As we age, our bones lose strength and density, and we become more prone to fractures and osteoporosis – literally ‘porous bones’. The risk of osteoporosis is greater for post-menopausal women, due to the loss of the bone-protective effects of oestrogen.

Dairy products are often said to be the best foods for strong bones due to their high calcium content, but strong bones need more than just calcium. Sally Duffin, registered nutritional therapist for Vitaminology, the largest online directory for vitamins and supplements, explains that there’s a whole team of nutrients needed to build and maintain bone tissue, including magnesium, zinc, vitamin D, manganese, boron, and vitamin K. 

Sally’s super-five:

1. Sardines

Sardines and other oily fish like salmon and mackerel are rich in vitamin D. Vitamin D regulates calcium and phosphorus absorption in the small intestine and helps promote calcium uptake by bone-building cells. Sardines are packed with tiny soft bones which, if eaten, also supply calcium itself.

2. Collard greens

Dark green vegetables like collard greens, broccoli, and kale are packed with calcium. The green vegetables need calcium as part of their skeletal structure to be able to grow upright -just as we need it in our bones.

3. Nuts and seeds

Almonds, cashews, hazelnuts, Brazil nuts, pumpkin seeds, flaxseeds, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds – nuts and seeds are brimming with the trace minerals our bodies need to build strong bones. These nutrient-dense foods provide zinc, magnesium, and manganese, making them an essential part of any bone-health nutrition plan.

4. Broccoli

As well as being a good plant source of calcium, broccoli gives us magnesium, vitamin C and vitamin K. Vitamin C plays an important role in maintaining the honeycomb matrix structure inside bone tissue that the minerals latch on to. Vitamin K is used to form osteocalcin, a calcium-binding protein needed for bone mineralization.

5. Tofu

Tofu is one of the best vegan sources of calcium and protein, both of which are necessary for strong bones. Soy is also a rich source of isoflavones, a type of phytoestrogen (plant compound with oestrogen-like actions) known to aid bone mineralization and help manage osteoporosis.

There is lots of information on the Vitaminology website, including a library of informative articles and videos across a wide range of healthcare topics, written by our highly experienced and accredited team of registered nutritional therapists. For those seeking nutritional advice, Vitaminology offers in-depth, one-to-one video consultations with our team of registered nutritional therapists.

In January 2023, Vitaminology will be publishing the TOP 100 Vitamins and Supplements selected across multiple categories including joints and bones.

Written by Sally Duffin, Registered Nutritional Therapist for Vitaminology, mBANT and CNHC – Speaker, Author & Writer  

Sally is a writer, author, Registered Nutritional Therapist (MBANT, CNHC) and Fellow of the Health Food Institute, with over 20 years’ experience in natural health.  She runs a private nutrition practice in York, working with a range of clients experiencing digestive issues, perimenopause symptoms, depression, and anxiety.   

Sally loves empowering people to make connections between food, lifestyle habits, and wellbeing.  Her first book, ‘Natural Nutrition for Perimenopause – What to eat to feel good and stay sane’ was published in 2021 to five-star reviews, and she is now planning the next one! 

The post Healthy Bones Without Milk? Yes, of course appeared first on Wellbeing Magazine.

Medically speaking, Osteoporosis is a chronic condition caused due to loss of bone density in humans. It means that when your doctor says you have thin or weak bones, it means you are prone to fractures and injuries. Yes, you read that right!

According to prominent health experts, once your body enters into its 30s, it tends to lose bone mass much faster than it grows a new one. And that’s the prime cause of Osteoporosis.

Reality check! Paying close attention to bone health is an underrated concept. But not anymore!

So, if your doctor diagnoses you with Osteoporosis, then you need to know that it’s high time for you to prioritize your bone health and prevent the condition from worsening. Yes, you can do that! Fortunately, we’ve got some ways that can help in stopping or slowing down your loss of bone mass and deal with Osteoporosis. Keep scrolling to know more.

• Give adequate importance to a healthy lifestyle.

Maintaining a healthy lifestyle can actually prolong the life of your bones. For example, if you need to cut back on drinking alcohol as it is found to be the prominent reason behind bone loss.

In fact, your morning coffee is also affecting your bone health, so you need to limit the caffeine intake too. Also, make sure that you refrain from intake soda as it also promotes bone loss. All these lifestyle habits decrease the blood supply to the bones and limit the production of new bone mass. And that isn’t something you want for your body.

• Medication can restore balance.

Thanks to advancements in medical science, there are a lot of medications and supplements that promote the growth of bone mass in the body. It can also help in restoring balance by remodeling the structure of the bone. There are many osteoporosis medications available that help the bones to catch up on the mass production.

For example, natural compounds such as chondroitin sulfate, which is found in the bone, skin, cornea, and other tissues of the body, play a key role in comforting the elasticity of the bone tissues and promotes the mobility of joints.

• Stretch and exercise to restore coordination

One of the best ways to build strength and promote the growth of bone mass is to incorporate weight-bearing exercises into your fitness routine. You can also incorporate some healthy activities in your daily life, such as take stairs instead of an escalator or walk whenever you get a chance. Apart from this, you can go running, hiking, dancing, and aerobics. Adding exercises to your daily routine will help your bones to move and maintain their health.

Wrapping Up!

So, now that you know how you can combat Osteoporosis and maintain the health of the bones, what else are you waiting for? Use the tips mentioned above and prolong the life of your bones as soon as possible.

The post Osteoporosis Treatment: Here’s how to restore strength into weak bones! appeared first on Wellbeing Magazine.

The PhysicalMind Institute’s Teacher training course “Osteoporosis Awareness” used exercises on the apparatus, which maximized weight bearing and decreased forward flexion. Thus it was just ìa short walkî to incorporate these concepts into new choreography for the Pilates matwork. This means that we are now bending the spine at the ìbra lineî and softening the rib cage rather than crunching the head forward and we are using the deepest abdominal muscles ñ the transversesóto stabilize the spine so that we can stand erect.

A healthy pelvic floor is so important to our overall well-being and fitness, that it is surprising how frequently it is overlooked in traditional exercise. This is yet another reason why Pilates is such a beneficial program – it creates awareness and promotes the well-being of the pelvic floor. Pelvic floor awareness and engagement is a necessary part of performing the Pilates exercises correctly. The pelvic floor performs three very important functions.

1. Supportive pelvic floor function is to keep our internal organs in place. We utilize the pelvic floor every time we cough, laugh or sneeze. Because these actions create internal abdominal pressure, our pelvic floor responds by keeping everything in line. If a healthy pelvic floor is weak, however, the contents of our pelvis (or our internal organs) can prolapse, or fall. Women are prone to the prolapse of their uterus when they are not aware or have not exercised and strengthened their pelvic floor muscles or when the pelvic floor muscles have been damaged.
2. Sphincter: For prevention of incontinence, the pelvic floorís inability to perform this function is a serious problem for millions of people – and generally not talked about because it is an embarrassing topic.
3. Sexual function: pelvic floor muscles can increase sexual stimulation. Women who are aware of their pelvic floors and practice exercising them report having enhanced sexual feeling. As far as the relationship of the pelvic floor to fitness is concerned, it is imperative that the pelvic floor be engaged during exercises. This engagement enables us to lift heavy items more safely, and supports our lower back. Specifically, the pelvic floor muscles, along with the lumbar multifidus, diaphragm, and Transversus Abdominus, form a cylinder, or a support for our lumbar spine.These muscles working together maintain the IAP (Intra Abdominal Pressure) needed to stabilize and release the pressure from our lumbar spine, as well as to support our internal organs as we exert ourselves.

Pelvic Floor awareness is important in Pilates Matwork, but even more necessary in the Standing Series. In the standing series, we use the pelvic floor to focus on our breath, as well as to perform in stabilization role. Pilates and the Pelvic Floor can help people who are incontinent, women who are recovering from pregnancy, people who are having trouble” finding” or engaging their lower abdominal muscles. Old or frail clients can use pelvic floor awareness to perform their abdominal work, as well as people with low back pain, and everyone can use this safely to strengthen their core. Added benefits from these exercises are that you are more resistant to urinary tract infection because of better blood flow. Flat abdominals are also a benefit, since a compromised pelvic floor makes it nearly impossible to attain, due to the shift and prolapse of internal organs.

The pelvic floor muscles interact with other muscles in our body to perform many functions during our exercise as well, such as external hip rotation. Unfortunately, many people are not aware what an integral part the pelvic floor plays in our health, until it has been compromised or damaged. Many factors can damage a healthy pelvic floor; childbirth, surgery (prostetomy for men and hysterectomy for women), postmenopause deficiencies in estrogen, drugs, diseases such as diabetes and multiple sclerosis, as well as smokers cough and excessive body weight. A healthy pelvic floor can help you against these ailments. Standing Pilates is a great and intensive way to train ourselves to engage and become more aware of our pelvic floor and the integral part it plays in our physical well-being. Another attribute of Standing Pilates is that it forces us to use extreme focus. We are forced to focus on how our body moves and reacts in a balancing position. Standing Pilates is a full body exercise in the sense that you will feel everything working to stabilize your body and are more aware of how your body moves and relates to yourself. such as correctly sitting in a chair or bending to pick something up. These moves can be incorporated into improving the way we move our bodies in everyday life. During the last decade we have turned into a nation of flexion addicts. We are sitting at the computer, eating, traveling in cars and planes, eating, watching TV, eating, talking on the phone, and eating. We are sitting, and more accurately, slumping. We are almost always inclined forward even if we are doing nothing. This posture degrades our musculature and impacts our neurological systems. In other words, it is bad!

Our bodies are designed to function from a neutral spine. When we are slumped in the sitting position, our muscle become lax. Look at your clothes and see how they hang. Now slump and watch how the fabric wrinkles. This is what is happening to your torso muscles. And you wonder why your abdomen is sticking out! Muscles become lax when you slump, so other muscles try to take over the slack of the internal support muscles. When you sit for long periods, your hips and shoulders become stiff. Your hip flexors and neck muscles must take up the slack. They are tightening to hold you up and this is not good.

If you find yourself slumped at a computer, slouching on the sofa with neck or back ache then perhaps try out a Standing Pilates class and find out the benefits for yourself.

The post What is standing pilates? appeared first on Wellbeing Magazine.