Hi everyone! I posted on this somewhere else (forgot where) so I thought I would start a topic on it to see if anyone else experiences this. Wanting to know if this could be part of peri-meno too along with all the other stuff. This has got to be one of the top 3 issues for me. It started about a year ago and it hasnt gotten any better. It is NOISE. I am a childcare provider--I am having to use some of their tv time right now so I can have a minute. Im not blaming my kids, they are just kids and just being kids--ive got great kids all between the ages of 2 and 3 anyhow, there comes a time during the day--sometimes I just start the day like this, where I just cannot take any kind of noise. Their voices go thru me and sometimes makes me want to cry cause it actually hurts my head. Sometimes in the afternoon around 430 or so I call it "conference time" because just these few kids can make it sound like a conference of 30 people all talking at the same time!! Its not just them, there are certain tones from the tv or music or my fiance when he pretends to sing. I had to yell at him and tell him "stop, your making my head hurt"!! Poor guy was just trying to make me laugh--p'sssd me off instead. I usually warn him that I am noise intollerant and he understands, but there was no warning. Yesterday I was on Advil round the clock. Sometimes when watching tv I wil have to RUN away from it cause I cant take whoever is talking on it or there may be music playing from a movie or something.
Please tell me this is peri-meno or pms related and that there are other women going thru this......

starfairy,

I owned and operated a daycare for almost 13 years. I absolutely LOVED it, until I hit about 43/44. I loved the kids, but I could not take the noise. I suddenly felt I was losing my mind, when before the noise did not bother me in the least. I could no longer be in a room with people who were chatting. Not only could I not participate, I could not stand to be near anyone who was talking. I would get extremely irritated if my own son tried talking to me, especially if he was standing near me. Even noise from the tv would send me into overdrive. I have been standing with a group of people, trying to have a conversation and it felt like all the noise got jumbled up into one gigantic mess that I could not decipher. That happened with my daycare parents on at least one occasion and I had to apologize. I felt like a total idiot. I endured those years and I am much better today.

I was not able to continue to operate in the same capacity as I had been doing all those years, so I had to reduce my work load and then eventually I ended up retiring.

I hope this passes very quickly for you. If I had it to do all over again, I would talk to my dr. and see if he/she can help you manage.

My very best wishes,

bev

Dear Starfairy,

I had such noise intolerance during the beginning of my first year toward menopause-- it lasted for about 4 or 5 months....I could not even stand going out to dinner for the background noise in a restaurant!
The good news is that it did resolve....I am hoping it does for you too, VERY QUICKLY! I am sorry you are in the middle of this....hold strong Starfairy, it does get better ....all of it....eventually.
OO Jonesy

Oh you betcha! I also have an inhome daycare and all my kids are under 5. I've been doing this for 8 years so I have learned to make much of it simply background noise, but yes, I have my days! How long have you had your daycare and where abouts are you?

Hi Bev,
Oh I cant stand chatting....
Funny I had had my childcare for about 20 years when I was 44. I had been working weekends at an assisted living facility and loved it. They offered me full time so I closed my childcare. Well this job didnt pay near enough of what I needed to bring home so I worked another part time job. This went on for a year and I was missing my family and boyfriend and the kids. I re-opened my childcare. This noise thing started aroound a year ago and its good to know that other women suffer from this---not that Im happy about it---but I actually didnt know what was going on with me. Im not that bad with the parents yet, and I have had to be stern with the kids when parents arrive--they are not allowed to charge to the door when someone comes in and raise all caos.
Thanks for your response!!

It is sooooo good to know that this will resolve itself. Seems like when I am out like in a restraunt or grocery store that that noise dosent bother me---yet.
Thank You so much!!

Sometimes I want to get the biggest heavy dutiest set of headphones that will block out all the noise but I know in reality I cant.

Not only with the noise issue I have had to set some bounderies with my parents and come up with this awesome contract...I got tired of doing their job in the morning...it is their responsibility to do or not do certain things. Forinstance one parent let her child bring in TWO sleeping bags, just because she didnt want to fight with this 2 year old. This is not my problem and I have no room for one sleeping bag let alone two. This contract has helped with some of the irritating issues and has taken some stress off of me.
I have been operating in Georgia for about 25 years---closed for one year and reopened in 2006.
430 is about the time we have to put the tv on...state allows 2 hours per day so this is our last hour. Sometimes I get them busy till pick up time but when they are conferencing among theirselves and I cant take it---we get the tv going.
My mother dies laughing when Im frustrated and tell her its congerence time...lol

Hi i must of answer this question a few times to other girls and yes i had a year when noise would absolutely put me in a anxiety attack and also make me cry the weirdest head feelings. Motorcycles, cars a running airconditioning could you beleive that any kind of noise i really thought i was gonna go crazy. I am on zoloft now and i don't get it anymore. So i really think it might be a hormonal problem. hang in there. Terry

I do have periods of time when I cannot take noise, people talking, or touching me.... It comes and goes. I'm sure that it is perimenopause, but on what to do about it I have no clue!

Best Wishes to you...

TJ

I felt the same way, starfairy. Wanted desperately to wear earplugs, but I couldn't do that, so I did my best to distract myself or to get the children involved in quiet play. We spent a lot of time outdoors for that reason also. It seemed to help if we werent' closed in. I also taught them to use their inside voice when we were inside and that they could scream all they wanted when we were outside.

Now I am driving a school bus filled with about 80 students. The last day I drove, the one child who was making all the noise was sitting directly behind me. She thought she was helping me by SCREAMING at the others to sit down and be quiet. I asked her to please do the clapping thing instead of screaming. She apologized and then proceeded to scream again!! I then looked up into the mirror and softly placed my finger over my lips as if to say please be quiet, not to the one who was screaming, (she was too busy being bossy) and they looked up at me and you could see the understanding in their eyes and immediate compliance! It was fantastic!!

Something else I would do to get my kids to quieten down......... start whispering. I guarantee they will whisper back. It is the neatest thing I have ever seen!

I'm just reminiscing, missing my kids very much! I know you know all this, but it helps to be reminded sometimes too, doesnt it?

Take care of yourself, do what you need to do for you, cause no one else is gonna do it.

Many hugs,

bev

Very good advice Bev!! I appreciate it so much.
I was taking care of one of my kids older sisters---OMG what a nightmare---your kid on the bus being bossy reminded me of that. I finally had to tell the parents that I could no longer take them in anymore. What a difference it made.
I am reading Christine Northrup and Dr John Lee's books...I have had them for quite a while and skimmed thru them. I just started the Active Womens vitamins and am looking into bioidentical hormones. There has got to be help.

i beleive at this time of our lives all our senses are highed to a higher level , smelling, hearing seeing , touching.... its all hormone related....

I have been experiencing the same thing...and MORE! Up until a few months ago, I used to be the most social person. I loved going out to a local cafe to read if it wasn't busy, or to talk with people when it was. Now I have gotten so weird in the head that when I stopped in there the other day to get a drink to go, I practically ran out of there crying because the voices of the crowd were echoing so badly in my head I thought I was losing my mind. The same thing happened when I tried to attend a synagogue service a couple of weeks ago and had to leave because of the noise of the congregants singing!

I've been seeing a therapist and participating in an anxiety group and they try to tell me that these are symptoms of extreme anxiety disorder. I don't know what's going on, but really do feel like I'm losing my mind. I think some of this is hormonal (I'm almost 52), some is due to being very anemic and some may be just because I'm having a nervous breakdown (seriously!)

I found this online recently and feel it is the best description of what I've been going through:

http://ask.metafilter.com/62699/Type-of-an...-never-heard-of

"Has anyone had the experience of being sick, weak, panicky, malnourished, anemic, perhaps about to faint, and the world turns into a kind of claustrophobic twilight horror zone where you feel like a ragged ghost or like you've stepped into another ghastly dimension, even though everything looks and sounds EXACTLY the same and you know you're physically in the same place and you can even talk rationally, but now your world has just turned into a kind of hell?"

I had an MRI done yesterday to rule out any kind of physiological disorder and should be getting the results early next week. This is really freaking me out that I entered this living hell a few months ago, don't know if it is temporary, don't know if it's related to peri-menopause -- and worse -- don't feel like I will ever be able to get through this.

Has anyone here experienced anything like this???? Has anyone here gotten over it ok??? I've posted here once or twice before, but really could use the support. I so want my life and MYSELF back, please help me through this...

I finally found someone with the same symtoms i had a year ago i thought i was going crazy. I see a phychiatrist i have for like 8 years now, and he told me the same its bad anxiety. I am on zoloft now and it made a big difference in my life also the xanax i take. your not alone. Hugs Terry

Dear'cross'

Support coming your way.And yes I have experienced all of the symptoms you describe at the time I was early Menopausal.It was like being in The Twilight Zone.One of the worst physical things was that even the thought of food would make me almost throw up and I did lose a lot of weight.

I finally got relief when put on Prozac and Xanax for anxiety.Till now and I am now 57 I can't tolerate a lot of noise and do enjoy a lot of alone time.

The good news is that with the proper help and support with either Therapy and various vitamin and herbal supplements there is alot of hope and things do get way better.Honestly
So hang on friend
Let us know the reults of your MRI

Warm Wishes
Elizabeth

Star I went through the same thing......but the good news is that after about 9months of it and some xanax I am about 95% better.....the bad news for be is now I can go out and spend money......I had saved so much by not being able to go out to stores and out to eat......so hang in there sister it will get better....I know just how you are feeling right now I thought this past April that I was losing my mind........but it has gotten so much better! Valerie

dear Terry
Now you have found someone else.This was me.Thank God for Prozac.
I rarely need Xanax now as a lot of the anxiety has definitely got better

All the Best
Elizabeth

Yep I had the noise thing too. I remember one day dropping a steel knife on my stone kitchen floor and the noise rang through my brain like a vibration!. I hate noise in busy places.....the other day my husband was using a roll on deodorant and the noise was irritating me so much. I also believe that this is hormonal. I had tinnitus for a long while but that has now cleared up. I have a really strong sense of smell too....so I really do think that our hormones are having a joke with all our senses right now!!

Jazz

The neurologist told me today that the MRI of my brain was normal. A doctor friend of mine who reviewed it too, and other tests, said that my back problems (bulging discs) could account for some of my symptoms (dizzy, off balance, etc.), but essentially there's nothing wrong with my brain.

It's hard to believe that perimenopause/hormones/anxiety could cause me to become so sick physically and mentally practically overnight -- yes it was that sudden that I started having bizarre mental changes and physical symptoms, e.g., electric shock sensations, following a short course of Progestin back in October! -- but I guess I have to have faith that that's the case and that it can and will get better.

I had a warning at work today (I work at a school and have missed an awful lot of work!) and I really can't afford to lose my job, especially since I'm a single mother. Today was a bit better, feel like I'm somewhat back in my body, but still really exhausted and "twitchy". Boy this is crazy and I hope it passes...

P.S. In another thread some women said they were obsessed with death. This episode has had me alternating between terror about dying, praying to die just to get it over with, trying to get my affairs in order, and begging God to help me get through this. I talked with a friend yesterday, who's about 8 years older than I am, who told me that she went through something similar and that this is actually somewhat "normal" for perimenopause. Sheesh, I guess they also used to call it a "nervous breakdown"...

YES, YES AND MORE YES! Sorry, did it feel like I was shouting. Some peoples voices sound like fingers on a chalk board. A lady at work has a booming laugh and I nearly jump through the ceiling every time she laughs. Oh, and motorcycles! or souped up Hondas - or the thump-thump of some dorks too loud stereo your stuck at the traffic light with! Luckily it's not the old west and we don't carry guns! Their would be some seriously flat tires - and some folks running for the hills. Yeeeehaw!

But seriously, yes me too! About 46 years of age for me - my hearing became super sensitive. Stopped going to crowded places. Ew, ew and how about the lovely clothing store that's blaring music?!? The mall just freaks me out! The sound is incredibly muffeled and loud there. The Mall is a whole 'nother topic. I digress.

Nite! Chatty,

Really?!! The tinnitus cleared up?! That gives me so much hope, as the tinnitus is definitely my most annoying symptom. Also, sensitivity to noise. I've always been sensitive to noises, but now it is ten times worse. My husband drives me crazy when he clanks his spoon in his cereal bowl! Geez!! Thank goodness he puts up with me!

Please tell me this is peri-meno or pms related and that there are other women going thru this......

As other have said: Y-E-S. The things that get me the most are electronic sounds and woop-woop car alarms. I have not had the ringer activated on my telephone as a default mode for over ten years and some days even the blinking light on the answering machine will make my heart race. I may start another thread on solitude, as I crave it owing to similar agitation.

I have three things that help me. One is to go alone to the mall at the busiest, loudest possible time and walk from one end to the other. This is a means of subjecting myself to a form of shock therapy. From there, anything else seems less. It only works if done infrequently. Another is to find a space -- sometimes the bathroom will have to do -- where I can do some deep breathing to calm myself. The third is to wear earphones and play only music, no talking.

catch 22 here, I love the quiet, real quiet to be exact. BUT then I can hear the ringing in my ears!!!!! lol So after being around people talking (yakking) alot or listening to music or whatever-I like the peacefullness of home and then zinnnnggggggggggg-the tinnitus kicks in. I'm sick of all this mess to be honest. Fed up.
S'guns