This is our BIGGEST sale ever so don't miss out on fastastic savings with our SUPER SUMMER SALE!!! 

One of the questions we are asked many times is 'Which products might help with my symptoms?'. In order to make it easier to find out what natural treatments can help with your menopause symptoms we have re-categorised the shop to make it easier for you.

Categories include Cooling Solutions to help with those hot flushes and night sweats; Nutrition & Weight Control to help you stay in control of your body; Head & Mind to help with anxiety, depression, insomnia & mood swings; Intimate Moments to help with symptoms such as vaginal dryness; Hair, Skin & Bones to improve condition and to combat aching joints; as well as our popular Book section. Hopefully this will make it much easier for you to go directly to the area you are looking for to see what you can take that might ease your discomfort. 

So, take advantage of these reductions to bag yourself a bargain! 

Over two-thirds of women suffer from hot flushes our recent survey results showed, and nearly a half (49%) want more information on HRT alternatives to help with their menopausal symptoms.  But even though hot flushes were the most common symptom, surprisingly nearly 60% of women complained that problems with the head, such as headaches, migraines, anxiety and confusion, were a symptom of their menopause too.  Our present free Top Tip download is 10 Ways to Improve your Headaches and Migraines. You can find this on the right hand side of the homepage. If you know of anyone who may also be suffering, then please share the link with them too.

Thank you to everyone who took the time to complete our questionnaire.  We had a fantastic response and the results and your comments are very helpful and give us a good idea of what support you’re looking for through your menopause.  We will be making changes over the coming months but hope we will continue with this website as three-quarters of you use the internet to look up remedies and treatments for the symptoms of the menopause.  We’re also looking at writing a book based on the Menopause Support Programme as nearly half of you (49%) get your information from books.

We’ve drawn the winner from those that completed the survey and we are pleased to announce that Carol from Plymouth won our goodie box containing a mini Chillow Pillow, a cooling scarf, FEMA 45+ multivitamins, Pure Fish Oil capsules, Spiezia Facial Cleanser, a step counter, lemon Materia Aromatica aromatherapy oil, a selection of Pukka Teas, Walnut, Olive & White Chestnut Bach Flower Remedies, a Recovery Remedy, some Yes! Lubricants and a relaxing cd!

Are you suffering from bloating, a swollen and painful stomach, having to pee more often or finding it difficult to eat normally?  All these can be symptoms of the menopause but if you have them on a daily basis they may be the sign of something more serious - ovarian cancer.

This disease, often called the ‘silent killer’, is difficult to diagnose but new guidelines published yesterday from NICE are addressing this.  They suggest a simple blood test through your GP.  The test looks for the level of a protein CA125 in your blood.  Even though the test is not 100% conclusive, it’s a good first step and if found positive, will be followed up by an ultrasound examination and further specialist treatment.

Time is the most important factor here – if you catch the disease at the early stages, 90% of women survive after treatment.  But this survival rate declines as the disease progresses.  So if you do have any of these symptoms, on a daily basis, then please go and see your doctor and ask for this test.  As a recovering ovarian cancer mother on Woman’s Hour said yesterday.  ‘Women tend to put their bodies on the back burner and put off going to their doctor but early diagnosis is the key to successfully beating this disease.’

If you want to listen to the excellent Woman’s Hour interview, click on the link below – it’s the first item of the show: The program start after 30 seconds into the show

Woman's Hour 10:00 Wednesday, 27th April 2011

« I confirm the subscription of this blog to the Paperblog service under the username menopausesupport ».

We’ve reduced our prices for HRT alternatives and Menopause supplements recommended by women in the recent YOU magazine article.  If you’re suffering with your first menopause symptoms and want to try a natural alternative to HRT then why not give the Ladycare magnet a go?  Read my earlier blog post to find out about the latest research.

Or perhaps you’re looking for a remedy for the difficult menopause symptom of dryness ‘down-below’? Then we’ve got just what you need, try our natural, organic lubricants.  These are so much kinder to your delicate skin and feel more realistic too. 

The menopause supplement Omega 7, Sea Buckthorn Oil, can also help with dryness, but you do have to take it for a few weeks to start getting relief.  We’re offering 50% extra free in our packs – so you pay for 60 capsules and get an extra 30 completely free!

Barbara explains that her sex life suffered as she found vaginal dryness a real problem. “I found Omega 7 quite helpful, it lessened my dryness.”

We’re keeping these offers, and the very popular Menopause Supplement – Pure Fish Oil with a massive 360 mg of EPA each capsule, until the end of April.  So hurry up, start helping yourself with your menopause and order today! 

Happy Easter!

A Ladycare magnet is a small, discreet plastic magnet.  It is a tear drop shape similar to the size of a desert spoon, which you wear all day and night, attached to the front of your underwear, just below the tummy button.  We know that many women find them very helpful in reducing menopausal symptoms after about a month of continuous use.

In a trail of 508 women between 50-67% found a reduction in their anxiety, weight gain, mood swings, vaginal dryness, insomnia and breast tenderness.  Also a 33% decrease in hot flushes, loss of libido, memory lapse and aching muscles.

But how does the magnet work?   I’ve always thought it must be using a similar system to the wrist magnets you use to help motion sickness.  But a recent piece of research shows more clearly how it works.  A trial of 35 British police women measured the levels of the two parts of the nervous system before and then after wearing the magnets for a month.

The first part of our nervous system is our ‘fight and flight’ system and secondly, our ‘rest and digestion’ one.  We know that it is the first system that gets fired up when we get hot and sweaty.  This trail showed that after wearing the magnet for a month there was a significant increase in the ‘rest’ nervous system compared to the ‘fight’ system being stimulated.  So this looks like a plausible explanation as to the way the magnet might be correcting your menopausal symptoms.

To celebrate this new piece of research we’re offering the Ladycare magnets at a special price of £18.95 until April 30th! 

You may well ask!  Although most of us have heard of the menopause, the word ‘peri-menopause’ is not used as often. In fact, when I first heard it, I had no idea what it meant even though I have a scientific background.

Basically, it’s the medical term that can be simply summed up in five words: ‘The approach to the menopause.’

This is important, as unlike childbirth which, once started, it usually progresses fairly rapidly, the menopause can go on for many years. It can stop and then, just as you think it’s all over, it can come back as an encore.

The peri-menopause is the start of all this. It’s the beginning of some of the symptoms such as irregular bleeding, mood swings and tender breasts. It’s the stage where you’re not quite into the full swing of the M word but very nearly – or at least, on the cusp.

So how do you know if you are menopausal or perimenopausal or neither?
 

There may be other health reasons for your so-called menopausal symptoms which is why it’s important to see your GP to rule out anything else. Your doctor may give you a blood test to check your hormone levels. The blood tests won’t definitely say if you are menopausal but they can give an indication by testing the level of FSH in the blood: this is the Follicle stimulating Hormone which stimulates the eggs in the ovaries to ripen. As you get older and the follicles become more resistant the FSH levels, they have to rise to a higher level to try and get the follicle to produce an egg. So if the result is very high, the doctor will say you’re likely to be in your menopause, especially if you have other symptoms such as irregular periods. 
 

However, in the peri-menopausal period, the FSH levels fluctuate from month to month and through the cycle, particularly if you’re still having periods. A temporary raised FSH level can also be because of stopping the oral contraceptive pill, breast feeding, severe illness, hypothyroidism, depression, radiotherapy, chemotherapy and some medicines such as Prozac.

It’s worth knowing that if you’re already taking hormones for a medical condition (including contraception), the blood tests are unlikely to reflect a true reading. So you might need to come off the Pill in order to see if you really are entering the menopausal stage. The tricky bit here is that you could still be fertile so even if you are peri-menopausal, you could still theoretically, get pregnant.

There are also certain over-the-counter medical self-testing menopause testing kits where you can check the level of FSH of your urine on a stick, as in a pregnancy test. To get the best result, take the urine test on the third to fifth day of your period and do it over successive months to get a more accurate result. This will however only be an indication that you are menopausal: you do need to have other symptoms too.

At least five and preferably eight is the result of two new research studies from Oxford University.  In the first study 300,000 people from countries across Europe were assessed and it was found that eating at least eight portions reduces the risk of dying from heart disease by 22% compared with eating less than three portions.  The second study found that eating at least five portions could save 15,000 lives a year by reducing the risk of heart disease, cancer and stroke.    

For menopausal women this is really important as the risk of heart disease and strokes increases dramatically as your female hormones reduce as you go through the menopause.  Also by eating a wide range of plant foods including garlic, celery, broccoli, carrots, potatoes, apples, plums, cherries and rhubarb you are supporting your dropping oestrogen levels as these foods provide beneficial ‘phyto-oestrogen’ nutrients too. 

So how to start eating more fruit and veg?  The best way I know is to snack on fruit between meals (rather than the chocolate bars or biscuits) and at proper meal times make half your plate covered with vegetables.  You might also like to think about some vegetable based recipes.  Two of the favourites here at Menopause Support are for mushroom stroganoff and roasted red peppers.  They’re delicious! If you'd like to have these recipes just send us an email to info@menopausesupport.org.uk – enjoy!  

The answer is YES for most of us .... but it’s a really difficult question to get a discussion going on.  Not only do we not like admitting to the menopause but we certainly don’t want to talk about how our sex lives are changing too.  But changing they are, if the experience of women I meet at Menopause Support are anything to go by.

During our workshops this topic of 'personal relationships, feelings & emotions' often overruns on time and is one of the liveliest and enthusiastically received.  I think women just want to feel they’ve got an safe opportunity to talk about it and know that how they feel, and what’s happening to them, is normal.  Questions like ‘Why am I just not interested in sex anymore?’  or ‘Can I do anything to stop it being so painful?’ are regularly discussed.

So with Valentine’s Day coming up (a bit cheesy I know!) we’ve decided to run a free Sex and the Menopause topic talk on the subject.  Register your free place now to join us on Thursday 10^th February from 7.30 to 8.00 pm.  Telephone in and listen to my tips, ideas and latest research.  And if you want you can ask your question through the talk too, anonymously if you wish.

If you would like to hear a recording of this topic talk, please email us to request the link info@menopausesupport.org.uk

I thought you might like to help us here at Menopause Support to ‘break the menopause taboo’ by telling your menopausal story for anonymous publication in YOU magazine from the Mail on Sunday.  

I’ve just been contacted by Rosanna Greenstreet who is a freelance journalist writing for the YOU magazine, the Weekend Guardian, the Sunday Times and various other magazines. She is also a published author with a weekly column for the Guardian and has also written the book - My Body My Enemy, which is about a recovered anorexic Claire Beeken.

She has been commissioned by YOU Magazine to write a piece about the menopause and is looking for women who have been through or are going through the menopause. The interviews will be anonymous. She would like to ask women about their symptoms. Any remedies that have helped them. How they feel about themselves. How the menopause might have changed their lives and impacted on their sex lives. What the plus sides are and how they feel once they are out the other side.  

She would also like to talk to someone who has been through early menopause and also a woman whose menopause was brought about by illness or an operation.

I am going to be interviewed today and will obviously be talking about the Menopause Support Programme!  If you feel you could do the same I know this will really help other women to know how they can get support too.

If you are able to help then please telephone her on 0208 892 8773 or email her rgreenstreet@btinternet.com

Join us here at our free Menopause Support ‘phone-in’ next Thursday 13^th January at 7.30pm to find out the latest research and ideas on how to get rid of those extra festive pounds.

I’ll be discussing why weight control is so much harder once we get into our 40s and talk about ideas and tips which women find really help keep their weight under control through this period of their lives.  I’ll be sharing the latest research on what works and what doesn’t and talk about how to use these findings in your day to day life.

The call will last 30 minutes and you will have an opportunity to ask questions.  Book your free place now, click on 'Book Now' on the Weight control topic talk page for the ‘0845’ number to ring next Thursday. 

Looking forward to talking with you then and in the meantime, if you’re anything like me, wear your ‘fat-day’ jeans for the next few days!

If you would like to receive a recording of this Weight Control topic talk, please email us to request a link info@menopausesupport.org.uk