Will this last forever?

[mickswife]

just joined this forum, I have found it very informative. It seems that most women suffer from insomnia with meno. My mother use to tell me that when she turned 50 that's when her insomnia started and she never ever knew what caused it, she died from cancer 3 years ago.
when I hit 49 that's when it happened for me, 2 to 3 days of no sleep was sending me around the bend, then l would have well meaning hubby and daughter telling me if l did more around the house or walked a couple of km that might make me tired so l can sleep. ugh
I am now on 300mg of progestrone and seems to be helping now l seem to have 1 or 2 days no sleep but can still go to work.

I have a question how long will this last, I am paying $100 a month for pills and will this go on for ever? Mum didn't sleep for 20 years until she got cancer and that helped her sleep.

[susan]

Well i suppose the good news is that everybody is different so it may not necessarily last forever for you.

Insommnia has been a very bad symptom for me, but I do think I am a little different as mine didn't come on with menopause, i have been a bad sleeper all my life. It has got worse with menopause though and I have resorted to taking a sleeping tablet as well as my HRT patch as I still work and have teens so need to hold it all together for others.

But I am not really recommending sleeping tablets are there are drawbacks to them, and feel I am an extreme case.

But I think there is a good chance that if your insommnia only comes on with menopause which sounds like what has happened to yourself ie at 49, then the right dose of oestrogen may sort this out for you.

My Doctor actually said to me 'now we have you on the HRT we might be able to get you off the sleeping tablets'. Which implied to me that HRT can sort out womens menopause related insommnia.

What i'm a bit unclear about is why you are on just progesterone, is this what your doctors are suggesting to deal with the insommnia ?

I have it in my mind that oestrogen is also needed and that oestrogen is also needed, so a balance of the two hormones to restore sleep. Rather than a large dose of the one hormone.

Which progesterone is it, we have one here called utrogestan which seems to be the only one that is associated with making women drowsy.

Maybe you should try some oestrogen gel to go with your progesterone as an experiment to for a month or two to see if it makes any difference ?

If it works and money becomes an issue you could maybe go onto some sort of combined oestrogen and progesterone product to keep costs down, or possibly we could point you to some web-sites where you can just purchase the products direct once you know what works.

Welcome by the way.

xxxx

[jacksfullofaces]

Welome
I didn't suffer from insomnia until peri hit. I took about two nights of poor sleep before I ran yelping for the hormones.
Jacks

[Robyn]

Hi mickswife

If I remember correctly you are being treated through the Australian Menopause Centre? I’m sorry to tell you this, but you are being ripped off. Those people are nothing more than charlatans pushing compounded bioidentical hormones, which are not regulated or approved by the TGA, AMA, AMS or PBS in Australia. There is no reason whatsoever why any woman in Australia should be paying so much money every month to get bioidentical hormones, because it is available through regular GPs.

You might like to read this article. www.theage.com.au/national/menopause-experts-warn-against-doctor-pushing-untested-hrt-20110813-1is6g.html

This is exactly why I keep telling the other ladies on the forum that we really need to be careful when we refer to “bioidentical hormones”. Compounded hormones don’t seem to be a major issue in the UK where a lot of our members are from, but they are certainly a major problem in other countries, especially Australia and USA, and when a lot of women hear the term "bioidentical" they immediately think of the compounded rubbish.

The reality is, andd what these people don’t want you to know, is that you can get bioidentical hormones through your regular GP in Australia, and most prescriptions are covered by PBS which means you shouldn’t have to pay any more than around $20 per month, and I’ve paid as low as $10 per month, especially if you have a discount chemist handy to you. Regular HRT is also not the “dangerous” stuff that these people like to tell women it is. It’s just scaremongering, and it’s not fair that they are preying on women who are suffering and need help.

The only exception to what I've just said is that we don't have a regulated bioidentical progesterone available through regular GPs in Australia. Only a bioidentical oestrogan is available (oestradiol). However, there is a product called Utrogestan which is available in a lot of other countries, and is quite easily obtained online. If you need more information on that I'm happy to help you out there. It is very cheap to buy from Europe and the delivery is very quick. Plus it is a regulated product. It is not compounded and therefore unreliable.

The Aust Menopause Centre also pushes the use of progesterone alone which won’t really do very much to help with your menopause symptoms of insomnia. What women actually need when they reach menopause is oestrogen to help relieve their symptoms. Progesterone is really only needed to protect the lining of the uterus.

I totally understand how you feel because my main symptom has always been insomnia. Hot flushes etc have never really bothered me too much, but now that I’m on HRT my situation is getting better. My advice to you would be to stop paying for the stuff you are getting from the Australian Menopause Centre and go and see your GP and discuss your HRT options with him/her.

[mickswife]

The HRT I'm tacking is 300mg progesterone, no other name for it. They started me on 150 g but then l had fibroid tumors so they bumped me up to 300mg that worked and the tumors are gone.
I wanted something that wasn't synthetic and was natural, AMC said that's what they are. Now we are on school holidays I might go to my GP and get her to check my blood as this hasn't been done for a while.

[mickswife]

what is bioidentical hormones?

[Robyn]

I’m glad Bella answered your question, because she can explain it far better than me.

I’m sorry if I sounded a bit grumpy in my above reply to you, but it’s just that places like Australian Menopause Centre really annoy me. I don’t have a major problem with the fact that they prescribe compounded hormones per se. If they’re working for you – fine, however it sounds like they’re not really working for you, so I think you need to be talking to your own GP.

A friend of mine has been using compounded hormones for about 2 years and she feels great. However, she is also paying around $70 a month and that is a ridiculous amount to pay for hormones in Australia. I keep telling her that, but she is one of those people who believes that regular HRT is “dangerous”.

Doctors, and companies like Australian Menopause Centre, that push compounded hormones do it by trying to tell women that all the HRTs available through pharmaceutical companies are somehow evil or dangerous, which is nonsense.

AMC also makes women pay enormous amounts of money for their hormones, and the majority of the time you don’t even get to sit face to face with a doctor. It’s all done on the phone. I looked into getting hormones from this company ages ago, but the hard sell approach they used on me really put me off them. So I stick with my own GP and I pay a fraction of the price for my hormones, which are tested and regulated, unlike the compounded hormones.

[mickswife]

from what l have read fibriod tumors are from an over load of oestrogen in your system. I am worried about synthic verses natural. while have the tumors l was bleeding every 7 days and ended up iron defecent, now 1 year on and lam bleeding every 3 months, night sweats have gone, hot fluses only once in a while and sleep patteren better than it was so the pills have made a bit of diference.
l think l will make an appointment to see my doctor as now l am a bit confused.
Thanks ladies you have made me think.