Essential Lifestyle Choices

Wellness, while not always easy, is simple. Common sense is 90% of the battle. Drink plenty of pure water, eat a phytonutrient rich diet, manage stress, find ways to bring safe movement (whatever that looks like for you) into your life, and adequate quality sleep. The first four you can consciously control with a little discipline. The last, sleep, can sometimes prove to be a bit more challenging. I sailed right through menopause with minimal problems. The only problem I had? Brutal bouts of insomnia. My insomnia was the first in a line of dominoes that led to insulin resistance and eventually progressed to adrenal burnout. So while I was doing pretty ok sticking to the first 4 , this one area threw my health into absolute chaos. This health crisis took a very disciplined approach to overcome.

How did I do it? I started by recognizing that my physiology had entered a new life stage whether I wanted to admit it or not. This was a little hard to face. At first, it looked like, “you are too old for all this cardio”. That wasn’t really the message, but that’s exactly how I perceived it. I had exercised my body into adrenal fatigue and instead of honoring my body, I fought it all the way to burnout. If you have ever had a hormonal imbalance, you know that it is a process getting to recovery. I had to do unspeakable things like ….cut waaaaaaayyyy back on my coffee habit….aaaand my beer. My husband and I are lifelong service industry people and total foodies. This was a major aspect of our lifestyle, but it was making me sick. I had to get serious about really cleaning up my diet. I also had to reevaluate my exercise routine. While I was nourishing my adrenals, I traded in my spinning and step classes for a lot more yoga. One key caveat worth mentioning would be that while some changes are just ALWAYS a good idea, some can be just temporary. I may not need to give up yummy delicious beer and coffee forever, but it is necessary to give my body time,space, and/or building blocks to properly heal.

Sleep was still an issue for me. I had to take a hard look at some things that might be contributing to this problem. My husband has always been a fall asleep with the tv on kind of person. I can do that, but I always wake up. I had to be diligent about no ipads or tvs anywhere near bedtime. Monkey mind chatter was also a problem. I developed a bed time routine of self massage while recapping my day. I would make an action plan for tomorrow and then release the issue for the day. This simple act gave me a place to lay my “worries” with a system for picking it back up tomorrow. So far, it’s been reasonably effective. The last step in operation good sleep was getting a new bed. I am a huge fan of memory foam, but the fumes made me sick the first time I purchased one. With some research, I found Nectar. It was a great balance between reasonable pricing and environmentally responsible materials. Even better? They had a year long trial so I could see if I even liked it.

The Most Comfortable Mattress

I like doing business with companies that produce a good product and back it up with a guarantee. I also liked that I could get a new, lump free mattress for under $1000. The last mattress I bought was on super (Benchmart was closing in 3 days everything must go) sale but was still $2200. If your mattress is over 8 years old, do yourself a favor and look into a Nectar.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *