By Sharon Gavioli, Registered Nurse, Birth Educator, Counselor, Brisbane, Queensland
At the age of 46, my body decided to commence the first signs of impending menopause with intense hot flushes.
This came as a shock to me, as my mother had told me she did not reach menopause until she was 55 and that her periods had continued regularly, until one month after which they never returned. I felt at 46 that I was too young for menopause but despite my objections this cycle had begun.
I experienced irregular cycles and significant hot flushes for the next five years.
For me, the hot flushes were the most difficult to accept. I struggled with heat rising from my body to my face at regular intervals during the day and frequently during the night. It was this night waking that really unsettled me, as I had become precious about sleeping due to having had very disturbed nights with my seven babies.
I decided that I needed to treat the hot flushes for my own well-being.
Having turned away from Western Medicine due to my perception that it only treated symptoms and not the cause of illness, I sought out alternate medicine to deal with the persistent flushes. For the next three years I used creams and herbs which almost totally alleviated my hot flushes. In my 49th year, with other hormonal health issues presenting, the prescribed herbs and creams failed to keep the flushes under control. With the awareness that alternative medicine was not the answer I thought it would be, I decided I needed the support of Western Medicine to assist with my hormonal issues.
The hot flushes continued in spite of taking hormonal medication.
Although I supported my body with an array of prescribed bio-identical hormones and supplements, which slightly improved the hot flushes, they did not stop. At this point, I started having Esoteric Healing sessions as an additional support to my medical treatment, which saw my health greatly improve in a very short period of time. From these sessions, I came to view the hot flushes in a more positive light and that maybe they were what my body needed.
I decided to make friends with the hot flushes and stop my hormonal support.
With my new understanding of the flushes, I did try to completely come off the hormonal support but became overwhelmed by the almost hourly nightly wake ups. I did not feel this was supportive of myself so I recommenced the hormonal support. With this support the hot flushes continued but lessened in intensity at night, which I felt grateful for.
I came to connect the hot flushes to the way I was living as a woman.
I had been attending the Esoteric Women’s Group as another support during this period. From attending these, I began to understand that in my life I wasn’t truly taking responsibility for giving myself the time to care and nurture myself. My pattern had been to always put others before myself (as I wrote about in my blog Embracing True Devotion as a Woman and Mother). Slowly, I started making changes in the way I cared for myself which resulted in the flushes reducing naturally.
I felt there was a deeper reason for why I was experiencing the flushes.
This deeper understanding was reconnected to when I attended the inaugural Esoteric Women’s Menopause group hosted by Serge Benhayon from Universal Medicine. What I heard that night was what I already knew within me about True Responsibility, but I had not fully embraced this as I entered my cycle of menopause.
This knowing was that for a woman to step into her true wisdom in menopause is to empower others to step up to embracing true responsibility for themselves.
I realised I still felt responsible and invested in my partner, my children and my friends living in a certain way. I was not asking or trusting them to step up and be truly responsible for their own choices and decisions.
This continued pattern of over responsibility felt like the missing piece in the intensity of the hot flushes.
From this awareness I committed to embrace true responsibility by lovingly breaking any of my over responsible connections to others. Each day has been a new opportunity to identify my patterns of over responsibility while being gentle with myself when I slip into an old way of being. After living this understanding for a time, I felt again to stop the herbal supplements. This time, the flushes did not return with a vengeance but actually lessened in intensity over time. I have also discovered since tracking my cycle according to the moon using a new Period and Full Moon Diary app (available for iPhone and iPad) called Our Cycles, that the flushes have a tendency to increase at a similar time each month.
I have now realised the intensity of the hot flushes is an extraordinary marker of my living True Responsibility.
When I am out of balance, I now feel deeply grateful for the wisdom of my body that is constantly bringing me to a deeper awareness of how I am living as a mature woman. I am also looking forward to my further stepping into the wisdom that menopause brings, which I now can see is of benefit to all!