Allie Pepper has reached the summit of Mount Everest but menopause was her greatest uphill battle
By Shelly Horton|
Aussie mountaineer Allie Pepper has reached the summit of Mount Everest ¨C but climbing the mountain that is menopause had her thinking she'd have to give up her passion completely.
"Menopause hit me like a freight train. I was only 45 years old, and I was going from sleeping like a log to waking up five times in the night, dripping in sweat," Pepper says.
"I was so sensitive and emotional. I would watch a video on Facebook about a lost dog and I would cry my eyes out."
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Pepper is an athlete and has trained six days a week for decades, so she's very in tune with her body and needs it to be in peak condition.
"I couldn't recover from a training session, I had really bad aching joint pain, and I could sniff a cucumber and put fat on. I did not know what was wrong with me, or what had happened to me," she says.
"I thought I had to quit climbing and quit my dreams of climbing 8000-metre mountains. What a sad, sad and bullshit reality."
Her first attempt to get help from a GP wasn't very helpful. She was sent for hormone blood tests, which are not recommended by the Australasian Menopause Society as a way of identifying perimenopause and menopause.
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"I was put on medication that worked a little bit, but it didn't really change a lot of my symptoms. So, it was a bit of a process to figure out what to do," she says.
Pepper felt defeated. Her body that helped her become the third Australian ever to achieve the summit of Annapurna 1 in Nepal, the tenth highest mountain in the world, was now letting her down.
Then she watched a 60 Minutes episode on menopause and had a breakthrough.
"They mentioned a website called Wellfemme, and I was able to have a telehealth appointment with a doctor who is an expert in menopause. They took their time to get to know me and my story and my symptoms, and then they put me on the right HRT [Hormone Replacement Therapy]," she says.
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"It took about a month for the really big symptoms to disappear. And now I've been on this medication over a year, I've noticed a huge difference," Pepper says. "I feel better than I did ten years ago!"
So good, in fact, she is currently in Kathmandu, about to start a world-record climbing project.?
"I aim to climb all 14 of the world's 8000-metre mountains to the true summits, without additional oxygen, in the world's fastest time," she beams.?
Pepper's shocked at how little women are taught about perimenopause and menopause. If she'd known more about this stage of life, she would never have thought about giving it all up.
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"I love being in thin air on top of a mountain, it's where my spirit is free. It's not only my passion, but also my business Allie Pepper Adventures," she says.??
Pepper believes that during her expeditions, she learns more about what she's capable of, and she takes these lessons to the next mountain ¨C which is a lot like learning about perimenopause and menopause.
She hopes her world-record attempt will inspire other women struggling with perimenopause and menopause.
"My best advice is to educate yourself.? You can look on the internet and you'll find websites like the Australasian Menopause Society, which is a great place to find information. Don't give up on yourself.? Don't be discouraged if your first GP doesn't have the answers.? Educate yourself and take charge," she says.
As Pepper is showing us, midlife is not the end of your life, there are many more mountains to climb!
"I'm going from menopause to menopeaks!" she laughs.
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