Why you should prepare for perimenopause in your 30’s

Perimenopause - the period of time before you enter menopause. But why should you be worrying about it earlier in life?!

Your hormone health in your 20’s and 30’s will be a reflection of how your body will cope with both perimenopause and menopause, so if you are having issues with your menstrual cycle now. It’s likely you will struggle more as you enter into later years. But why is this?

Well let’s talk about what happens during perimenopause. Most people think estrogen starts to decline as we head into perimenopause and menopause, but estrogen doesn’t start to decline until menopause so why are people suffering so much with symptoms during perimenopause?

Well estrogen starts to fluctuate wildly during perimenopause. Why does this matter? Because fluctuating estrogen means we start experiencing symptoms of high estrogen such as breast pain, heavy periods, fluid retention and irritable mood. And to add to our already fluctuating levels of estrogen, progesterone, our nice calming hormone starts to decline. Progesterone balances the effects of estrogen, so as it starts to decline we lose the ability to balance the effects of excess estrogen and the calming effect progesterone has on our nervous disappears.

So why does our hormone health in our 20’s and 30’s matter? Well if you are already suffering from hormonal imbalance in your 20’s and 30’s then as we hit perimenopause and menopause and our hormones start to wildly fluctuate and decline even more, it’s going to amplify these effects which means perimenopause and menopause are going to hit you 10x harder.

So let’s say your on hormonal contraception which prevents ovulation or you are not ovulating in you 20’s and 30’s then you already have minimal progesterone heading into perimenopause so you are going to be even less protected from the effects of fluctuating estrogen than someone who is ovulating or who has healthy progesterone levels. Or let’s say you have high estrogen levels which is characterised by breast pain, heavy periods, irritability and fluid retention, then as estrogen starts fluctuating even more in perimenopause your symptoms of estrogen dominance are going to be more prominant and likely unbearable.

So does this mean we are set up for failure if we have hormonal imbalance earlier in life?! No, BUT it means we need to try and balance our hormones earlier in life so that we head into perimenopause and menopause with confidence that it won’t overwhelm our life.

So what can you do? If you think your suffering from hormonal imbalance OR are struggling with perimenopause or menopause, there are simple changes you can make to take back your hormonal health and essentially your life. However, everyone can have different root causes so book an appointment now to discover your root causes and fix your hormonal health.