I’ve begun having full on night sweats, which I’m pretty sure are because of my age and stage of life. Perimenopause hit me pretty hard a few years ago and my mast cell symptoms got far worse when I tried treating the hormone fluctuations with progesterone and estrogen cream. I learned quickly I am allergic to both after having avoided synthetic hormones for decades.

The birth control pills used to make me so sick and eventually if I kept taking them it would get worse and worse until I was a mess. Mostly clotting, pain and horrible inflammation. The actual hives and itching didn’t happen until later in life but just before my periods I did begin getting those, too. I was allergic to my own period!

So it’s good that’s going away but in its place are now these menopause symptoms like night sweats that I’m not sure I’m ready to deal with. I’ve always had the occasional hot flash, my entire life, but this is different. This is drenching night sweats that leave me freezing to death afterward, unable to sleep.

Maybe it’s something else, but I’m pretty sure it’s just that I am close to menopause now and I can’t take HRT obviously, can’t eat soy, etc. so there isn’t much to help me except being stubborn and getting through it like I have everything else.

I mean, it can’t kill me, can it?