This is very thoughtful piece by Lisa Selin Davis who also wrote Puberty for the Middle-Aged. I’m grateful for her linking to WLB to allow more people to access information that helps them better understand this transition and feel less alone. And I’m also grateful to Dr. Stephanie Faubion for sharing some truths that are hard to fathom, articulate and understand. She made the points that:
1. There is a huge gap in terms of both provider and patient education about perimenopause and menopause.
2. There is not a cadre of health care providers that have the expertise to help women through this.
3. Menopause gets about an hour of coverage in medical school.
This is because the knowledge (i.e. the evidence base) about what women experience and why hasn’t been fully established. Pause there. Incredible, right? Women’s bodies have always gone through this transition but it’s still not well understood. Is it better than 20 years ago? For sure, but there is still a long way to go.
