Diary of a Menopause Denier

I’m pretty sure my new neighbour now thinks I’m an alcoholic.

Just to give you some context, I’m one of those people who never gives in to illness, so I refuse to admit that I am in any way experiencing menopause symptoms, even though I keep finding myself wandering around the house in my bra and pants this winter. I keep blaming the new central heating system, despite the fact that my other half is bundled up in a blanket huddling in front of the fan heater. I am not having hot flushes!

So at the housewarming party of our new neighbour, wearing a full length Victorian dress, I was having a lovely time, despite being rather warm – they have a new central heating system too. The room was full of people and as the fun started the temperature rose to the point where I was feeling rather clammy.

Then all of a sudden I started to feel extremely unwell – and please bear in mind that I’d only had one very small glass of white wine at this point, so I was not in any way squiffy – but I suddenly felt very hot and decidedly not right. Cutting short an interesting conversation with a very nice lady I found my way to the hall where my other half stared at me wondering what the heck was wrong. My first thought was to get to the bathroom where I could lock myself in and be ill in private because that’s how my mind works. But realizing I wasn’t going to be able to make it up the stairs I lurched for the front door, and on hitting the cool evening air I promptly fainted. Now I have never fainted before, and I don’t ever want to again – it was really unpleasant. To my credit I managed to stay upright by clinging to the front door, and for a brief moment I felt absolutely lovely – all floaty and dreamy. But then I opened my eyes and saw my new neighbour, let’s call her Cleo, staring at me, but I was unable to articulate that I was not drunk, just hideously overheated.

Back at our house after a cool shower and a pint of iced water I felt absolutely fine, but my other half refused to let me go back to the party wearing a bikini, which was probably wise as I don’t think it was that sort of party and at no time had we been asked to put our car keys into a bowl. The new neighbours seem like nice people, although they’re probably thinking twice about their new neighbour who they probably think is a lush, while I adamantly refuse to admit I had a major hot flush and continue blaming overly efficient central heating systems for my symptoms.