By Ronke Aramide
We are fearfully and wonderfully made by God, but women are beautifully and carefully created to further proclaim His mightiness.
From conception to delivery, it was believed that women can predict the gender of the child they are carrying through some traditional beliefs or occurrences.e.g,when a woman falls down while heavily pregnant, it means she is carrying a male child who is kicking football in the womb,or a delayed labour will suggest female child, because women don’t naturally dress up to time while going out.
The reproductive system of women is technically wired by God which is complicated if tampered with by external or internal forces,thereby making women run helter skelters for solutions.
Some people even believe it is spiritual attacks, but to talk about this issue, an internationally recognized gyne- nurse, Mrs Mariam Balogun was contacted to educate women on the body system and changes from Puberty to Menopause to allay the fears of spiritual attacks especially while experiencing menopausal symptoms.
To be able to understand the menopausal stage, we have to start from puberty period. One does not just get to the menopausal stage without passing through other stages of growth,hence expedient to talk about “Puberty, Active Sexual and Menopause stage”.
Puberty age is the stage of developing all sex organs, when pubic and armpits hair begins to grow, boys develop husky voice, while ladies develop breast, start menstruation and the ovaries, vagina and other reproductive organs begin to get ready for action.
This is to say that at any time from age 10 that a girl starts menstruating ,she can get pregnant if she engages in sexual activities that involves releasing of sperm into her vagina during ovulation because before menstruation,there must be ovulation, i.e eggs released by the ovaries.
The hormones involved in menstruation are Estrogen and Progesterone plus Luteinizing hormone and before anyone can enter into Menopause, these two strong hormones would have stopped working.
Menstruation is done monthly until there is conception, it will seize during pregnancy except on rare occasions where some pregnant women still menstruate or a medical complications occur.
The monthly flow goes on for so many years until the person is at least 45 to 55yrs of age, premature menopause, (which is usually caused by stress) can come around 30-35yrs,but some people fall under menopause at about 20-25yrs of age which is very abnormal and requires medical attention.
Estrogen secrets inside the endometrium lining (also called weeping uterus) to produce egg which is pushed out as menstruation when not fertilized.
Ovulation period differs from person to person,to a cycle of 28days, ovulation will be 14th day, while 30days cycle will have 15th day as ovulation day during which the estrogen is very high in the blood but after ovulation,it goes down and the progesterone will go up to be able to expel the unfertilized eggs as menstruation.
Anyone who has undergone a surgical operations that involves reproductive organs like hysterectomy, having cancer of the uterus, stress or having imbalance hormones can go into premature menopause regardless of the age.
The hormones have ways of regenerating, if there’s a hormonal deficiency, it can repair itself within 3 to 4 months, but when it lingers for a year or more, it is regarded as full menopause, i.e all the reproductive hormones have shut down or reduced, when one have not menstruated for a complete year, we can say the person has entered into Menopause.
Before the full menopause, there are signals to be noticed which is called Pre- menopausal signals, because estrogen has a powerful effect on other parts of women’s body,like the heart, bone, skin even the brain, so as it reduces many issues begins to come up e.g mood swing (they begin to get angry over little things),we were made to understand that the homones works hand in hand,when one is going down, others goes up to complement,e.g the pituitary gland and hypothalamus rises to the body by sending messages to the ovary to produce egg but when the active homones (estrogen) to support the ovary has gone down,it remains adamant hence the mood swing because the adrenaline is very high at this stage.
By virtue of that, men should take note of such period and assist, this is the period men complain of their wives being too cold or harsh towards people around them.
Another signal is hot flush, this is when they have abnormal temperature, they are catching cold when others are feeling heat, abnormal sweating even under air-conditioner, especially underneath the breast and the hollow of the back, the skin will be very dry, unusual pains underneath the feet, dizziness and dry throat etc.
Dry Vagina is another symptom of menopause stage in women, because the estrogen that produces mucus to lubricate the vagina and makes it ready for sex has stopped secreting, the vagina will be dried ,the breast will not be looking attractive again,even when touched, the woman may not feel any sensation unlike before that little touch arouses her nipples and tickles her.
At full menopausal stage of every woman, all reproductive organs like the ovary, fallopian tubes uterus etc will begin to shrink.
To be continued…
