Five rules to stay menopause active

Exercise is a magic medicine ready to boost the body’s major power centres … provided you stick to a few golden rules.

Exercise can be the gift that keeps giving for midlife women. Beyond the obvious health gains, it’ll support your mind and mood; your confidence, sleep and metabolism. It can keep stress at bay and breathe new life into your muscles, joints and bones.

But wrapped around exercise itself is a new set of non-negotiables which everyone – from the midlife triathlete to the newcomer – needs to write into their routine.

1. Set fuel to full

All bodies need sufficient fuel, but that’s especially true now. Midlife is absolutely not a time for starvation diets or shorting your fuel supply, it’s about giving the body the energy it needs to move … so you can establish and maintain a firm bedrock of holistic good health.

.A healthy balance of energy in versus energy out will power exercise and recovery, stave off physical issues, stabilise your mood and boost your sleep.

And here’s a quirk: midlife hormone patterns instruct the body to lay down stress – which there’ll be more of if you underfuel – as fat, typically around the midsection.

So as much as eat more to keep the weight off might sound counter-intuitive, the midlife body has a different chemistry … the rules have changed.

2. The warm up sends a message

The midlife body has already accomplished a lot. And it can still move brilliantly, provided we support it in the right ways. And that means a solid warm up.

In midlife, muscles and bones are more vulnerable than in younger years. They don’t cope overly well when they’re suddenly jolted into action and too many midlife women wind up injured (again and again) because they attack exercise without a decent warm up.

So in midlife it’s essential (not optional) to properly oil up your joints and prepare yourself physically and mentally for the stress of exercise.

A flowing warm up built on stretching or dancing, that gradually builds in intensity, will get your body ready to move, train and perform. Try not to view your warm up as just an annoying bit to get through … really use the time to check in with your body and focus on how it’s feeling and moving ahead of a workout.

3. Cool down to counter pain … and fat gain

Exercise stresses the body. That’s how we get fitter. But midlife is a stressful time in and of itself … and too much stress can make the body (and the mind) less tolerant and resilient.

Stress in midlife is both chemical and psychological. It’s chemical because cortisol or ‘stress hormone’ levels are up, and it’s psychological because menopause symptoms are disrupting your already-busy life.

So a deliberate cool-down is a great way to absorb the stress that exercise has created – and this is hugely important. Skip the cool-down and you’ll leave a big pile of unprocessed stress in the body. Untreated, this pile of stress can cause additional pain and longer recovery times.

You read this earlier, but if the body can’t process excess stress (cortisol), it’ll simply lay it down as fat, typically around the mid-section. Given the ‘middle-aged spread’ is something you probably want to avoid, make sure to safely wind down after every session via stretching, deep-breathing and / or a significant walk.

Exercise is a gamechanger for midlife women. Fitness, resilience, muscle and bone health, mood, sleep, outlook … the list of positives goes on and on. Bookending exercise with a warm up and a cool down prepares the body so you can get the best of it, and protects the body so you can add strength and resilience that’ll look after you today and tomorrow.

4. Stay hydrated, stay resilient

Staying well-hydrated during exercise is always a good idea, but in midlife it’s a non-negotiable.

That said, women with pelvic floor issues (primarily leaking) often fear drinking too much in case the obvious happens. We cover this in point 5).

But the midlife body thrives when it moves, and when it can move. Hydration is an essential part of powering that movement and, basically, is extra insurance against stress and recovery pains that can impact your mood, sleep, and general wellbeing.

A body that isn’t adequately hydrated is a superhighway for pains and niggles you can definitely do without.

5. Support your pelvic floor (so it continues supporting you)

It’s fair to say that women, in general, don’t give the pelvic floor the love and attention it needs. And really, you could breeze through life experiencing no pelvic floor issues at all …

Until you get to midlife, that is.

With oestrogen levels tapering down (as happens in menopause), the pelvic floor is suddenly starved of what it needs to maintain business-as-usual functioning. Cue common issues and symptoms such as leaking (urine), incontinence, vaginal dryness, pelvic and/ or back pains to name just a few.

If you’re currently worried about your pelvic floor, book in to see an expert and / or a click here to find Women’s Health Physio, who can identify any problems you have, and provide solutions to help.

Solutions to help will definitely include pelvic floor exercises, as they’re the easiest and most effective way anyone build strength and condition the pelvic floor.

Going forward, we recommend two minutes of pelvic floor work as part of every exercise session. Do this and you’ll train up one of the body’s most under-appreciated power centres, adding a resilience that’ll stave off significant issues, now and in future.

Learning to tune into your pelvic floor (sooner rather than later) means getting to know your normal. And when you know your normal you’ll be able to identify abnormal … and seek solutions before small problems become life-limiting issues.