Something for the weekend

Amusing faux pas in language can be quite common especially when you try to be multilingual.... well sort of!

I enjoy little amusements whenever friends and colleagues communicate in mass messages via phonecall/text/email sharing half witty informative rantings.

Some of my friends are like me nothing abbreviated ever by SMS text (too old for all that fandangled new street stuff ;-). We couldn't even find our way round a text dictionary let alone a hasty reply in text abbreviations that would mean the same thing to the reader as it does to the writer.

In a particularly close group of 4 diverse and intelligent ladies only 1 and 1/2 of us understand and use text abbreviated language. I say 1/2 i think the second understands more but as a teacher she feels guilty if she allows herself to slip into "slang" language obviously feeling guilty would she seem to be dishonoring her secret vow to uphold the law of great english and grammar in all modes of communication.

Well the one that is fully fluent in the new lingo sent us all a text wishing us all a "wend". Now you can easily put two and two together and guess she meant to wish us a "gr8 w'end" but experienced a glitch from brain to execution.

If you are anything like me and my pals you will find time to misinterpret her message as a way of amusing oneself applying varying degrees of humour to the witty texts that were exchanged simply to highlight to our lovely friend she had fallen foul of her own choice of language.

Can anyone else suggest alternate meanings of "wend"? Just to lighten the mood a bit.

opinions or bullies

If you have read my other post about women's health you will note that I have an interest in working with allopathic pracitioners (NHS GP's) to aid and benefit my clients in obtaining and maintaining better health.

Whilst researching the facts on menopause etc, I decided that I would like to work in conjunction with a NHS GP who understood the challenges a woman faces as a result of hormonal changes one undergoes during the menopause and at other times. I am searching for someone who is open to working with complementary therapies and diet changes as a way of supporting the women into overall wellbeing and to help them alleviate the symptoms they were experiencing.

To aid my seach, I placed a message on a health forum asking for information of any NHS GP who worked with women and was open to working with her patients on the complementary route so that I could liaise with them with regards my client's health and learn alongside how these affects could be alleviated, avoided or relieved completely. No where in my message did I refer to menopause as an illness simply that I was seeking to work with a NHS GP.

I was completely shocked when a rather (in my opinion) irrational, self centred, parochial woman attacked my comments on the forum with her personal viewpoint suggesting my request was wrong because menopause was normal and that women should simply be allowed to "get on" with the natural process - it was not an illness and does not need to be treated as such. I was shocked to have her "friends on the forum" add comments such as "which American invented that little money-spinner?!(perimenopause/menopause) being treated like illnesses", and informing me that they valued her opinion because she had been on the forum longer ... Doh!?

How does that make her an expert!? :-(

Is it just me or are these people missing the point? How scary is it that women such as these can be so ignorantly vocal, opinionated and lacking in compassion for their fellow women to not even consider that someone some where could benefit from combined wellness advice rather then jumping to their own conclusions that it is all about the money!

I am honestly appalled at the disgusting attitude shared by these people. I feel they are blind, biased, dogmatic and bullyish. The sad thing is these bullies are active on an international forum supporting independent points of view on personal choice and health management.

Now I do not see menopause as an illness, I know it is a normal process nevertheless I have seen first hand how the change in hormones can affect the overall wellbeing of the individual. many women suffer needlessly and in the dark since the NHS method of dealing with women's complaints seems to be archaic at the best! The complete helplessness these women feel, etc makes me sad and angry that we have such a narrow remit in place in the NHS when it comes to womens health.

I am disgusted that my fellow women do not see the need to support their kin in a quest for education, awareness and support and improved well being.

Is it any wonder feminism had to become extreme before we could make any headway in our campaign for equality let alone education? With women like these around we not only have to educate our male counterparts but we have a fair way to go before we can convince women we are one and the same tribe and can work better if we work together rather than sell ourselves short by dictating to our counterparts on how to simply "get on with it, it's natural".

Womens Health and the NHS

I realise that I have failed in my attempt to blog more frequently, but hey ho... some you win... some you . . . win just later.

Over the last few weeks a handful of my clients have been experiencing "odd" symptoms. mainly feeling ungrounded, heady, lightheaded, emotional, overwhelmed and frankly fairly confused about life. I got a sense of it being a chemical imbalance - more hormonal but I wanted to be sure.

So I started some research to see what the cause could be. Two things became glaringly obvious:
1) All these women live exceedingly full lives thereby not really having time for regular R&R
2) They were all in their early/mid-forties.

Now the symptoms of restlessness, lack of sleep was affecting all of these women and me. I realised most have not experienced a full nights refreshing sleep for at least a few months now if not years. I noticed a pattern between symptoms and experiences of these ladies.

Narrowing down information from research the outcome highlighted that the symptoms were akin to "adrenal fatigue" and could be cases of hormonal imbalances.

Now my conclusion is that most of these women may be experiencing the early symptoms of Perimenopause/menopause. I decided that the best way for me to get clarity on this is to approach a GP for a hormonal/adrenaline test to verify where my client was on the scale of overall hormonal level balance. The head GP at our vetoed this test as it is not a "standard" test that the NHS will happily pay for.

That same evening I happened to flick on to the Oprah show and guess what? They were discussing perimenopause/menopause and it's impact on women. check out http://www.oprah.com/article/health/womenshealth/health_life_body for the indepth info.

What this confirmed to me is that I was on the right track with regards my hunch and research that the imbalance in hormones were at the root cause of the issues confronting my clients and me.

My point is - we in the western world have sort of become mules following advice from mainstream medics to always consult a doctor before making any lifestyle changes just in case you may think you have one thing when the appropriate tests could highlight your diagnosis as being incorrect and your condition may need a different approach. We are constanlty being advised by medic and the public awareness groups in line with:
"Remember: many of the symptoms can also be related to serious health conditions, so it's always best to consult your doctor."

According to the article on Oprah's website the symptoms associated with menopause are:
Heart palpitations
Migraine headaches
Night sweats
Insomnia
Hot flashes
Fibroids
Weight gain
Aching and sore joints
Increase in allergies
Cold hands and feet
Tingling in hands and feet
Dizziness
Disorientation
Fatigue
Itchy, "crawly" skin
Change in libido
Breast swelling and tenderness
Heavy menstrual periods
Irregular or erratic periods
Vaginal dryness and/or painful intercourse
Urinary symptoms
Skin problems
Bone loss
Depression

The advice generally is "See Your Doctor". Unfortunately in my personal experience since the NHS does not fund hormone tests as standard where does that leave us? Not all of us in the UK can afford private medical care, does that mean that you simply continue to suffer or find alternate ways out in a hit and miss experiment.

In an ideal world I would love to work alongside a GP who was deeply involved in women's health and open to discussing ways in which a complementary therapist be that a nutritionist or a herbalist or homeopath can work with a patient, whatever choice works for the client themselves, so that the outcome was a healthier happier individual able to continue a more balanced happier life.

Are there any doctors out there who put helping women first and wish to work with giving women a choice on their personal health care? If so I would love to talk to you.

You should never hesitate to talk with your doctor about treating a suspected hormone imbalance. hormonal imbalance, stress, menopause,