My mother never discussed menopause with me since she was from a generation of menopausal gatekeepers who avoided a topic they considered taboo. Consequently, I was unprepared when my first hot flash hit like a power surge, frying my body from the inside out.
The onslaught of internal heat spread faster than an out-of-control wildfire — without any hunky firemen to extinguish the flames. Mom didn't warn me that I would melt like clocks in a Salvador Dali painting or lose my last shred of modesty from a sudden urge to rip off all my clothes in public.
Ever wonder if spontaneous human combustion is real? Experience a hot flash, and you'll know it's not a myth.
As beads of sweat ran down my face, I called my mother, convinced I was experiencing the early symptoms of a heart attack. She brushed off my concern and said it was only menopause, cryptically adding that there would be more to follow. More what?? Invisible forces randomly setting me on fire with gasoline and matchsticks?
She was right, of course. There was so much more to come and so much more that she neglected to tell me about, such as night sweats — the evil twin of hot flashes. Not only had I turned into a human volcano, but I woke each night soaked in a pool of sweat that felt like lava oozing across me and my expensive 500-thread count sheets.
And that was just the beginning.
If hot flashes and night sweats had a baby together, it would be insomnia. As if riding a hormonal rollercoaster into the flaming bowels of hell wasn't enough, my body decided it would be fun to transition from normal sleep to the nocturnal hours of a cave bat. Naturally, my lack of sleep led to an exaggerated level of irritability — mostly with other human beings.
The memory of my mother's crabbiness in her early 50s makes sense to me now, so I forgive her for throwing a rubber sandal at me when I fed her dry pot roast to the dog.
Another topic Mom and I never discussed was sex, but a heads-up about vaginal dryness in menopause would have been nice. Less estrogen meant my lady bits became as dry as the Mohave desert — tumbleweeds included. As a result, it wasn't long before my husband discovered that the jaws of life aren't just for opening car doors. The irony is that I could finally have spontaneous sex without fear of getting pregnant, but I had zero interest because my libido crashed faster than the stock market in 1929.
Other menopause gems she neglected to tell me about were thinning hair and wiry hair growing in weird places. I didn't mind when my armpit hair stopped growing, but when a few curly, white ones mysteriously appeared on my chin, I feared I'd sprout a full-grown Santa Claus beard in time for Christmas. I never guessed that would be another symptom on my menopause bingo card.