Have I started?

For the first time in my life, my period is late. Two weeks late. I am nearly 50 and child-free, and my periods have always been regular. I was always judicious about contraception and was sterilised five years ago.

I got the usual lumpy spots around the chin which signalled a period, normally a week later, but nothing happened.


I wonder if this is the start of the "official" menopause. Will I sail effortlessly through it with no more periods?

I have mixed feelings about it. I feel a grief, a sadness, not about the loss of my child-bearing years but the loss of youth. All I can look forward to now is poor quality thinning hair, loss of oestrogen making my face collaspe and my middle getting thicker. I can't think of any positives, except not having to buy tampons.