Untreated Perimenopause Almost Cost Me My Life... So We Talk About It Now, Together.

We talk about periods.
We talk about puberty.
But no one really talks about what happens next.

In this episode of Between Us Mother Daughter UNFILTERED, Zeynep shares her experience with untreated perimenopause; what it actually felt like, what was missed, and how quickly things spiraled without answers.

What started as irregular cycles turned into constant bleeding for 10+ months straight which then led to extreme issues and a body that no longer felt like her own. After months of being dismissed and told everything was “normal,” the reality turned out to be far more serious.

Tara Khaleesi shares what it was like watching it unfold as a daughter; the confusion, the fear, and what she understands now that she didn’t then.

Tom joins back to give the male perspective this time on perimenopause; what it looks like from the outside when you don’t understand what’s happening, and why awareness and communication matter more than ever.

This is not about fear.
This is about awareness.
Because untreated perimenopause doesn’t have to become a crisis; but without understanding, it can.

And that’s exactly why we talk about it now… together.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Perimenopause is the hormonal transition before menopause and can last for years. Symptoms go beyond physical; they affect mood, sleep, and mental clarity:

• Hormone levels fluctuate unpredictably, not in a straight line
• Many women are dismissed or misdiagnosed during this phase
• Severe symptoms can escalate when left untreated
• Awareness, early recognition, and support can change everything

If this episode helped you understand something you’ve been feeling, share it with someone who needs to hear it.

Stay UNFILTERED.

Transcript

Intro

Tara Khaleesi 0:00

Welcome back to Between Us, Mother, Daughter, and Filtered. I'm Tara Khalisi and I'm Zaynab. And today we're going to be talking about perimetopause, our second part to our two-part series on hormones. Alright, let's go.

Zeynep 0:25

Last episode, we covered hormones in teens, and that was fun and funny.

Tara Khaleesi 0:30

In this episode, we talk about how in perimenopause the hormones get wacky.

Zeynep 0:36

That's a good way of putting it. Well, first off, I can say that we were not educated at all about perimenopause. And I want to go over this very quickly because even women my age or older, like my mom didn't know. Apparently, as I'm learning, I'm not a doctor or an expert in this field, but I read enough that I can explain this well. Premenopause, P-R-E, menopause,

Pre, Peri, Menopause (24 HOURS) and Post

Zeynep 1:04

believe it or not, starts with teens when you start getting your period. Can you believe that? So I'm in pre-menopause. Yes. Yes, you are in pre-menopause. So daddy lives with two menopausal women. One is pre-one is peri. So you get in pre-menopause when you get your period. Yes. When you start ovulating, and that's when pre-menopause starts. It lasts till late 30s to mid-40s. In this time period, you have predictable patterns of hormones going up and down. You have regular PMS, regular periods. Everything is in autopilot. I like calling this phase autopilot phase, basically. And then you get to late 30s. Mine was close to mid-40. Shitstorm happens. And that is called perimenopause. Yes. Unfortunately, perimenopause lasts between four to ten years. And it's, as I said, it starts in late 30s to mid-40s up to early 50s, right? What happens in perimenopause is your progesterone hormone, like we went over last episode in teens when you have your cycles, your progesterone drops first. And estrogen goes up and down. And that makes your periods very unpredictable. Become shorter or longer, heavier, lighter. Yes. Yeah. And your mood, anxiety creeps in, even if you never had it all your life. Irritability, emotional swings, those are really, really bad, heavy stuff if you get it hit hard. Even for the people around them. That you can definitely testify, I know. And sleep gets disturbed because we were not educated on it. I had no idea what I was going through. I couldn't sleep anymore. For seven plus months, right at sharp 3 a.m. is if I had an alarm on. I was up. I can't go back to sleep and I have to have my whole full day. Doesn't matter if I go to sleep at 9 or midnight. I still wake up at 3 a.m. sharp.

Tara Khaleesi 3:14

That's scary. That's like a horror movie.

Zeynep 3:18

Well, it was because I didn't

Why We Are Talking About It

Zeynep 3:20

know what was happening. And brain fog is the worst of all. Because, you know, forgetfulness, it happens to everyone. But I remember telling your dad and he's like, oh, I it happens to me too. And I said, I I don't think so. Because as I'm talking, I forget the words. Like regular vocabulary. I I don't know, like I like motherboard for computer, right? I can't find a word in English or in Turkish as if it's erased from my brain. Because we didn't know these are the symptoms of perimenopause.

Tara Khaleesi 3:54

Here I am thinking, oh no, I have early dementia. I need to go see a neurologist. This isn't talked about at all. All this is happening to you, and I'm sure you're just like, what is happening to me?

Zeynep 4:06

Lately, thankfully, people started talking about it. Perimenopause. Doctors started talking about it. They are tuning in more how to help with these symptoms in perimenopause. But when I was going through a few years ago, I had no idea. I wasn't hearing anything about it. I have older friends who weren't in it. They didn't even know what it was. We always thought it was menopause. Like back in Turkey, my grandma used to have hot flashes. And my mom back then would say, Oh, she's in menopause. All I knew was when you get old from a kid's eyes, your grandma is old, you get hot flashes and you stop getting periods. People call that menopause. That's it. That's all I knew. And I wasn't getting any hot flashes. So when the doctor said you're in perimenopause, and I thought he's saying pre-menopause, it didn't make sense. I'm far from menopause. What are you talking about? I was too young to be my grandma. Yeah. And your body changes too. You get bloated, your weight shifts, you gain or you lose weight. And this phase actually lasts about 10 years, believe it or not.

SPEAKER_02 5:15

Oof.

Zeynep 5:16

Sounds like it's a long time to go through all these symptoms. And symptoms do change. You may have hot flashes first two years, next eight years, you may not. Sometimes it doesn't even last 10 years. Sometimes it's four, sometimes it's seven. There's no certain time limit that we know, like, okay, I see the light at the end of the tunnel. So I don't, because I don't know how long mine is gonna last. Bro's got shades on. What happens after you reach that 10 years? If you don't have your period for 12 months straight, right? The next day, the next 24 hours, that one day is the menopause. Exactly. So menopause that we grew up thinking was actually perimenopause. I was shocked when I learned this. So think about menopause as a timestamp. That's it, it's not a phase. After that one day, you go into postmenopause. Exactly. And postmenopause is for the rest of your life. Estrogen during postmenopause is lower but stable. So your mood stabilizes too with that. Progesterone is very, very low. But again, you don't have mood swings like you used to in perimenopause. Yeah. However, postmenopause, you may get lower energy and bone density loss, which is important. So during these phases, perimenopause and postmenopause, HRT, which is hormone replacement therapy and NTRT testosterone replacement therapy can definitely help. This wasn't talked about before and it was feared. And I'm not saying everybody should be on it, but definitely this is a conversation you should have with your doctor. Absolutely. Because it brought back me, who I was.

Tara Khaleesi 7:14

Learning and hearing about all of this now kind of makes me understand more. When I was in fifth grade in New Jersey, it was snowing, it was so cold, and I was already next to the window, which was already bad enough because you can just feel the cold from the window. I was freezing. I was in a blanket, sweat, sweatpants. I remember you used to take your little blankets, and I'm like, what are you doing? My teacher, I remember, took off her cardigan when it was already freezing in the classroom. And she's like, Oh my gosh, it's kind of hot in here. And I'm over here shivering. She opens the window and it's snowing outside. It was so bad. But now that I think back on it, she was probably in perimenopause and having hot flashes and all these other things happen. Yeah.

Zeynep 8:03

I never had hot flashes, so I don't know, but I heard it's very bad. I have friends who said

When Symptons Started and Being Dismissed

Zeynep 8:09

it just feels like your body is on fire. I can only imagine. And with perimenopause, and what happened to me was in 2023. I started getting my period every five to seven days. I was 44 at the time and I never had missed missed or had an irregular period until I got pregnant with you, but then you don't get your periods. All of a sudden, I was getting my period every five to seven days. Basically, all the time. I knew something was off. Listen to your gut. Like I always say to you. I was losing a lot of blood. Before it got to six months, I said, okay, I need to go see my gynecologist. And the nurse did say perimenopausic. And her attitude was, Well, we all go through it. I'm like, okay, is there anything I can do? She's like, You're gonna go through it. That makes no sense, but okay. I was literally sent back home.

Tara Khaleesi 9:08

With no treatment, no nothing.

Zeynep 9:10

Nothing. By literally just suck it up. And well, she didn't say that in those words, but she basically did. I went back home. Now month seven or month eight. Still, every five to seven days, I was getting my period. A month passes, it's still going on. I called back and I requested a doctor this time instead of a nurse. I saw this uh gynecologist and he said, It sounds like perimenopause. Again, I'm thinking premenopause. Let me do blood tests, see where your hormones are, and then we can look into options. I get a call in two days. He said, I see estrogen is on the lower side, but everything is within normal range. If I knew any better, I would have said, Who sets this normal range? What is a normal range, right? I didn't. And now we're in 2024, end of April. I know you're gonna remember this.

Tara Khaleesi 10:04

Oh yeah. Oh, this is bad.

Zeynep 10:06

Yes, your dad had to go to Europe for a week. It's it's just you and me. He left, I think it was a Saturday. Sunday was okay. Monday morning, I can't get up. I cannot lift my head from the pillow. I remember that you were out of it. It was so bad. I had no idea what was going on. I couldn't open my eyes. My breathing was getting shallow. Thankfully, your dad was returning Thursday. You stayed home with me, and your dad came. I was getting a little better. You know, I could get out of bed, but I still had breathing problems. I went to our family doctor. She referred me to a lung specialist because I can't breathe. And I went to the lung specialist, he did ultrasound x-rays, and he's like, I can see you're not breathing well, but your lungs are fine. In the meantime, I had seen this specialist, that specialist had to get mammogram, a bunch of blood tests. Nobody's giving me anything but anxiety. I'm like, I can be anxious, but it's not gonna get me to this level. I don't know what's going on. By the end of May 2024, I had lost 25 plus pounds in five weeks. I don't know if you remember, but I looked like a skeleton. I remember it it was bad. And you were pale too. Well, yeah, it was so bad. We are moving, like I have to carry boxes from upstairs to downstairs. I remember calling your dad. I can't get up. Leave alone carrying anything. I cannot carry myself. So we were really worried. I went back to my doctor and I said, every test is negative. Grateful, I'm thankful. But what is going on? I can't breathe, I can't eat, like everything is so intense in my body. She ordered tests was June 3rd, 2024. I remember because we moved June 7th.

SPEAKER_02 12:14

Yeah.

Zeynep 12:15

Four days later. So now we're in Florida. I didn't hear back from anyone. I am still very weak, but I'm getting more electrolytes now. And I started walking. I started getting healthier.

Tara Khaleesi 12:27

I still didn't gain all the pounds, but uh Yeah, like you were saying before, how the weight is shifting.

Zeynep 12:33

Yeah. Now, the year 2025, July. I'm talking about two years straight. We found a new doctor here and she orders blood tests. Results came. She says, I need to see you. I'm like, oh no. I go. And she's like, I really don't like your hemoglobin. It's 10.6 and it's very low. She asked me which doctor I saw in New Jersey and she logged into her computer and she's like, When did you have your transvision? I said, I didn't. She looks at me, she's like, Oh, you must have gotten something through IV then. I'm like, I didn't. Here I was walking around with hemoglobin and ferritin at seven. My ferritin should have been around 90.

Tara Khaleesi 13:18

Oh my gosh.

Zeynep 13:19

And it was at seven? Yes. And she's like, it's a miracle that you're still alive. So she's thinking 10.6 is low. I was at seven all this time and nobody caught it. How did anyone not catch that? I'm saying I'm weak, I can't go up the steps, I'm fainting, I can't breathe. Here, all this bleeding, 10 plus months of periods for iron out. I was out of blood.

Tara Khaleesi 13:52

Oh my god.

Zeynep 13:53

My brain wasn't getting oxygen because blood carries oxygen. I didn't have any left.

unknown 14:00

Wow.

Zeynep 14:01

So if the first nurse didn't shrug it off and say, you know. We all go through it. The second doctor tried to do the right thing by giving blood tests, but your hormones are wacky already. He has to be testing me every couple hours to get a good read because I don't know if he tested me when my estrogen was high, but then it dips the next hour. I should have been put on HRT, which is hormone replacement therapy. But I was told about it after the fact. And then everybody kept saying, Well, you'll get cancer if you use it. So that stopped me another six months because I was scared. Do I want this? I want to see you graduate. I want to see you in college. I want to see you get married if you choose to get married. And I wanna be here. So I was scared to get the treatment. But it became so bad that I was sleepless. I was gonna die from not sleeping. I decided to get it. It worked for me. It is something to definitely be talked about with your doctors. Ask about it, get information. Don't go on a website and just get it blindly. Get with a hormone therapy doctor. Professional help. Professional

The Fear Around HRT and TRT Treatments for Perimenopause

Zeynep 15:17

help. And it's been life-changing for me, as you know.

Tara Khaleesi 15:22

And for me, like seeing you go through all this was really scary because yeah, I was little and I didn't know what was going on, but I we're connected in a way, and I just knew something was happening, and you did not look well at all. What was I 10? I didn't know what to do. I couldn't do anything, and I'm like, what is happening to my mom? I was scared, but I was like, the doctors are gonna help, and mom, I've seen so many.

Zeynep 15:51

You don't know if it is something serious like cancer or something really bad, because no one loses that much weight in perimenopause, but also no one bleeds for almost a year every five to seven days. Like it's a non-stop bleeding. And if you see those levels, I would assume you would call. Yeah. But yeah, it was very unfortunate, and that's my parimenopause story, and that's why I got um kind of obsessed with educating you and others about hormones. So you think periods is bad. You haven't even started yet. But it doesn't have to be. That's the thing. Like perimenopause doesn't have to be this painful. For you, it's not going to be. I know. I'll know what to do. Exactly. When you reach late 30s and early 40s, you're going to be ready. Yes, look for the signs. Is my sleep disturbed? Am I more anxious? And you're not gonna let anyone say we all go through it because you don't have to.

SPEAKER_02 16:53

Exactly.

Zeynep 16:54

Yeah, good point. Yeah, so that's paramenopause. And once again, to get the male perspective, we have Tom Mirashewski back on our podcast. Welcome back.

Tom 17:04

Thank you. Happy to be back.

Zeynep 17:06

You're getting used to this, huh?

Tom 17:08

Yeah, because I think I'm pretty much a professional at this point of dealing with different levels of hormones in women at differing ages.

Zeynep 17:17

Yes. So I told my side of it and how crazy it's been these past few years for me. And for you, it must be even more crazy to watch me go through it.

Tom 17:30

Yes, I think being on this end of it, watching you go through these different things, because it wasn't just a you're irritable right before your period. This introduced a lot of physical things like waking up all the time. There

Male Perspective on Perimenopause

Tom 17:45

are different phases here. This is consistent. This stuff doesn't come about like 10 days out of every month. It's every day. I mean, for me, watching you go through these different things and not knowing, obviously, I'm really worried and concerned about your health because you're losing weight, you're not eating, or yeah, that was you had an increase, like you've always been a very old woman, right? And this was for the first time where I started to see you with having panic attacks or being overly anxious.

Zeynep 18:25

Well, we didn't know, like I couldn't breathe, and you're right, the panic attacks were crazy. I can't breathe, and then I get more anxious, and I'm like, oh my gosh, I can't breathe now. I'm gonna die, I'm dying.

Tom 18:36

Yeah, and from the male point of view, I think what's key is obviously being aware of what perimenopause is and the symptoms and everything that happens along with it, so that you're prepared.

SPEAKER_02 18:50

Yeah.

Tom 18:51

Um, what what's crazy is I never even heard the word perimenopause, and I'm in the life science field.

SPEAKER_02 18:58

Yeah.

Tom 18:58

Never heard of it until you brought it up. And then over the last year, I'd say, I've seen so much more come out about it. There's an awareness campaign out there to help women to understand what's actually happening, that their body's not falling apart or they're not going crazy. And I think it's more important for the spouse or the partner to be able to say and recognize, hey, this is what's happening here.

Zeynep 19:23

And it's real. There are a lot of men still don't believe that's it. This is real. I'm talking about smart, educated, intelligent men still debating this.

Tom 19:32

Well, the the reason is they're seeing this behavior, because it is behavior to a certain extent, happen consistently every day. And it's like this is who she is now. Yeah, but she's irritable all the but they don't know that. All they know is, oh my gosh, she's constantly complaining about this or that. And I think one of the other things is sometimes there's a little, I don't want to say rage, but oh no, you can't say rage. Okay, there's rage there. And for men, when things happen, it's like, oh my god, like I said thing. Let's take a step back and really unfold what I just said. I just

This is Real! What We Wish Couples Did

Tom 20:10

said, hey, do you mind maybe putting this away next time or shutting the door? And that will start World War III. But you're gonna bring up everything that I haven't done in the last 20 years.

Zeynep 20:23

But seriously, you know, I'm not a violent person. For the first time, I start and I was sharing that with you because I was like, I don't know what's happening to me. I physically wanna hurt people. And that was the weirdest thing because I never have in my life. You thought I was kidding, and so I'm like, Tom, I am not joking. You don't understand the rage comes over you. You don't see anything. Thankfully, I don't have that anymore.

Tom 20:54

No, but I mean, again, taking a step back to a lot of men out there, they don't know that all these different things are happening, they just see the outcome. The outcome is you yelling or screaming and all of this other stuff. And I can see why there's a high divorce rate. Again, it's not just 10 days out of the month, it's every day. And every day's a new thing. And I never knew who I'm waking up to the next morning. Right? Hey, let's cross our fingers and hope that this is a better day. Maybe she got four hours of sleep instead of two, and maybe she's not raging today, and maybe, you know, so Yes.

Zeynep 21:31

Well, I really appreciate you bringing in the male perspective because it's hard for us to even think about you in this phase of our life because we're going through it every day and every minute is different for us, and most people don't know what the hell this is. I didn't know what perimenopause was. My mom didn't know. I had to teach her hey, you know, those times you were raging and stuff. That was actually perimenopause. Menopause is only for one day. It's a timestamp. 24 hours. It's the day after 12 months of no period. We're learning as we go. And Tara's generation, they are actually learning now in their pre-menopause, which is the healthiest years of their life, so they know what's to come. And from male perspective, I appreciate you saying all that because we don't have the patience to think about, oh, how could this affect my husband right now?

Tom 22:30

Yeah. So that's why I think awareness is so important here. Exactly. And again, it's every day or every other day. It's not like it's changing. Because awareness helps us to understand, okay, how do we help you through this?

SPEAKER_02 22:44

Yes.

Tom 22:45

When you get panic attacks, I'm going to grab your hands, look in your eyes, and say, breathe as I do, right? To work you through that. When you do have these times when you rage, I'm going to step back, let you rage, and you always come back to, yeah, okay, I know that that was my hormones. My hormones. I apologize.

Zeynep 23:06

Yeah.

Tom 23:06

So we work together along through it.

SPEAKER_02 23:09

Yeah.

Tom 23:10

Versus you're so mad at me for sneezing and breathing. And I'm not like, hey, I don't want to be around this.

Zeynep 23:19

Yes. And that's why it's actually a fact that the divorce rate goes high up during clear menopause years because of the non-communication that goes on between husband and wife. Because your estrogen, which is the caring hormone that we have, it just dips. Somehow we turn into I don't care anymore. Because I started hormone replacement therapy. My estrogen is coming back to not normal, but still a lot higher than what I started at. When I feel that way, like I don't care. I just learn to stop myself and say, okay, your estrogen dipped. You do care. You do love this man. He's the love of your life.

Tom 23:59

Yeah, I I can see for people who have a relationship that's struggling to begin with, they're almost doomed.

Zeynep 24:06

Oh, yeah.

Tom 24:06

I mean, no doubt. But uh the one thing I will say though, there is help. Like you've done the hormone replacement therapy and still do that. By looking at your levels and the different things and monitoring it, it's really I enjoy being with you. Again. Again. And I don't worry about these different things anymore because I know it's in check. Hey, you still spike and do this and that.

Zeynep 24:31

Yes. But it's a lot less.

Tom 24:33

Oh my gosh, because you you know what's happening. And I think that was the biggest thing too. If you know what's happening, like, hey, here are the key reasons. These are all the symptoms of this. Yes. Because you're not going, oh my gosh, like what's wrong with me. I mean, I keep going back, as we talked about before, awareness and communication. So communicate when things are happening. Even though it may be very apparent, it may not be apparent to the other person.

Zeynep 24:58

100%. Well, thank you so much. We appreciate it. I know that our male listeners definitely do.

Tom 25:04

Yeah, great being here.

Zeynep 25:06

Thank you. And now I want to turn to our daughter, Tara Khaleesi. I know you have years to get your perimenopause, but if you were to take one thing from this episode, what would it be?

Tara Khaleesi 25:17

Honestly, it would just be that it's real. You don't know how many years it will take, and it's not something you can just push through. And also, if you feel like there's something off with your body, listen to it. Because that's exactly what you did.

Zeynep 25:32

I don't know where we would be right now, but I know it probably wouldn't be in a good place if you didn't. Exactly. And once you understand what's happening inside your body, you start to notice something else. It affects how you act, right? That's why some days you feel

Tara Khaleesi - Gen Alpha Take Away

Zeynep 25:47

confident, other days you question everything, and why you suddenly care more about what people think and feel the need to fit in. Which brings me to our next episode: Conformity and Dopamine. Yes, that's what we'll be talking about next. And until then, stay unfiltered.