mamaj
Glad to hear you are feeling better. the symptoms running in sync with your cycle seems to be pretty standard.
I do lean towards the hormones as our primary problem, for exactly what you said. Most of my symptoms that are still lingering are much worse at ovulation and my period. the fact that they are directly linked to our endocrine system, particularly the adrenals and subsequently the thyroid, makes me even more suspect.
As far as the silicone, frankly, I doubt we will ever know what role it plays in all of this (if any). Between the breast implant and norplant lawyers, god knows smarter people than me have tried to link it firmly to these symptoms.
If Bayer had been more upfront about discussing the silicone, particularly whether the gel gets into our systems, It would be much lower on my radar. Plus, as far as I can tell, norplant did not contain the gel matrix, just the same shell, yet the side effects were the same. If it were just the hard silicone,I would think we would recover faster, since it would in theory be completely out of our systems upon removal. HOWEVER, the fact that they told us they never "studied" whether it gets into our systems makes me suspicious. How can they possibly not have that answer?
No, not all women go through this at menopause. some just sail through it, and then there are ones like us...
My mom had early onset, but she said she hardly even noticed it. My cousin didn't even know she went through it until her doc told her. I think the fact that our bodies are thrown into it unaturally plays a big role in the roller coaster.
Hang in there. this recovery can take a lot of patience. Not one of my strong points :(