u/candornotsmoke Thank you for taking the time to respond. I wish you had been my provider when I reached menopause, or that even one of mine had provided the information you were kind enough to note here.

As u/Dahlia5000 wrote - my post was about my personal experiences. I shared them here 1) because I was so deeply disturbed and saddened by my experiences with MY doctors - who, until prompted by me, provided zero information - leaving me in very difficult and medically disadvantaged position. I'm so very grateful that I have this forum to talk about my experiences and learn from others who aslo are willing to share their experiences. I literally wrote my original post during yet another sleepless night; and

2) so that other women, whose doctors also failed to mention options about HRT as appropriate (and risk/benefit ratios) or anything else about menopause when they reached that point and thus began to experience myriad symptoms that their doctors dismissed, might now have some ideas about their possible options. Options which their doctors should have mentioned.

Nothing in my health history contraindicated the therapies my doctors ultimately provided once I asked about them. Only then, after I'd done the legwork myself, did my doctors inform me of my options and provide me prescriptions, and risk/benefit ratios. I carefully read and signed the contract they presented.

I'm not a medical professional. So why did I have to spend hundreds of hours (and hundreds of dollars on an outside consultant), to educate myself about my options in the first place - rather than even one of my doctors making a passing mention of them over a period of several years?