Can You Prevent Menopause Belly
There are also preventive steps you can take to limit how much menopause affects your body shape. Keep in mind that genetics and your prior health history play a role in how menopause affects your body, so these steps might not completely prevent some menopause belly bulge.
- Maintain an active lifestyle. If you are able to be active 3 to 4 times per week, consistently elevate your heart rate, and/or participate in strength training, you may find that you experience fewer menopausal symptoms as your estrogen levels decline.
- Consider quitting smoking. If you smoke and have put off quitting in the past, menopause is a great time to reconsider doing it. As you age, the health effects of smoking continue to increase. If you quit smoking, you may find you have higher energy levels and are more motivated to take care of your body.
- Talk with a doctor about your specific health concerns.Menopause is typically an indicator that youre going to need to take care of your body a little differently and that you may have different health concerns going forward. Adjust your mindset to steward your body as well as you can during the years to come.
Heres To Menopause Bloating Relief
While a little extra intestinal gas may not be detrimental to your health, it can sure disrupt your working and social life. If youre dealing with digestive issues, check with a doc, consider keeping a food journal to help you track triggers, and try to maintain a sense of humor. And maybe get a dog. You can always blame it on the dog.
Have you experienced increased gas or bloat during this time of your life? What did you do to fix it, or did it improve over time? As ever, wed love for you to share your experience with the community. Leave us a comment below, or talk to us on our or in Midlife & Menopause Solutions, our closed Facebook group.
What Can Cause Bloating After Menopause
Unfortunately bloating is not only a concern during menopause years but can continue to get worse as you age, even after your hormones have had time to stabilize. While diet and lifestyle can still cause bloating issues after menopause, there are other things that may be the culprit for your bloating.
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How K Health Can Help
Find out whats causing your pelvic pain. Did you know you can get affordable primary care with the K Health app? Download K to check your symptoms, explore conditions and treatments, and if needed text with a doctor in minutes. K Healths AI-powered app is HIPAA compliant and based on 20 years of clinical data.
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Prevent Bloating With Menopausal Probiotic Supplements
Made especially for menopausal women, Menolabs’ complete probiotic supplements can help reduce gas production and eliminate chronic bloating.
Among its doctor-formulated probiotic ingredients, Menolabs Menofit also contains lactobacillus Plantarum, a probiotic ingredient that improves sugar metabolism. This is good news for menopausal women whose digestive systems have a hard time digesting natural sugars more than usual. Improved sugar metabolism is a step further to eliminating chronic bloating.
Menolabs Menofit contains 100 percent natural ingredients and is dairy-free to suit menopausal women who are also lactose intolerant. Instead, Menolabs is packed with complete probiotic ingredients to truly boost metabolism and help maintain a healthy gut, bloat-free, and gas-free.
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Try Peppermint Or Ginger Tea With Meals
For many women suffering from perimenopausal bloating, the worst symptoms can occur after meals. Whether its slower digestion or increased food sensitivities, the tummy and digestive tract can get inflamed and bloated after meals. Try drinking peppermint or ginger tea after meals to see if that helps reduce the bloated feeling.
What Bloating Feels Like
Bloating related to hormonal changes such as during perimenopause or menopause most often is related to a feeling in the stomach. Many women complain that hormonal or perimenopause bloating feels as if the stomach is hard, puffy, or filled with air.
Bloating can also feel uncomfortable in other parts of the body, including the face, ankles, and hands. Bloating in any area is uncomfortable and can reduce ones quality of life and self-confidence.
The natural bloating remedies included in this article may be effective in helping with symptoms of fullness in the abdomen. But, of course, please be sure to check with your doctor if the bloating doesnt improve after a few weeks.
And, try to avoid over-the-counter medications including laxatives which are not safe for long-term use.
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How Are Diarrhea And Incontinence Related To Menopause
When progesterone levels decrease associated with menopause you may experience an increase in your bowel activity meaning food may move through your GI tract more quickly resulting in diarrhea, increased gas, and bloating.
Post-menopausal women may be more inclined to experience incontinence, diarrhea, and constipation due to pelvic floor dysfunction, and a weakened pelvic floor. Your pelvic floor, or the muscles, ligaments, connective tissues, and nerves that support the bladder, uterus, cervix, vagina, and rectum, and hold these structures in place and help them to function, plays an important role in bowel movements.
Your pelvic floor muscles stretch from your tailbone in the back to your pubic bone up front, and from one hip to the other side to side. They move up and down like a trampoline supporting your internal organs.
Normally, when you go to the bathroom your body tightens and relaxes its pelvic floor muscles in a coordinated fashion. When you have pelvic floor dysfunction, your body keeps tightening these muscles instead of relaxing them when it should.
Women are at increased risk for a weakened pelvic floor as a result of pregnancy and childbirth. Pelvic Floor Dysfunction is also more common with age. Properly diagnosing and treating pelvic floor dysfunction is crucial to managing symptoms of diarrhea, constipation and incontinence in affected patients.
How To Calm Your Gut During Menopause
Menopause is a significant event in every womanâs life and can be both physically and mentally taxing on your well-being. The first step to soothing gut symptoms is to speak openly and honestly with your healthcare provider so that they can help guide you through this new chapter of your life and advise on appropriate treatments or management tools.
In addition to speaking to your doctor, there are some simple at-home remedies you can try to manage menopause-related gut symptoms, such as:
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Hot Flashes During Perimenopause
Most women dont expect to have hot flashes until , so it can be a big surprise when they show up earlier, during perimenopause. Hot flashes sometimes called hot flushes and given the scientific name of vasomotor symptoms are the most commonly reported symptom of perimenopause. Theyre also a regular feature of sudden menopause due to surgery or treatment with certain medications, such as chemotherapy drugs.
Hot flashes tend to come on rapidly and can last from one to five minutes. They range in severity from a fleeting sense of warmth to a feeling of being consumed by fire from the inside out. A major hot flash can induce facial and upper-body flushing, sweating, chills, and sometimes confusion. Having one of these at an inconvenient time can be quite disconcerting. Hot flash frequency varies widely. Some women have a few over the course of a week others may experience 10 or more in the daytime, plus some at night.
Most American women have hot flashes around the time of menopause, but studies of other cultures suggest this experience is not universal. Far fewer Japanese, Korean, and Southeast Asian women report having hot flashes. In Mexicos Yucatan peninsula, women appear not to have any at all. These differences may reflect cultural variations in perceptions, semantics, and lifestyle factors, such as diet.
Gastrointestinal Symptoms And Menopause
The natural process of menopause provides another model for addressing the question of whether declining or low levels of estrogen and progesterone play a role in abdominal pain/discomfort symptoms. However, the transition to menopause is highly variable from woman to woman. Fluctuations occur in hypothalamus , pituitary , and ovarian hormone levels in addition to a conversion from ovarian E2 production to adrenal estrogen production. Despite these well-established physiological changes, little is known about the impact of the menopause transition on FBDs including IBS.
Scatterplots of percent of days when gastrointestinal pain/discomfort, somatic, and anxiety/depression symptoms were rated as moderate to severe in men and women with irritable bowel syndrome. Reprinted with permission.
In clinical studies of IBS, information on menopause status or HRT use is often not described. Women who have experienced hysterectomy or ovariectomy may be excluded from studies of patients with IBS. One study utilizing a large American health maintenance organization database found an ~2-fold higher rate of hysterectomy in women with IBS . Similarly, a study in the United Kingdom noted a higher rate of hysterectomy in women with IBS . However, another more recent survey conducted in the community failed to find higher rates of hysterectomy in white and African American women with IBS.
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Menopause Upset Stomach And Anxiety Stress And Tension Theyre Linked
Oestrogen keeps the stress hormone cortisol in check when this sex hormone runs low during the menopause, blood pressure rises and your digestion slows down. Without oestrogen’s calming effect, adrenaline levels can rise, which switches off digestive functioning. The result: stomach pains, acid reflux, abdominal cramps, constipation, bloating and sluggish bowel.
Increased anxiety is a very common symptom of the menopause, as is a tendency to get flustered during stressful or high-pressure situations. You may get a sense or feeling that you just arent able to cope as well as you used to be able to.
Tension can leave your stomach feeling in knots.
Theres an inextricable link between the gut and the brain, so if youve got a menopause upset stomach, its certainly worth checking in on your tension levels. Again, this is down to hormones.
Hot flushes, a quintessential menopausal symptom, can also sometimes feel quite overwhelming. For many women, these progress into panic attacks. The direct link between our mind and our tummy means that any worries, stress or anxiety are mirrored in your stomach, with muscles in the gut becoming tense.
Fortunately, there are always steps we can take to look after our mental health when lifes stressful situations threaten to get the better of us.
Consider exploring a course of cognitive behavioural therapy , joining up with a local meditation group or treating yourself to regular relaxation massages perhaps even all of these!
Pain Sensitivity And Pregnancy
In addition to ovariectomy, pregnancy is another model with which to examine the role of ovarian hormones in modulating pain. Pregnancy is a time of elevated ovarian hormone levels as well as opioid-mediated antinociception. Cogan and Spinnato found that somatic pain thresholds were elevated in 6 pregnant women at the end of their third trimester compared with 6 women who were not pregnant . Gintzler and Liu, in a series of experiments using a physiological pregnancy rat model, observed a 60% increase in hypogastric nerve impulse propagation as well as activation of spinal and opioid systems and 2-noradrenergic pathways. Hypogastric neurectomy abolishes pregnancy-related antinociception, likely through loss of augmented 2-noradrenergic tone.
Considerable preclinical and clinical evidence is consistent with the concept that female sex hormones , in interaction with neuroendocrine systems co-opted from attachment/caregiving processes , may underlie biobehavioral sex differences in response to stress.,
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Dietary Changes May Help Reduce Belly Bloat
Dietary changes are usually among the first activities recommended to people suffering from bloating since a wide variety of different foods can cause it. To determine what’s causing your belly bloat, note which foods you ate near an occasion when bloating occurred, and try eliminating those foods to see if it subsides. Foods that can cause bloating include high-fat or fried foods or very-high-fiber foods such as bran-type breakfast cereals. Another culprit can be dairy products, if you’re lactose-intolerant. The list of food that may induce bloating also includes starchy foods, carbonated beverages, chewing gum, and certain vegetables, such as onions, broccoli, beans, cabbage, turnips and Brussels sprouts. Foods containing fructose or the sugar alcohol sorbitol can also cause bloating in some people.
Hormone Replacement Treatment May Help Menopausal Bloating
If youre bloating during menopause, hormone therapy may be able to help relieve your symptoms. While menopausal bloating is often confused with other conditions like irritable bowel syndrome, a common cause is simply hormone changes that naturally occur during perimenopause, menopause, and post-menopause. If you have bloating due to these hormone changes, hormone replacement treatment may help reduce bloating.
The aim of hormone replacement treatment is to help bring hormone levels up to healthy ranges and to help create hormonal balance. Our provider may recommend hormone imbalance treatment if your hormone levels are low or if you have too much of a hormone. Often, this may cause other symptoms in addition to bloating, such as:
- Mood changes
- Anxiety
- Low libido
If you and your doctor decide to start hormone replacement treatment, our team offers hormone injections for fast, convenient, and advanced hormone care. Injections can help you absorb the hormones better and allow more dosage control so we can adjust your dosage to suit your needs and body.
Hormone therapy from our team also means regular monitoring to help us fine-tune your dosage. This also helps us keep track of how youre responding to treatment and evaluate your overall health. Hormone care from our team means routine checks of your hormone levels to help personalize your treatment plan.
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Hormones And Fluid Retention
The hormones progesterone and estrogen play a significant role in fluid retention. When estrogen levels are elevated, women tend to retain more water than usual. This is why bloating is common in the days leading up to a womans menstrual cycle more estrogen means more water retention. During menopause, estrogen levels erratically fluctuate and bloating becomes more chronic. Bloating during menopause can really take off if and when estrogen dominance sets in due to hormonal imbalance. Also, progesterone is a natural diuretic, so when progesterone levels are below where they should be, women may also experience fluid retention and bloating.
What Are The Most Commonly Asked Questions About Menopause
If you were to look at the many online questions about menopause symptoms you would find quite a few along these lines: Can perimenopause cause water retention? And, can hormones cause gas and bloating?
The answer is yes in fact bloating is frequently experienced during both perimenopause and menopause.
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Decrease The Size Of Your Meals
Instead of eating three big meals, consider 3 smaller meals and two or three snacks thoughout the day. The smaller amount of food going through your digestive tract may help reduce bloating after meals.
You may also want to incorporate a digestive enzyme with your meals to help with digestion. I like the Pure Encapsulations Digestive Enzymes.
Menopause Doesnt Have To Be Difficult
Hot flashes, weight gain, bloating, fatigue and joint pain
Now, add all these 5 symptoms together and most ladies simply lose their will to do anything because of the sheer discomfort.
But we are happy to say we have effectively created supplements to manage all of it and over 51,537 ladies worldwide are gliding through menopause thanks to them.
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Take A Collagen Supplement
Many people know of collagen as the hair, skin, and nail-loving supplement that can essentially turn back the clock to help you look and feel years younger. While this is true, taking a collagen supplement, like SkinnyFit Super Youth, also has incredible gut health benefits! Studies show that collagen is an essential biological process in repairing the intestinal lining. .
Lifestyle Changes Combined With Hormone Replacement Treatment
However, because we take a broad approach to healthcare, we may recommend combining hormone replacement treatment and lifestyle changes as part of your custom treatment plan. Depending on your specific circumstances, there are several changes you may be able to make to help reduce bloating. We understand that there are many factors that can influence bloating, which is why we often recommend making some healthy changes when youre experiencing symptoms. Some of the changes we may suggest include:
- Drinking plenty of water
- Fatty foods
Therefore, if youve been experiencing chronic bloating, its important to talk to a physician about your symptoms to help you start feeling better.
At HerKare, we provide advanced, compassionate womens healthcare. Whether youre experiencing uncomfortable menopause symptoms or need a general wellness checkup, our team is here to listen and provide a warm, friendly environment where you feel comfortable to discuss all your health concerns. Our goal is to help you feel your best and help you remain healthy. Therefore, we work with you to find solutions tailored to your needs and your lifestyle. Book an appointment today and lets talk about your health and wellbeing. We are here for you.
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Increase Your Water Intake
Staying hydrated is really important for digestive health. Water helps move things along and can help prevent constipation, especially if your digestion or metabolism slows down during perimenopause or menopause.
There isnt one ideal amount of water to drink per day, but you should monitor the color of your urine. If it is dark yellow, then you are likely not drinking enough water or fluids .
If you arent a big fan of drinking plain water, try an infused water like my Cucumber Ginger Lemon Water. Skip the diet colas as they contain artificial sweeteners.