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4 Reasons Why Fibre is your Friend During Menopause

Joanne Fazel • May 18, 2022

The right nutrition is crucial for menopause health - here are 4 reasons why you should make fibre your friend during the menopause transition


We’ve all seen the adverts for Bran Flakes haven’t we? Urging us to eat a high-fibre breakfast so that we can feel great (and poop more!).

But do you understand why fibre is essential for our bodies or why it’s especially important during the menopause?

Let’s first explain a little bit about fibre. When we eat, our digestive system breaks down the food in order to release the nutrients we need to function. However, fibre are the parts of the food which cannot be broken down by the body.  

And this is a good thing.  

You see fibre comes in 2 forms, both of which have health benefits.

The first is Soluble Fibre. This type of fibre can be dissolved in water and the fluids within the gastrointestinal system to form a gel-like substance. This slows down our digestion and also helps to feed our good gut bacteria.

The second is Insoluble Fibre. This type of fibre cannot be digested and doesn’t dissolve in water so it remains in the same state, helping to bulk out your stools (that’s poo to you and me!) and keep you regular.

So, let’s take a deeper look at how those characteristics of fibre can actually be of big benefit to menopause health.

1. It helps with your menopause hormone balance

Yes, fibre is like that hard-working waste disposal officer cleaning up the rubbish and dumping it out of the body. Making sure that your body is regularly getting rid of the waste products rather than being in a state of constipation means that used and excess hormones such as oestrogen are expelled from the body rather than having time to be reabsorbed through the gut lining and back into the blood stream.

When we go through perimenopause our sex hormones, oestrogen and progesterone are in a state of flux and oestrogen can often fluctuate wildly, creating a state of oestrogen dominance which can cause a whole host of unpleasant symptoms.
   
We certainly don’t want to be adding to the imbalance by reabsorbing hormones back into the blood stream that we no longer need.

2. It helps with menopause weight management

You’ve heard me talk before about the importance of keeping your blood sugars balanced during the menopause. When we eat carbohydrates, they are broken down in the gut into glucose, which is the preferred fuel for the body.  

However, if we choose refined carbohydrates (think cakes, biscuits, chocolate, bakery items, white versions of pasta, rice & bread) rather than wholegrains and veggies, they are broken down almost immediately in the gut and release a spike of glucose into the blood.

In turn, our bodies then have to produce a spike of insulin to mop up all that sugar. Some can be used by your cells, but much of it will instead be converted into fat and stored in and around the liver to be used at a later date.  

Because the sugar has been mopped up so quickly it sends a signal that our body has run out of fuel which then in turn signals the adrenal glands to produce a spike of cortisol (our stress hormone). This can then cause us to start craving more food in order to get more fuel – and what type of food does it trick you into wanting? Yep, you guessed it……more refined carbs.

It becomes a vicious circle and all the time your body is laying down the extra sugar as fat. This is one of the main causes for menopause weight gain.

But when you eat enough fibre, it helps to slow down the release of glucose into the blood stream, leading to a more stable blood sugar level throughout the day. That means that you feel full up, the cravings stop and your body uses the fuel rather than storing it.

3. It’s good for your heart health

When we go through menopause, we start to lose the heart protective benefit of oestrogen. Up until menopause women are at lower risk of heart problems than men, and that’s thought to be due to our high oestrogen levels during our fertile years.

However, after menopause women’s risk of heart problems rises and so it’s important that we have strategies to look after our cardiovascular health especially at this time.

We’ve all heard about keeping an eye on our cholesterol levels to keep our heart healthy right? Well, cholesterol is in fact an essential substance in our bodies, we can’t live without it. However, it does come in different forms. LDL cholesterol is often termed ‘bad’ cholesterol and it’s the level of this type that we want to keep low in comparison to HDL cholesterol (or ‘good’ cholesterol).

Fibre may actually help to reduce the level of LDL cholesterol in our body by reducing the absorption into our bloodstream and therefore contribute to menopause heart health.

4. It can improve your menopausal mood swings & brain fog

Have you heard of the gut-brain connection? There’s a reason for that. That’s because our gastrointestinal tract is actually connected to your brain via the Vagus nerve.

Our gut bacteria actually make hormones and neurotransmitters which send signals to the brain, keeping it informed of the situation in our digestive system and whether or not it’s ‘happy’ or ‘distressed’.

Did you know that your ‘good’ gut bacteria produce neurotransmitters such as serotonin, dopamine and GABA which all play a key role in mood?

Given that mood swings, anxiety & overwhelm are common symptoms of menopause, it makes good sense to ensure that we are encouraging the growth of our healthy gut bacteria, and therefore eating enough fibre to keep them well fed and thriving.

So how much fibre should we be aiming for a day?

Ideally, we should be aiming for around 30g a day, or at least 14g per 1000 calories eaten. The average UK woman eats half of that. Did you know that our ancestors, as hunter-gatherers ate around 100g of fibre a day!

What kind of foods should I be eating to get more fibre?

The types of food you want to concentrate on are:

• Wholegrains
• Beans, Lentils & Pulses
• Vegetables & Fruit (particularly cruciferous veg, peas, carrots & sweetcorn (including popcorn), apples, pears, berries, bananas, melon & avocado)
• Nuts & Seeds

Easy ways to up your fibre intake every day

• Leave the skin on fruit & veg
• Add salad to your sandwich
• Add another portion of veg to your lunch and dinner
• Sprinkle nuts or seeds & fruit onto your breakfast cereal
• Choose wholegrain varieties of pasta, rice & bread instead of white versions
• Choose fruit & a small handful of nuts as a mid-afternoon snack
• Swop your refined carb snacks such as crisps & biscuits for oat cakes or wholewheat crackers with hummus or guacamole or a bowl of air-popped popcorn
• Use a nut or seed butter on toast instead of butter and jam
• Add beans, lentils or ground flaxseed to soups, stews, casseroles, curries and sauces
• Use wholemeal flour in baking recipes instead of white flour


I specialise in coaching menopausal women who want to lose weight and regain their energy and mental clarity to make changes to their nutrition & lifestyle habits so that they can get back in control of their bodies, soothe their symptoms and feel more like themselves again.

If you are struggling with menopausal symptoms and would like to have a chat with me personally about your situation and explore how you can take positive action to start feeling better, please book a FREE call with me here.  
 

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