Menopause Overture #4 or “Let’s Talk About Sweat, Baby”

7th June 2013

I have breaking news for you if you haven’t yet got to menopause. You’re going to find yourself wet in all kinds of ways but the one way you really wish would happen. More on that in another post.

It’s not just the hot flashes, it’s the sweat, too. Cold, hot, light film, tropical downpour… you name it, it happens. Once again, I’ll refer you to this clip of Andrea Cabral, Massachusetts’ Public Safety Director, clearly experiencing a monster hotflash and the sweat that goes with it. If you look closely, you can see the film of moisture on her face…if you watch carefully, you can see it get worse in the blink of an eye.

While I was in perimenopause, my sweat came as what I’ve named a “flashsweat.” No heat and not while I was awake. I’d wake up in the middle of the night with the sheets under me soaked in sweat.

These days, sweat comes with heat, awake or asleep, with no consideration for whether or not sweating is convenient for me at the moment! Don’t get me wrong, sweat happens, but I prefer it happen because I’m either sitting in the sun on a warm summer day enjoying the heat or because I’ve worked out…taking satisfaction in the notion that the sweat is the fruit of my labor. So to speak.

Instead I find myself blasted by heat, drenched under my clothes without warning, then chilled from being wet with sweat. Other times the heat is a really pleasant sensation, as if I’m experiencing a mild blush all over my body and this doesn’t always bring sweat, but when it does it’s more like….what do they say? Women don’t sweat, they glow? It’s more like that. But still I wonder how it is my body has become such a stranger to me when once it performed in a predictable and amicable fashion. I’m going to delve into the hows and whys of this in another post. I know it’s related to the change of balance in hormones but I want to know the actual why…how the change makes the physical part happen biomechanically.

In the meantime, my only advice is…..layers. And if you can get away with it, a large fan.

Menopause, Overture #3 or “Is this a hotflash or did the room just spontaneously combust around me?”

27th May 2013

Um, yeah, hot flashes. They come along a wide spectrum of severity ranging from the mildly pleasant “oh-my-I’m-blushing-all-over-my-body” to this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQBFUnZ4NyI

That’s video of Massachusetts Public Safety Director, and former Suffolk County Sheriff, Andrea Cabral, fanning herself during the live broadcast of Gov. Deval Patrick’s press conference declaring a state of emergency in the Commonwealth due to a coming blizzard. A lot of people made fun of Ms. Cabral. But take a closer look. There’s a film of sweat on her face, she even reaches up as if to prevent a bead of it trickling down her left temple. She and I are the same age. I’d bet good money this woman was having a terrific hot flash. And not in the good rollercoaster “that scared the bejeepers out of me but I loved the whole ride” sense of terrific, either. I’ve had these. They come like a drenching summer storm of heat and moisture, suddenly, inexplicably, without warning.They can rock you back on your heels and leave you dizzy and spent. For real.

And this is why I’m developing a scale on which to rate hot flashes that I’m naming in honor of Andrea Cabral. For the woman who publicly, unabashedly dealt with a monster hot flash and took a lot of shit for it. Much like the Scoville scale for the heat of chili peppers, this scale will be subjective, based on human experience — not scientific measure.

So, what’s “zero” on the Cabral Scale? I’d say the “Flush to Your Face” hot flash that reddens only your cheeks as if a furious blush has come over you. What’s the highest on the scale? I’d have to say the “Cabral Fanning” hot flash that has you tending to your own need for comfort in any way possible, in public or private.

For every woman who’s been drenched with sweat from a hot flash, doffed blankets and pajamas in the middle of a cold winter night, fanned herself in public, I offer you the opportunity to name a point on the Cabral Scale by posting descriptions of your hot flashes here! Have fun, be descriptive, irreverent, profane if you must. I’ll choose the best and share in a future post!