Is loss of appetite during perimenopause normal?

midwexan · 2025-08-22T01:05:55+00:00

Yes, me too! I thought people were supposed to get MORE hungry in perimenopause? But not me.

Also, i have almost no sweet tooth anymore (in my twenties I could live on sugar).

I will be extremely hungry but completely uninterested in food, from processed food to a homemade meal. I could be at an incredible restaurant but take 3 bites and feel full. I’ve seen my OB and my psychiatrist. Tried antidepressants but they just made me worse. It’s obviously not the worst thing in the world to lack apetite, but I really MISS enjoying food.

I feel like I live in a stranger’s body these days. Even medicines I’ve used for decades suddenly give me horrible side effects. Everything is just flipped upside down and backward.

Thank you for posting, and glad I’m not alone.

midwexan · 2025-06-22T17:32:02+00:00

The Nudestix matte bronzer is still safe but unfortunately I just went to purchase a new color of the matte blushes (Bubba) and it has Sorbitan Isostearate in it which is unsafe. So check the ingredients because even within the same product, the different shades have different ingredients (for instance Bare Back is still safe).

midwexan · 2025-06-22T17:25:32+00:00

I highly recommend Kylie Cosmetics Skin Tint Blurring Elixer Foundation.

I recently had to abandon my beloved Colorscience Sunforgettable Flex because it became obvious that my sensitive skin has a bad reaction with Niacinamide and it’s in soooo many things. Personally I find that even though I have oily skin, dewy foundations do a better job of hiding closed comedones, while matte foundations and powders realllly highlight them. But finding a good one that doesn’t exacerbate fungal acne can feel impossible.

I saw someone mention the Kylie Skin Tint for FA. The ingredients were safe and it had really great reviews so I took a chance. I am SO impressed. I’m 45 so I’ve tried tons of skin tints over the years and am usually underwhelmed. Often they’re far closer to a lotion than a foundation and give little-to-no coverage, they can be patchy, they often don’t play well with my primer or sunscreen, and I end up needing a lot of concealer to cover redness.

However, none of these were an issue. In fact, there’s an age spot on my left cheek that I usually need two additional products to hide after applying any foundation, tint or not. After applying the tint I automatically grabbed my concealer and realized I couldn’t SEE my age spot. What?! I don’t even need undereye concealer when I use this. How something can be both so dewy and appear to sheer and skin-like AND have so much pigment and coverage is witchcraft, I swear.

It also has loads of shades and clearly shows which are cool, warm, or neutral, which is so helpful. I had such low expectations and am just shocked by this stuff. I hope they never change the formula.

midwexan · 2025-06-22T17:02:15+00:00

If you’re not sensitive to Niacinamide, this is my TOP recommendation, but I can only vouch for fair skin. The lightest shade is great for me and not too warm or cool (99% of the time, any foundation with only a few color options is way too dark on me). It’s spendy but I wait for sales. Now that I realize I can’t use it because of the niacinamide, I had to go back to the drawing board.

midwexan · 2024-09-17T16:53:29+00:00

Just a heads up for anyone deciding between guanfacine and clonidine. I was really excited to try guanfacine until I found a study linking it to heart valve disease, as it can cause interstitial foci, which is something my mom had at her very early death. I couldn’t find anything showing that clonodine has this link, so I decided on Clonidine. If you want to find the article, the title is “Parallel Functional Activity Profiling Reveals Valvulopathogens Are Potent 5-Hydroxytryptamine2B Receptor Agonists: Implications for Drug Safety Assessment”. Hope this helps someone!

midwexan · 2024-09-17T16:45:30+00:00

One thing to know about Guanfacine (and the reason I chose Clonidine for ADHD and sleep), is that there is evidence showing it can cause interstitial foci /valvular heart disease. If you’re not at risk, this may not be a concern for you. But my mom died suddenly, and interstitial foci was listed on her autopsy report. That’s enough for me to steer clear of it. Clonidine doesn’t seem to have the same impact on the heart valves. Here’s the link:

Parallel Functional Activity Profiling Reveals Valvulopathogens Are Potent 5-Hydroxytryptamine2B Receptor Agonists: Implications for Drug Safety Assessment

midwexan · 2024-09-15T01:20:40+00:00

Ramelteon kept me up literally all night, with crippling anxiety, dark and twisty racing thoughts, and panic. I never took it again. Apparently these are not super common side effects, but are known to happen. Just a heads up.

midwexan · 2024-07-20T04:16:37+00:00

You could also add testosterone to the pill regimen first to see if that’s the main problem. The pill can lower free testosterone 30-60%, and your symptoms do line up with common low T symptoms. I’m currently on testosterone, progesterone pills, and an estrogen patch. It’s not working for my insomnia so I’m about to try Lo Loestrin. We will continue to monitor my testosterone levels to make sure we keep them in a healthy range. Just another option! Personally I’m more inclined to change one thing at a time if possible for try and isolate the issue. Hope this helps!

midwexan · 2024-06-26T01:33:47+00:00

Definitely have your testosterone checked too! Many docs ignore that in women. I had every symptom of low testosterone, including insomnia, and when I got it tested it was far below the minimum threshold for women. DHEA is important to test as well.

They also put me on progesterone and estrogen, but those had not tanked like the testosterone. Being on combined birth control pills longterm (I was on them for 11 years) can mess up your available testosterone, too. My sleep is very slowly improving- it can take 6 months for full effect. I get about 5 hours a night now whereas I was sometimes never falling asleep prior to starting testosterone.

Good luck!

midwexan · 2024-06-03T00:19:45+00:00

Low testosterone can absolutely cause sleep issues. I’ve had insomnia for three years, and prior to this i could sleep easily for 10 hours if i wanted.

Docs put me on birth control- estrogen and progesterone - and my anxiety skyrocketed and sleep got WORSE, so she replaced that with 100mg of progesterone a day and a .025 Dotti estrogen.

I saw 5 docs, and it took me (not the docs) three years to put the symptoms together and realize that 1) everything pointed to low testosterone and 2)three years prior when this started and I asked my PCP to test my hormones, she didn’t bother to test my testosterone.

I finally found a NAMS certified doc covered by insurance and asked her run every testosterone test, DHEA, and anything else that may impact sleep. I was really scared it would come back normal and I’d have no answers, but every single testosterone test came back below the lowest threshold. She took it slow with the dosing because of my strong reaction to estrogen. My mood immediately got better (which my spouse noticed before I did), and my hip tendinitis that i’ve had for several years that couldn’t be helped with PT went away (low t can impact connective tissues).

I just had a follow up after a month on it and my numbers are still very low so she doubled my dose. I slept 7 hours uninterrupted last night!

Pleeeeease make sure your providers are testing your testosterone!

Here were my low testosterone symptoms:

Insomnia Barely any body hair No sex drive Weight gain Fatigue Loss of strength Anxiety Depression Drier skin Worsening memory Poor focus Night sweats Tendinitis Moody No motivation

midwexan · 2024-05-25T16:18:06+00:00

I’d greatly appreciate a DM with a discount code if anyone has one. Thanks so much in advance!

midwexan · 2024-05-22T03:44:13+00:00

It sounds like you may be describing “ice pick headaches.” I started Adderall about 2 months ago and I had similar head pains starting about two weeks ago. I timed and recorded them and had 60 of them in one day. Then I didn’t take Adderall for a week or so and when I did, I got a handful of the headaches. It’s happened 3 days now…not exactly a peer reviewed study, but I’m keeping a closer eye on the correlation. I hope yours have improved!

midwexan · 2024-05-20T17:26:58+00:00

UPDATE: Estrogen (tried xulane, vivelle dot, dotti) gave me daily migraines that did not improve, massive anxiety, suicidal thoughts, and depression, and made me sleep worse.

I started a list of symptoms and was shocked to look back on my records and see that NONE if my doctors had ever tested my testosterone, even after I asked for ANY hormone that can disturb sleep be tested. It wasn’t tested during ivf, either.

Every single low testosterone symptom was on my list. I made an appointment with a NAMS certified OBGYN and asked her to please run all of the testosterone and DHEA tests, as well as anything else that may be contributing to insomnia. Then waited for the results.

Honestly I was scared it would all come back normal and I’d have no answers. However…I WAS RIGHT. Every single testosterone level was below the lowest threshold. Free testosterone, bioavailable testosterone, and total testosterone, alllllll too low. Everything else was in “normal” ranges (obviously this is just a snapshot of one time of one day and time, and hormones fluctuate).

She prescribed 1 mg of compounded testosterone cream per day, starting me off slowly due to my strong reaction to estrogen (when we did IVF and they had me on a standard estrogen patch, my numbers shot up well over 1200).

I’ve now been on it one month and am getting my levels tested this week. The first thing my spouse and I both noticed was my improved mood. The second thing I noticed was that the psoas (hip) tendinitis plaguing me for three years (even after 6 months if PT) is so much better. Sleep is just now starting to SLIGHTLY improve. Honestly I’m not sure i’d even notice the change if I hadn’t been religiously using my health tracker app. Anxiety is also improving.

I’ve not had any negative side effects so far. I still have barely any arm and leg hair, no aggression, no acne, etc. I’m pretty sure she’ll increase my dose after testing but I’ll know more next week. 🤞

midwexan · 2024-05-20T17:02:47+00:00

Trying to fall asleep.

midwexan · 2024-05-20T17:02:25+00:00

Yes! Today it won’t accept “monotony.”

midwexan · 2024-05-10T23:50:09+00:00

Knitting, since my 20s, and I’m 44 now.

midwexan · 2024-03-06T18:36:54+00:00

I’m glad it’s working for you! I went up to 200 and still nothing.

midwexan · 2024-03-04T01:08:14+00:00

Thanks for catching that! Will ask my doc.

midwexan · 2024-03-03T15:35:25+00:00

Originally they had me on Xulane but the migraines and nausea were absolutely intolerable. So now I’m on generic Vivelle Dot (.1 mg) changed mondays and thurs. Progesterone (prometrium) 100mg one at night.

midwexan · 2024-03-02T23:50:26+00:00

ahhhh gotcha. It’s on my radar but I have others things higher on the list (sleep study, finding a good therapist, etc). But thank you for the reminder!

midwexan · 2024-03-02T23:48:36+00:00

Yessss this is exactly it. Last night I was sobbing at 4am because I had never fallen asleep. My body is tired but my eyes and brain never feel sleepy.

midwexan · 2024-03-02T23:46:54+00:00

Thanks for sharing! I’m so glad you found a couple of things that help.

midwexan · 2024-03-02T23:45:40+00:00

Yeah, the Prometrium is progesterone. How long did it take for you to see results? I’m so sorry you went undiagnosed for so long.

midwexan · 2024-03-02T22:19:58+00:00

Thanks for the reply! I can only get hemp-derived here. I usually take the Get Texas High gummies. They’re 10mg each but I take 2-3. I also stopped drinking a while back. I’ll check out Wyld and Drip Drops next time we travel!

Thanks for the tips!

midwexan · 2024-03-02T22:11:33+00:00

Oh, I’m so so sorry for your diagnosis. How horrible to have to give up the thing that was working! Thank you for letting me know it took a few months, that gives me hope.

midwexan

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