Maybe she was just crying. Maybe it was perimenopause

Your weekend roundup of hopefully helpful things

Photo by Levi XU on Unsplash

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Earlier this month British Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves cried in parliament after being questioned by the prime minister. It doesn’t really matter what for. Later when everyone lost it on her, she said it was ‘a personal matter’.

What I know is Rachel is 46 – a prime age for perimenopause, the often-misunderstood precursor to menopause.

During this transition, the drop in progesterone can hit us hard. It can alter brain function and dysregulate the hypothalamus–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis.

As Lara Briden explains so well, here’s how progesterone calms stress pathways: It converts into allopregnanolone, a neurosteroid that activates GABA receptors. This has a calming effect on the brain and helps regulate the HPA axis. Loss of that progesterone equals stress vulnerability: during perimenopause, progesterone levels fall before estroge…