"The Change"

That was what my mother's generation called it, that wonderful time in a woman's life when her hormones start heading for the exit and the body she's depended on for forty or fifty years suddenly behaves like a total stranger.

I like the diminishing periods, and most especially the emotional and spiritual growth I've experienced in the past couple of years. But this body......well, I don't recognize the middle-aged woman in the mirror, and I can't figure out how I can be freezing from the neck down and on fire from the neck up at the same time. The area under my breasts is perpetually sore and itchy. My legs sweat. My dreams have turned bizarre on me. I never know when my bladder will let loose. My libido.......what's that? And of course, one always feels SO attractive when she's waking up approximately 2,793 times a night to pee, change nightgowns, flap the bedclothes or turn the pillow over.

So, what are some of YOUR experiences with menopause? What age were you when it started, and how did you deal with it? Any and all replies will be appreciated, unless of course you're a man like Archie Bunker who tells Edith, "So CHANGE, already!!"