What My Mom's Menopause Taught Me About Women's Health

A Mother's Experience with Menopause

• 💡 The speaker reflects on her mother's experience with menopause in the 1940s, recalling a medication called 'butol' that her mother used for relaxation.
• 💊 This medication, later identified as a barbiturate, was prescribed to manage her mother's grief, stress, and likely perimenopausal symptoms.
• 😔 The speaker's mother experienced anxiety, insomnia, mood swings, and feelings of being overwhelmed, with no discussion of hormones like estrogen.

Medical Dismissal of Women's Health

• 🧠 In medical school, the speaker learned that her mother's symptoms were likely due to a central nervous system depressant, highlighting how her mental health was medicalized and silenced.
• 🚫 The speaker criticizes the historical medical approach that dismissed the cognitive and emotional aspects of perimenopause as personality flaws, stress, or unresolved trauma.
• ⚠️ This dismissiveness stemmed from a medical system that taught women tend to somatize their emotions rather than recognizing biological changes.

The Shift Towards Biological Understanding

• 🔬 Thankfully, science and research are now providing proof that mood changes during perimenopause are biological, not just psychological.
• ✅ Current scientific evidence clearly shows that hormonal changes directly affect mental health in women during this transition.
• 👏 Women deserve better and a more accurate understanding of their health experiences.