The age after forty is a time of maturity, wisdom and prudence. After the transition comes not old age, but the best years - and these every woman should enjoy.
Why am I talking about the best years? Because at forty we don't go on crazy diets like we did in our twenties, we don't spend our nights partying or poring over textbooks, and we don't need to figure out what our bodies can handle. After various trials and errors, we finally found the one, and what followed was a wonderful, but also challenging and exhausting time of starting a family. We've had sleepless nights with young children and juggling the roles of mother, partner, cleaner, shopper, cook - often alongside a professional role.
Now our children are growing up and our concerns about their health, survival in school and first loves are receding. We have more time to ourselves, and we also know that Hollywood diets and sweaty pajamas are nonsense. We understand that we need to work on our characters and our souls.
I just turned 50 and I see this time as a gift for all I have done. I can focus on myself and my work, take care of my partnership and enjoy my children from afar (they'll be angry soon if we still call them kids). We have only our youngest teenager at home, but he has long since grown over my head and can learn on his own or cook for us.
Women from 40 upwards are, in my opinion, women in their prime. But if they want to really enjoy these wonderful years, they need to keep themselves in good shape and in good spirits. What do I recommend? The best diet and taking care of yourself!
The best diet
The rules of healthy eating are very simple. It is not at all true that if we want to eat healthily we have to become an expert on nutrients and follow the latest nutritional trends in popular magazines. And there is certainly no need to follow any kind of diet.
A healthy diet is a diet based on the intake of real food, which is preferably not industrially processed at all. On the other hand, semi-processed, highly industrialised and chemically flavoured foods should be reduced.
A huge advantage of a diet based on real food is that it provides the maximum amount of nutrients, and in ideal natural proportions. Real foods are not addictive (like many highly processed food products), do not lead to overeating, but instead provide a healthy natural weight without restricting the amount or having to count calories. Food is meant to be an indulgence.
If you eat after you've calculated the calorie content on a calculator or app, you're stressing yourself out unnecessarily. I don't think that has anything to do with health.
A healthy diet should include plenty of vegetables, good quality protein and fats. If you like cereals, then they should be as minimally processed as possible. Artificial sweeteners, trans fatty acids, monosodium glutamate and many other flavourings are not part of a healthy diet.
The best of each food group
Vegetables and fruit
- Do not limit your vegetable consumption at all. The more varieties you eat, the better, as this is the easiest way to ensure you get a wide range of phytochemicals - different coloured substances that promote health.
- You can also usually indulge in fruit in abundance.
- Limit fruit only on the basis of individual health, especially if you have diabetes, obesity or are in the first stages of an anti-fungal diet.
- There are all sorts of ways to process fruit and vegetables, with different benefits for each (I'm not referring to potatoes in the form of fries or fruit in the form of sweetened compotes, of course).
Protein
- Ideally, eat organic proteins, because heavy metals and chemicals concentrate along the food chain and are therefore more abundant in animal foods.
- Don't forget legumes, nuts and seeds.
- In the case of digestive problems, any kind of restricted dietary intake or illness associated with malnutrition, I recommend animal foods, preferably as part of every main meal, even if only in limited quantities.
- In the case of soy, prefer traditional products such as fermented tempeh, soy sauce and miso paste.
Fats
- It is best to eat fats in their natural form, i.e. fish, nuts, seeds or avocados.
- For isolated fats, I recommend using only the highest quality fats and real food fats such as organic butter, lard and cold-pressed oils.
- Prefer lard and clarified butter over oils for baking, as butter and lard can tolerate higher temperatures.
- Limit as much as possible trans fatty acids, which are most commonly found in ultra-processed food products today.
Cereals
- Preferably use cereals in their natural and minimally processed form.
- In case you have weakened digestion, be sure to cook and chew them thoroughly.
- Don't just eat wheat, but instead eat as wide a range of grains as possible. Don't forget less common types such as buckwheat or groats.
- Try to increase your intake of gluten-free cereals.
- Limit as much as possible products made from unprocessed white flour and foods combining white flour, fats and flavours (many store-bought desserts and biscuits).
- If you are overweight, have diabetes or metabolic syndrome, try to limit carbohydrates in your diet (including all cereals).
Promoting healthy living through movement
Regular exercise is an essential part of health at any age, and its importance increases with age. Older age without exercise is accompanied by a gradual loss of muscle mass and its replacement by fat tissue. In addition to hormonal changes, it is this exchange of active energy-burning muscle for passive fat that is the main cause of weight gain, even if a woman still eats the same amount. Although intake is constant, output decreases and energy in the form of additional fat is stored.
In addition to regular exercise in the fresh air, strengthening exercises that promote bone health and exercises that promote flexibility are extremely important for women. Specifically, I recommend investing in lighter weights (ideally with Velcro straps for ankles and wrists), jump ropes, mini-trampolines, as well as regular weight training, yoga or Pilates, walking and outdoor play. Gentle and fun physical activities suitable for older ages include swimming and dancing.
It is essential that you enjoy the movement, because it is the only way to keep you going. More important than the impact destruction of the body on the marathon is a regular 20 to 30 minutes a day, which you can supplement with a longer hike, cross-country skiing, cycling or skating every week.
Regular sport will help you maintain a healthy weight, improve flexibility and stamina, relieve stress, reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease, maintain desirable blood sugar and blood pressure levels and improve your mood.
Good mood
It's true that a comedy or joke will make most people laugh, but there's more to a good mood - it's caused by a sense of contentment and an activity that we enjoy and find pleasurable. I'm sure each woman has her own individual list of what she enjoys and what makes her feel good.
For me alone, being outdoors, reading books, getting the right amount of sleep (neither too little nor too much is beneficial), exercise, a good movie, meeting friends and walking the dog will improve my mood.
Prevention of possible health problems
Osteoporosis
- For bone health, we need regular and proper exercise. For this, exercise with weight training is the best, but a fitness studio is not necessary, wrist weights and regular home workouts or walks with weights are sufficient.
- A healthy diet with a variety of minerals and vitamins is important because bone health depends on a synergy of many nutrients, not a simplistic equation milk = strong bones, as the dairy industry would have us believe.
- An essential vitamin for calcium storage in the bones is K2, found in fermented foods.
- The best sources of most of the minerals you need are green leafy vegetables, whole grain cereals, sour dairy products and nuts.
- Limit as much as possible foods that deplete the body of nutrients - sugar, excess salt, soft drinks and highly processed foods.
Menopause
- Menopause or transition is, according to modern medicine, the period when fertility permanently ceases. Medicine offers a range of drugs to deal with its manifestations, just as the cosmetic industry offers us heaps of „necessary“ products to mask the natural signs of ageing.
- In many traditional cultures, however, menopause is considered to be a time of one of a woman's fundamental transformations, a time for calming and attuning to one's inner life and to nature, a time to open oneself to greater knowledge.
The transition is celebrated and valued.
- Changes associated with a woman's natural cycle are not manifestations of terrible. However, they are major milestones in women's lives that I believe have been exploited by the medical and pharmaceutical industries, and so many women today see them as unpleasant manifestations that need to be treated instead of an opportunity to learn about and feel their own bodies.
- Very interesting are the results of a survey which found that in the USA up to 70 % women suffer from menopause-related hot flashes, while in neighbouring Canada it is only 30 % and in Japan only 9 %. So the question is whether hot flashes affect women very unevenly in different countries or are just perceived and interpreted differently. Because simply labelling a phenomenon as a health problem or even classifying it as a disease can lead to negative expectations and evaluations.
- For a positive attitude, I recommend enjoying the practical benefits of life after transition, such as enjoying your sex life without fear of unplanned conception.
- I recommend to think about the meaning of transformations. And in the case of difficult accompanying manifestations, try to solve them primarily by natural means. Regular exercise, relaxation exercises and techniques, hormonal yoga, herbs including aromatherapy, nutritional supplements and complementary therapies are the best.
Weight gain
- From about the age of 30 onwards, the body's energy needs slowly but surely decrease (with the exception of periods like pregnancy, of course), which practically means that a lower energy intake is enough to maintain the same weight.
- Another reason for the surprising weight gain may be the increasing proportion of adipose tissue at the expense of muscle (especially if you do not have physical exercise) and, of course, also hormonal changes associated with the transition.
- Still, there is no point in starving or dieting, both of which only lead to a further reduction in energy consumption of the body, which goes on an austerity cycle.
- The question is whether the weight gain in some women is due to the intake of a diet that, although considered healthy, is not suitable for the constitutional type.
Memory support
- The brain needs to be trained in exactly the same way as the muscles. What doesn't get used, dies.
- I recommend playing board games (such as chess) or doing crossword puzzles regularly.
- Reading or listening to books in foreign languages also trains our memory.
- Starting your studies is also ideal, whether you want to continue in your field or learn something completely new. For example, if you usually work with computers, take an interest in growing home-grown herbs in your spare time. And if you work more outdoors, start learning how to create websites...
Ensuring all vitamins and minerals
- The key is long-term intake of real food.
- In times of increased stress and debilitation, the diet described above can be supplemented with a balanced mixture of vitamins and minerals, but it is best to target the individual nutrients needed.
Therapy of health problems
- Unless it is an acute problem (poisoning, being run over by a car), I recommend that you calm down and think about what your body is trying to tell you before you start going to doctors' offices. A large number of health problems, such as high temperature, skin eruptions, indigestion or headaches, are actually defensive reactions of the body that should not be suppressed. But conventional medicine usually recommends the opposite.
- Rather, observe yourself and write down what is happening to you. Think about why this is so, and take advantage of natural therapies to support the body - as opposed to conventional drugs, which usually only suppress symptoms.
- Specifically, I can recommend, for example, the use of Bach therapy, herbs or aromatherapy.
- In the case of more serious problems, it is of course best to consult a doctor who also deals with complementary methods.
This article was published with the kind permission of of the magazine Sphere
casopis-sfera.cz / gnews.cz-HeK
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