@westwoman3698 Years ago I bought "The Way a Woman Ages". It was so depressing that I threw it away without getting too far into the book. So some aspects of menopause were a total surprise. My mother had a hysterectomy and my grandmother didn't remember it, so they weren't much help. Neither was the doctor. Of course, our society thinks you should die right after menopause, or at least go into a nursing home. Actually there is a plethora of books out now on female aging. And finally we are bringing prostate cancer out of the closet.