I’m way overdue writing a blog entry. I’ve been sneezing, coughing, hacking, and blowing for the past week thanks to a horrific cold/flu bug. Travel for 24 odd hours with recirculated air and no sleep and ZAP – there goes your immunity. Though uncomfortable, it’s perfectly normal for your natural defenses to be lowered in such a situation.
Here’s what doesn’t seem normal. Between one fourth to one third of the menopausal women I know suffer some kind of major illness or immune dysfunction with the advent of perimenopause and menopause. Most of these women are nonsmoking, active, generally healthy women with no major diseases or conditions. In other words, way too many women were becoming seriously sick when the Big M came to visit.
The Venuses themselves exhibited this phenomenon. I contracted a cardiac virus while traveling. Another Venus came down with Lyme disease. One goddess skipped the cold and flu going around and went straight to pneumonia without passing Go or collecting $200. Shingles, a painful herpes virus condition, sprouted on yet another goddess.
Now I know what you’re thinking. These are all infections and the Venuses caught them. Yes, it’s a bummer, but probably just coincidence. But as a nurse, I know that infections aren’t as simple a story as bug meets girl, girl meets bug, girl gets sick. Generally, you need a cascade of events to create illness: decreased immunity + environmental insult (bug e.g. virus or bacteria, toxin or poison, etc.) + inherent weakness or preparedness of your body to accept the insult = sick goddess.
And if this is hard to swallow, remember that not everyone exposed to the Black Death (plague) in the Middle Ages caught it nor did those who were exposed to the killer viruses in the great flu epidemics.
With this in mind, I got to wondering (read obsessing) if immunity decreases in women when they reach perimenopause/menopause? And thanks to my Menopausal Tourette’s, I blurted out my concerns to any who’d listen. While at the Maui Writer’s Conference, I chanced to blurt to a lovely woman of menopausal age. Sue (not her real name) told me her story. With the onset of perimenopause, she developed crippling arthritis from SLE or lupus. This active, previously healthy goddess literally could not get out of bed. While lying curled up in pain, she was also suffering hot flashes and day/night sweats. Hoping for relief of at least the heat, she got a prescription for bioidentical hormones. Within a couple weeks, the hot flashes had abated, and so had every symptom of lupus. She’s not had a recurrence of either.
After this stunning affirmation of my fledgling hypothesis, I did what any modern goddess would – I Googled menopause and immunity for studies on this phenomenon. The paucity of data was disheartening. The two studies I did find (one conducted in Turkey in 2004, one from UCLA in 2000) indeed found significant changes in immune function in menopausal women. Additionally, these studies found that hormone replacement therapy seemed to improve most markers of immune function. (Boy, if I were the drug companies, I’d be all over this rather than trying to put compounding pharmacies out of business.)
Both these studies were small, and certainly more research needs to be done to confirm and validate these results. Alas, it is so difficult to get anybody to give a rodent’s hiney about research in women’s health, particularly the area of menopause. So we’ll just have to speak up – louder, more clearly, and more often.
I’ve started by contacting the Nurse’s Health Study where I’ve been a participant since age 19. This is the largest prospective study ever done and it’s still going on. As the women in the study reach menopausal age, I’m asking the investigators to look at this problem in future testing and samplings. And writing my congresspeople. And blurting my thoughts, on occasion, as well.
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I have sooooo much empathy for you – I too had 30-40 hot flashes per day for far too long. I did NOT have 7 children nor primary caregiver responsibilities for anyone save myself, so you are overdue some relief! Start with the least interventional modality first – then give it time to work before going on to the next remedy.
First: natural progesterone cream (not wild yam cream). Pro-Gest at Emerita.com is a great one. Also Natural Woman progesterone cream – at prodnature.com. These may also be available at your health food store. Again, don't let some well meaning clerk sell you wild yam cream – it's not in a form your body can actually use.
This took care of my hot flashes for about 1.5 years. Then they started up again (because estrogen levels dropped.) Then you might wish to try an herbal menopause formula such as Menopause Plus formula from Emerita.com. (May be in your health food store.) The great thing about this herbal combo is that there is no soy in it. Soy is a major allergen – one of the top food allergens known.
If it doesn't work, you might try a soy preparation such as Estroven, available in most drugstores. Be careful with soy – it can disrupt thyroid function or trigger allergies, although some women do very well with it for relief of hot flashes.
Give each of these at least 2 weeks to work as recommended (although they worked for me within a couple days!).
If these don't work, try bioidentical hormones such as estradiol – you'll need a MD order for this. Bioidenticals are just that – identical to the hormone our own bodies produce. Although no studies have been done to prove they are safer than synthetic HRT, it just stands to reason that and identical hormone might be better. I use an estradiol patch in a very low dose – I went on it not for hot flashes (the progesterone cream and herbs took care of those) but for the immunity problem. I wasn't coming back 100% after my cardiac virus and so went on the patch – within a month, I was off medication and completely healthy.
I want to stress that it is important that you get some relief and get some sleep. You may also want to look into respite care for your child with cerebral palsy to give yourself a day off now and again, if that has not been happening. Because you are correct that sleep deprivation will hammer your immune system eventually.
Oh and snoring? Yep, many of us menopausal goddesses now snore – not sure if that is just the again process or to do with the Big M itself or both. Anybody have any ideas?
Good luck! Please keep us all posted!
all my best,
Lynette
I remember you and I having conversations on this topic, thank you for putting it out there so other goddess can comment, and hopefully find some help. Aloha Rae
Now I understand why I got the flu so severly last year. I just thought it was God getting back at me for my bragging how lucky I am that I never get sick.
So great the research you have done Lynette. I am beyond menopause and can sympathize with the sistahs suffering, with immune deficiency. It really does get better as time and the new medical dicoveries help. Can`t say enough for the progress made already. Again, kudos to Lynette!
I am a 49 yr. old mother of 7. I started with hotflashes in July '05, so I just hit the 3 year mark. I barely sleep at all, but when I do, my husband says I am snoring loudly (forget the fact that I have been sleeping with a grizzly bear for the past 24 years). But I guess my snoring is bothering him, the poor dear. I never snored until recently. Has anyone else been told that they have started snoring during menopause. I have gained 15 lbs. over the last 5 yrs., maybe that has something to do with it. Or maybe its just the pure exhaustion. Also, my youngest child has severe cerebral palsy and I am her primary caregiver (I mean her only caregiver). So when I say exhausted I mean dark circles under the eyes and yawning all the time. So far I haven't gotten sick. But I too always assumed that if you weren't getting proper sleep your immune system would not be functioning optimally. Another question I have, is, does anyone else have hotflashes about every 15 to 20 minutes day and night. I am going out of my ever lovin mind. When I read what the experts say about severe hotflashes they say that 10/day is severe. I can get that many in 3 hours somedays. I do not take anything for them. HELP!
Interesting. I always felt that my past ability to ward off "bugs" was aggravated by the increasing lack of sleep I was experiencing throughout menopause. Now that I am post, sleep seems to be coming in longer and deeper levels than to which I had become accustomed to for the past 10 years. I have also noticed that my health has been quite wonderful lately (albiet this current lingering smoke is not helping.)
Any connection to lack of sleep and the breakdown of immunity?