need that to live. So I’m still trying to work out what does that mean for me?

But closer to home just making sure that I’m trying to be a better partner and a better sister and a better sister for my brother and just trying to appropriately use my mothering kind of instincts rather than just trying to shove it off onto everybody; “Oh, you know, here you are, this is what’s going to happen”. [laughing] Kind of trying to find appropriate ways to [laughing] do something that I kind of – I mean, that’s something that people have said about me, is that I naturally have this mothering way and not everyone wants to be mothered I’ve realised. [laughing] And so then just how can I be of benefit to the world still without kind of not being of benefit? [laughing]

Well, so it’s a huge knocked confidence because you change. You physically have changed. You emotionally change. You psychologically change. So I went through, you know, it was, like, ‘Oh, my gosh, I’ve changed.’ I got really shy and went, ‘Oh,’ you know. And then it was sort of like blossoming as the symptoms sort of receded I sort of went, ‘Well, hang on, look at everything I’ve gone through, everything I’ve achieved.’ Because I was studying while I was being operated on and I just kept going. So, you know, it was that sudden realisation, ‘Hang on, I can do anything. There’s nothing that can stop me now because I’ve had it all happen.’

So, you know, it’s sort of like a cocoon transforming into a butterfly. You know the caterpillar and… it’s that kind of analogy that I’ve suddenly gone through this and, bang, I can do anything because I’ve mastered, well, I haven’t mastered it. I’m still learning. But, you know, I can operate through it, you know. I don’t look at it anymore as debilitating. But I look at it as an opportunity now. It’s that whole changing the mindset of how I’m going to manage it. And it is really empowering. It’s exciting to be on the other end and also, you know, be there and know what you’ve achieved. But it’s getting through and knowing that you will get through I think was the big thing. So having that hope, yeah.