What Types of Menopause Treatments Can Help My Symptoms

3 minute read

By: Vivian Manning-Schaffel|Last updated: March 14, 2024|Medically reviewed by: Sharon Malone
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If you’re going through menopause, there’s a very strong chance you’ve already experienced at least some menopause symptoms.

These symptoms are due to the wildly erratic estrogen levels that accompany perimenopause, the transitory phase between your reproductive years and menopause where estrogen levels begin their gradual decline in your body.

Perimenopause comes with a variety of intrusive symptoms like:

  • Changes in your menstrual cycle

  • Hot flashes

  • Bone loss

  • Vaginal dryness

  • Mood Swings

  • And much more

And, did you know that perimenopause can last for years?

There’s no reason to suffer in silence during this menopausal transition. Instead, now is the time to learn about effective, medically proven options for treating perimenopausal and menopausal symptoms.

Alloy offers hormonal treatment options like estradiol pills, patches, evamist®/estrogen spray, gels, and vaginal cream to give you relief from menopausal symptoms by supplementing your body’s natural estrogen during and after menopause.

We also offer non-hormonal treatment options for menopausal symptoms, including low-dose paroxetine, which helps regulate vasomotor symptoms like night sweats and hot flashes.

Discover what menopausal treatment options are best for you by taking our online assessment and speaking with a menopause-trained doctor.

What do I need to know about menopause?

So what is menopause exactly and how does it affect your body? Because the age a woman enters perimenopause also varies so greatly, the onset of perimenopausal symptoms (like hot flashes) can be surprising. For the average woman perimenopause begins between the ages of 45 and 55, but some begin in their mid-late 30s, while others might start after 55 (known as late-onset menopause).

That age swing alone can make perimenopause and menopause tricky, if not impossible, to diagnose, says Menopause.org. If you go to the doctor to get your hormone levels checked, test results can be misleading, because hormone levels vary from day to day.

That’s because during perimenopause, your body is stuck in a hormonal push-pull of trying to convince itself to produce more estrogen. As your ovaries produce less estrogen (or estradiol), the pituitary gland can crank out more FSH (or follicle stimulating hormone), to no avail.

There are a couple of “tells” that you’ve transitioned from perimenopause to menopause — not having a period for a full year, according to the Mayo Clinic, and having an FSH blood level is consistently elevated to 30 mIU/mL or higher for a year.

What are common menopause symptoms?

Then there are the 34 potential menopausal symptoms— each that can call for its own form of menopause treatment. Here are a few of the most common:

Irregular menstrual cycles

Irregular periods, or shifts in your menstrual cycle, are one of the first clues you’re in some stage of menopause. Irregular periods can either come close together or further apart than usual, then progress to less frequent irregular periods in varying degrees of heaviness.

Hot flashes/night sweats

Hot flashes — the sudden onset of intense, feverish sweating — can happen to 75% of menopausal women, according to Johns Hopkins Medicine. As you can see, hot flashes and menopausereally go hand-in-hand for most women.

They feel like a sudden internal heat that emanates outward toward your skin, and are often accompanied by a raised heart rate. One treatment for hot flashes is paroxetine, an SSRI that, in low doses, has been proven to alleviate hot flashes and night sweats in 50% of women.

Weight gain

During perimenopause your metabolism slows, triggering weight gain concentrated in the midsection when you head into menopause. The average woman gains 5 pounds but can gain 10 or more during this time.

Sleep disturbances

Plunging estrogen levels and menopausal night sweats can mess with our ability to get enough deep REM sleep, which can make us prone to weight gain, studies show.

Plus, sleep deprivation has been shown to raise cortisol levels — a stress hormone — which can also contribute to weight gain.

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Vaginal dryness/painful intercourse

Vaginal dryness and painful intercourse can occur during perimenopause and menopause when estrogen levels decline and vaginal tissue becomes thinner, making you more prone to bladder and urinary tract infections, as well.

Topical estradiol creams have been shown to provide relief for vaginal dryness, as well as itching, burning, and the prevention of frequent UTIs.

Mood irritability

Mood changes in perimenopause and menopause can be the result of the sleep deprivation and hormonal fluctuations.

Menopause symptoms can make some women miserable, while others sail through unscathed. Approximately 85% of women have experienced a menopause symptom (or many), according to a 2015 BMC Women’s Health study.

What types of menopause treatments work best?

Although most of us will experience at least one menopause symptom — and likely a range — every woman’s experience with menopause overall is different. Hence, potential remedies that work for one woman, even a sister or your mother, may not be right for you.

That’s why it’s good to acquaint yourself with potential options — and to talk with your healthcare provider. Here are a few of the best-known remedies for menopause to learn and ask about.

Menopause Hormone Treatment

Whether or not you can take it depends on your personal and family medical history, but if you’re healthy, within 10 years of menopause and don’t have any contraindications, low-dose hormone therapy is the go-to for perimenopause and menopause symptom relief.

It comes in pill, skin patch, gel or cream form. If you still have your uterus, you’ll need to add a progestin to your estrogen dose.

Vaginal estrogen or moisturizers

Vaginal estrogen releases just a small amount of estrogen, which is absorbed directly into the vaginal tissue to relieve dryness, discomfort with intercourse and some urinary irritation and symptoms.

Vaginal moisturizers and lubricants can relieve the symptoms, but they do not address the underlying problem which is due to the thinning of the vaginal and vulvar tissues.

Gabapentin (Neurontin)

Used to treat nerve pain and seizures, Gabapentin has also been shown to help reduce hot flashes. A study of women with breast cancer showed gabapentin reduced their hot flashes by around 50 percent.

Eat well and exercise regularly

Regular exercise increases blood flow and helps to regulate your insulin levels and blood sugar to mitigate menopausal weight gain. Weight-bearing exercise has been scientifically proven to help prevent bone loss, which really starts to happen in menopause.

Eating smaller portions and cutting back on carbs can help too, according to the Cleveland Clinic.

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What types of menopause treatments can help my symptoms?

Get more sleep

Poor sleep quality is a lesser-known common symptom of menopause, says Johns Hopkins Medicine. With hot flashes, an increased risk of sleep apnea, and anxiety as part and parcel of our menopausal makeup, it’s no wonder. To improve sleep, try and keep blue light (which messes with your circadian rhythms) distractions out of your bedroom, and dial back your bedtime.

Herbal remedies

Black cohosh, St. John’s Wort, and Red Clover are all said to alleviate menopause symptoms, but they aren’t approved by the FDA and can also mess with your hormone levels, so you might want to discuss this form of treatment with your doctor before moving forward.

Phytoestrogens or plant estrogens

Some studies of the efficacy of plant or phytoestrogens are promising: One meta-analysis of 10 studies found them to cause “a significant reduction” of hot flashes. But again, these formulas aren’t regulated, so tread lightly to start.

Alloy Will Help You Find Your Personal Menopause Treatment Plan

Menopause symptoms can be disruptive, draining, and confusing. It’s good to know that Alloy’s got your back.

You can explore our solutions for treating menopausal symptoms. Or, take our online assessment to speak with a menopause-trained doctor and discover the best treatment for you.

Experts agree that for the vast majority of healthy women, supplementing your body's natural hormones is the safest and most effective treatment to ease the vasomotor symptoms of menopause, including hot flashes and night sweats.

Head to our product page to check out your options. A menopause-trained doctor will review your choices to make sure you get the right treatment.

Sources

  1. https://www.menopause.org/for-women/menopauseflashes/menopause-symptoms-and-treatments/how-do-i-know-when-i’m-in-menopause-

  2. https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/menopause/diagnosis-treatment/drc-20353401

  3. https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/introduction-to-menopause

  4. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28525646/

  5. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/sleep-deprivation-obesity/

  6. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4542113/

  7. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1627210/

  8. https://www.menopause.org/for-women/menopauseflashes/bone-health-and-heart-health/bone-health-exercise-is-a-key-component

  9. https://health.clevelandclinic.org/menopause-weight-gain-is-it-inevitable/

  10. https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/how-does-menopause-affect-my-sleep

  11. https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/blue-light-has-a-dark-side

  12. https://nwhn.org/herbaltherapiesformenopause/https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4389700/

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