The Boston Women’s Health Collective opened our eyes in the seventies about women’s health and especially about our own bodies. It should be no surprise that they offer us a definitive guide to our menopause transition. Like the rest of the Our Bodies, Ourselves series, Our Bodies, Ourselves: Menopause (Touchstone, Simon and Schuster, 2006) explores menopause as a normal, healthy phase -- part and parcel of being a woman.
A cadre of women’s health experts explains what it means to be “in menopause.” Symptoms, treatments –- including alternative and complementary treatments -– are described as well as the benefits and risks of hormones and other prescription medications. In clear, understandable language, this guidebook offers excellent information and opinions about menopause and its impact on your life.
With typical candor and the straightforward style that gave us permission to use a hand mirror to see our respective vulvas, this book explores issues of sexuality, body image, health decisions and the medical establishment. And whether the discussion is masturbation or osteoporosis, women readers feel as though the authors have our best interest in mind with every word.
Check the table of contents and you will find a comprehensive look at this important phase of life, with an emphasis on the health implications of menopause. You will find information on:
- Exactly what is happening in our bodies
- What are the usual symptoms of menopause
- What to do about those symptoms
- How to accept our changing bodies and our changing selves
- How to stay healthy and take care of ourselves
- How to deal with serious health concerns that begin during menopause
- How to stay powerful and political during later years
If you are looking for a book that will help demystify the process of menopause and will present the latest information on available treatments, this is a great choice. It gives you information and language to help you talk to your medical provider(s) about your own menopause and what you need to get through it in one piece.
As with other books in this series, it has an excellent index and is thoroughly referenced. If you want to study further on any topic, you will be able to find plenty of follow-up suggestions in the reference lists. And, of course, in the spirit of advocacy that made their name, the authors include a section on the politics of women’s health care. This is the perfect primer on the menopause transition.
