If you’d like some help finding a blog that’s informative and relevant to your interests, check out this list of 100 Best Blogs on Boomer Health.   It’s always nice when someone does all of this research for you and even provides links, so be sure to bookmark it for future reference.The list is organized into 15 different categories and the section on blogs about women’s health includes this one on menopause (#35) and several that I follow and have included on my blogroll, including Aging Fabulous, and Our Bodies our Blog.

One blog that I’ve recently discovered that isn’t on this list is The Perimenopause Blog.  Women just beginning the mid-life transition will find this site particularly helpful, so if you know any 40-something women who are complaining about insomnia, weight gain and other unexpected changes to their bodies, send them to this blog for help.

Do you have a favorite blog that’s helped you on your mid-life journey?

Perimenopause — the six to 10 years leading up to menopause –  can be a time of great frustration to women.  Despite a healthy, active lifestyle that’s been free of physical problems, the hormonal changes that begin during perimenopause can cause an array of symptoms that seem puzzling to someone who doesn’t know what to expect during this time of transition.

But before you know it, you’re taking sleeping pills to help with insomnia; anti-depressants for mood swings and anxiety; ibuprofen for the head aches and joint pain that you think are due to stress or too much jogging; and perhaps antibiotics for the occasional urinary tract infection that you have for the first time in your life.

It usually isn’t until years later that you can look back and clearly see that all of these mild but annoying problems were due to declining estrogen levels and that some help with hormone balancing and possibly supplements would have made a big difference in how you felt, without taking prescription drugs.

One way to put these pieces of the puzzle together is to keep a daily diary of your body’s physical and emotional changes so that you can clearly see if there’s connection with your cycle.  Knowing what is causing these symptoms will reduce your anxiety and help your doctor help you cope better with these hormonal changes.

There are some excellent Daily Perimenopause Diary templates available from the Centre for Menstrual Cycle and Ovulation Research at the University of British Columbia.   Their website also offers excellent information about all stages of hormonal changes.