Within five months of having a life-saving hysterectomy, menopause psychotherapist Diane Danzebrink found herself on the brink of taking her own life. She shares her story on The Liz Earle Wellbeing Show: ‘I just thought, this isn’t living and if this is what it’s going to be like, I don’t want to be here anymore, because I’m too much trouble for everybody around me.’
She came within a hair’s breadth of driving out in front of a lorry. ‘My Jack Russell, Henry, barked at the crucial moment and it broke my train of thought,’ she recalls. ‘I gripped the wheel incredibly hard and drove home shaking, before telling my husband what I’d almost done.’
Things started to change for the better when Diane replaced the estrogen that had disappeared following her hysterectomy: ‘Once I put my first estrogen patch on, probably within about 48 hours, I started to notice a difference.’
A for anxiety
Though Diane’s case is severe, it’s not unprecedented. Research shows the highest rate of female suicide is found in women aged 45-54, the very same time of life when hormone changes occur. It’s estimated that 75% of women experience symptoms during this hormonal
