Arthritis, Be Well health tips, Health and Fitness, Keep Moving: Managing Arthritis

Tips for women who have back pain because of osteoporosis

Here they are:

Tip #1 Increase your vitamin D3   (more info about Vitamin D3 for bone density here)

Tip #2 Add weight bearing exercise to your routine

Tip #3 Eat more greens

Gentle Reader,

You have a sharp pain in your back and can’t remember that you lifted that bag of groceries 3 days ago even though you knew it was too heavy for you.  The pain subsides after a few weeks with the help of rest and some pain meds.    And then it happens again.

What’s going on?   You probably had a vertebral compression fracture, caused either by falling or by placing a load on outstretched arms such as raising a window or lifting a small child or a bag of groceries.  The front of the vertebrae collapse.  The spine is weakened by low bone density.  Our bodies can repair these hair line fractures on their own.  The trick is to lessen the chances of reoccurrence.

You go for your check up and they do a bone density test.  The dreaded report comes back. You have osteopenia.  They tell you that is probably why you’ve been having back pain.  This happened to me a few years ago.  My doctor immediately offered me drugs to increase the bone density.  I asked him to give me a couple years to change this picture and reverse the trend to osteoporosis.  The next bone density showed full blown osteoporosis.  I was very disappointed.  I’d been taking a good quality calcium for years.  Why hadn’t it protected me?  I was very physically active, walking all the time, skiing, working in the garden.  I pleaded again for more time and turned down the prescription.  It worked.  Here’s what I did.

#1 Increased Vitamin D3 to 6000 mg a day.  My blood test indicated a major increase was necessary.

#2 Stair climbing.  The advice was climb 200 steps every day while carrying 20 lbs.  I climbed 200 steps several times a week but didn’t carry any extra weight.

#3 Add minerals by eating lots more greens.  I eat 3 – 5 heads of greens (kale, chard, mustard greens, and collards) every week, usually steamed or in soups.  LacinatoKaleSpinach is good, too.  I also increased the supplement Alfalfa.

I was able to reverse the condition.  You can too.

I know you have done amazing things to turn osteoporosis around.  Let us know by leaving a comment.  If you found this helpful, pass it along.  And thanks,

Fondly, Betsy

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving

BetsyBell’s Health4u

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

206 933 1889  1 888 283 2077

betsy@hihohealth.com