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[Lynda07]

To be honest Kathleen I don't have any coping strategies for it other than trying to tell myself it passed before and it will pass again. It's quite exhausting at times though and I'd love to be on a level, mood wise. I don't mean this as a negative reply, more just my honest reply. X

[paisley]

I am really glad you wrote this Kathleen because what you have described is me exactly. I can wake up feeling awful & then the second half of the day it changes again. I can be feeling ok & then suddenly a black cloud comes over me from nowhere. I never know sometimes from one hour or minute to the next how I will feel. It's very unnerving. You can't plan things because you don't know how you will feel. I don't like this uncertainty at all

[Kathleen]

Hello again ladies.


Jillydoll - I also hate the randomness of mood swings. I can feel normal ( well, as normal as it gets ) then suddenly I'm very irritable or more often, super anxious. These episodes are usually rounded off by a bit of a flush, sometimes a tummy grumble and then an urge to cry!  This can occur several times a day and I have absolutely no control over it.

Birdy - Yep, sounds very similar. I worry about social occasions because I know I could ‘ have a funny turn‘ at any minute and feel dreadful. On the other hand I could feel fine! There is no way of predicting how my moods will go.

Lynda07 - I also find this whole mood rollercoaster exhausting. I feel that I am forever trying to find a balance but it constantly eludes me.  Being on a level mood wise is also my dream. We live in hope!

Paisley - yes it's the uncertainty that's so distressing. When we were menstruating and had a predictable cycle it was easy to plan ahead and have a good idea about how we would feel. That's all gone now and the swings just keep on coming. I hate it.

Thanks again ladies for your replies. It helps so much to talk about these things to people who truly understand.

Wishing you all well.

K.

[jillydoll]

Ahh yes Kathleen ‘funny turn' when you experience such weird feelings and you just don't know what they are, sometimes making you feel like your going to pass out, or even worse, you can't understand what your feeling. If someone asks ‘what are you feeling?' you can't describe them, at least with the ‘passing out feeling' you know exactly what your getting.!
I still get them occasionally and I'm on hrt, admittedly, not so often, but they're still there.
Rollercoaster is exactly what it is! ....xxxxx

[Kathleen]

Hello jillydoll.

I have a variety of phrases describe how I'm feeling but no one really gets it do they. Only fellow sufferers truly understand and that's one of the reasons  this site is so helpful.

Take care and let's hope the ' funny turns 'take a hike for the foreseeable future!

K.

[racjen]

Hi Kathleen

whilst I can't offer any help as such, this paragraph that you wrote (below) is exactly how I feel/what happens to me.

"I wonder if anyone feels their mood changing in a chemical way? For example I was happily doing something in the kitchen but when I finished a low mood came over me like a wave. I suddenly felt very tearful and bleak  and hopeless. Nothing had happened to cause this change in mood, it just came over me. Feelings of anxiety occur in a similar way but I can also experience positive moods, for example at lunch time I noticed that a calm sensation came over me but unfortunately it didn't last. Also I can go about my day and chat to people etc but sometimes there is another emotion just below the surface, usually a tension or sadness."

It's only been the past three years I've felt like that so kind of ties in with my menopause although it also started around the time my mum died. I don't take any medication or HRT (that bit was just for info). It also reminds me of how my PMT used to affect me too.

Lynda

Yes, I really recognize that feeling - the sudden change in mood like someone's just flipped a switch in my brain. Never ever had it before menopause.

[Kathleen]

Hello racjen.

My trusty meno book says ' mood swings from elation to despondency are common '. However it's only when you experience them that you realise how disconcerting and distressing they are. At one point I worried that I was bipolar but a friend who knows someone with the condition assured me that I'm not.


 The calm mood ( I wouldn't call it elation ) is very pleasant however it is always followed by anxiety or irritability which sucks, obviously.  I never liked actual rollercoasters as a child and I'm not too fond of this menopausal version either!

Wishing you well.

K.

[jillydoll]

Funny you should say that Kathleen, I used to think that myself too!
Being bipolar.
Then I realised it would've been diagnosed much earlier, and looking back, I was never really moody, or had bad mood swings...not even as a teenager.
We can't find our answers, so we go looking for them, and always end up barking up the wrong Tree!
Take care xxxx

[Kathleen]

Hello again jillydoll.

I wasn't a particularly moody teen either. My periods could be heavy and arrived with tender breasts, bloating and diarrhoea but that was all over in a day. Even during my pregnancies and post natally my hormones didn't trouble me but the menopause has been a miserable experience.

I agree that if we were actually bi polar we would have been diagnosed by now. So hormones it is then, I just wish they would sort themselves out!

Wishing you well.

K