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Sharleen Spiteri has spoken out about her experience with menopause, recalling that the hormonal change made her forget song lyrics and “literally want to kill somebody” at times.
In a new interview, the Texas frontwoman, 56, shared some insight into her experience with the transitional life stage after a person’s menstrual cycle ends, which can involve symptoms such as hot flashes, chills, and night sweats.
After noting that the last time she’d spoken to journalist Nina Myskow in 2017, just shy of her 50th birthday, Spiteri said that her menopause started shortly after their interaction.
“Thank God I’m not in that place where I literally want to kill somebody, which I was,” she said in the Times profile.
Spiteri then noted some of the symptoms of menopause that were having a significant effect on several areas of her life, including her career and personal relationships.
“I’d got to the point I couldn’t remember the lyrics to the songs. I was away with the fairies. I went on HRT, tried this, tried that, [my doctors] were, like, ‘You’ll be fine.’ But it was awful. What works for one doesn’t work for another.”
She also noted that she found she was gaining weight despite “running up and down the stage for two and a half hours on one meal a day” while on tour. “I was having hallucinations, seeing double. Couldn’t figure out who I was,” Spiteri added.
After her mother and father died in short succession, Spiteri dealt with high levels of anger – some of which she believes was a result of the menopause.
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“And then when my mum and my dad died, the anger was insane,” she said. The levels were so off the chart that my husband [celebrity chef Bryn Williams] and my daughter didn’t know who I was. They were literally, ‘Who are you?’”
The “Summer Son” vocalist sought a private specialist to help with her experience, and discovered that a hormonal allergy was the cause of her issues.
“They found I was highly allergic to progesterone, and because of that I wasn’t absorbing any oestrogen. I was a mess. That changed everything. That was two years ago, and now I’m kind of at the end of it – at least, I hope I am.”
Another public figure who has recently called for more open discussions around menopause is Hollysood star Halle Berry.
During a panel discussion with First Lady Jill Biden this week, the Catwoman star said that her doctor once mistook symptoms of perimenopause as “the worst case of herpes” he’d ever seen.
