Age has many plus points and as many minus. Weight is one of those points which you would usually file on the minus side because it is so much out of your control. Come the forties and you find yourself putting on weight even if you drink a glass of water. The menopause seems to have a great deal of influence on it, but the main factor is age.

Menopause may be an inevitable stage of life for women approaching their forties and fifties, but that doesn't mean that it is always an easy phase to survive. There are many uncomfortable symptoms that can accompany menopause, like hot sweats, mood swings, depression and sleep disturbances. Then there are the symptoms that don't get talked about as often, such as vaginal dryness and decreased libido. For some women, these symptoms will be relatively mild, and they will be able to ride out the change with little or no assistance at all. For others, menopause becomes a challenging phase of life that requires treatment and support to get through. For these women, there is menopause help available to provide coping and treatment during these difficult years.

Most of us tend to think of menopause as something that happens to older women, but not many of us realize that symptoms of pre menopause can occur as early as our thirties.  The pre menopause experience is extremely varied between different women, with some experiencing it sooner, some later, and some never at all.

You aren't considered to be post-menopausal until one year after your last menstrual period, but who is to say when menopause actually begins?  The best way to judge that is by paying attention to your symptoms and to the signals that your body is sending you.

Did you know that men, too go through menopause? Yes, they do and the male menopause is better known as andropause. Similar to women, men go through this phase during their middle age, usually when they are between 40 and 50 years of age and they too, experience some very uncomfortable symptoms that are so characteristic to this phase of life.  Before you learn about what the early signs of menopause in men are, you need to know what male menopause is.