I’m telling my ‘Patient’s Story’ to let other women know how grateful I am to Dr Kalentzi for sorting out the insomnia I developed as a result of the perimenopause. Dr Kalentzi was the third doctor I saw for my problems and the only one who was able to help me.
I started suffering from insomnia when I was 46. It was really bad. Most nights I didn’t get to sleep until 5am, so I had to do my work on one or two hours sleep a night. It was incredibly hard and I felt like I was going insane.
I visited my GP and was told I was too young for the menopause and that my insomnia was probably due to my shift work, which I’d done for years.
After I persistently asked for a blood test, my GP agreed to do one and it showed I’d started the menopause. I had a Mirena coil, which provides progesterone, so my GP was unsure what to give me and referred me to the Community Gynae Service. After waiting over a month for an appointment, I saw a doctor who told me to buy magnesium tablets to take before bedtime and see if it helped me sleep. If not, he told me to make another appointment.
I was so upset they didn’t start me on HRT. The magnesium didn’t help and on my next appointment I was given oestrogen patches to try, but they didn’t help either. I went back a few times but didn’t feel I was getting anywhere. I felt like I was a nuisance and the wait between appointments was too long when I was finding it so hard to sleep.
I decided to go private and saw a male doctor who also wasn’t sympathetic. He prescribed HRT as an oestrogen gel and medication for my insomnia. He refused to do blood tests, which he said were a waste of time. He also gave me testosterone but I really wasn’t happy to take it without blood tests to monitor the effect. The treatment didn’t help.
I found Medical Prime online. I saw they did blood tests, which was what I wanted, and I made an appointment, which I got very quickly. By this time I was 48 or 49, still with terrible insomnia. I felt at the end of my tether. It was very helpful that Dr Kalentzi was a woman. Finally I’d found a doctor who was sympathetic and understood my problem. She explained everything about the perimenopause and menopause and helped me to understand what was going on. She immediately did blood tests, which showed that my oestrogen levels were low. She put me back on oestrogen patches with the dose adjusted. She also prescribed progesterone tablets, which can help with sleep. But it didn’t matter how much oestrogen I was on, it didn’t help with my sleep.
At my next visit, after more blood tests, I started taking testosterone and this really worked for me. After two weeks I started sleeping really well and since then I haven’t had any problems with insomnia. Just to experiment, I went off testosterone for a while and started sleeping badly again. So I know for certain that it’s the testosterone that makes the real difference. Now I feel fine – like a normal human being. I see Dr Kalentzi once a year for a checkup and have blood tests. I couldn’t be happier and am so grateful to Dr Kalentzi for all her help. I’m so glad I found her.