Читать книгу Sex For Dummies - Pierre Lehu A., Dr. Ruth K. Westheimer - Страница 74

Menopause is that time in a woman’s life when she stops releasing eggs and shedding the lining of her uterus through menstruation. She is no longer fertile and has no more risk of getting pregnant. Although every woman is different, the average American woman hits menopause at 51, so we spend the last third of our lives as postmenopausal women.

Now, if all that happened to women during menopause was that their monthly bout of bleeding stopped, the commercial world would already have made a celebration out of this day, complete with parties and gifts. However, the cessation of ovulation also causes a decrease in the production of the female hormones, estrogen and progesterone, which means menopause has other effects that women sometimes find unsettling.