Menopause Wellness: Simple Ways to Support Your Health

Transcript:

Jamie Forward: What can women do themselves to support their bodies during this phase of life? Dr. Ali?

Dr. Nina Ali: Yeah. I mean, I think that part is a lot of things that we all know in our brain.

Me personally, I know I need to be getting a certain amount of sleep, I need to have a healthy diet, I need to be active. So, those things, really trying to be in your very best health as we go through this transition is kind of the bigger goal. And our lifestyles are not really set up to make those changes easy, so you do have to really think about it and make an effort, but it is things that we have been told. You need to have a certain amount of fiber, you need to have a certain amount of protein, we need to generally eat more vegetables and less red meats.

And kind of pay attention to these things that we have, all of us, hear about and know about, but when you actually want to go and implement that into your workday and make sure you’re eating properly and getting up and moving and working your muscles, we know from a scientific perspective that in perimenopause and menopause, we rapidly lose bone strength and muscle strength, which compounds a slowing metabolism and increases our risk for various metabolic problems.

So, thinking about that and implementing practical things that can be done, I think those are kind of the basic parts of optimizing health, and really important. And we all would love quick fixes and love to have injections and supplements to take the place of those things, but really nothing is going to be better than sort of implementing those things into your life. So, we want to emphasize that.

And also, talking to other people, like, whoever is on here and listening and getting this information, I think being informed and having spaces where you can discuss with other people who are going through the same sorts of transitions like we all are or will at some point is really helpful and really important as well. And so, women tend to be good at that, but we need to find spaces where it feels comfortable.             

Jamie Forward: Dr. Piasta, did you want to add anything there?

Dr. Jackie Piasta: I agree with everything Dr. Ali said. I usually try to impress upon my patients that this is really a time to take stock of you being able to put your oxygen mask on before helping others and sort of assess. You know, a lot of women enter into perimenopause into what we call that sandwich generation, right? But a lot of women, they had been taking care of their families for many years prior, and so perimenopause is an excellent time to sort of reassess areas of your life where you can really kind of add. And it doesn’t have to be anything cosmic. A lot of times I’ll just say, “What can you add to your plate? Or what little movement snacks can you add? If you can’t devote 45 minutes to a strength training class, can you park 20 spaces further away in the Target parking lot than you would have?”

Something, just little – our goals should be smart, they should be attainable and realistic and all those things. So, certainly it’s a good time to sort of reassess. And community, find community. I have a group of patients that sort of are all friends, and they see me and it’s sort of this running joke that one of them will see me, and they’ll go have their little coffee date and then sort of mind share. So, that’s so valuable because I might say one thing that I don’t say to another one. And so, finding community, going on those Facebook mom groups and seeing who’s going through this where you can share those lived experiences.