Menopause, Stretching, and Yoga: What Happens to Your Ligaments on the Inside

Ah, yes. The most taboo word in the woman's (or men's) language, the all-important menopause. Women dread it, men fear it, and our bodies seem to take over us and become a whole other person. A young person gets told their entire life from older women "just wait till you hit menopause", but what really goes on inside your body to where things change like this, and we have to use this phrase? Especially when it comes to flexibility, balance, and overall mobility. We know menopause changes our bodies, but many people don't know what is going inside your muscles, ligaments and tissue for all of these changes to occur, apart from just hormones being all over the place. So, let's dive in.

Today I want to focus on ligaments, water, and flexibility/stretching. As you age, you start to lose water, women know this but don't think about you are losing water everywhere. This includes your muscles and ligaments, not just skin and "down there." Muscles shrink as we age but ligaments shorten and become tighter, pulling all of your joints in closer causing stiffness and inflammation. The outside of your skin becomes looser but the inside of your body becomes tighter.

How do we fix this and why does it matter? Well, you know how you should drink at least eight cups of water a day? That is how we fix the inside of a menopausal woman. You see when your ligaments get shorter and tighter, they require water to spring back the elasticity in them. Kind of like a weird long sponge. Your ligaments never "lost" any amount of space, you just started drinking less as you got older. Dehydration is one of the most common concerns for older people in general. But simply drinking enough water everyday would fix a lot of mobility, movement, and flexibility concerns into the later years of life.

Take your hip socket joints for example, the side of your hips is where a lot of people have stiffness. It can be caused by sitting too much but more than likely it is this: Many joints and ligaments meet at this one hip socket joint on the side, like a stop at a major highway. When you sit or stretch your hips, you are putting pressure on those ligaments, forcing them to stretch. That is the good part, you want to do that. The bad part is if you don't have enough water in your system, then the stretching is useless. When you put the pressure on your hips, water is supposed to encompass the socket joint and distribute all around your hips. That is what give you the relief you feel when you stretch. When you don't have enough water, then nothing gets distributed, and you end up feeling a burn and pain when you stretch rather than relief. This is why water is the KEY factor in practicing flexibility. It is not going to yoga six times a week, it is stretching along WITH adequate water so your joints can move with ease.

I want you to stretch as you age, that is why every doctor, physical therapist, and personal trainer wants you to keep moving or suggests a yoga class. But hydrating before and after the class will be the key to a successful routine and a successful body as you move through menopause and the years after.

I will have a workshop soon about this topic in more detail coming soon so be on the lookout for that!