Unfortunately, I agree w/auntjen. My family has doctors in it back several generations (including one ancestor who treated people in both the Union and Confederate armies, believing that people are people no matter what), but they'd all be spinning in their graves/urns to see what's become of "medicine" and associated industries today. Big pharma doesn't feel it really has to "prove anything with science", either, as evidenced by the rampant cheating, misreporting, ignoring side effect reporting, balancing how many lives they can lose before the damages payments become overwhelming, before they have to do a recall, etc. Or maybe they feel the right to prove anything they want with 'science', is another way to look at it. Basically, as auntjen said, profit conquers all. Kind of funny to be warning against alternatives when some big pharma products have *just above* been revealed to be horrendous and decptively advertised. If I had waited for conventional medicine to address my hormonal issues adequately, I'd probably be in a mental hospital by now. Geting a friend's mom's reference to Emerita pro-gest when I was about 40 was the best medical thing to happen to me next to having cancerous moles taken off and a heart attack stopped with incredibly high levels of nitroglycerine. OH, and last month my pharmacy which has known me for about 5 years once again messed up my prescription for something I take every day, giving me a yet-cheaper generic rather than the somewhat-less-cheap generic they had been giving me before, even though I've told them every single month to order the somewhat-less-cheap one for me because the yet-cheaper one just *doesn't work*. Did I check this last month? NO, because I was harried and I guess I trusted them. I know them all by first name, one mom's daughter is on my daughter's XC team...but I was miserable for a MONTH because of human error in mainstream medicine, and because the so called generic "identical" meds, with loads of "science" stats behind them, are anything but. I don't trust any of it anymore.

I take Promensil (derived from red clover, contains no soy) and I use natural progesterone cream and this combination works well for me. With the Promensil they say it takes 4-5 weeks to "kick in" properly but it worked for me almost immediately. I was having about 70 hot flashes a day (yep, every few minutes day and night). I've heard that it hasn't worked for some ladies, perhaps they didn't give it long enough, or perhaps it just wasn't for them. Everyone is different and react differently to different things. It's all trial and error I'm afraid, although I was lucky that the first thing I tried worked and worked fast. Good luck. DD

Mrs. H, you mentioned that perhaps some of those women are on antidepressants ... you may very well be right! I am 3-1/2 weeks off Effexor XR, and I have been through the most hellish withdrawal symptoms (I've read online that Effexor withdrawal is not unlike heroin withdrawal - yikes!). Effexor is commonly prescribed for menopausal women because it does seem to help with the depression and the flashes/sweats. I had taken it for over 6 years (I initially went on it to help with some anxiety/depression issues I was having), and tried four times to get off of it (both by weaning and going cold turkey) but could not bear the withdrawal, so always went back on. I finally determined that I was going to rid my body of this drug once and for all and take a natural, holistic approach to my well-being, and that's when my flashes/sweats/chills started to the point of being near-debilitating. I have just found a holistic doctor who told me that she doesn't think I'm in the full-on throes of menopause yet (although we are testing the ol' hormones, so it will be interesting to find out what's revealed there), but that my flashes/sweats/chills are directly linked to Effexor withdrawal. She's started me on a program of amino acids to help restore balance to my brain chemistry, and hopefully, my body will learn to regulate itself normally once again. At any rate, my experience with antidepressants is that they do indeed "work" (at least they did for me), but I'd rather have gone through some of my darker moments unmedicated than suffer the withdrawal that I've gone through for closing in on a month now. For anyone who may be considering antidepressants, please, please, please research thoroughly and don't just take what your doctor says at face value. (My doctor who initially prescribed the meds only told me that many of her patients take them, and that some people choose to stay on them for the rest of their lives ... yeah, because they can't get off!) I wish you all a wonderfully relaxing, happy, and sweat-free weekend. :-)

Dorishill I know it's been a while but just wanted to know how you are doing. I made a copy of all the vitamins you were taking so I can start taking them also. I have been going thru hell with all these symptoms...I don't know how much more of this I can take, I feel like I'm dying. These are the moments when I wish I was born a man..I never imagined it would be this hard. If you have any updates on anything that you think can help please let me know. My email to any of the ladies that want to talk..I'm here.. Intellectualbrat@aol.com I just started taking the Estroven Extra Strenght since the 3rd of September and I haven't had any hot flashes but still have the other symptoms. Hopefully it will kick in soon. Good luck to all.