Menopausal crankiness

I would have never believed it to be true or would dismiss it; I'm not cranky and what if I were? It's not because I'm in menopause (started when I was 39 so for almost 10 years now so what's the big deal?) hell no, I'm doing just fine thank you.
But (as my mum sometimes 'subtly' puts it) I seem to have a history with being down at times. I take things very personally too, can't help it, I have a low selfesteem ever since I was a teen and being bullied for years. (working on that) So when I had a 'thing' at work with coworkers I made it bigger than it was in my head. So big in fact that my health was at risk. My epilepsy was acting up big time which is not a good thing when I'm working at an elderly's home. Thankfully they are only smaller seizures but still very annoying. My mind was working overtime thinking and overthinking why it was that they didn't like me or what I had done wrong. (which was nothing, all in the head)

Yesterday we had a team meeting and when my foreperson started a discussion about the subject everyone was very surprised at what I was thinking. I had made things so much bigger and worse than they were. Nothing was going on, only in my head it was. From a small thing with one coworker I had made it into 'nobody likes me'... (it's a bit more complicated than that but I'm not going into more details here) It didn't make any sense to me until one coworker said she had experienced the exact same thing a few years back (meanwhile she was waving a piece of paper in front of her for cool air so we were in the same boat so to speak)
She felt down all the time, forgot everything, kept overthinking things and she said; 'It's the damn menopause'.
I never wanted to believe that or I really never had thought about it to be honest. But it made a lot of sense. She said I had to clear my head more, walk outside more, do more things for myself by myself just to clear that full head of all those thoughts.

If I see that list I can name almost 20 which I seem to have; the worst being itchy, mood swings, irritability, trouble sleeping, anxiety, faulty memory, achy joints, muscles, tense muscles, weight gain, clammy feeling and the hot flashes and night sweats. The past week sore breasts joined happily along with them. So waiting on the rest of the list to join in... Thankfully my period has gone for good so that's the one good thing about it! I don't see restless legs syndrome on there but it should! God that's annoying! And the itchy thing... when I finally sleep I wake up from scratching my head because it has gotten so dry and itchy!
Menopause; and to think I'm only 48.... darn...
*breathe in, breathe out*

We have to see the humour in it somehow, somewhere...
Anyone?

© KH