Watch Your Diet During Menopause

As women get nearer to their menopausal age, the digestive tract becomes less efficient and digestion takes longer. During menopause, your body is going through lots of changes, so you need more amounts of vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals to deal with it. You may be experiencing hot flashes, bloating, water retention, tiredness and depression. A healthy nutritious diet not only minimizes all these health risks, it also reduces the physical and mental stress of menopausal life.

Here are some tips for healthy eating during menopause:

1. Include as many natural foods as possible, in your diet.
2. Drink mineral/bottled water. Cut down your intake of caffeine, alcohol and wine.
3. Increase your daily intake of fruits. Choose bananas, melons and citrus fruits like oranges and lemons. Also include some dry fruits like apricots and figs in your diet.
4. Increase your daily intake of vegetables and salads. Choose vegetables such as yam, dark leafy vegetables like collard greens, kale, spinach, pak choi, broccoli, cabbage, peppers, tomatoes and a variety of other vegetables.
5. Include enough fiber in your diet especially soluble fiber.
6. Add soy foods such as soybeans, calcium-fortified soy milk, soy yogurt and tofu to your daily diet.
7. Cut down on your intake of fried foods, instead boil or bake them.
8. Cut down on white bread/flour, eat more of wholegrain bread, oats, rye, wheatgerm.
9. Eat more of long grain brown rice.
10. Eat less of regular potatoes and more of sweet potatoes and pasta.
11. Add regular helpings of beans and lentils to your diet.
12. Switch from processed cooking oils to unprocessed oils. Choose olive oil, canola, wheatgerm and flaxseed oil.
13. Make fish and oily fish (salmon, mackerel) a regular feature in your diet.
14. Include nuts like Brazils, walnuts, seeds like pumpkin, sunflower, linseeds, dry fruits like apricots and figs in your diet.

Here are some more tips to sail through this difficult period:

1. Exercise and stay active.
2. Sleep for 8 hours every night.
3. Take a walk in the morning.
4. Do not feel bad and depressed. Do not think too much about it, concentrate on something you like doing, watch T.V or go shopping. Go for dinner with your friends and family. You will feel good.

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