Does the male menopause exist?

The menopause in women is a definite physiological event in which the ovaries stop producing hormones and close down. We also know that women produce a finite quantity of eggs during their lives.

This is not the case in men. The testes and adrenal glands continue to produce male hormones, and sperm to the end of life, although the amounts do decline through the years. The other problem with male aging is that not nearly as much research has been carried out in this area as has in women. Where there is little available information, myth and supposition abound.

However, there are undoubtedly changes in men's hormonal make up as they age, and as their lives change.

Married men produce less testosterone than unmarried men for example.

Many men tend to put on weight as they get older, and this also leads to lower levels of testosterone. Men who retain the same body weight which they had in their twenties retain the same testosterone levels, but these men are in the minority in Western society.

These two factors alone could produce something equivalent to a male menopause.

Men are also subjected to varying pressures by society as they age, particularly in a Western environment. At the risk of angering my fellow professional female colleagues, there seems still to be a lot of pressure on men to perform, particularly in the fast-moving corporate world. Couple this with an increasing sense that only young people have the flexibility to cope in todays changing world, leading to less reliance on the supposed wisdom and experience associated with age, and you have a potentially very stressful situation for an older man, trapped in a world in which his main reason for existing, to bring home the bacon, is under threat. This in turn can lead to chronic stress which will have untold effects on his body's physiology.

To me the true test would be to examine the phenomenon in a society in which men did not gain weight as they age, and in which age and experience is still revered.

In any event, further research is needed, since many men certainly feel major changes in their bodies and minds as they get older, many of which are distressing.