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Speaker 1: Oh, hello there. Thank you for joining us on the

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Speaker 1: daily podcast from Body and Soul called Healthy Ish. I

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Speaker 1: am Felicity Halle. Today we're chatting with Jamie Rose Chambers.

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Speaker 1: She's a dietitian, nutritionist and author of the Peridet. Yes,

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Speaker 1: we're talking about perimenopause, the second puberty of life, as

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Speaker 1: she refers to it, as she's going to share the

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Speaker 1: key foods to help relieve common symptoms. Now, if you

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Speaker 1: want more from Jamie, listening to our sister podcast, Extra

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Speaker 1: Healthy Ish, where we got a bit deeper into the

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Speaker 1: impact of food not only on perimenopause, but also on menopause,

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Speaker 1: but really on every daily aspect of life. Hey, make

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Speaker 1: sure you're listening to Extra Healthy Ish, our sister podcast

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Speaker 1: where she goes deeper into the impact of food on perimenopause.

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Speaker 1: You can search for Extra Healthy Ish wherever you get

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Speaker 1: your podcasts. Jamie ice to have you on the podcast

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Speaker 1: and congratulations on your new book.

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Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having me.

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Speaker 1: Oh it's a hot topic, isn't it. Pery menopause. Oh,

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Speaker 1: we're talking about it all of the time. Eight out

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Speaker 1: of ten women suffer from pery symptoms. That's a lot.

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Speaker 2: It is a lot, and you know, I think maybe

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Speaker 2: we just didn't talk about it much for a really

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Speaker 2: long time, or it was just associated with menopause. But

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Speaker 2: actually what we're finding is that the bulk of the

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Speaker 2: symptoms that women experience are actually through perry. Remember that

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Speaker 2: women can go through perimenopause for up to ten years,

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Speaker 2: so it's a really long time to be living with

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Speaker 2: some of these symptoms.

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Speaker 1: It's interesting, isn't it, Because often you'll have a symptom.

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Speaker 1: I mean, I'm in that age bracket and you're something

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Speaker 1: will happen and then you're like, is that pery or

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Speaker 1: is that just because there's so many question marks going

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Speaker 1: on in my mind right now.

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Speaker 2: It's so true. And look, I mean certainly in clinic,

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Speaker 2: the women that I see in that age group and

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Speaker 2: in that pery zone, they have so much going on.

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Speaker 2: I mean, it really is kind of the peak of

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Speaker 2: our life. The forties is when we often have families

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Speaker 2: where a couple of decades into our careers, we've got

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Speaker 2: you know, often parents that we're caring for. We're juggling

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Speaker 2: so much like me, I'm right in the middle of

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Speaker 2: a house renovation as well. At the moment, I've got

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Speaker 2: a little one who's waking up in the middle of

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Speaker 2: the night with nightmares. So it's like, is it Perry,

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Speaker 2: Am I just tired? I don't know what's going on?

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Speaker 2: So it can be a really it's a really challenging

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Speaker 2: time for a lot of women.

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Speaker 1: So what are some of the symptoms remind us?

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Speaker 2: Okay, so I think probably the main one that we

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Speaker 2: all associate certainly with menopause. But remember we're talking these

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Speaker 2: are the same symptoms, it's all perry is the lead

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Speaker 2: up to menopause. So hot flushes, that's probably one of

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Speaker 2: the most common ones. Now they do get more serious, generally,

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Speaker 2: and more frequent the closer we get to menopause, So

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Speaker 2: if you're just kind of early on in perry, you

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Speaker 2: may not be so much experiencing them. What you might

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Speaker 2: find and probably the best way of figuring out whether

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Speaker 2: you're in the throes of perry is period start to change.

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Speaker 2: So our menstrual cycle starts to change. They might get longer,

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Speaker 2: they might get shorter, they might be heavier, they might

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Speaker 2: be lighter, they might be all over the shop. So

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Speaker 2: that's usually a pretty good indicator that things are starting

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Speaker 2: feeling a bit pmsy but not when you're supposed to

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Speaker 2: be PMS. So for example, feeling a bit ragey and

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Speaker 2: you know, irritated by things that probably shouldn't be irritating you,

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Speaker 2: feeling a bit teary watching an ad or a silly

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Speaker 2: thing on Facebook, and all of a sudden, you know,

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Speaker 2: you're finding that tears are springing to your eyes. So

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Speaker 2: they're pretty common things, more so at the start of

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Speaker 2: that Perry journey. As time goes on, that's typically when

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Speaker 2: the hot flushes tend to kick in. Look, mental health

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Speaker 2: issues are a really big one. I mean, I've heard

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Speaker 2: stories such as women sending themselves off to be tested

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Speaker 2: for depression, anxiety thinking they had early on set Alzheimer's

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Speaker 2: or dementia because they had this brain fog they couldn't

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Speaker 2: concentrate properly. You know, I do it all the time.

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Speaker 2: I walk to the fridge and I open the fridge.

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Speaker 2: I'm like, I don't know why I'm here, I can't

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Speaker 2: remember why I'm here. I walk into a room, what

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Speaker 2: am I here for? Again? You know, those sorts of

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Speaker 2: things are really common. To change to digestion, that's another

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Speaker 2: really common one. So again, a lot of women find

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Speaker 2: that through their cycle, they might be a little more constipated,

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Speaker 2: and then for example, they get their period and they

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Speaker 2: have a bit of you know, a looser store. And

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Speaker 2: so this is again a really common one where bal

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Speaker 2: habits can change. Forty two percent of women in perimenopause

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Speaker 2: experience or report that they experience heartburn. I mean, that's

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Speaker 2: you know, that's crazy.

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Speaker 1: Let's give up on that. On the digestion what and

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Speaker 1: talk more about food. What role does the food we

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Speaker 1: eat playing how we experience perry and all the symptoms.

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Speaker 2: So I've sort of summarized the way I think about

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Speaker 2: the relationship between food and perry is sort of It's

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Speaker 2: got three main roles. Number one is managing or helping

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Speaker 2: to manage the inevitable weight gain or change to body

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Speaker 2: composition that goes along with perimenopause. I don't think I

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Speaker 2: know a female that has been through menopause and hasn't

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Speaker 2: noticed a change to their body shape or had some

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Speaker 2: sort of a change to their weight. It can be

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Speaker 2: very distressing for a lot of women. I hear them

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Speaker 2: talk about, I can't wear my clothes anymore. I used

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Speaker 2: to have a waste and I no longer have a waist,

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Speaker 2: and so that's a really common one. Obviously, the way

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Speaker 2: in which we eat and adjusting for that can really

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Speaker 2: help you get through that time. I think once upon

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Speaker 2: a time, weight gain was sort of an inevitable part

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Speaker 2: of perimenopause, and although it is, we have really good

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Speaker 2: tools to manage it. Now we know a lot more

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Speaker 2: about why that happens. The second is literally managing the

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Speaker 2: symptoms of perimenopause. So we talked before about hot flushes,

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Speaker 2: we talked about anxiety and depression and change to mood.

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Speaker 2: So in the book, what I've done is literally trawled

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Speaker 2: through all the research to find any foods or nutrients

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Speaker 2: that had a relationship with perimenopause symptoms, both positive and

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Speaker 2: negative and negative, so we can actually use some of

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Speaker 2: these foods to target some of the symptoms acutely, so

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Speaker 2: right now, but also long term as well in terms

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Speaker 2: of how our body changes through perimenopause. The third is

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Speaker 2: again that long term, so it's sort of like the

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Speaker 2: long game through perimenopause, and once we get out the

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Speaker 2: other end of menopause, our body has kind of been

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Speaker 2: through a lot and things have changed quite a lot,

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Speaker 2: and there are certain body systems that become a little

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Speaker 2: bit more vulnerable that we have to look after our brain,

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Speaker 2: our cardiovascular system. So there are certain foods and food

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Speaker 2: groups that we know can really help to protect those

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Speaker 2: body systems so that we're in good shape for kind

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Speaker 2: of the next phase of our life after menopause.

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Speaker 1: Give us some of these, I mean, you've got a

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Speaker 1: list of power foods in your book. Can you just

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Speaker 1: give us a few of these, and then obviously we

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Speaker 1: can buy a book to find out more.

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Speaker 2: Okay, I'm going to give you sort of my top

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Speaker 2: three or four that I think the most important. Number

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Speaker 2: one protein. We bang on about protein. If you see

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Speaker 2: anything about perimenopause, you'll notice that there is a very

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Speaker 2: strong relationship with protein. We talk about it a lot.

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Speaker 2: The reason why is that through perimenopause, women will lose

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Speaker 2: up to about ten percent of their muscle mass, and

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Speaker 2: so through perimenopause we lose The symptoms are all triggered

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Speaker 2: from this decline in our female reproductive hormones, particularly estrogen.

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Speaker 2: So as that declines, our muscle mass declines as well.

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Speaker 2: Now muscle I like to think of it like a

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Speaker 2: big kind of calorie burning furnace. As we lose our

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Speaker 2: muscle mass, we lose our ability to burn calories. So

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Speaker 2: where let's say we used to eat you know, this

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Speaker 2: amount of food every day and it kept our weight stable,

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Speaker 2: all of a sudden, we can't burn calories like we

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Speaker 2: used to, and so the weight starts to creep up.

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Speaker 2: So that's one of the mechanisms they believe is related

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Speaker 2: to that change in weight. So that happens through perimenopause.

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Speaker 2: So protein is particularly important. Our needs are probably higher

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Speaker 2: than a lot of people really realize. We also need

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Speaker 2: to kind of have it nicely distributed through the day,

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Speaker 2: so it's really important that there is some protein throughout

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Speaker 2: all of our meals so we're actually getting enough consistently

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Speaker 2: through the day. That of course needs to then be

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Speaker 2: coupled with strength based training as well, so it's all

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Speaker 2: about preservation of muscle mass. The second thing is calcium.

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Speaker 2: We begin to lose bone mass as well as muscle

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Speaker 2: mass through perimenopause. We really want to look after our

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Speaker 2: bones because if we don't, there is a really sharp

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Speaker 2: decline in loss of bone mass through perimenopause, and it

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Speaker 2: just puts us at such higher risk of osteopenia and

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Speaker 2: osteoporosis later on in life. It's really hard to turn around.

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Speaker 2: Once it's there, it's really difficult to change and to

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Speaker 2: treat improve So, and you can see by if you

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Speaker 2: look at the recommendations of calcium every day, premenopausal women

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Speaker 2: need a thousand milligrams a day. That's the three servings

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Speaker 2: that we all hear about. After menopause, it goes up

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Speaker 2: to four servings a day, and that's thirteen hundred milligrams

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Speaker 2: a day. We also then need to make sure that

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Speaker 2: our vitamin D levels are optimum. Two can be done

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Speaker 2: with a simple blood test, but vitamin D actually helps

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Speaker 2: us to absorb calcium from our intestine, so the two

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Speaker 2: work together. The third of fider estrogens, now, these are

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Speaker 2: really interesting ones. These are basically plant estrogens, so they

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Speaker 2: mimic what estrogen does in the body to a much

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Speaker 2: milder degree of course, but if we're having these foods

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Speaker 2: every day at a reasonable dose, the researchers found that

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Speaker 2: they can really help to support some of the symptoms

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Speaker 2: that go along with perimenopause, particularly things like hot flushes.

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Speaker 2: So fighter estrogens we're shown to decrease symptoms like hot

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Speaker 2: flushes by over forty percent in women in pyramids. It

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Speaker 2: really is. Yeah, so what can you.

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Speaker 1: Just give us a few foods that would have fighter

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Speaker 1: estrogens in them?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, So the top top two are flax seeds otherwise

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Speaker 2: known as seeds. I always recommend grinding them because we

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Speaker 2: can access the nutrients more efficiently. The seconder soy based products. Now,

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Speaker 2: this is really controversial because soy was always thought to

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Speaker 2: be you know, sort of associated with breast cancers and

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Speaker 2: things like that. Always if you're worried, check with your

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Speaker 2: health care provider. But overall, soy has been shown to

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Speaker 2: be very healthy and can be a very uh you know,

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Speaker 2: a fantastic part of a healthy diet. But we're talking

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Speaker 2: whole soy products. So edimamae beans, tofu tempe soy milk

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Speaker 2: are really our main sources there.

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Speaker 1: Beans. I've really got into those really, so that is

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Speaker 1: that's good news.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely, And if you buy them frozen, they're so easy.

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Speaker 2: You know, we don't have to go to Japanese or

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Speaker 2: you know, sushi to get them.

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Speaker 1: Yes, that's right, Jamie, Thank you for coming on healthy,

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Speaker 1: Thank you for having me. Hey, thanks for listening to

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Speaker 1: this chat. If you want more from Jamie, her book,

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Speaker 1: it's called The Peri Diet It is out now, and

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Speaker 1: she is also up on Extra Healthy Ish, where we

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Speaker 1: go a bit deeper into what to eat to relieve

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Speaker 1: those perimenopause symptoms. If you did enjoy this one, though,

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Speaker 1: tell us rate and review these episodes. Subscribe to this

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Speaker 1: a podcast, anything else Head bodyansoul dot com dot you,

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Speaker 1: follow us on socials, Grab our print edition which is

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Speaker 1: out in your local Sunday paper, and until tomorrow, stay

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Speaker 1: healthy ish