So many mental manifestations of menopause have plagued me and the goddesses at one time or another. Inability to concentrate, butterfly mind (winging from thing to thing without alighting long on any one), jellyfish brain, ADD (attention deficit disorder), forgetfulness, dyslexia, and more have at times dwarfed the physical and emotional symptoms. Yuck.

The weirdest is when you have several of these in the course of a single day. If my brain is not going to work, I at least would like it to malfunction in the same way for a time. So I can figure out how to deal with it.

And now, a new mental effect is afflicting me. I’m going to call it Menopause Demotivation Syndrome. After all, we seem to name everything these days to make it sound important at best and necessitating treatment at worst.

Living in two places requires that my husband and I essentially move twice a year. Which means making reservations, packing, organizing house sitters and repair personnel, etc. I’m not complaining – life is good, if slightly disorienting sometimes.

I’ve always been a self starter. I get stuff done. Or maybe I should say “I got things done.” These days? Not so much. Oh, I eventually get things done, but I feel my drive to do even those high priority items slipping into neutral.

Which is why, a week out from our departure from Hawaii to the mainland, I am still trying to get into gear. First gear would be okay, although with each day that passes, a higher gear will be needed.

Panic mode used to be a motivator. That helped. I can’t find that mode anymore.  Or the mode where I put my head down and just do one task after another, forcing the motivation. Nor can I access the mode where I delight in organizing, packing, and planning.

In fact, it is taking every last shred of discipline I have just to write my blog entry for this week. I fear that I will exhaust my infinitesimal supply of get-up-and-go just doing this. I’m not sure this is hormonal, although it could be (by the way, goddesses, the decrease HRT project is going swimmingly, although I’m not sorry to leave Hawaii for the summer as it is heating up a bit.)

Perhaps this demotivation is naturally occurring phenomenon due to aging? What do you think? Am I the only one? And do you have any tips for kicking into gear? Because I seriously need to get packing.

Right now though, I think I’ll have a cup of espresso……..Better make it a double!

While it does seem to me as if Christmas comes all too quickly each year, which would substantiate the belief that the clock hands whip around the dial at an ever increasing pace, Still, I experience plenty of times when time tortoises. Like in meetings. I hate meetings. Or in the dentist chair.

I must say that I haven’t noticed time speeding up. Lately though, I have caught time behaving in unexpected ways, time warping if you will. It would make seem logical to me that time set aside for enjoyment would pass quickly while chore time might drag. But that doesn’t seem to be the case.

What I’m talking about is a weird sort of time distortion. For example, the day we spent waiting for the tsunami lasted about a week. That makes some sense to me, I guess.

However, this past week lasted about a day except for yesterday which seemed to last nearly 3 days. Yesterday was a fun day – set aside for Lei Venus and I as an art day. Today is a work day whizzing by even without the notorious time sucks of Facebook and Twitter.

That gives the lie to leisure time going by in an instant and work time dragging on slowly.

I’m pretty sure this isn’t a manifestation of Menopause brain fog – my brain seems to be working as well as it ever doesn’t these days. Is there a tear in the space-time fabric?

All this musing (read perseverating) about time came up because I could swear I just wrote a blog post a day or two ago. And it’s been a week! Some days I feel like an elder Alice whose fallen down the rabbit hole and can’t get up. And everything is topsy turvy. Especially time.

Is anyone else experiencing time warps? Does time speed up as we age? Tell me it isn’t just me.

I feel like I’ve inadvertently applied for citizenship in a new country – the Procrasti-Nation. Oh, I’m still keeping my US passport and all the freedoms we enjoy. But since the Pause, it seems I’ve adopted a whole new cosmology. Why do today what you can put off ’til tomorrow? Or forever? Why not do something frivolous or fun instead of my chores or commitments?

Our national anthem here in Procrasti-Nation might be “Feelin’ Groovy”. Or “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.” Instead of the lofty Latin “e pluribus unum”, our motto could be “I’ll Do It Later.”

Our national pastime: cloud watching. Far more entertaining than baseball, I think, and you don’t have to keep track of stats or wear jerseys.

So here I sit, writing my weekly blog entry at the last possible moment. I was going to write more about the Goddesses’ caregiving insights at our annual gathering, but I just couldn’t marshall my thoughts. The topic is so important that I’ll have to do it later.

That’s what happens when you live part-time in Procrasti-Nation. The important stuff waits while you do something less pressing, maybe even downright trivial. Like untangling your ‘ball’ of necklaces or reading your Facebook news.

Although I don’t “accomplish” as much when residing in this new place, I have to say that I’m a big fan of procrastinating. I spend more time petting the cats and dog. I’m more present to my friends when they drop by. And I’ve found a lot of stuff takes care of itself if you just leave it alone.

I’ve also fallen into some fun new projects because I was avoiding those items on the top of my prioritized to do list. Case in point: I was at a women’s writer’s retreat with Venus Karen Leland and a host of other wonderful, creative goddesses last summer. We were writing, reading, and critiquing one another.

One day, when we were supposed to be working on our various projects, I found myself taking a yet another unplanned vacation to Procrasti-Nation. One of my passions (passionettes, actually) is digital photography. Since all of us were engaged in the big living room with our laptops, I had to look busy. On the spot, I created a photo blog that I named “The Digital Diva”.

Weirdly enough, it took off. Enough so that my husband, Dewitt, asked if we could do another blog like it to just showcase our iPhone art. So Digital Diva / Digital Dude was born. We’ve taught classes and just written an article about creative iPhone apps and photo art for Outdoor Photographer magazine (it’s due out in a few months.)

Most of the time I spend in Procrasti-Nation does not lead to new blogs or much of anything save untangled silver chains. Like they say on the weight loss commercials, actual results may vary. Still, it feels like a gift that menopause has given me: an actual pause in my busyness and frenetic doing. And that’s why I’ve decided to emigrate there. Every now and then.

Initially, Dewitt was certain that he’d need an MRI and surgery as it wasn’t getting better. Then his brother mentioned that he’d had similar injuries and was on crutches for a time but it eventually healed on its own.

“Oh yeah,” I said. “That could be true. Remember when I sprained my ankle so badly and was on crutches for a few weeks, then hobbling for a while after, but it healed on its own, too.”
“No,”he said. “I don’t remember that at all.”

I stared at him, astonished. How could he not recollect an event that is lodged so firmly in my memory. After all, I was unable to walk for a good, long while.

And then I realized why he had zero recall. This wasn’t a case of elder forgetfulness nor memory lapse. He didn’t remember the event because his life didn’t change. At all. Except for a small detour to the Urgent Care Center, nothing changed for him. I still made dinner, did the shopping, even went to my job as a nurse educator, slowly executing the stairs with my crutches. Luckily I had injured my left leg, so I could still drive.

Why? Why do we women carry on as if nothing has happened when we are ill or afflicted with an injury? All those meals fixed, laundry and errands done, and work done while incubating a fever of 101+, horrific cramps, the stomach flu leads to one question? Are we freaking nuts!?! Or do we have a heretofore undiscovered martyr gene embedded in our feminine DNA?

We goddesses are well equipped for caretaking and ill equipped for the necessary job of caring for ourselves. And at this stage of life, we are looking at some long term caretaking events in our near future (if we haven’t already immersed ourselves in them.)

How will we cope? With caring for aging parents, with unforeseen injury and illness to our significant others? What balancing acts might we find ourselves performing?

Caregiving turned out to be the uber topic this year at our annual Venus gathering. Ironically, two of our very own Menopause Goddesses were unable to make the meeting at the last minute due to caretaking emergencies. Perhaps we should have talked about it last year!

Many hours of discussion and sharing later, we uncovered the main secret to artful caregiving (where you care for yourself as well as those who are in need of your care). It is this: Ask for help. This will save your bacon. Over and over again. And likely the bacon of the one(s) under your care.

People want to help. And we need to let them. We need to ask for their assistance and then accept it with gratitude and grace.
Even those under our care can help, in ways we hadn’t considered. We can ask them too. Everybody gives. Everybody receives. Everybody cares.

We still don’t know the prognosis for Dewitt’s knee. We have to fly to Honolulu on Friday to see a specialist and maybe he’ll have to have that MRI. We’ll know more then.

In the meantime, this evening I called out “Hey gimpy boy, get in here and do these dishes. You only have to stand for that.”
“Be happy to, you only have to ask me,” he grinned as he hobbled the few steps to the kitchen.

The sun is shining brightly and we are ready for Christmas. I’ve taken my own advice and am relaxing, enjoying the season. Tonight we will go down to Teri’s store, Kalele Bookstore and Divine Expressions to hear the kupuna (Hawaiian elders) sing Christmas carols. You might remember Teri from the blog entry spotlighting her last year: “Daring To Dance: A Menopause Goddess Lives Her Dream”.

I’ve jettisoned the Christmas cards in favor of a photo collage that can be emailed. (And I am not completely sure that I’ll get that done. Nor am I worried about it. February 14 is soon enough for an update.)

I’ve decorated the house with those stuffed Santa, angel, and moosie dolls and hung some stockings.  It took all of about 15 minutes. (See photo with our cat Frankie snuggled up with the Christmas finery.)

I’m not baking Christmas cookies. I may not eat any holiday sweets unless someone makes me eat them. (And of course, my Menopause Goddess friends know enough to twist my arm and then forcefeed me. Thank you all in advance.)

I did manage to decorate a tree this year, possibly the world’s tiniest tree. No lights to untangle, no tinsel, and it can be used again next year. It looks so nice on my computer keyboard. Very festive. (see photo.)

The point of all this holiday non-doing is that an outing to hear Christmas carols at Teri’s store is not a burden or an obligation that I have to squeeze in among all my other commitments and holiday prep. It’s a pure joy. My calendar is gloriously unstuffed. No menopausal meltdowns or mania have visited me this season.
I have time to appreciate the year’s end, family, cats, friends, and fun. Mele Kalikimaka, as we say here in Hawai`i, to all goddesses and their families.

One of my girlfriends is newly in the throes of perimenopause.  And she has just experienced her first full-on Menopause Moment.  Yep, one of those mental lapses that previously would have been simply unthinkable and would cause a woman to doubt her very sanity. I think that we can safely assure her that it won’t be her last.

Just a little background on my friend to put this all in context. A (for Anonymous which is how she wants to be known just now) is a CEO, multitasking go-getter who still finds time to play and hang out with friends in between running her business and her bicoastal life. I think of her as one of the most balanced and together people I know. Which is why her story of her Menopause Moment is all the more hilarious and revelatory.

Menopause doesn’t discriminate and it takes no prisoners.  It afflicts every woman in her own unique way while providing universal Menopause experiences; those Menopause Moments that remind us we are in the second half of our lives.

Okay, enough background info – back to the story.  Our heroine has just finished closing up her East Coast house for the winter and is embarking on a circuitous journey to her West Coast home via New York, Miami, Kansas, Atlanta, and Seattle. She’s all packed and is on a last minute business call as she climbs into the taxi for the airport.

A couple of minutes of driving and her phone loses service.  She’s puzzled.  Usually she has such great service with her network all the way from home to airport.  She starts to dial again, when she realizes that the phone in her hand is not her cell phone.  It is the cordless HOME phone and she has just taken it with her.  After a few minutes consternation, she begins to laugh out loud and calls to tell me all about it, proclaiming, “I know understand how women put the mail in the freezer.”

So hey, no harm, no foul.  She’s sending the phone back to a neighbor to put back in her house.  The best thing about all this?  She knew that it’s NORMAL and she LAUGHED at it.  Because, girlfriends, that is all we can do in the face of such disorienting change.  Like the calypso poet / singer Jimmy Buffett says “Breathe in. Breathe out.  Move on.”  Words to live by now and for the next 50.

A while back, a number of Menopause Goddesses responded to our online survey about revamping the Menopause Goddess Blog. And I’m happy to report that we have launched this new site here at www.menopausegoddessblog.com  (instead of .org).

It looks pretty much the same in terms of design, but has lots more functionality, including the ability to share blogposts with your friends via social networking tools as well as email. (See the bottom of any post.)

Most of our survey respondents wanted a Menopause Marketplace and we are in the process of setting that up so that you’ll be able to access our favorite vendors of all things helpful to Menopause Goddesses.  We’ll have it up and running very soon.

You can now subscribe to our blog via email or RSS. (See right hand column. (If you don’t know what RSS is, don’t worry – about 75% of those who answered the survey picked the “What the heck is this?” response to “Do you use RSS feed for the blog?”  Email subscription is an easier option.  We use RSS for those who like to use it and to feed to other blogsites that we contribute to such as Wellsphere.com.

Because this new platform has great anti-spam capabilities, you’ll be able to comment more easily without having to type those little letters in the box.  (I for one won’t miss them at all!)

You can also follow our updates via Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn – and we promise not to tell you where we are or what we had for lunch in our social networking buzzes. With Twitter especially, we can forward links to great articles and sites regarding menopause and midlife transitions – you won’t want to miss them.

Per the survey data, most of you like the length of the postings and don’t want them any more frequently than once per week.  Proving that menopausal women are careful with their time commitments and how they deal with the information overload that seems to BE our world today.

We’ll continue to post to both sites for the next month; after that the old address will take you straight to the new site. All the archived blog posts since the very beginning have been transferred right here to the new site, so we won’t lose anything.

And the “Search” function should help you easily find what you’re looking for. (See right hand column again.) Click on “Contact Us” in the left column under “Pages” to let us know if there are any other features you’d like to see on our new, improved blogsite – we now have a way to grow it as much as we’d like.

Any other thoughts, ideas, complaints or praise, we’d love to hear from you.  Let us know what you think!  And don’t forget to bookmark this new site at menopausegoddessblog.com

When I was dragging my weary bod around like a lead weight during perimenopause, I figured it was just part of the Change.  But when my hair began thinning, my hands and feet were cold even though I was so hot generally I felt like a living furnace, and my weight was going up, my nurse mind went “Aha!”.  I need my thyroid tested.  Although these symptoms are nonspecific and indeed can be from low estrogen and progesterone, I knew they could also herald hypothyroidism.

So off to my MD I went.  She ordered T3 and T4 levels as well as the more specific blood test TSH which stands for thyroid stimulating hormone.  Basically, this is the hormone that tells your thyroid gland – hey, more thyroid hormone is needed, kick it into gear and produce some.  So if you are low on thyroid hormones this TSH level should be high.

Mine wasn’t.  It was normal. My blood tests were all normal.  I didn’t think much more about it, although the symptoms continued.  My previous MD left her practice and I found a holistic practitioner who is an MD, homeopath, herbalist and runs a complementary medicine clinic.

Complementary medicine is just what is sounds like.   All the tools of Western medicine are used and complemented by other disciplines such as nutritional healing, homeopathy, herbs, massage, acupuncture, and more.  (Also called integrative medicine or holistic medicine.)

This new practitioner performed a complete physical exam and pronounced me hypothyroid as I had every clinical symptom and sign.  The blood tests?  Just not sensitive enough.

Many physicians now believe that hypothyroidism should be diagnosed on the basis of symptoms rather than blood work.  If still unsure that low thyroid hormone is the culprit, they simply place the patient on a very low dose of supplemental thyroid hormone.  If there is improvement, the diagnosis is clear.

I started my Naturethroid and within two days was sleeping through the night, my hands and feet warmed up, I had energy again, and I was calm.  It took longer for the weight gain and hair loss to stabilize, but they did.

And as time has gone on, my dosage of thyroid hormone has been decreased gradually until I take very little.  My own hormone factory has kicked in again.  I have energy and am at my ideal weight.

I’m not sure why, but with the onset of Menopause, it seems that many of us also lose thyroid hormone.  Maybe all our hormones are more intricately linked to one another than we know; maybe it is part of the overall Change.  Whatever the reason, it’s worth checking out.  We may not have to feel so tired, heavy, low energy, and mentally foggy.

To find a practitioner near you, I suggest you check out the American Holistic Medical Association.  Their website is http://www.holisticmedicine.org/ You may also Googling complementary and integrative medicine in your area.

I was talking with a young friend at our weekly beach night picnic (where we force ourselves to go to the beach, because what good is it enjoying your home town only when visitors arrive.)

A professional woman with a young toddler, she was talking about stress in her life. You know the normal things: finances, not enough time for all she has to do, etc.

Theresa Venus and I spoke in unison – “You have embarked on a stressful part of life; building a career, a home, a family. What’s important is to avoid overwhelm.”

And then the evening got going. Food and libations were consumed, sunset and scenery were admired, toddlers entertained and entertaining. No more was said.

Yet the Venuses have spent a lot of time musing on what we wished we’d known sooner. The next few blog entries will focus on sharing some of the wisdom we gleaned looking backward to our own stressful, building times of life. We offer these ‘flashbacks” to all of our daughters and goddesses-in-training in the hopes that you will gain some advantage from some of our stumblings and successes.

What We Wish We’d Known Sooner About Career/Work
What You Do Is Not Who You Are
Most of us Venuses wished we’d known sooner that work is something you do, not something you are. (Even if or maybe especially if you like your work.) We wish we’d known sooner that leisure time pursuits are equal to or more valuable than work time. In other words, we wish we hadn’t taken it all so seriously.

One Venus summed it up like so:

“We are not defined purely by our work/career. We have
many other dimensions. In other countries, “What do you
do?” is not the first thing people ask when they meet you.
True self-esteem doesn’t come from what you do (no
matter how successfully you do it), but from who you are
and who you are becoming. There’s no such thing as just
one career in life. Reinventing yourself is entirely possible.”

We Have Choices
We wish we’d realized sooner that we have more work-world options than we might have believed. We might have made different choices, had we really believed they were possible.

Beej-Venus would have gone to medical school instead of nursing school. Genelle-Venus had dreams of a more artistic bent, but upon reflection has decided she’s happy with her “imposed choice” of nurse. She now manages a plastic surgery office and
practice.

“I always say that I wish I’d been a dancer, but then I might
have missed my kids and husband, so it’s good that I’ve
kept it solely as a passion. I really love my job, because I help
people change their lives. I get to see wonderful healing and women
feeling good about themselves.”

Many times the Venuses have found themselves stuck in a job or position because of fear, or worse, because we believe we are indispensable. When we finally take the plunge to leave a job or career or when it is forced upon us, we find that change can be liberating and invigorating.

As Sandy-Venus tells us:

“A job is a job and it can always evolve. There will always be more work and if you work in an institution you are just a body. No one is forever, someone will always come along who can do the job better than you.”

You Do Not Have To Be Good At Everything
This is HUGE. We’d like to shout this from the rooftops.
We wish we’d know earlier that we didn’t have to be good at everything, nor did we have to do everything ourselves. We wish we’d known sooner that we could just focus on those things we did well and find others with different strengths to help us in areas where we weren’t gifted. Perhaps we’d have been a little more forgiving of our colleagues when they weren’t able to perform well at every task.

Karen-Venus, our favorite business consultant adds a few final bits of wisdom about work and career:

“Don’t sweat the small stuff (and it’s all small stuff).
Ask questions.
Trust your instincts – you know more than you think.
Be authentic.”

(Some material adapted from the chronicle of the Venuses’ adventures “The Big M”.) Visit www.thebigmwebsite to purchase or to download Chapter One for free or click the link below.

Buy The Big M