The menopause brings flushes and sweats: the duration of these problems

THE MENOPAUSE BRINGS FLUSHES AND SWEATS: THE DURATION OF THESE PROBLEMS
Women know that the menopause brings flushes and sweats, and generally cope if they are not too frequent. For some women, however, they happen so often and are so severe that they tend to dominate life. Amandine Dupin (better known as the French novelist George Sand) was forty-nine when she wrote in a private letter, dated 1853, 'I am as well as I can be, given the crisis of my age. So far everything has taken place without grave consequence, but with sweats that I find overwhelming, and which are laughable because they are imaginary. I experience the phenomenon of believing that I am sweating fifteen or twenty times a day and night ... I have both the heat and the fatigue. I wipe my face with a white handkerchief and it is laughable because I am not sweating at all. However, that makes me very tired.'
As many women can testify, hot flushes and sweating episodes are far from imaginary, being intimately associated with fluxing levels in certain hormones and a rise in skin temperature by several degrees. Some women have accompanying nausea and palpitations. Flushes tend to be more prevalent in women who experience a rapid change in sex hormone levels, for example following a hysterectomy and bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy (that is, removal of both ovaries as well as the uterus and cervix), than in women who have a natural menopause. Flushes and sweats are also more likely in women who smoke, have a history of premenstrual syndrome (commonly abbreviated to PMS) or experience flushes and night sweats before menopause.
The duration of these problems may also influence a woman's decision to seek medical help. Flushes and sweats that disappear after a few months are easier to cope with than the same symptoms lasting for years. Studies show that flushes go on for about two years in most of the women affected. About 20 per cent have them for five or more years, and about 10 per cent are still having occasional flushes into their sixties. Descriptions of flushing and sweating episodes vary enormously. Some women tell us that their hot flushes are like a spray of hot oil that quickly passes. Others note that the sensation of heat is inevitably followed by shivering and cold sweats. Yet other descriptions of night sweats make them sound like clammy journeys through tropical rainforests without the beautiful surroundings, the aftermath of which is a need to change sheets and nightwear.
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