climacteric: Meaning and Definition of

cli•mac•ter•ic

1. a period of decrease of reproductive capacity in men and women, culminating, in women, in the menopause.
2. any critical period.
3. a year in which important changes in health, fortune, etc., are held by some theories to occur, as one's sixty-third year
4. the period of maximum respiration in a fruit, during which it becomes fully ripened.

1. critical; crucial.