Ulrika Jonsson has revealed she suffered “unimaginable anxiety” and memory loss while going through the menopause, which left her fearing she had Alzheimer’s disease.
Speaking on ITV’s ‘Lorraine’, the 50-year-old said she went through a stage of forgetting words mid-sentence.
“That was really scary,” she said. “I actually took a friend of mine aside and said to her, and she’s a few years older than me, and I said ‘I’m really worried that I might be getting early onset Alzheimer’s,’ and she said, ‘honestly, it’s just the menopause.’”
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Lorraine
Ulrika, who began to experience the menopause at the age of 46, said some of her symptoms felt similar to when she had experienced depression in the past.
“Depression has been a regular feature of my life, and when I first started feeling…I thought I was going into a very dark episode and I had no warning of it beforehand, there was nothing that would’ve given me any signs towards it,” she said.
“And then came the most unimaginable anxiety that I’ve not known before. Anxiety, like, proper panic. At one stage I thought my head was going to explode, just anxiety over the tiniest thing, and then you become even more scared because you’re anxious.”
Ulrika also experienced slight weight gain, despite exercising and eating healthily, but she didn’t even think to consider her symptoms could be linked to the menopause until she visited her GP, who told her she was “perimenopausal”.
Perimenopausal is the term used to describe when a woman begins to experience symptoms of the menopause a few months before her periods stop.
At first, Ulrika did not want to accept the diagnosis.
“I was like, ‘no,’ because at that stage I was 46, and I thought that this was my time to have my body back after having four children, this is going to be my time. No, god had other plans,” she said.
Thankfully, Ulrika said she was able to navigate the difficult time with the support of her husband and children.
The star was sharing her experience as part of the programme’s The ‘M’ Word campaign, which aims to end the silence around menopause.
Recently, the show’s host Lorraine Kelly shared her own experience of the menopause, saying “you just feel there’s no joy in your life”.
“I don’t use the word depression lightly. This was a blackness where I would wake up - nothing else in my life was going wrong, I’m a very lucky woman, no money worries or nothing like that - and I would wake up and think ’I don’t see the point in carrying on. I just don’t see the point in life,” she said.
‘Lorraine’ is on ITV, weekdays 8.30am - 9.25am.
11 Famous Women Get Real About The Menopause
Zoe Ball, 49(01 of11)
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"I am hot and hairy. It’s like my last hurrah. Is it going to get better? Do I do HRT or do I have the funny tea supplement?”
When an audience member suggested she should have more sex to combat the symptoms, she replied: “OK, that’s a good tip. HRT and more sex. I’ll take that." (credit:Barcroft Media via Getty Images)
Gillian Anderson, 48(02 of11)
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"It was at the point that I felt like my life was falling apart around me that I started to ask what could be going on internally, and friends suggested it might be hormonal…I was used to being able to balance a lot of things, and all of a sudden I felt like I could handle nothing. I felt completely overwhelmed.
"Peri-menopause and menopause should be treated as the rites of passage that they are. If not celebrated, then at least accepted and acknowledged and honored." (credit:Matthew Eisman via Getty Images)
Angelina Jolie, 41(03 of11)
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"I will not be able to have any more children, and I expect some physical changes. But I feel at ease with whatever will come, not because I am strong but because this is a part of life. It is nothing to be feared." (credit:Umit Bektas / Reuters)
Jennifer Saunders, 58(04 of11)
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"It is fairly brutal and you go through all the accompanying side effects: hot flushes, weight gain, a sense of mourning for lost youth, sexiness and somehow the point in anything. I became depressed, which I ended up getting help with.” (credit:Mike Marsland via Getty Images)
Tracey Emin, 53(05 of11)
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"It is a nightmare, an absolute nightmare. It's horrible. And I don't look like that kind of person, you don't put menopause on top of my head, it doesn't associate with me." (credit:ANTHONY WALLACE via Getty Images)
Julie Walters, 67(06 of11)
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"I still get hot flushes. That’s fifteen bloody years. Still, it’s nothing like I did then. Ripping off your nightie and Grant [her husband] thinking it’s something else! No – don’t get any ideas!” (credit:Barcroft Media via Getty Images)
Kim Cattrall, 60(07 of11)
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"Literally one moment you’re fine, and then another, you feel like you’re in a vat of boiling water, and you feel like the rug has been pulled out from underneath you.
What I would say, which I’ve said to myself and to girlfriends who’ve also experienced hot flashes, in particular, is that change is part of being human. We evolve and should not fear that change. You're not alone. I feel that part of living this long is experiencing this, so I’m trying to turn it into a very positive thing for myself, which it has been, in the sense of acceptance and tolerance and education about this time of life." (credit:Roberto Ricciuti via Getty Images)
Amanda Redman, 59(08 of11)
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"How hideous for women of our mothers' generation, because - while me and my girlfriends will talk about everything under the sun, including the menopause - it was something they didn't discuss. They must have felt so lonely and embarrassed all the time.
"For me, it's tailing off now. But I can still suddenly go that awful colour when I'm talking to somebody and sweat beads will break out on my upper lip. You're acutely aware of it, even if they're not." (credit:David M. Benett via Getty Images)
Carol Vorderman, 56(09 of11)
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On ITV’s ‘Lorraine’, Vorderman described how her life had been normal until the menopause started.
“Then this depression hit me - and I don’t use the word depression lightly. This was a blackness where I would wake up - nothing else in my life was going wrong, I’m a very lucky woman, no money worries or nothing like that - and I would wake up and think ‘I don’t see the point in carrying on. I just don’t see the point in life,” she said.
Ulrika Jonsson, 50(10 of11)
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Ulrika Jonsson has revealed she suffered “unimaginable anxiety” and memory loss while going through the menopause, which left her fearing she had Alzheimer’s disease.
“I actually took a friend of mine aside and said to her, and she’s a few years older than me, and I said ‘I’m really worried that I might be getting early onset Alzheimer’s,’ and she said, ‘honestly, it’s just the menopause.’”
Lorraine Kelly, 57(11 of11)
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Lorraine Kelly admitted that the menopause caused her to "no longer feel joy in life" when it started.
“I remember last year, Steve and I had gone away to Spain for the weekend, it was the most beautiful day, everything was fantastic. Rosie [Lorraine’s daughter] was sailing through her exams at university, life was really good, love my job, all of that… and there was no joy in my life,” she said.