"I went Through Menopause at 19".

As a college freshman, Molly Parker was struck with mysterious hot flashes and mood swings. Here, she describes what it's like when your body ages before its time.

* When I was 18 years old, I felt that my life was off to a new start. It was the fall of 1990, and I was a freshman at Mount Holyoke College, in Massachusetts. It was my first time away from my home in Clinton, New York, and I was excited about making new friends and getting involved in campus activities, especially theater. I wanted to explore everything that college had to offer. But in my third month of school, I began feeling seriously out of sorts. My period started showing up late and then not at all. I had bad mood swings and would find myself on the verge of tears for no reason. Occasionally, I would get so depressed that I would sleep all day long.

At first, I thought I was having a reaction to stress. My parents were splitting up at the time, and I was adjusting to a new environment. When spring semester rolled around, I went to the college health clinic, where the doctor told me that my period would probably come back when things settled down. But it didn't. Six months later, I went to another doctor and was given a different diagnosis. What I heard would change my life forever.

A Strange Change

Before my diagnosis, I had spent almost a year in the dark about my condition. Strange things had been happening to my body that I couldn't understand. I would wake up in the middle of the night, drenched in sweat and feeling anxious. During the day, I'd get a restless feeling in my gut, which would seem to turn into an intense heat. I'd start sweating profusely and it felt like my whole body was going to explode. I'd have to take off my coat and fan myself, even in the middle of winter.

But things weren't just out of whack physically--my mind was affected as well. I started having trouble concentrating, and I'd often find myself daydreaming when I was supposed to be studying. I was out of control emotionally and cried a lot, often spontaneously. The littlest things could set me off. For example, one morning, the dining hall was supposed to serve chocolate-chip pancakes at breakfast, but instead they only served plain ones, which upset me greatly. Once I started crying, I had a hard time stopping. I actually began thinking that I might be mentally ill.

Unable to explain to anyone what was happening, I began withdrawing from the world. Neither my friends nor my parents had any idea what was going on with me. Amazingly, I was able to get through the year academically. That summer, while working as a camp counselor in New York, I constantly felt restless and was crying nearly every day. It had been months since I'd had my period, so I knew something was really wrong. I went to see my gynecologist, who recommended that I go to an endocrinologist (a hormone specialist).