Yoga has become incredibly popular over the last ten years with people of all ages turning to the practice for their exercise, health and wellbeing. For perimenopasual women, yoga also offers an holistic approach to managing and easing symptoms. If you’re not yet 'a yogi' and you’re wondering what all the fuss is about, here are ten reasons why you should be thinking about buying your first yoga mat.
Bust that stress
As well as detoxifying our body every time you step on the mat, yoga helps boost your immune system and improves digestion too. It also calms your mind; helping ease anxiety, depression, and fatigue. During perimenopause, it's a great way to provide relief from rising overwhelm and stress.
Combat exhaustion and fatigue: yoga helps to keep your nervous system in balance and enables the body to rest and recharge through the practice of relaxing and restorative poses. Equally, it can also boost our energy levels too; providing much needed respite from all the changes that our body goes though in perimenopause.
Improve your flexibility
With increased age, reaching that top shelf or bending down to pick up things off the floor will eventually begin to challenge you. However, with a regular yoga practice, the body begins to loosen and lengthen, and over time you will enjoy improved flexibility and range of motion. Also, in perimenopause, our joints begin to stiffen due to the loss of estrogen, so yoga is the perfect way to loosen them.
Be present
Yoga will help focus your mind and bring you to the present. With increased awareness of your body and breathing, you will begin to see improvements in your overall wellbeing as you stress less about past and future events. Anxiety and Brain Fog are common symptoms in perimenopause and yoga helps bring a sense of stillness and calm to an over anxious and cluttered mind.
Stand tall
Over time, yoga will improve your body alignment that will result in better posture and a flatter tummy as you slouch less. We also have yoga to thank for relieving back pain, sore necks, and many other common muscle problems.
Perfect peace
As well as the mental and physical benefits, yoga and meditation will help you connect with the deeper and more spiritual side of yourself; giving you long lasting contentment and happiness.
Flex those muscles
Depending on the type of yoga you practice, most yoga postures are designed to gently use every muscle in the body; increasing your overall strength and body tone. Peri/menopause is also the time for paying attention to our bone health as they begin to deteriorate and put us at risk of osteoporosis in post-menopause. Fortunately, yoga is great for building and maintaining bone density.
Bone density
Begin to strengthen your bones now to ward off osteoporosis that can occur post-menopause. As we lose estrogen in perimenopause, we also lose calcium from our bones. Yoga is the perfect exercise for all-round strengthening of our joints and bones. Simply standing on one leg will help increase your bone density.
Pain relief
Yoga and meditation are proven to offer pain relief for many chronic conditions such as cancer, multiple sclerosis, auto-immune diseases and arthritis. In addition, it can help sufferers deal with the mental and emotional side of pain. By boosting your endorphins , you elicit the feel good factor which is so desperately needed during perimenopause.
Boost your Digestive system: through the practice of twisting poses, yoga has the power to help boost your digestive and elimination systems which can become more sluggish during perimenopause. It's also an effective way to squeeze toxins from your system.
Ditch the scales
While a regular practice will get you moving - raising your heart rate and burning off calories - the mental and emotional benefits will inspire you to become more focused and conscious of what’s on your plate and also to accept some of the changes in your body at this stage of life.
Why not join our Facebook group Yoga for Peri/Menopause and enjoy free tips, advice, yoga sequences, classes and meet other like-minded women who are undergoing the same challenges?
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