For a long time, the public version of menopause was remarkably brief. Your periods would stop, you might get a few hot flushes, and that was more or less the entire briefing.

Nobody explained that the years before the final period could affect sleep, mood, concentration, confidence, joints, skin, temperature, bleeding, bladder function, sexual comfort, and the steady sense of being recognisably yourself. So when it starts, most women are left guessing, and often told to relax.

This book does not hand you a plan or tell you which treatment to choose. It gives you language. How the transition is actually described, which symptoms are associated with it, why one blood result may not settle the question, what else might need investigating, and how to walk into an appointment able to ask something precise.

Frances Bellamy is a health writer, not a clinician, and she says so on the first page. There are no supplements to buy here and nothing is promised. What you get is a clear explanation of your own body, written for a woman who is tired of being told it is probably just stress.

Menopause, Explained is Book One in The Menopause Clarity Series.