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Summary
On episode 123 of 40+ Fitness, Coach Allan sits down with Dr. Stephanie Faubion, director of the Women’s Health Clinic in the Department of Internal Medicine at the Mayo Clinic and one of the nation’s leading experts on menopause, to discuss her book The Menopause Solution.
Dr. Faubion’s argument: women now spend 40 to 50 percent of their lives after menopause, so this transition is the time to set up decades of healthy living, not just survive a set of symptoms.
The conversation covers the five areas she says matter most going into menopause, then digs into two of them in depth: joint health and bone health, including why resistance training protects both.
Links
- https://www.mayoclinic.org
Key Takeaways
- Women now live decades past menopause, which changes the goal. Average life expectancy was around 50 in 1900, versus the upper 80s to 90 today, so managing health at midlife is now about quality of life for a very long stretch afterward.
- Dr. Faubion’s five areas to focus on heading into menopause: getting informed about what is happening to your body, building fitness, protecting sleep, focusing on prevention of long-term disease, and managing stress.
- Joint pain is increasingly recognized as a menopause symptom. Women report more joint aches and higher arthritis rates after menopause, though researchers still do not know exactly how much of that is driven by declining estrogen.
- Body mechanics protect joints as much as any single exercise choice. Notice what triggers pain, what position you were in, and how long you held it, and work with a trainer or physical therapist to fix the movement pattern causing it.
- Muscle loss after 50 makes joint support work harder. Strengthening the muscles around a joint helps protect it, which is why Dr. Faubion says to exercise smarter, not necessarily heavier, as your training changes with age.
- Bone loss accelerates fast right around menopause. Women lose the most bone of their entire lives in the first five years after menopause without treatment, tracking directly with the drop in estrogen.
- Bone mass peaks around age 20 and several factors raise osteoporosis risk later. Being female, aging, being white or of Asian descent, family history, a thin frame or low body weight, a sedentary lifestyle, low calcium intake, smoking, alcohol, eating disorders, and certain medications all play a role.
- Resistance training is the strongest tool for protecting bone. The link was first confirmed when astronauts lost significant bone and muscle mass in zero gravity; walking stresses bone more than cycling, and cycling more than swimming.
- Calcium and vitamin D both matter, but they are checked differently. Calcium is best gotten through diet, with supplements as a backup, while a simple blood test can flag low vitamin D, something more common for people who avoid the sun or live in northern climates.
“If there is a fountain of youth, it’s got to be exercise.”
Dr. Stephanie Faubion