the ‘menopause brain’?
Meleni Aldridge, BSc NutrMed Dip cPNI Cert LTFHE mNNA
Executive Coordinator ANH-Intl and ANH-USA
Are you a woman of a certain age experiencing brain changes and pondering this valid question - is ‘menopause brain’ really a thing? Or do have you a loved one that you think fits this bill?
Given these days how many women—particularly those who're in, or are approaching, menopause—are talking openly on social media and elsewhere about signs of hormonal imbalance and dysfunction, you could be of the view that nature has created a life stage that disadvantages women. Or that menopause, and its symptoms, requires treatment and should be medicalised.
Or perhaps we’re outliving our invitation to be here, living longer than nature intended once our child-bearing usefulness is over? Or maybe the chasm between our genetic blueprint, evolutionary history and modern life is widening and taking its toll on women’s health?
At ANH, our view is that menopause is an entirely normal stage in a woman’s life. We simply don't subscribe to the view of many drug regulatory authorities which, undoubtedly prompted by their revolving doors with Big Pharma, are trying to medicalise the life stage. No, we submit that menopause is a key life stage that every woman, who still has her ovaries, will reach in her life if she lives past her fifties. But when viewed through the lens of conventional medicine, it’s a life stage that isn't well understood, mainly because it’s only recently that there’s been acknowledgement that there are many more differences between men and women’s bodies that go way beyond anatomy. Most of the early clinical research that built the foundations of modern medicine as we know it was conducted on men and much of the ongoing research still is. Not only that, If women want to manage menopausal symptoms, hey, why not just prescribe synthetic hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and ignore the fact this will likely increase the risk of breast cancer and endometrial hyperplasia (a thickening of the uterine lining)?
Neuroendocrinology
In the human body, nerves (neurology) and hormones (endocrinology) are two communication systems that work hand in hand. Your neurological system is like a super conductive highway throughout your body that enervates every thought, action and reaction. Hormones are messenger molecules that direct and govern your biological actions.
In a woman’s body, our neurology and our hormones work in tandem, far more so than in a man’s body where the prime hormone mover is testosterone that pulses in 15-20 min bursts during a 24-hr period throughout life.
We women on the other hand, have a suite of hormones that need to work in synergistic flow, as well as with our neurology, immune system and metabolism. You may not be aware that oestrogen is also involved in a woman’s brain function, with oestradiol specifically being critical for energy production in the brain. This is why a woman can lose around 30% of brain energy after menopause. Please note I’ve said brain energy, not brain function. There is a difference.
Contrary to conventional thinking, new research carried out by Lisa Mosconi PhD and her team in the Women’s Brain Initiative at Weill Cornell Medicine
The effects being more potent in certain areas of the brain. In the case of hot flushes/flashes it’s the hypothalamus not regulating temperature correctly, an underpowered frontal cortex causing brain fog an
debbing oestrogen in the amygdala responsible for the increased ‘senior moments’. When our oestrogen is high, so too is our brain energy.
Correspondingly, when our oestrogen is low, our brain energy drops, which long-term as in menopause, can cause our neurons to age faster. This is the reason why women have a two-fold risk to men for developing dementia, because low brain energy sets up a milieu in which amyloid plaques can develop. Whilst amyloid plaques are not the cause of dementia, they create increased risk, especially in the presence of insulin resistance, metabolic dysfunction and low-grade, chronic inflammation.
You’ll recognise the same bad actors responsible for creating the environment in which chronic diseases flourish. Dr Mark Hyman, in his interview in the recent Better Brain Blueprint documentary series, confirmed that you can have a brain full of amyloid plaques with no evidence of dementia, but it’s the combination of plaques and inflammation from metabolic dysfunction that tips a brain over the edge.