Stages of Your Life

Natural menopause is not a moment or milestone that happens overnight.

In general, you do not go to bed one night with your ‘normal’ reproductive cycle and awake the next day in menopause.

Instead over many years, a woman’s ability to conceive a child and her periods (menstrual cycles or menses) begin to change.

STRAW+10 framework

There is an internationally accepted framework – which is a way of understanding – for a woman’s typical reproductive journey, and where a woman is in that journey.

This framework is called STRAW +10 (Staging of Reproductive Aging Workshop).

South African experts were part of the development of the STRAW+10 framework.

According to STRAW+10, the reproductive journey for adult women has various phases. This is a very simplified version which mainly focuses on the perimenopause and post-menopause stages or phases.

Stages of Reproductive Aging Timeline

My Menopause SA

Evidence-based menopause information for South African women.

Page last reviewed: 1 March 2026
Next review due: 1 March 2027

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All Understanding Perimenopause & Menopause

Harlow, S. D., Gass, M., Hall, J. E., Lobo, R., Maki, P., Rebar, R. W., Sherman, S., Sluss, P. M., de Villiers, T. J., & STRAW 10 Collaborative Group. (2012). Executive summary of the Stages of Reproductive Aging Workshop + 10: Addressing the unfinished agenda of staging reproductive aging. Menopause (New York, N.Y.), 19(4), 387-395. https://doi.org/10.1097/gme.0b013e31824d8f40

Panay, N., Ang, S.B., Cheshire, R., Goldstein, S.R., Maki, P., Nappi, R.E., & on behalf of the International Menopause Society Board. (n.d.). Menopause and MHT in 2024: Addressing the key controversies – an International Menopause Society White Paper. Climacteric. https://doi.org/10.1080/13697137.2024.2394950