The Sunday Times Mirror

Ever wondered why mummy is getting so annoyed even though you’ve been a goody-two-shoes through out? Mama’s Girl tries to find the answers to her annoyance

Mother. She is precious. Our teacher. Our emotional support. She is the one who was there with you from the moment you stepped into this world; the hero in most of our lives.

In a sense, we need and are used to a ‘super-mum’ of sorts. As children, we never see our mother as the weak one out of our parents. But like all humans, they too go through rough patches. After being the super humans we know and expect them to be forever, reality bites and… BANG! They realize they are tiring out. They become irritable and snappy. They always seem to only see the ‘wrong’ in things. And, for some reason, the target always seems to be you!

In your eyes, you do all you can and you don’t necessarily see what has gone wrong. It sometimes comes to a point where pretty much everything seems absurd and irrational. It can be best described like an abstract painting of sorts. Complicated. Why, you ask? Mothers and Menopause – the two big M’s – this is when, as a child you feel like your whole world, your universe, is crashing down and somehow, the one person who made the most sense in your life, does not seem to be doing or saying anything logical or meaningful anymore. Been there? Yup, it’s a long and bumpy ride ahead!

Most mum’s react to menopause – that’s a fact – and at the same time this reaction seems to affect their children to varying degrees. If any of you teenagers and youth are going through that period when your mother’s experiencing meno-pause don’t worry, you are not alone.

“I was 20 years old when my mother went through menopause,” said Ashani* (25) “and it was quite bad!” The experience lasted two to three years with most of the mood swings during the first year of menopause. She went on to explain that her mother would have complete extremes of emotions – “completely normal and very cheerful but when something went off, she would become just absolutely unreasonably irrational.” Ashani also added that after her mother would explode she would also feel really bad about lashing out at everyone.

“She targeted ‘ME’ in particular,” she said adding that this was possibly because she was the one who was mostly at home. Ashani also noticed that her father was also a target, at times. She remembers one incident in particular, “it was on my birthday that year. She got into a frenzy… she was just being nuts for no reason!”

It came to a point where, “I told my mum that I will not ask my friends to come home again because of her moods and she felt really bad and cried and apologised,” she said. “I felt my mother was in denial that she was coming into a different stage in her life and she didn’t look for any kind of support either.”

“The way I look at it is that my mother because she is a free spirit and so am I so for this reason, she would have reacted the way she did,” she said, adding “I felt sorry for my father as she would randomly say things to him and I don’t know if she apologised to him.” So what did the family do? They tried to steer clear from her in order to try and prevent any outbursts. “Basically this was a ‘no-win’ situation!” she said.

Thiruni* (28) is Ashani’s older sister who handled the situation differently. “I was able to handle it better than my sister,” she said. “See, my mother is the pivotal person of the house, so her moods affected the whole household.” Thiruni would deal with the situation, in the sense that if she felt her mother was going overboard, she would tell her.

At the same time she understood that her mother did not have control over what she was going through, adding, “I didn’t resent her for what was going on.” She also said that when she has to go through it, “I will watch and see and try to control it so that I will not be the same, after all we all have to go through it!”

Krishan* (29) and Keshini* (24) are a brother and sister combination who’ve been through the same experience, but for Krishan it’s, “I didn’t notice anything, I didn’t even know she had it, my sister would probably have gone through a lot, ask her!”

Keshini and Ashani seemed to have gone through the same things. She described it in one word – “crazy!” Her mother was around 48 and she was around 14, when her mother went through it. “Because I was in my teens, I had no idea what it meant,” she said, adding “She was against all teenage sorts of things and I too was very rebellious and for the slightest thing, we would just go at each other.”

Keshini’s father was working out of Colombo at the time so her mother would constantly complain to her father saying, “I will get a heart attack because of her!” Keshini also remember’s her mother complaining about always being stuck in the same place. “She would not really apologise but would cook something nice or be nice,” Keshini said, “and I wasn’t mature enough to understand, so I thought she hated me!” She did not see this as something that would have passed, and at that time she did not want to restrict herself from doing what she had to do. “My brother was doing his A/Levels at the time so my mum would always remind me of it, and make me feel like the unimportant pain.” It was a real change for Keshini because her mother, in general was laidback and passive.

“I didn’t even know my mother was going through anything so I didn’t have to deal with anything,” said Shehani* (23). She was around 12 at the time, and from what she remembers she was the same person she always was. “I actually didn’t know she went through it, till recently, and I have not heard of mothers going through mood swings during this time either.” About her mother’s personality, she said that in general her mother was a calm person but at the same time had the capability of getting angry, when provoked.

Anusha* (20) had a rather different experience where her mother did not react at all with her sibling and her, lashing out at her father instead. “It was only about two to three years ago, and I was around 22, and my mum was around 50. Although menopause is an ongoing condition, which is not short-lived, there was a significant difference in her behaviour for about a little over a year. Well other than getting a bit irritated, it was not such a big deal for me.”

One thing is for sure, each experience seems to be different from the other… because each mother reacts differently to reaching this stage of their lives.

According to psychologist Santushi Amarasuriya, “Menopause can be considered the cessation of the menstrual cycle which signals the end of ovulation and termination of reproductive capacity which occurs around the age of 45-55 in most females.” The point made by Santushi is that it is necessary to identify women who are experiencing it, as in the Sri Lankan cultural context, family members may not be even aware that their mother is going through menopause. So they cannot help.”

If you go back to each experience it is clear that most of the kids were not aware of what was going on with their mothers, but if there are changes in their family life, they are affected by it.

“Children are affected by it if the mother shows symptoms such as mood swings, depression etc., but may not know the reasons for it because the mother may not want to disclose the experience of menopause.”

“Dealing with a depressed mother is a whole other subject altogether,” and, what should be focused on are, “the changes that a woman goes through during menopause so that families are more sensitized to it and are more supportive.” It is important for women to understand the early signs of menopause, in order to make it easier to deal with. Ms. Amarasuriya also went on to say, “Women need to look at the experience positively.

Apart from this they need to have a healthy lifestyle, learn to cope with stress and learn relaxation techniques and seek the support of their families/ friends to support her through this period of change.”

“Most children are around the ages 18 to 20 when their mothers go through menopause,” said Ms. Amarasuriya, therefore the children are at an age where they will be able to understand the situation better.

However, when the children are younger, like when they are just entering their teens, as in Keshini’s case the situation is a whole lot different, “because this is an age when the child too goes through an adolescent’s crisis and also an identity crisis.” There can be clashes between the mother and child in such an instance.

So what can we do in these instances, when do we clash with our mothers? “Being supportive, understanding and listening to your mother will help,” Ms. Amarasuriya said. That aside you can do things to make your mother feel good and if possible also suggest that she see a doctor, if necessary.