The marketing of menopause
Menopause is big business. In the USA, the market is huge and growing every day. There are books coming out all the time with doctors ”explaining” it to women like it is something they invented and we know nothing about – to the extent they tell us what to call it.
Our mothers called it “change of life” which is pretty much what it is. And change is good, right?
Now they label it “menopause” and tell us that we can only use that word when we have not had a period for 12 months. Mind you, once that happens, we will always have to use that word. Even at 90. There’s no “post-menopause” – just forever menopause. It is no longer a change of life. It is a life sentence. Not so good.
And if that is not quite bad enough, they then invented “peri-menopause” to cover anyone remotely close to menopause. How do they figure that out when it changes from woman to woman? Well we’re talking about science here so let’s just use a formula. The average age of menopause is the USA is 51 so anyone within 7 years of 51 will cover it. So even if you go through menopause at 56, according to doctors you are peri-menopausal from 44 onwards even if you are pregnant to the eyeballs with baby #3. But wait, there’s more. They then invented ”pre-menopause” to cover the 7 years before that. All up the menopause market is now any women over 37.
And unfortunately, advertisers consistently project negative images of menopause in order to hawk their products since fear of the lack of sex also sells. And in doing so they perpetuate the crone myth. The overwhelming message is that unless you actually do something about this dreadful impending thing called menopause, you will not be “slim, sane and sexy”. No, no. You will be a fat mad old cow that no man would touch even with a ten foot pole. And it’s not just advertisers. The media play into that message with articles such as “The Bitch is Back”.
The underlying message is that women must project an image that equates to reproductive viability in order to be of any true value to society. If we cannot attract a mate in order to reproduce we are of no true use except possibly as grandmothers. Menopause by definition means we cannot reproduce. The horror, the horror. We dye our hair, spend a fortune on our skin, yearn for slim bodies. But is that enough? Will women soon be driven to faking their period in order to deny having reached menopause at all? You think that impossible? I urge you to watch a wonderful Lebanese movie called Caramel. It’s a great movie about love marriage and friendship amongst six women. But when you watch it, take notice. One of the women, Jamale, a divorced mother of teens and a part-time model, does exactly that.
