Can’t reach the top shelf? Can’t throw your hands up during the chorus of your favorite song? Can’t pull your hair into a ponytail without wincing? You start blaming the mattress, the gym, a weird sleeping position, but the culprit may be your hormones. Frozen shoulder shows up like this: quietly, then all at once, and often gets misread as an injury. For women in their 40s and 50s, it’s often connected to estrogen decline during perimenopause and menopause, which affects the connective tissue around the shoulder joint in ways most people never think to ask about. If this sounds familiar, it’s worth asking your provider whether perimenopause could be part of the picture.