Navigating Menopause: Sharing My Personal Strategies and Specialist Tips That Pulled Me Through

Hello ladies,

I am Tanya Moss, president and co-founder of Nayelle Probiotic Skincare.

Skincare is my passion and I know that with each decade women are presented with different challenges.

Peri-menopause and menopause are definitely one of these challenging times.

Today, I am sharing my personal strategies and tips from specialists that I used to rebalance my skin, my emotional well-being and my physical well-being.

I feel good sharing my story as we all have such different experiences and I hope that my tips can help other women navigate this time with more ease.

This is a detailed blog post so here’s an overview of what it covers:

• Overcoming Dryer Skin
  • Externally – best skincare natural ingredients
  • Internally – collagen
• Emotional Well-being
  • Natural supplements
  • Professional advice
• Intuitive Eating
  • Beyond the scale

PART 1 – Overcoming Dryer Skin

Tanya’s Tips to keep your skin plump and as healthy as possible:

During peri-menopause and menopause, the declining estrogen levels affect our skin in numerous ways including dryer skin and a reduction in collagen. There is help though and being proactive is essential.

There are effective ways to improve your skin both externally by applying skincare and internally by adding new nutrients to your diet.  

HYDRATING YOUR SKIN EXTERNALLY 

It’s no surprise that I’m going to recommend nourishing your skin with natural-organic skincare, but also a probiotic skincare line. 

Why?

Because clean ingredients are not enough. The skin can typically only absorb small amounts of ingredients whether they’re clean or not.

At Nayelle, we go beyond to make skincare that works. To start, we select science proven ingredients from natural sources such as sea kelp, snow mushroom, glacial oceanic clay, kefir, aloe vera, plant oils and flower extracts.

Then we use the 100% natural probiotic process to ferment & upgrade these ingredients to achieve higher levels of antioxidants, vitamins, minerals… and to make them easy to absorb.

Fermenting these carefully selected superfood ingredients creates a rich fusion of goodness that feeds your skin the essentials to build collagen. This increased collagen production rewards you with plumper skin to prevent fine lines and wrinkles from forming.

Retinol

Also, adding retinol to your skincare regime is beneficial. However, until recently many women, including myself, could not tolerate retinol because it’s too irritating for sensitive skin.  Now, there is a retinol alternative via Bakuchiol Oil.

Studies have shown that Bakuchiol used at 0.5% twice daily performed similarly to 0.5% retinol once daily for wrinkle reduction and reducing hyperpigmentation.

Bakuchiol oil has been shown to increase skin firmness, reduce wrinkles, pore size and hyperpigmentation. It also speeds up cell regeneration by sending a signal to your cells that it’s time to amp up collagen production and cell turnover.

Having powerful antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and antibacterial properties make it so soothing also for rosacea and acne-prone skin. And it is non-comedogenic which means it will not clog your pores.

It’s also worth mentioning, Rose Hip oil as a retinol alternative for its high concentration of natural vitamin A. In fact, it has the highest of any pure botanical oils! Therefore, Rose Hip has a very potent ability to reduce the depth of wrinkles, fade fine lines, lighten age spots, and promote overall healing of damaged skin.

It delivers all these benefits by boosting the growth rate of new cells and increasing collagen production deep under the skin surface. It is also lighter in weight than many other botanical oils used for skin care so it is quickly absorbed. It has been around for centuries and is regarded as the queen of oils.

Nayelle’s GLOW Face Oil Serum contains both of these lovely oils along with crambe abyssinica, sea buckthorn and argan oils.

While Bakuchiol and  Rose Hip oils being the stars here, this entire crew helps relentlessly to reduce the depth of wrinkles and to seal in and hold much needed moisture so fine lines and wrinkles are less noticeable. This luxury six oil blend also provides a light coating that protects your skin from environmental and air pollutants.

Our Fall Skin Kit includes the Glow Face Oil along with the Clean Foaming Gel Face Wash, Rejuvenate Probiotic Night Cream, and Revitalizing Probiotic Serum. All you need to restore moisture back into your skin.

HYDRATING YOUR SKIN INTERNALLY

For strategies to internally hydrate your skin, collagen supplements are the number one key.  It works fast and you’ll notice improvements in your skin, your joint pain decreases and your hair and nails grow faster too.  It truly is miraculous and clearly something our bodies require to function properly.  

You can take collagen  via a collagen pills or powder.  I prefer powder and Organica Collagen powder is the one I use but there are many available. True Marina offers a high quality vegan collagen via fish scales.  

Taking collagen daily is easy as it can be added directly to your morning coffee or added to your smoothie. I like taking Kefir daily to aid my gut digestions so I add my collagen to it.  My favourite Kefir is the dairy free Coconut Kefir that comes plain with zero sugar or raspberry which is like a delicious raspberry milkshake… such a treat. 

Aiding collagen production is essential for your skin, but also your overall health. Joint pain was a sign for me that I needed to increase collagen supplementation for my physical body.  Not only did I get longer, thicker hair that I always dreamed of, but my hip and knee pain subsided. A win-win all around.

PART 2 – Emotional Well-Being

Overcoming the crazy ups and downs and the lack of joy:

Holy moly, this transition threw me out of whack.  I had never dealt with depression and was so surprised by this unusual, awful feeling.

I wasn’t feeling at all myself and at first looked to food and wine to lift me out of this uncomfortable state. No surprise that these weren’t long term solutions nor did they deal with the root of the problem.  The weight packed on and I was feeling even worse.  I was desperate to find strategies to deal with it. 

Hormone replacement is available to help with easing these symptoms. For me personally, this was not a comfortable option with the increased risk of cancer that it comes with. 

Luckily, I found some good advice from a wellness fitness coach, Rebecca Johnston, on the left.

She created a 6-week course to reset & balance hormones for menopausal women. A liver cleanse, specially designed weight workouts, kundalini yoga & meditations for mental shifts is a  snapshot of her unique & effective program.

You can find her on IG @iamrebbeccajohnston ~ Be Naturally Fit.

This course was a lifesaver and one I highly recommend.  Reach out to Rebecca directly for either personal coaching or to join this virtual course.  

Supplements were also very helpful:

Macca Root worked quickly to lift my moods and sexual drive. South American women have used this natural supplement for centuries to balance their hormones throughout their lives.  

Dr. Taz and her book “Super Women Power Rx” provides a vast variety of tips to help balance one’s hormones.  She beautifully combines Easter and Western Medicine to provide the best of both worlds for women’s health.  Her IG handle is @drtazmd  where you will also find links to her podcasts. In her book, she shares the benefits of ashwagandha and lexirs to balance hormones.

I found drinking the  tasty “Harmony Lexirs” the easiest and most enjoyable way to add these to my daily routine. Vahdam Turmeric Mushroom latte is my absolute favourite and it’s so delicious.  

Just add 1 C of oat milk, and 1 tsp of this powder to a milk frothier and voila, you have a nutritious and delicious latte.

Benefits of Tumeric Mushroom Latte: 

• Anti-aging
• Eases pain & inflammation 
• Reduces Stress
• Boost Immunity
• Energizing Detox

Insomnia was another unwelcome gift of peri-menopause. Magnesium before bed helps along with keeping a regular sleep routine. I found the  “Calm Magnesium Powder” helpful and is the one often recommended from health practitioners. 

No Caffeine after 2pm is a hard and fast rule to keep the insomnia at bay.  

Matcha Green Tea lattes provide a lovely lift in the afternoon and are extremely anti-oxidant rich. Antioxidants fight off free radicals in our body and those little rascals are part of what cause premature aging and those unwanted wrinkles.

PART 3 – Intuitive Eating

Going Beyond the Scale:

With peri-menopause, the weight became a real issue for me.

Feelings of depression lead me to eating more emotionally to try and lift myself out of it. Wine became a real crutch too. I was looking for quick ways to escape this uncomfortable feeling.

I have known for a long time that diets don’t work, but out of desperation, I resorted to them. And as usual, the weight comes back. The all too common “yo-yo”  effect of dieting.

Implementing the nutritional supplements I mentioned earlier in the article, along with new attitude and lifestyle changes brought me the long term relief I was seeking.

I found great support from Dr. Jenn Huber, RD ND. She hosts “The Midlife Feast” and shares daily insights on IG @menopause.nutritionist that help create the mind shifts needed for balance.

Key topics she covers are: making peace with food, beyond the scale, intuitive eating, and myth busting.

Dr Huber shares that she used to track and count everything she ate because like so many of us…

“I didn’t trust my body to tell me:

• When to eat
• What to eat
• How to know when I’d had enough”

“And most of all, I believed that unless every bite of food was accounted for, I’d “never” not be eating. Because anytime I took a break from counting, or allowed myself a “cheat day”, it became an all-out food fest that didn’t feel good either… Which meant I spent most of my life either on or off a diet.  And I didn’t have health or happiness to show for it.”

“Now that I’m an intuitive eater, I use body kindness and body respect to build body trust.  I eat with permission, not restriction. Food is just food.  And we’re good friends, playing for the same team.  And you deserve this too, especially if you’re midlife and have spent a lifetime of starting a new diet every Monday.”   

Dr Huber offers a free guide to menopause nutrition for un-dieters to make peace with food in midlife.

PART 4 – Helping Each Other

Have any questions? What are your experiences?

I really hope that sharing my experience and tips can help you navigate the challenges of menopause.

I would love to hear from you at tanya@nayell.com if you have any questions or if you would like to simply share some of your tips with me.

Thank you for reading!

Wish you finding your balance during challenges with peri-menopause and menopause,

xx Tanya