Yoga for weight loss and menopause

You’re turning 50 and want to look as good as your favorite celebrity? Well, find $20 million to support your personal nutritionist, chef, trainer, and stylist habits, and you will be so kept up with the Joneses you will be the Joneses. Get back to reality, would you really want that anyway? Yeah, me too, but for those of us not having the fat massaged out of us, there are some popular things you can do at home to avoid putting on pounds while menopause approaches.

At this time in your life, you’re starting to slow down. Your metabolism that used to save you every holiday season is on its ninth life. Your estrogen levels are decreasing, which messes with basically every other process in your body and causes some unpleasant changes. Weight gain is difficult for women to deal with. It is not completely inevitable, though. If you are looking for a workout that is not only physically beneficial, but also mentally, you may want to consider yoga for weight loss.

You may be trying to reconcile your notion of yoga (leisurely stretching and yawning) with losing weight. You’ve never been to yoga class, have you? If you have, you know that there isn’t anything easy about it. For one, there are many different types of yoga. Kundalini Yoga, for instance, is concerned with living in godly consciousness and enlightenment, awakening chakras, and discovering inward bliss. And it makes you sweat. Speaking of sweat, some classes are performed in small rooms with heaters ablaze to induce extra expulsion of toxins.

Though yoga is a very complex and ancient practice, and cannot expect to be mastered after reading less than 1,000 words about it, below are two poses to try at home that target your abdomen, where for menopausal women, food starts to more literally stick to your ribs.

Work your abs

Utkatasana (Chair Pose)

• Start standing up-right in Tadasana (Mountain Pose), arms perpendicular to the floor
• Exhale and bend your knees, try to keep your thighs nearly as parallel to the floor as possible. Knees over the feet, torso slightly forward over the thighs to form a right angle.
• Tuck your shoulder blades in and lift your arms to the sky. Keep your back long, push your tailbone downward.
• Hold for 30 seconds or one minute if you can, then straighten your knees and inhale. Return to mountain pose and exhale.

Bitilasana (Cow Pose)

• Begin in a tabletop position, on all fours, hands directly below shoulders, knees below the hips. Center your eyes on the floor.
• Inhale, lift your rear and chest to the ceiling (think cow) and let your belly sink. Raise your head to look straight in front of you.
• Exhale. Return to tabletop. Repeat 10 or 20 times.

If you are interested in learning more about yoga, it is worth the money to enroll in a yoga class. You don’t even have to buy a mat, though they are relatively inexpensive costing around $15. Often the instructor will let you pay class to class before committing to a series. Classes are typically one hour long, with 40 minutes of practice (posing), followed by 20 minutes of meditation. Also, classes are a great motivation for maintaining your weight-loss regimen and your waistline! For more information about weight gain treatments in menopause follow this link.

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