By Cam Allen, Midlife Method with Cam Allen®
In postmenopause at 60 and 70, the path for your physical body gets narrower. There is less wiggle room, so a glass of wine, a vacation, or a stressful week takes longer to bounce back from.
At the very same time, your view of health gets wider. Your feelings, your thoughts, and your energy talk to your physical body all day long, and research links a positive view of aging to about 7.5 more years of life.
A listener sent me the best question. She had been listening to the belly fat series, and she wanted to know if anything changes as you get further into postmenopause, at 60 or 70. She was thinking about her long-term plan.
Related: Menopause Belly Fat, Part 2: 3 Hormones Storing Fat in Your Middle https://www.camoyler.com/blog/menopause-belly-fat-hormones
My answer is yes. Something does change. It just might not be what you expect.
I am starting my eighth year postmenopausal, and my view of health looks very different than it did in my 40s. Back then, health was mostly about how I looked. I used CrossFit to carry me through a separation, a divorce, an empty nest, and a remarriage at 52. My physical body carried me through every bit of it. Now I see health as a much bigger picture, with four bodies: physical, mental, emotional, and energetic.
The physical path gets narrower.
That glass of wine is felt for longer than it used to be. As we get older, our bodies hold less water, so the same glass of wine ends up more concentrated in your blood. Vacation eating works the same way. When I come home from a trip, it takes my body longer to get back to normal than it did in my 40s.
So the physical basics still matter, maybe even more. Lift something heavy for you. Eat your protein. Protect your sleep. The path is narrower, so we walk it with more care.
Related: Protein After 50: How Much You Need and How to Get It in Menopause https://www.camoyler.com/blog/protein-after-menopause
Yes, and I watched it happen on a graph.
A couple of years ago I was wearing a continuous glucose monitor. I was working at my computer, and my dog Maverick was barking at me. He was a big mastiff mix with a big bark, and on most days I could shrug it off. That day it got under my skin. I felt frustrated, then kind of angry.
I looked at my monitor, and my blood sugar line shot straight up past my spike line. I had not eaten a thing. I had not moved. All I did was sit at my computer and get frustrated with my dog.
This makes sense when you think about how we were designed. Back in our cave-lady days, if a tiger showed up, your body needed fuel fast to run. Stress tells your liver to release stored sugar into your blood for instant energy. My body could not tell the difference between a tiger and a barking dog. It got me ready to run, and I just sat there.
Related: Blood Sugar After 50: 2 Habits That Lower It Without Meds https://www.camoyler.com/blog/blood-sugar-after-50
At a CrossFit competition in Covington, Kentucky, I hit my personal record on the clean and jerk. Someone snapped a picture of me with the bar locked out overhead, grinning at the judge and asking if it counted. At that same competition, I rubbed my tailbone raw doing sit-ups and did not feel a thing until I got in the shower.
Researchers call this stress-induced analgesia. In the heat of a big moment, your body can turn the pain volume way down so you can keep going. My excitement and focus changed my body chemistry.
A Harvard researcher, Alison Wood Brooks, tested excitement in a karaoke study. Before singing, people said a short phrase out loud, like "I am excited" or "I am anxious." The excited group sang best. In a public speaking study, people who said "I am excited" gave stronger speeches than people who said "I am calm." Nerves and excitement feel almost the same in the body, so it is easier to call that racing heart excitement than to force yourself calm. Next time your heart is pounding before something big, try saying, "I am excited."
Your mental body is all of your thoughts and what you say to yourself. About your body, about getting older, about life.
Some days I look at my legs and see bumps and cellulite, and my energy drops right down. So I go lift. After back squats and deadlifts, I add up every pound my bumpy legs moved that day. Sometimes it comes to thousands of pounds. When I look at my legs again, they still have cellulite. My thought about them has changed, though. Those legs are strong, and they have carried me through life. Same legs, different thought, different energy.
Researchers at Harvard worked with 84 hotel housekeepers who were on their feet all day pushing carts, making beds, and scrubbing tubs. Most of them did not think of their work as exercise. Half of them were told that their work counted as real exercise. Nothing else changed. Four weeks later, that group had lower blood pressure, lower weight, and less body fat. Their thoughts changed, and their bodies followed.
I picture a gobstopper, the candy with all the layers. Your energetic body is the outer layer. It is your life force, and it holds your emotional, mental, and physical bodies inside it.
The question I ask is simple. Do I have the energy to live the life I want to live? Every body feeds that answer. Real food and intentional movement give me more energy. Kind thoughts fill my tank. And underneath it all, I ask myself if I am taking care of myself the way God intended.
For me, it shows up in my physical body first. I feel puffier, my belly is more bloated, and I see it in my face. I believe the physical body lags behind the other three. Your emotions, thoughts, and energy move first, and your physical body shows up later with the bill.
I saw this clearly when I made a reel to celebrate 100 episodes of this podcast. I pulled snapshots of me at the microphone from across those episodes. Beyond the haircuts and curly or straight days, the shape of my face changed a lot. 2024 was a tough year. I was in a car accident with whiplash, I could not lift while I recovered, we moved, and there were hard family things going on. I could see that whole year in my face.
Researchers in Sweden photographed people after a normal night of sleep and again after 31 hours awake. Strangers rated the tired photos as having more swollen eyes, darker circles, droopier mouths, and more wrinkles. They even looked sadder. Same face, one rough stretch, and other people could see it.
This is the simplest way I know to check in. Ask, then pause. Let the first answer bubble up, and listen without arguing with it. That first answer is your best next step.
If naming feelings is new for you, a printed emotion wheel helps. I printed one when I started making podcast thumbnails, because I had to practice naming what I felt.
A Yale researcher, Becca Levy, followed 660 adults age 50 and older for up to 23 years. The people with positive views of aging lived about seven and a half years longer than those who saw aging as decline. That gap was bigger than the years linked to low blood pressure or low cholesterol.
So at 60 and 70, your thoughts about aging belong in your health plan. I think of it like hiking up a mountain. The higher you climb, the narrower the trail gets, and the wider the view. That is what I see ahead at 60 and 70. A narrower physical path and a much bigger view.
Health becomes more than how you look in your jeans. It becomes how you feel, what you think, and whether you have the energy to live the life you want. Menopause keeps inviting us to get to know all of who we are, and to care for all of her.
What is postmenopause?
Postmenopause is the stage of life that begins after you have gone 12 months in a row without a period. Once you are postmenopausal, you stay in this stage for the rest of your life, whether you are 55 or 75.
Does fitness still matter for women over 50 and 60?
Yes, maybe even more. As we age, the body has less wiggle room. Lifting something heavy for you, eating enough protein, and protecting your sleep help you hold on to muscle, steady your blood sugar, and recover well.
Do whatever you need to do to keep your midlife muscles.
Can stress raise your blood sugar without eating?
Yes.
When you feel stress, frustration, or fear, your body tells your liver to release stored sugar so you have quick energy to run. Cam watched her own blood sugar spike on a glucose monitor while sitting still and feeling frustrated, with no food at all.
What does mindset have to do with menopause?
Your thoughts and feelings change your body chemistry.
Research has linked a positive view of aging to about 7.5 more years of life, and a simple change in how people saw their daily work to lower blood pressure and less body fat. A healthy menopause mindset is part of your health plan.
Hear the whole conversation, including the barking dog, the karaoke study, and the mountain trail, on the Midlife Method with Cam Allen® podcast.
Want to work on this together? Apply for 1:1 coaching: https://calendly.com/cam-heymomma/apply
I am a functional health coach, not your doctor. Take anything new to your next appointment and talk it through together.
50% Complete
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.