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I know exactly what you are going through! Perimenopause started for me when I was around 36 or so. I went from being "normal" to having hot flashes, anxiety, panic attacks, feelings of detachment (like I was in a daze or something), to having mood swings...happy one minute, angry the next, to crying the next. Around the same time, my cycles started with minor changes...spotting the middle of the month, going from a set-the-watch-by-it cycle of 28 days to very sporadic 21 days, 25 days, 35 days, etc. My OB-GYN (an older male doctor) actually laughed when I told him I thought I was having a nervous breakdown and told me, "Oh, I hear that from a lot of women your age." But yet, he told me I was too young to be going through menopause. What a laugh! Since then, my symptoms have gotten worse. The hot flashes I can actually deal with. It's the others sometimes that can be trying. Changed to a women doctor, who ran some bloodwork to find that I was low in progesterone, but that the estrogen levels were okay, but I understand that those are not always accurate either. She put me on progesterone replacement, but not the estrogen. My cycles continued to be messed up and the anxiety seemed to get worse. My family actually told me that my mood swings had gotten worse since I started taking the progesterone. So, I stopped. I have found that exercise (at least 30 minutes each day of aerobic exercise), coupled with relaxation techniques (deep breathing when I find myself becoming anxious) have really helped. If you consciously make an effort to breath deeper as a general rule of thumb, you will ward off a lot of the anxiety before it can get started. I continue to have other problems like the palpitations, especially the week leading up to and including the first couple days of my cycle, but especially with the exercise, they are much more tolerable. I still have a "bad" month every now and then when for no reason, all I want to do is cry or am overly anxious about the dumbest things, but for those, I just keep telling myself it will pass and try to exercise for, maybe, 45 minutes instead of the normal 30 and then do some yoga breathing techniques. I can sympathize with your feelings of lonliness. I find comfort in knowing that other women are experiencing the same things...and then some! of what I am experiencing, and believe it or not, that can be comforting during those "bad" months, too. Anytime you want to "talk," please e-mail me. It is comforting talking to others and getting support. Know that you are not alone!!!