No Miracles
There’s an uncomfortable truth about perimenopause and menopause — and about growing older in general. We’ve always known what’s good for us, we just got away with it for a long time — and we can’t get away with it any longer.

There are no miracle menopause diets. There are foods that contain phyto-oestrogens, molecules in plants that are thought to bind to oestrogen receptors. There’s very little evidence that these actually change our menopause symptoms. And even if they did we’d have to eat ridiculous amounts of them.

There are suggestions that Japanese diets, for example, help with menopause — but it’s hard to separate that from other aspects of Japanese culture, which views menopause very differently.

Plants!
So what does help? Firstly plants! As many different ones as possible. They’re full of essential vitamins and minerals and fibre — including magnesium which sits at the heart of every single green chlorophyll molecule. You can’t have too many plants in your diet — and a plant based diet is a great idea.

Fibre
One of the reasons plants are so great, is because you need the fibre. Constipation is a common problem. Our muscles can struggle in perimenopause and menopause — and the bowel is a muscle too. Fibre also helps us feel full when we’re trying to deal with menopausal weight gain.

Protein
However it’s also important to make sure you have enough protein. We often lose bone density and muscle mass. We’ll talk about exercise next week which is crucial — but we need to support that by eating plenty of protein which our bodies need to build new muscle and bone. If you are reliant on plant protein you will need to select your protein sources very carefully and may need to consider supplementing your diet to make sure you get all the essential amino acids.

Protein also helps us feel full and helps us manage our food intake. We may find ourselves more susceptible to sugar rushes. We often don’t manage our blood sugar levels as well as we did — some of us may even find ourselves pre-diabetic or dealing with Type 2 diabetes. Sugar fluctuations cause fatigue. Our brains are already struggling with glucose metabolism. Surges and drops in blood glucose level make all those brain symptoms worse. They also make managing our weight harder.

Sugar
I’m not going to tell anyone never to eat sugar. Banning food stuffs just makes us want them all the more. However there’s no doubt that the more we eat sugars the more we crave them. I am going to tell you to be sensible with sugar. Keep it for occasional treats.

And there’s more!
And just in case this is all sounding just too boring, here’s something else to consider. If you’re struggling with hot flushes it’s very likely that alcohol, caffeine and spicy food will make them worse. Again, don’t make yourself miserable, but do keep a lid on your intake, especially later on in the day.

Being sensible about caffeine and alcohol is also important if we struggle with sleep, which many of us do around perimenopause and menopause (we’ll talk more about sleep in another issue). I also find that I sleep better if I don’t eat late at night.

Keeping it simple
A good variety of plants

Plenty of protein

Plenty of fibre

Be sensible with sugar

Be sensible with caffeine and alcohol and spicy food.

A thought about allergies and intolerances
Many of us suffer from digestive issues and food intolerances at this time of life. These can be many and varied. There’s no evidence that either gluten or diary products are bad for us if we’re not intolerant. In fact they’re important sources of protein, especially if we’re vegetarian or vegan.

So, it’s important not to make assumptions, but to use a systematic way of investigating your food issues. There are a few different ways of carrying out an exclusion diet — many available online but if you can I’d recommend the support of a dietician.

It may be that FODMAPS become a problem. FODMAPS are a whole class of mostly plant based carbohydrates that can become difficult to digest, absorb and are very fermentable. I’m sure you can imagine what that means in your gut.

The trouble is cutting out FODMAPS is really hard. There are so many of them, and if you’re not intolerant to them they’re really good for you. It’s hard to have a healthy diet without them — and if you do it should only be temporary so that you can slowly reintroduce the different classes of FODMAP and find which are troublesome.

I really would not recommend trying this without the support of a dietician. If you do want to find out more check out Monash University’s FODMAP website. They’re the people that have done this research — the horse’s mouth if you like.

If you do turn out to have a FODMAP problem you’ll have to work hard to balance avoiding those food sources with eating as many fruit and vegetables as we can.

The rest of us would do well to get chomping on as many plants as we can!