As if menopause wasn’t challenging enough with mood swings and hot flashes coming out of nowhere, you may suddenly notice the scale creeping up and your waistline expanding. What happened? You may not be eating or exercising any differently than you always have. In fact, you may even be more active and still notice that those few pounds have stubbornly come to rest around your middle, and taking them off is not as easy as it was when you were twenty.
When your hormones shift getting ready for menopause, your body changes the way it handles food. Coupled with a busy, stressful life this can spell a slow climb into weight gain and that can mean trouble down the road. Here are some basic facts about what is happening and what you can do to stay well. Adapting early in the menopause process helps you stay ahead of that risky curve, but making changes anytime in your life can put you on a road to better health.
Why is this happening?
As estrogen and progesterone decline, they take with them the physical advantages that they have been offering all these years. These are not things you have probably been aware of, but they have protected you from conditions like heart disease, bone loss and weight gain. Now that hormones are diminishing, you will begin to notice the physiologic changes that come along with the slowing down of your ovaries.
Besides the waning of hormones, you may be more sedentary in your life and may be managing stressful life events. All of this together means that your body is:
- Having a harder time regulating insulin, which will encourage weight gain
- Releasing more stress hormones, like cortisol, which signal your body to hang onto fat
- Losing muscle mass, so you burn fewer calories all day long
- Moving less, and therefore burning fewer calories
What’s at Stake?
Menopause is the beginning of your “third age.” As you move into this time of your life, you want to feel well, and happy, and free. Sometimes, though, it seems as though midlife is ganging up on you to have just the opposite effect. If you continue a lifestyle that encourages you to gain weight, you are increasing your risk for:
- Heart disease
- Cancer
- Diabetes
- Osteoarthritis
These are not what you had in mind for your middle age or golden years. Keeping your weight in a normal range will cut your risks of all those conditions. And if you do happen to acquire one of those conditions, keeping your weight at a healthy level will make it easier to manage your symptoms.
What can you do to get and stay healthy?
A sane, healthy diet is your first step toward a healthy menopause. If you see it not as “being on a diet” but as “eating for a healthy body” you have a better chance of success. You want a healthy body. The healthier your body, the farther it will carry you into your third age. Here are some diet tips that you can start today. As you adopt these suggestions, your body will feel better and staying within a healthy weight range will be more possible. Try adding just one a month for the next 8 months. As you gradually shift to healthier eating patterns, you may be surprised how your body and your mind respond.
- Increase the calcium in your diet. Calcium helps your body maintain weight, and is essential for strong bones. Get about 1200 mg. a day if you are a women over the age of 50.
- Choose foods for their high fiber content. Fiber helps you regulate your insulin, and generally keeps your intestinal system in working order. Choose fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains and legumes to boost your fiber intake. (See how close you can come to 2 to 4 servings of fruits and 3 to 5 servings of vegetables in your daily diet.)
- Drop the salt. Read labels and take the salt shaker off the table. Try cutting your current sodium intake in half.
- Reduce the sugar. Again, read labels. Sugar is everywhere, even in foods where you might not expect it. Choose the products with the least amount of sugar and high fructose corn syrup.
- Drink more water. Replace soft drinks with water, and try to get at least 8 glasses a day.
- Decrease the fat in your diet. Choose lean meats or fish instead of fatty choices; limit fast food to a couple of times a month; read the labels and avoid saturated fat.
- Keep the alcohol at a minimum. Although there are some plusses to a little wine with dinner, alcohol can add many calories and can interfere with insulin so be judicious.
- Take a multivitamin, and be sure it has vitamin D.
If you take these sensible steps, your battle is half won. The other half of the battle for healthy weight, of course, is exercise. So begin with these dietary suggestions, and if you want to maximize their effect add exercise to the mix. Your body will begin to tell you a happier story about midlife.
The formula for a healthy body in menopause is simple, but not easy: Eat smart, move more.
Start with eating, or start with moving, but start today.
Sources:
North American Menopause Society, (NAMS), Menopause Guidebook: Helping Women Make Informed
Healthcare Decisions Around Menopause and Beyond, 6th Edition , North American Menopause Society, 2006. 10 Oct. 2007.
Simkin-Silverman, LR, Wing, RR, Postgraduate Medicine,Vol 108, No 3, Sept. 2000. 24 Nov. 2007.
