MENOPAUSE: IT'S ABOUT BALANCE
The medical community is quickly evolving its understanding of menopause. Following the abrupt early halt to the HRT portion of the Women's Health Initiative last July due to findings that Hormone Replacement Therapy's risks outweighed its benefits headlines now read "Menopause is not a disease but a normal part of life." Hormone "replacement" therapy (HRT) has become simply hormone "therapy" (HT) in recognition of the fact that replacing estrogen is not natural and brings dangerous side-effects rather than the fountain of youth once touted.
Shocking and novel as these concepts may be to today's medical community they are nothing new to Maharishi Ayurveda a consciousness-based natural medical system from ancient India. For over 5000 years Ayurveda has acknowledged menopause as a natural transition not a mistake of Mother Nature's that requires hormone replacement therapy. Maharishi Ayurveda reassures us that menopause can be health-promoting spiritually-transforming and free of troublesome symptoms.
Experts today are affirming this positive view of menopause stating that it is not natural to get weak bones heart disease and rapid aging after menopause. Rather osteoporosis heart disease and other chronic health problems develop over a lifetime resulting largely from poor diet stress and lack of physical exercise. And hormone replacement therapy (HRT ) once heavily promoted as the medical solution to these problems is no longer recommended for their treatment or prevention.
Menopause: A "Balance Deficiency"
What is recommended for the prevention of major health problems after menopause is a healthy lifestyle. And according to Ayurveda healthy living is also the best way to ease symptoms of the menopause transition itself. How balanced or overall healthy you and your lifestyle are when you reach menopause largely determines how smooth your transition will be. If you are "burning the candle at both ends" in your 30's and early 40's you are more likely to have mood swings sleep problems and troublesome hot flashes when your hormones start to change. Whereas if you are have healthy lifestyle habits and are managing your stress effectively you are likely to breeze through menopause without any major problems.
Health problems at menopause represent imbalances in the body that were already growing in the body and are unmasked by the stress of shifting hormones. Menopause symptoms are Nature's wake-up call to let you know you need to start paying more attention to your health. Age forty-five to fifty-five is a critical decade according to Ayurveda. It provides the foundation on which your later health is laid. Just like putting money in your IRA timely investing in your health can dramatically increase your "yield" of healthy years at midlife and beyond. Particularly if you have not been taking care of yourself in your 30's and 40's making lifestyle changes now is critical to ensuring that you age gracefully without the burden of chronic health problems.
What You Can Do Now to Get "In Balance"
While eating a healthy diet and getting enough exercise provides the foundation of good health for everyone each woman's menopause experience is unique. Symptoms vary from woman to woman. Knowing precisely how your body is out of balance can guide you in selecting the key lifestyle changes you should make to relieve your symptoms. Ayurveda describes that the type of symptoms you have depends upon which bodily principle or dosha is "out of balance" in your mind/body system.
There are three bodily principles: movement and flow (vata or airy) heat and metabolism (pitta or firey) and bodily substance (kapha or earthy.) And there are three basic types of imbalances relating to each of the three doshas. Easing your menopause transition can be as simple as "reading" your dosha symptoms and taking measures to get your doshas back in balance. The following symptoms and lifestyle prescriptions are indicated for each of the three dosha ...
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