Book excerpt: At this very moment over fifty million women are going through menopause. Pharmaceutical companies are mass marketing hormones as fast as doctors can prescribe them, and menopausal seminars sponsored by these companies are crisscrossing the country in an effort to educate women on easing the physical pains of hormone deficiencies. Books likeThe Silent Passage,What Your Doctor Won't Tell You About Menopause, andListening To Your Hormones are flying off the shelves because women are desperate to learn even more. And yet, these doctors, seminars, and books still haven't addressed what every transitional woman instinctively knows: Menopause is much more than just a list of physical ailments, menopause is a spiritual journey. The Seven Sacred Rites of Menopause: The Spiritual Journey to the Wise-Woman Years is a groundbreaking work that will usher in a new way for women to cope with the emotional and physical challenges of menopause. Venturing into uncharted territory, Kristi Meisenbach Boylan takes an intriguing and original look at the seven rituals that menopausal women move through on their voyage to the wise-woman years. Author Meisenbach Boylan believes that these seven ceremonial milestones should be viewed as celebrations--not as symptoms of an illness--and that the menopausal life passage isn't just about a woman's body fighting to correct hormonal imbalances, but is really about the soul trying to findits spiritual balance.