Hi all--a couple weeks from 50 here & not able to do HRT as have had 2 deep vein blood clots--I am feeling almost constantly hot!! lt doesn't feel usually like discernable flashes, just almost always. Still having periods but becoming more random.
Others?? LJ

Hello Minneah,
Me too - somedays my face feels hot for hours. like one HUGE hot flash without the flash. I can relate. I wear sleeveless stuff all the time and last winter I hardly wore a coat at all. Didn't feel cold. No more periods for me and no HRT. Have a great day. Reelpam

I'm 52 and I am constantly hot. If I turn the temperature on the air conditioner up I sweat buckets. You could hang meat in my car . This summer has been just awful with the record temperatures and humidity. For the first time in my life I can't wait for winter. I haven't had a period for 5 months and don't use HRT either.

Hi Minneah,

I'm a lot younger (42) and keep getting these hot times too, but they are not flashes as other people describe as they seem to last 30 mins or longer. I had panic attacks last year which I suspect may have included the typically described hot flashes but they seem to have mostly stopped for now, barring an odd one! I just get hot for no reason!!

Hi Minneah,

I'm 51, have been having hot flashes on and off since last October. They seem to come and go, and for the last month, they've been plaguing me with several an hour. However, I DO have plenty of hot spells like you described too, where I just feel plain hot (with none of the tingly rushes to my face) for anywhere from five minutes to half an hour. I'm always standing in front of the air conditioner or a fan! I don't take HRT either, and am determined to make it through menopause without it, just relying on herbs, vitamins, diet, and exercise.

RedFox

This is the first summer I've been able to go in places and not have to wear long sleeves or a sweater. I usually freeze in restaurants, stores, casinos, whatever, because they keep it SO cold inside. But not this year, oh no.

We just took a cruise, and in the past, I always planned on long sleeves for dinner. But this year, I got by with sleeveless outfits, and felt just fine.

All of this is an absolute first for me!

I'm not really hot, but I can tell the cold doesn't bother me.

Sharon

[font=Times New Roman][size=5] In reply to "always hot" - that's the first time I've heard anyone say this. This always overheated feeling is what I have been having in perimenopause . This is definitely hormones because I breast fed my child 13 years ago and the whole entire time I was breastfeeding I felt the same way with heat. It would be snowing and I'd be in a T-shirt. I've been waiting and waiting to feel a "hot flash" as all my friends say "you'll know when one hits" but I haven't and just perceive this is the way my body will react. And this summer has been a killer for me too..........

Same here! I keep taking my temperature, thinking I have fever, but...it's never higher than 99.5 I just feel hot all the time. I was ALWAYS cold before all this started. Osiebosie mentioned wearing sweaters in the summer to the movies, restaraunts etc....yup that WAS me. Not anymore. And, to make matters worse, I live in Southern Florida, not exactly a place known for having mild temperatures. Hah! Oh well, just another lovely peri symptom to deal with.

Hugs,
Susan

YES! Palamino, you brought up a very important point. I also breastfed my child, and during that whole time, I was very warm, whereas I had always been plagued with feeling cold. Definitely hormones heating up our bodies! I'm often reminded how many symptoms of perimenopause are similar to pregnancy and breastfeeding.

RedFox

MamaMia, I LOVE the pic in your signature!

You know, now that you all mention it, I nursed all 6 of my kids, and thinking back, I guess I had the hots back then, too. I just never thought about it much then. But, there are many common symptoms with peri-pregnancy-pms-puberty. What a hormonal MESS we all are, almost from the minute we are born.

Well, I don't know about the rest of you, but I am coming back as a MAN next time.

Take care,
Hugs, Susan

I'm with all of you and frantic to find some relief from it. My normally skinny freezing body is toasting me to death. It makes me want to eat even less and it's so hard to sleep. I saw a show on Good morning america that gave some tips but they didn't help much. I want to go back to being cold blooded. My thermometer is wore out but I just always have to check. At this rate I'll never know if I really have a fever and the thought this could go on for several years is just too much.

Well, I don't understand any of it because I have ALWAYS been so hot! I mean even since I was a kid!! And I've never weighed over 100 until now, and just barely over that now. So I feel I have a 24 hour a day hot flash, no matter the temperature.
And I have a daughter who is ALWAYS freezing with blue fingernails she's so cold!
(OH, and I'm actually still breastfeeding so I'm a real basket case right now)

Hot? I am fed up with this chronic heat. Last winter, my feet and hands were stone cold, and begging me to finish feeding the horses, clean the stalls and go take a nice hot shower.

My head and chest however, were declaring that I'd be the first case of spontanious human combustion under water if I tried that nonsense.

I've done the herbs and the alternative drugs. I now have rosacea, and am looking at $2500 for laser treatments. HRT is for me.

yes.. i am in Australia, and we are just into Spring now... all winter long i wore short sleeved tshirts over light pants, was always warm.. i couldn't understand it, altho figured it was only just another menopausal symptom... no hot flashes like last year.. i'm 53, and must be somewhere near to the end, i've had 2 periods this year so far, one in January and one in August.. not looking forward to summer!!

kinda happy to hear others have this too..

ha ha. no error message.

I am going throug so much right now I don't even know who I am. Neither does my family.

I'm up to my fourth day in a row of my lower leg burning up then cooling off when I think it's gone bango its burning up again. It's just in one spot no bigger than your fist!! I'm having hot flashes in the face too, but not as often as my leg. I think my sensory system has gone into overdrive. I hate the anxious feeling or dread that comes with it. Am trying to use all my mental power to overcome it but....... ..... am running out. Please let me know if you have similar symptoms as this is freaking me or am I so sensitive???? and weak???? I hate being preoccupied with ME symptoms. I find it difficult to concentrate on things for long periods of time while this is happening and yet I know I'm making it worse by the attention I'm giving it!!!! Help if you can identify with me.

Hey cc, I can relate!

Even with taking the bios,whenever I get a hot flash the anxiety appears. What's up with that?? Talk about annoying!

We just got back from a vacation in NH and I was sick with a cold the whole time. That, of course,made me feel like poo so the anxiety was rearing it's nasty little head all weekend. I think it was the cold that was bringing on the hot flashes but who knows. It's miserable all the same!

This is true for me too. Since having an increased number of hot flashes in the past few months my anxiety level is through the roof and this was after feeling better for awhile.

The quick fix for internal heat is HRT. I tried clonidine, which did nothing and Effexor, which was the drug from hell.

Antidepressants such as Effexor will rein in the heat, but can quash libido. For me, the side effects were horrifing.

The exceptional antidepressant is zyban, which enhances libido and lowers the temperature significantly. Needless to say, I used it to quit smoking but it also sold as wellbutrin. It also helped me lose a few pounds.

I had to take vagifem (Estradial) for vaginal dryness and all my hot flashes went away. I recently decided to go the natural way and with in a week I got my hotflashes back. I must say though, I prefer being hot to the very unfamilar cold.

I have hot patches like you mention, and cold patches too, Have for ages. Friends say they have experienced that too. Don't know why, but I totally agree with you about sensory system gone mad. Anyone else experienced this??
Eliza

I feel like I'm going to do a spontaneous human combustion thing when I go through hot flashes or just plain being hot all of the time. I swear, my family is going to find my charred remains on the bedroom floor one of these days.

My hot flashes come in clusters, meaning I may go for weeks without noticing a flash, then wham, hot flashes, one right after another.....

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Hi all. Was just reading your posts about the hot flashes. And I know how you all feel sometimes. It's like a hot rush from my chest on up and mine don't last a long time, thank goodness. And I am always warm. Always!
I will be 50 yrs old in January and I have not have a period now for 2 months. I can't believe it! But I am waiting for the other shoe to drop, cause I am told that when you start this, that your periods are always going to be periodic. But, that's ok, at least
now I am entering into this.
I take Cymbalta and I like this medicine except that I have headaches with it. Before the meds, I wasn't doing very well Lot of anxiety, panic. I now know that I was going through peri. symptoms. omeday I will eventually come off of the AD, but not until I go through menopause completely.

I am glad for this site. Nice to meet all of you!


Ladybug

I got hot fashes quite a bit and went on Vagifem for vaginal dryness, my hot flashes stopped. I have since gone off the Vagifem and back came the flashes. This may sound weird but I kind of like them. I have had that burning feeling on the back of my calves for a long time and thought it was dry skin but my skin is okay and I still burn. The weird thing is at night I have been getting very cold feet and hands for the first time in my life. I had my thyroid checked and it's fine. Another peri symptom

I am soooo pleased to read that, Shakti

I was on the cream for VA, and swore it had an influence on reducing hot flashes. Pharmacist would say, well, its for dryness, not hot flashes.

When my dr finally put me on BHRT, he put me on the lowest possible dose, no progesterone, and announced 'this would put a smile on my face'

Two weeks later, I'm back there, with VA to ask for the cream. He said, "well, what progress do we have to report?"

After I spent a few seconds chewing on my tongue to temper my temper, I said, "Every symptom I have had for 6 months is worse today that it has been at any time since I first came here, and I cannot believe that not only is there no progress, I seem to be regressing"

And he looked at me as if I was lying.

I was so shaken I went to talk to a compounding pharmacist to ask him about the 1/2 life of Premarin. He rattled on about the biological half life, but at least he reassured me that at the doses I was using the creme, it could have a modifying influence.

Your's is the first account that supports what I thought. Thanks!!