For most women, menopause – the stage in life when monthly periods stop and the ability to get pregnant ends – starts between the ages of 45 and 55.
For about one per cent of women, however, premature menopause kicks in before the age of 40. Globally, that is about 5.8 million women between the ages of 30 and 39.
Claire Blackshaw was among them. She was 32 and enjoying life in Hong Kong when, she now realises, she first experienced signs of premature menopause.
When Blackshaw got her diagnosis seven years later at the age of 39, it was too late to have children.
She feels deep “grief and frustration” over this and wants to save others from a similar fate. “I feel passionate about communicating my story to younger women to help them spot the signs of premature menopause,” she says.
Premature menopause is also known as primary ovarian insufficiency.