Whenever I tell the story of discovering that I was intolerant to gluten, I always get wide eyes and horrified expressions. I get it, because I’m still as horrified as everyone else. It literally happened overnight. One day I could eat my body weight in fresh baguettes, still warm from the oven and slathered with butter. The next day I couldn’t eat a jammy dodger without folding in half with severe stomach cramps and becoming so delirious I couldn’t drive.

A friend told me, very gravely, that this could be signalling the start of perimenopause, and I shouldn’t forget that black women tend to reach menopause earlier. And then I started noticing other things, like the lactose intolerance I’ve always seen as a mild inconvenience, no longer being so easy to ignore. There’s also the return of teenage-like breakouts, even as my skin seems to simultaneously be much drier than it’s ever been, and I think it would be over-sharing to discuss some of the other physical changes I’ve noticed.