Healthy tips for menopause

The core secret of maintaining health during menopause has never been the traditional "supplementing estrogen and nourishing ovaries" package, but finding a dynamic balance of body and mind that suits your own physique and living conditions - no one method is suitable for everyone, and the one that suits you is truly useful.

Don’t think this is a lie. When I accompanied my mother to a gynecological follow-up last week, I met Aunt Zhang from the same community. She was 52 years old and had just menopausal for half a year. She had severe hot flashes and night sweats. She woke up three or four times a night. She watched short videos and followed the trend and bought seven or eight kinds of "natural ovary maintenance creams" and "imported phytoestrogens."

In fact, whether it is Western medicine or traditional Chinese medicine, the consensus on menopausal conditioning is no longer "uniform supplementation". Western medicine has never recommended that ordinary people supplement hormones by themselves. Hormone replacement therapy (HRT) has very strict indications: only people who have severe hot flashes, sleep disorders, depression and other menopausal syndromes, and who have no history of estrogen-dependent tumors, unexplained vaginal bleeding, active thrombosis and other contraindications, need to use it under the full evaluation and follow-up of a doctor. There are many cases of breast and endometrial lesions caused by self-administered hormones.

TCM’s treatment ideas are even more inconsistent. Some schools believe that the core of menopause is kidney deficiency, and the main focus is to replenish the kidneys and essence. Many contemporary Chinese medicine practitioners also point out that most menopausal women today are either older or younger, and they are either still working on their careers, or they have to take care of their grandchildren after retirement. Liver stagnation and qi stagnation are more prominent than kidney deficiency. For people with chest tightness, temper tantrums, and rib pain, it is useless to eat ten pounds of donkey-hide gelatin. The key is to smoothen the qi first. The old Chinese medicine doctor my mother consulted last year said that seven out of ten aunts who come to prescribe menopausal prescriptions must first add liver-soothing medicine. Mere supplements will only replenish internal heat.

Speaking of this, I remembered that a fan left a message for me a while ago, saying that she drank 300ml of freshly squeezed soy milk every day with a health blogger. After drinking it for a month, her hot flashes did not go away. Instead, she suffered from bloating and acid reflux every day. When I asked her, I found out that she has a weak spleen and stomach. She has cold hands and feet all year round and unformed stools. The soy milk is cold, and drinking it will certainly increase her burden. If you have a hot constitution and are usually afraid of heat and have a dry mouth, drinking 300ml of sugar-free soy milk every day can indeed relieve hot flashes. But if you have a weak spleen and stomach like this fan, you can switch to eating 10 slow-cooked black beans every day. It is mild and does not hurt the stomach, but the effect is better.

Many people follow the trend of buying Internet celebrity creams when it comes to menopausal care, regardless of whether they have dry or oily skin. Acne and allergies are common. Take exercise as an example. Sister Li, who was a square dancer downstairs, was previously diagnosed with a decrease in bone density. The doctor told her to take more calcium and exercise. She followed others and walked 10,000 steps a day. Her knees hurt after walking for half a month. Later, she changed to Baduanjin for 20 minutes a day. She practiced the elliptical machine twice a week with a community rehabilitation practitioner. After two months, her bone density did not drop, her knees no longer hurt, and her sleep was much better. After all, the rate of bone mass loss in menopausal women is 3-5 times that of normal times. Choosing the wrong exercise can damage joints. There is no "must-do exercise list".

Oh yes, there is also the soy isoflavones that are very popular now. Some people say that they are fine if you take them, while others say that they are completely useless. Clinical studies have long concluded that only about 30% of people are sensitive to soy isoflavones. Taking them can relieve the symptoms of hot flashes. The remaining 70% of people take them and take them. There is no difference between taking a placebo. There is really no need to spend a lot of money to buy imported high-purity health products. If you want to take them, just try them for a month. If they don’t work, just stop. Don’t waste money on taking them.

Actually, the most serious symptom of my mother’s menopause last year was not hot flashes at all, but she always felt that she was “useless”. She was used to being busy at work, and now that she is retired and has nothing to do at home, she shed tears at every turn. I originally wanted to enroll her in a college for the elderly, but she refused to go. Later, she joined a group with the aunts in the community to learn how to make Hanfu headdresses. Now every week, little sisters make appointments to go to the park to take antique photos. She herself now always says that this is more effective than any skin care products. There is also research in psychosomatic medicine now. Emotional problems during menopause account for more than 60% of all discomforts. Many times if you feel pain all over your body and cannot sleep well, it may not necessarily mean that there is a serious physical problem, but it is just that your emotions are blocked and there is no way to relieve them.

In the final analysis, menopause is a normal physiological stage that everyone has to go through. It is not a "scourge of aging" at all. You don't have to force yourself to "return to the state of 30 years old."