For the past three days, I planned to write a humorous and helpful blog entry about........I forget. Menopause brain has warped my ability to think, remember and carry out simple tasks. So the only thing to do is write about the FOG.
Perhaps the most prevalent of the menopausal mental changes is also the most disconcerting. Virtually overnight, a bank of fog seeps into our minds. It fuzzes and blurs our cognitive functioning. It’s as if our synapses, which previously struck with the sharp accuracy of lightning bolts have morphed into heat lightning, flickering from brain cell to brain cell randomly, without completing the intended circuit. Eventually, impulses seem to trickle down to a usable thought, but the overall thinking seems to be fuzzy, slow, and thick.
This mental torpor makes it difficult to focus on tasks requiring mental clarity and concentration. Even simple things we’ve done for years such as balancing our checkbooks or paying bills seem like Herculean efforts. Tasks we used to do easily and quickly turn laborious. We make more mistakes. None of it is easy. Every menopausal woman we’ve talked with has said “I just hope my brain comes back.”
I’m off to drink my gingko biloba tea.....if I can just remember where I put it!
(adapted from our upcoming book "Venus Comes of Age")
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