279: Breaking the Age Barrier: How Strength Training Helped Jane Thrive in her 70s | Jane Thurnell-Read

00:00:00 Jane: You analyze, you react to everything in a completely different way because it empowers you. Instead of like, "I'm feeling like this, I've got brain fog, I've got headaches, I'm getting all these hot flashes, I can't sleep, I'm putting on weight." That's very disempowering if it's because of the menopause. But if you feel like this are my feedback from my body about what I need to do for the rest of my life, it's completely different.

00:00:31 Maya: You have more power over your health than what you've been told. This is the Healthy Lifestyle Solutions podcast. I'm Maya Acosta and I'm passionate about finding healthy lifestyle solutions to support optimal human health. If you're willing to go with me, together we can discover how simple lifestyle choices can help improve our quality of life and increase longevity in a big way. Let's get started.

00:01:02 Maya: Welcome to another episode of the Healthy Lifestyle Solutions podcast. I'm your host, Maya Acosta. And today, I have Jane Thurneel-Reed. She's an independent author, blogger and trustee. She writes about health and wellbeing with a focus on positive lifestyle solutions. She's in her 70s and loves inspiring others. She enjoys lifting weights in the gym, riding her bike and eating healthily. I hope I said that right with a dusting of vegan chocolate. Welcome, Jane.

00:01:35 Jane: Thank you very much. Lovely to be here.

00:01:39 Maya: I'm familiar with two of the books that you wrote recently, and as soon as I saw the titles, I said my female listeners are going to enjoy this conversation. It's the start of the new year, and as you know, people set goals and it's always, I think, for everyone on the list, there's the weight loss goal or even just getting more exercise this year. So I hope that we can talk about that and why maybe setting goals does not necessarily they don't always work the goals. I think we have to have a system in place, at least. I've been listening to the Atomic Habits book. I don't know if you're familiar with that one. And I know you also talk about menopause, which is also a huge topic that I'm very interested in. So I'm hoping we can talk about both.

00:02:27 Maya: But let's learn a little bit about yourself. You're in your 70s and you didn't really start to exercise until you were in your 60s. And I want you to know that's like an inspiration for me because I'm in my early 50s. I've never been in the gym. I have been, but I've never been consistent. You inspire me, and that's part of one of my goals. You inspire me to get fit and lift weights. How did you get to that point? Tell us a little bit about how your journey towards building, exercising and doing all that you do now. How did all that get started?

00:03:00 Jane: Yeah, I mean, people often assume that I've been fit all my life, but as you say, it's not true. I hated sports at school, absolutely hated it. In my 20s, I went to the gym a little bit and I did a bit of swimming, but when I went to the gym, I'd be talking to everyone. Anything I found a bit difficult, I didn't do. So I only did the exercises I liked. I didn't push myself, so I didn't get very far with that.

00:03:30 Jane: In my 40s, I met my partner and actually started cycling and did some long distance cycling. But it wasn't until I was in my early 60s when a cycling friend of mine said to me, "Jane, you should come to the gym, you love it." And I went, "No, I'm too old." She said, "You really would love it." I went, "No, Katie, I would hate it, I would hate it. I'm much too old to go to the gym." But she kept on insisting, and in the end I said, "Oh, okay, right, Katie, I'll go, but I'm not going to enjoy it, it'll be horrible."  And I went and I was absolutely amazed at how much I actually did enjoy it.

00:04:16 Jane: And now, in my 70s, going to the gym is a really important part of what I do. I feel like I've got a gym family because I know lots of people in the gym and they say, "Hello, Jane, how are you? How's your training going?" That sort of thing. I see it as being just so, so important in terms of overall health, in terms of mental health, in terms of getting older. It's just so, so important that we exercise, and particularly for women, strength training is really, really important for women.

00:04:51 Maya: Okay, so are you considered like a gym rat? Is there such a term?

00:04:56 Jane: Yes, I am. I am considered a gym rat. Somebody described me as a gym Bonnie, but I feel about being a gym ball.

00:05:05 Maya: Oh, that's a cute name. I love that. I don't even like the term gym rat. I just thought I'd throw that out there. So, Jane, let's start from the beginning for someone, say, like myself, who really shies away from going to the gym. I really do. Now, you mentioned cycling, so I love to cycle, I love to hike, I love being outdoors , I love power walking. I'm very active that way. But I'm highly, highly intimidated by gyms, especially the gyms where you can hear the men weightlifting and they're like and "Yaah!" And my husband at one point --

00:05:39 Jane: Men are amazing. The gym I go to now, which wasn't the gym I first went to in my 60s, has a lot of these big, powerful men, you know, sort of walking around like this because they've got so much muscle and stuff. But they are lovely, they are just so nice because I think they have nothing to prove, these very big men. They don't have to prove that they're masculine, fit, strong, and so they are, on the whole, incredibly gentle, incredibly considerate. They're the opposites of what you expect them to be.

00:06:19 Maya: Okay, that's comforting. So let me ask you, how does one get started in the gym when they're going for the first time? Do we hire a personal trainer? Do we ask a friend to join us or do we just kind of go and just try to even figure out the equipment on our own?

00:06:35 Jane: Yeah, I mean going with a friend obviously has a lot going for it. I mean a lot of women find that much better if there's two of them. The problem though with it, and I see this over and over again in the gym, is that two friends or two sisters will go to the gym together. They spend most of their time chatting while they're exercising, so they're lifting weights, but they're chatting to each other and actually they're not working out. And what happens is after a while, it's very boring because you're not seeing any improvement, because you'll only see an improvement if you challenge yourself. And if you want to challenge yourself, you've got to concentrate. You can't really talk if you're working out hard because you've got to concentrate on what you're doing.

00:07:29 Jane: So, though I understand why people often go with someone else, I actually don't really recommend it as a thing to do. If you can afford it, I think it's great to work with a personal trainer. Maybe the first time you go, you can ask the personal trainer if they'll meet you outside the gym in the car park, so that they walk in with you. I mean that's something you could do, say I'm really nervous, so would you come outside the gym and then go in with me that first time? Or the first two or three times maybe even. So if you can afford a personal trainer, I would definitely recommend that you get one.

00:08:07 Jane: Things to look out for are that you want somebody who's going to encourage you, so you want somebody that you feel will be empathetic, but what you don't want is somebody who's going to go, "Are you tired today? Oh, well, we won't do very much." And you want somebody who's going to be there watching what you do because particularly when you start, you need to make sure you have good form and that you're doing the things correctly. So if possible, I would really recommend that.

00:08:36 Jane:If you can't afford to do that, there's lots of videos, YouTube has lots and lots of videos about exercise routines you can do and how best to do them. So you could find one of those and use one of those. And I think in terms of gyms, I live in the UK, but what it seems to me is that if you want a friendly gym, you need to go to an independent gym. If you're not so worried about that, then maybe go to chain. I mean they're often cheaper, a chain of gyms. But often, there isn't a lot of soul in the gym. It's about making money. So people come along, do the exercise, people put the headphones on, nobody speaks to anybody. I mean, that works for some people. For me, that would be horrible. If I go away on holiday, people will go, "Where have you been? I haven't seen you." All these people in the gym, they notice when I'm not there, which is really, really nice. So I definitely recommend finding an independent gym with an owner there who really cares about the customers, all the customers.

00:09:51 Maya: It sounds like you build a sense of community over time. The more that you go almost that place where everybody knows your name.

00:09:59 Jane: Yes.

00:10:00 Maya: Rather than the bar, it's the gym. All right , so I'll share with you briefly that my husband had a little bit of training. Most of his life he's been in shape, and he had gone through this intensive program before I met him. And then early on, he trained me a little bit at our local gym, where he taught me how to use the various machines and be done in half an hour, just to the point. And what he told me back then was that the reason that people don't get in shape is because they'll do and you'll have to give me some of the terms, but they'll do a round of whatever it may be on a machine and then spend five to 15 minutes just texting and playing on the phone rather than back to back to back, from one machine to the other. So he trained me to do that, along with some sit ups and planks and a little bit of cardio work.

00:10:56 Maya: And I think we started with cardio work and then did the machines to get the optimal benefit of the exercise. So if you want to go through some of those things, I would also love to know how was it when you first got started? What did it look like? And where are you today in your 70s with your routine?

00:11:14 Jane: I'm actually stronger than I was in my 60s. I mean, I'm still getting stronger and stronger. And that's an absolutely, totally and utterly crazy, amazing feeling when all around me there are women who are getting less strong, more fragile, more dependent on other people. And me, I'm getting stronger and stronger. When I first started, I started with machines, the machines in the gym. The problem with that long term, is that the machines, you don't pick up the differences between the two sides of your body so easily. If you're doing something where you're like pulling something down, if you're using a machine, then you could have one arm that's working really hard and the other one's just sort of trailing along, right? So your strong arm gets stronger, your weak arm stays less strong.

00:12:18 Jane: I think when you start using machines, it's really, really good. But there comes a point when you need to use what's called free weights. So free weights are like dumbbells, kettlebells, bags and that sort of thing. So now, I hardly ever use machines. I'm always using free weights or I'm doing single leg or single arm exercises. So standing on one leg and then holding a dumbbell and going like that while I'm standing on one leg, that sort of thing. It's really strengthening, you're strengthening your core and making it less likely that you'll fall.

00:13:04 Jane: Some work from one of the Australian universities is that they say strength training is protective against dementia. And given how much people are frightened and worried about getting dementia, they're saying it should be an important part of anybody's strategy for preventing dementia is that you do strength training. It's not all about looking beautiful, it's about the physiology, the functioning of your body and of your mind and your brain.

00:13:34 Maya: Absolutely. And that's exactly why I want you on the podcast. Because many times we focus on appearance. So getting a beach body ready, wanting to fit into a certain size. We focus so much on the physical appearance of getting in shape and losing weight without understanding exactly what you're talking about. Using the exercise and especially building muscle as medicine, but also as a preventative measure. So you mentioned dementia, also the falling, preventing falling, so working on our balance and then you cover menopause. So tell us how exercise and especially weightlifting can help us as we go through menopause.

00:14:18 Jane: Well, one of the big things obviously, is people are worried about osteoporosis, particularly as they become menopausal and then post menopausal. And weight training is really important for that. It can really help strengthen the bones. I'm always in a hurry and I've had some pretty bad falls from time to time. I mean, generally now I don't fall because one of the things if you do a lot of weight training is that if you stumble, you get yourself back up again. Really, your body instinctively knows it doesn't go through the brain anymore. It's like your body goes and just whips you back up rather than you stumbling, falling and risking breaking your hips or your wrist or whatever. So weight training is really, really important for strengthening bones.

00:15:15 Jane: Also, muscle takes more calories than fat. So if you build your muscles using strength training and you are not going to look like a man. People worry about, "Oh, I don't want to get too big," you won't. In fact, what tends to happen is that often women actually look smaller, even if they're not. And part of that is because you start to develop your shoulders, and a lot of women are big hips, smaller shoulders. If you start to develop your shoulders more than your hips, look more in proportion, you're building the muscle there that you need anyway. And it helps your body to see much more in proportion. That's a great thing.

00:16:03 Jane: But the really important thing about from a weight point of view is that if you're sitting around watching the television and you've got 10 pounds of muscle, so you're not doing anything, your body is at rest. It will use more calories than 10 pounds... if you have 10 pounds of fat. So just to maintain your body, you will need more calories if you've got muscle. So that then makes weight maintenance much easier.

00:16:37 Maya: Speaking of falls, I had a fall in 2020, and I will probably say that's the first fall that I've had as I'm aging, in other words, the other falls when I was younger didn't count. They didn't count because I didn't have the injuries that I had in 2020. And so, at the time, we did work out a little bit that summer as a lot of people were staying at home.

00:17:02 Maya: But it was in the fall, lots of things were happening, the holidays, and had I had an exercise routine, I probably would not have ended up with a frozen shoulder, which is a result of not moving the arm because of the injury. It ended up being such a fiasco that I realized, "Wow, I'm at that phase in my life where what I do from this point on, it's either going to improve the quality of life as I age, or I'm going to be more and more debilitated." The falls and the injuries will get worse.

00:17:35 Maya: And I still have pain in my shoulder.  So I ended up going through a little bit of a rehab in terms of exercising my arm. But again, even after an injury and you discover what you can or cannot do, depending on what your doctor tells you, it just can help you recover more easily if you continue an exercise routine. I just never understood how important it is to prevent falls. It's not  really until you start to enter that age that you realize, "Wow, I can have severe injuries."

00:18:08 Jane: The figures are absolutely horrific. It's something like almost half of people over 65 are afraid of falling.

00:18:16 Maya: Wow, that's scary.

00:18:18 Jane: Most half. And the more being afraid of falling almost doubles your chances of actually falling because you're anxious. So you're like, "I might fall, I might fall." And because you feel like that, of course, you're much more likely to fall because you're agitated. So strength training is really important for that, because what happens if you start to be afraid of falling? Then you start to not want to go to new places because there may be stairs or the ground may be uneven. So you think, "Oh, maybe I won't go, maybe I won't go," and your world becomes smaller. And I think one of the things that strength training does is it helps you keep your world big, really big. So people see it as vanity or something optional. It's not. It's really an important central thing of what we should be doing, all of us.

00:19:23 Maya: That's such a significant thing, though, what you just said because I had never thought about how limited I would be. I'm just really thinking about that. That's profound that my world could get smaller if I fear falling, and also just fear not being able to complete something like, for example, a hike where I said I can't do this because I'm not in shape, so I have to turn around or be carried out or whatever it may be. You start to lose your independence, don't you?

00:19:51 Jane: Yeah. Gyms are full of young people. They should be full of old people. Every single old person should be in the gym.

00:20:03 Maya: I love that. That reminds me of a conversation that I had a long time ago when I went to one of the lifestyle medicine conferences and attended the exercise as Medicine lecture. And the individual that was giving that lecture said that every physical therapist should be knocking on the doctor's doors, just like pharmaceutical reps, and saying, "I have something that can help your patients." And why is it that physicians are not recommending that their patients go to the gym? Why do we have that mental block? I don't know if you can tell us about that.

00:20:38 Jane: Well, I think people are frightened of recommending it because they're worried that it may harm people. But strength training, resistance training, working out, whatever you want to call it, has been shown to be beneficial for people with osteoarthritis. At one time, the idea was, if you have osteoarthritis, you should rest. That idea has now been completely debunked by so much research, huge amounts of research. So if you've got osteoarthritis, you should be working out.

00:21:17 Jane: In the UK last year, there was a big position statement about around osteoporosis from all sorts of doctors, from major medical charities involved with osteoporosis. And they came up with this, what they called big position paper. And every single category of person should be doing some strength training. They said it's preventive. But even people who already have stress fractures because of osteoporosis should still be doing strength training. Obviously, not at the same level, but they say it's absolutely beneficial for everybody. There's been research on cancer. For some cancers, it's preventative. It's been shown that for a lot of people, even while they're having cancer treatment. If they do strength training, they will have fewer side effects from the treatment and just generally feel better. It's been shown to be beneficial for mental health so much.

00:22:27 Maya: And why is it not enough ? Because earlier you said not that it's not enough, what you just said. I wanted to go back to the point that you made early, that you met your partner and at that time you were interested in cycling, and then your partner said, "Let's go to the gym." And so I have heard that, like I said, I like being outdoors, but exercising in terms of just running or walking or cycling is not enough for us as we're aging. Why is strength training and we talked a little bit about free weights and dumbbells and all of that, but can you give us a little bit more detail of what strength training looks like and how much should we be lifting?

00:23:08 Jane: Okay, so strength training is where, I mean, sometimes you can be just using body weight, but generally, you're using actual weights of some sort or another, and it's also called resistance training. So the weight is resisting what you're trying to do and so you're actually working. So in terms of you need to be thinking about doing running exercises. Your lower legs, for example, or hiking or power is exercising your lower legs. It's building strength, sorry, in your legs, lower body. So it's building strength in your legs. But walking, you're doing the same movement all the time. So it's only building the strength in one type of just in one way, because you're just doing this or this over and over again. It's not building your upper body.

00:24:10 Jane: People who use poles, that's beneficial for the upper body. But again, the problem with it is you're just doing that one movement over and over again. But your shoulder, you can sort of do all sorts of things with your shoulders, but if you're using poles, you're just doing this one movement over and over again, you're not using the full range of what your body is able to do. So you really need to be thinking about that to be doing everything that's exercising the whole of the body.

00:24:40 Maya: Right.

00:24:41 Jane: And what you usually would do is what's called sets, what you referred to earlier as rounds, but I think in the US, I think we also call them sets. So you do say the same exercise eight or ten times and then you might do two or three sets with a pause in between. So you do eight or ten, have a pause, eight or ten again, have a pause, eight or ten again, and then have a rest. Right. And the last one you do should be quite difficult to do. So if you're doing ten, three sets of ten, number ten in each set should be a bit difficult. It's a bit difficult as you do it. You should be able to do it, but it should be difficult . And then you can rest between 30 seconds and two minutes between sets. I mean, two minutes would be if you're lifting very heavy weights, that you're maximum, really working to your maximum, but you need to push yourself to see the improvement.

00:25:46 Jane: And then you would do another thing, another series. So you do usually three sets, eight or ten. The 10th one is always the one that's a bit difficult. So you feel like, "I've done ten, but I don't think I could do eleven." So that determines how heavy your weight is because if you do ten and it's like, "Oh, I could have done 15.” The weights' are too light.

00:26:10 Maya: Right, exactly.

00:26:12 Jane: Okay, so you do... You should be just be able to do the ten, but not be able to do the 11th. A little rest, and then you can do another ten and the same thing should happen. You couldn't do the 11th. And that's how you gauge whether your weights are heavy enough for you. And one of the great things about when you start is if you work like that, you will see improvement and you improve really, really fast. You'll go, "Oh, a month ago, this was seemed like really quite a lot. Now I pick it up and it's like why would I exercise? This is too light."

00:26:57 Jane: I remember really well, the first time I lifted up a five kilo weight and put it back on the rack, on the weight rack. So five kilos is about 11 pounds. And then the left hand one I couldn't do. I had to use both of my hands to get that one up. And now, I hardly ever use five kilos for anything. It's just too light. I wouldn't think about using it.

00:27:27 Maya: So what are you lifting now?

00:27:29 Jane: Well, it depends on what exercise I'm doing. I mean, when I deadlift, which is where you've got a bar with plates on it, and you pick it up from the ground and stand up straight and that is 60. This week I did 62 and a half kilos for five, which is, it must be about 140 pounds.

00:27:51 Maya: My goodness.

00:27:53 Jane: Overhead, maybe 10, 12 kilos overhead.

00:27:58 Maya: That's incredible. My goodness. That's amazing. Congratulations on that. And it's only been, what would you say, about over 10 years? A little over 10 years?

00:28:08 Jane: It's over 10... yeah, it's about12, probably. I've had setbacks, I've had times when I haven't been able to get to the gym, family things have happened. We've had lockdowns. There's been all sorts of with the pandemic, there's been all sorts of things happen.

00:28:22 Maya: Yes. I remember especially in 2020 when people had less access to the gyms. But not only that, access to dumbbells when they wanted to order some of those.

00:28:33 Jane: No, you couldn't order them, could you?

00:28:35 Maya: At one time, they were like gold. If you could have access to those, that's incredible. So let's talk a little bit about your book on menopause. And I know that I've listened to you on other podcasts, and one thing that really stood out, that I said I definitely want to point this out, is there are myths associated with menopause. One of them being that we believe we have to experience all those complications associated with menopause. We're just bound to have those ailments that bother us a lot. And the other one is weight gain. So I'm hoping that you can talk a little bit about that. Should we expect weight gain when we go through menopause, and what can we do about it?

00:29:19 Jane: Okay, just in general, people, I think, women assume that any symptom that starts while their perimenopausal menopausal, post menopausal has to be caused by the menopause. But people develop asthma at 35 or eczema or something, or they start to feel tired a lot. And if you're 35 or 40, you go, "Why am I feeling tired? What's wrong? What have I done? Maybe I'll go and see somebody." But by the time people are perimenopausal or menopausal, they start to say, "Oh, I'm getting these dreadful headaches because of the menopause." And often they feel they can't do anything about it, whereas if it's happened any other time of their life, they would say, "I've started getting headaches. Why am I getting headaches?" And they might think, "Actually, I'm drinking too much alcohol. That's what's happening. I've upped the amount of alcohol I'm drinking. No wonder I'm getting all these headaches."

00:30:22:19 Jane: They're actually not headaches, they're hangovers, you know, that sort of that sort of thing. But because it happens at that time of the perimenopause, menopause, women go, "Oh, it's the menopause, so I can't do anything about it." And that's one of the real dangers, I think, is that if people believe that any symptom they develop between, I don't know, 40 and 55 has to be caused by the menopause, then they don't do anything about it, or they get put on HRT. And HRT, like all drugs, does have a placebo effect as well. No matter how effective a drug is, there is also a placebo effect. So even if it makes your headaches go away, it could actually be down to the menopause.

00:31:12:19 Jane: I was talking to somebody in the gym recently and she kept on saying to me, "Oh, this bloody menopause. And I keep on getting these dreadful headaches with it and I just feel awful and I'm tired all the time," and so on and so on and so on. And then a few weeks later, she said, "You know," she said, "I gave up alcohol. I realized how much I was drinking." And she said, "I thought, I decided to cut it out completely." And she said all those menopausal symptoms are gone. It has nothing to do with the menopause. It was the amount of alcohol she was drinking in her case. I mean, I'm using alcohol as an example. Obviously, it's not that way for everyone.

00:31:53 Jane: So I think the first thing is, don't assume that a new symptom or a symptom getting worse has to be down to the menopause. A lot of women complain about not being able to sleep very well during the menopause, but the researchers have found the best prediction of who will sleep badly during the menopause is the women who were sleeping badly before. So you've been sleeping badly for years, and now you're in the menopause. You blame the menopause, but actually you've always been sleeping badly. Maybe because you have poor sleep hygiene, maybe because you are extremely angry a lot of the time with your partner, so can't sleep. Maybe you're anxious. So you need to think about these things and not just immediately blame the menopause and the weight loss.

00:31:53 Jane: Very interesting study done. One of the Australian universities, which I can't remember which one, and I can't remember the reference, but if anybody wants to know, I can let them have that. And they looked at women who had it was natural menopause, so not surgical menopause. And they looked at women who had an early menopause, normal time of menopause or a late menopause, and they followed them over this time. And what they found was that they all put weight on around the same or those that put weight on, put weight on around the same time, the same age, not the same menopause time. So if it was down to the menopause, the women who had an early menopause should have put weight on earlier in their life than the women who had a late menopause. But actually, they all put weight on around the same age.

00:33:40 Jane: And so the researchers said it's actually a myth that it's down to menopause. It's about aging and it's about lifestyle. And because it's about lifestyle, you can do something about it. Somebody wrote a review of my menopause book on Amazon and said, you know, I believed that I was destined, you know, I put on all this weight, and I believed I was destined to just carry it for the rest of my life. And I think she said she couldn't or didn't want to take HRT, and so this was what her life was going to be like. And she read the book and realized, "Oh, hang on a minute, I can do something about this." And so she made some changes and has lost weight and kept it off. So she's really delighted it was a change in her mental state about what was going on. Because if you believe weight gain is because of the menopause, well, there's nothing you can do about

it.

00:34:39 Maya: Right. And the fact that you said that in general, the women that were studied gain weight at a certain age, and you're talking about lifestyle, then that means we sort of maybe at a certain age, slow down, focus on other things, and we're not as physically active. And then what surprised me, too, is how many people gain weight during the pandemic, even people that knew about lifestyle. We often talk about eating plant-based foods on the show, and I was really surprised, including myself, gaining weight. And it was a combination of either people drinking more or reverting back to processed foods or just billing. I don't want to say depression, because not everybody felt depressed, but we definitely felt moody during that time. And we were not as active, not traveling, not having access to some of the parks, national parks and beaches and whatever it may be. We were traveling less. That contributed to weight gain. So lifestyle does play a significant role. What's happening as we age that causes us to then slow down?

00:35:49 Jane: I think one of the things, people, as they get older, maybe the kids have grown up and left home and so you're running around less after them. If you have children. There also tends to be a feeling like, "I've worked hard all my life, I deserve a bit of pleasure. Let's open another bottle of wine or let's go out for an expensive meal," and stuff like that, or get a takeaway or something. People start to spoil themselves. And there is a big feeling like, "Now I'm older. Exercise is for young people. Older people, we take it easy."

00:36:27 Jane: I know people who laugh at people who take exercise as they get older. It's like, "Why are they doing that? What they're trying to do? What are they trying to prove? That they're still young and fit?" That they sort of unlocked for it, whereas actually we need to be doing it. It's not vanity. It's about something very real and very important.

00:36:50 Maya: You just brought up an excellent point and the fact that we may feel shamed or judged as we venture off into new activities as we age can hold people back. I recently had a conversation with someone much younger than ourselves, and we had completed a community walk, my husband and I. And this person said because we want to encourage people to at least get out and walk because there's still a lot of benefits to being in nature, being outdoors, building community. It's good for mental health and just gets you moving and you can still lose a little bit of weight through walking.

00:37:26 Maya: And so this person came up to me afterwards and said, "Do you like pickleball? Or have you ever been interested in pickleball?" And I said, "Oh, my goodness. Wow." I was surprised that he would ask me if I'm interested because I am a little bit older and I don't know how people view me right now. But my husband said, "She doesn't know what that is." And I said, "Yes, I do." As a matter of fact. And I started describing it. He's like, "How do you know this?" And I said because it looks fun. I actually been interested. And so this other young person said, "You should come out. There's this group that meets." And suddenly my mind is thinking, Jane, outside of the box, outside of what I'm used to doing the regular routine. And that's because someone else brought it up and saw that maybe I would be interested. And so, maybe, perhaps we need to include people a little bit more in physical exercises, activities, games that they might be interested in or maybe they don't know about.

00:38:20 Jane: Yeah, I think that's right. Going back to walking, I mean, I was sort of saying I don't want people to think from what I said earlier, that I don't think walking is a good thing to do. I do think it's a good thing, I don't think it's enough. But again, from a different Australian university, they did some research that 3800 steps a day, which actually isn't a huge amount, can reduce your chances of dementia by 25%.

00:38:49 Maya: And how is that, how is that associated? What is it about working that reduces our risk for dementia? Do you know the mechanism?

00:38:57 Jane: I don't think we know the mechanism. I mean, I think that's from looking, you know, statistical looking at what happens to people and looking at correlations and things and causes. Some of that I think is about getting outside. It may be about community.

00:39:18 Maya: Improving our roads?

00:39:19 Maya: I mean, there was some lovely research which showed that if you were in a bed where you could see the sky in the hospital, you recovered faster than if you were in a bed where you couldn't see the sky.

00:39:33 Maya: Oh my gosh. See, I believe in the power of nature.

00:39:39 Jane: Isn't that amazing? I mean, it was statistically significant. They did this research and it's like that's real proof about the power of nature. Even if you live in the middle of a big city, have a look at the sky, look up. Even if you haven't got plants and lovely stuff around you, if it's good for sick people and help them recover faster, I'm sure it's good for the rest of us too as well.

00:40:06 Maya: That is true, very true. So the book that we were just talking about is titled Menopause Weight Loss: Live well, Sleep Well, Stop Hot flashes and Lose Weight. You touched on hot flashes earlier and alcohol. And I will tell you my listeners know because I talk about this often, but I did stop drinking. I just decided not even one or two glasses of wine is good for me anymore. And you also mentioned earlier that some people can enter that pre or perimenopausal phase as early as their mid 30s. I was probably my heavier drinking days were in my 30s and I remember it's interesting that you're saying this, so correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm thinking about during those times, especially in my late 30s, I experienced hot flashes and I thought there's just no... when I drank, okay, not all the time, but if I drank a lot more. I started to feel hot and sweaty and I didn't know what was causing that.

00:41:08 Maya: And then I slowed down, and then I would have maybe one or two glasses of wine and I started entering that real menopause phase. And I would feel from time to time, hot flashes either from drinking, which there's a lot of sugar that might be the cause of it, I don't know. Or now, if I have something with too much oil. And I don't know what it is, but I am whole food plant-based. If I have something that's processed, I will experience a light symptom of hot flashes or something happening. Other than that, I am doing really well, Jane, and I think it's lifestyle like you said.

00:41:48 Jane: Oh, yeah, absolutely. I mean, it was interesting because when I went through the menopause, I was cycling regularly and I was a whole food vegetarian, not vegan. So I was eating dairy and cheese and eggs. But I had fairly minimal symptoms of the menopause. Fairly minimal symptoms. And at the time, I was just really pleased and didn't... I'm really glad compared with all these people who are having horrendous times. And it wasn't until I wrote the book that I realized, "Oh, the reason I had so few symptoms was because I was taking exercise, because I was eating lots of veggies and legumes and things." And I think what the menopause, how women should see the menopause is that the symptoms are directly connected. For most women, there are some exceptions to this, but for most women, they're directly connected with your lifestyle. And so they are messages from your body that your lifestyle is not okay. And if you change your lifestyle, you'll have a better menopause, but also, you'll have a better aging. Because what is right in terms of helping get you through the menopause is also right in terms of getting you to be 60, 70, 80, 90 as well.

00:43:22 Maya: It's all about feeling comfortable with where we are in life, embracing it and still allowing ourselves to have that inner child come out and enjoy life. Especially when you're sort of done raising children. You're done there's so much when it comes to the obligations that a woman has when she's raising her family. And then you reach a phase you only have a window to enjoy before the grandchildren come. But even then, the grandchildren can be a lot of fun. And then you start to get a little busy that way as well. Part of me, as I'm going through this phase as well, wants to kind of normalize and embrace menopause for what it really is, is that we should feel honored that we can go through this experience that we have been allowed to live this long.

00:44:12 Jane: Yeah, it's very much a transition time, and I see it as a time of preparation, a time of preparation for the rest of your life. Because what I found with hot flashes was… they were clearly related to stress. So if I was stressed, that's what happened to me. I'd get a really bad hot flash. And so, actually, I learned what were the stresses in my life. I learned about how much sleep I needed because if I didn't get enough, I'd get a hot flash or I'd have several or all day I'd have them, or all night. So it actually helped me fine tune my life by listening to all these signals that the menopause produced for me about how I needed to adjust my life. So I made lots of different adjustments and they've stayed with me. And I think that's why I am as healthy and well as I am now.

00:45:16 Maya: Yes, listening to the body. One way that I do experience hot flashes in a way is I could be sitting, relaxing, and I'll have a thought, a worry usefully or something that upsets me. And I immediately feel heat in my head and down my back, almost like the cartoons where the fire is coming out or the fumes are coming out of someone's ears from being angry and oh my gosh, it's like biofeedback. I don't know if that's how you would say it.

00:45:46 Jane: Yeah, exactly. Well, exactly, that's a good word for it. I think it is. And if you start to see menopause symptoms as biofeedback, that's a really good...  I shall use that in future. It's a biofeedback mechanism. If you see that, then you analyze, you react to everything in a completely different way because it empowers you. Instead of like, "I'm feeling like this, I've got brain fog, I've got headaches, I'm getting all these hot flashes, I can't sleep, I'm putting on weight." That's very disempowering if it's because of the menopause. But if you feel like these are by feedback from my body about what I need to do for the rest of my life, then it's a completely different ball game then.

00:46:41 Maya: And it allows you to see what you can do about it. Because for sure, when I have those upsetting thoughts and I feel the heat, I acknowledge that and I'll say, "Wow, that thought really upset me." And then I know sort of what I need to do next if I want to work with my... I have a life coach who's really helping me to heal some of those issues that I've had for a while. So anyway, moving on, I really want to cover this other book on hacks, 190 Weight Loss Hacks. Tell us a little bit about that. What was the inspiration behind this book?

00:47:15 Jane: I know loads of people, particularly women, who are successful, beautiful, all the rest of it, and cannot manage their weight and are deeply, deeply stressed by that. And I just got really fed up with all this because there's so much rubbish advice out there about what you need to do. So I decided to write a book and look for the scientific evidence, the evidence about what worked. I was originally intending to do 100 hacks, but it grew and grew and grew, and then I was intending to do 200. But in the end, I made it 190 because I decided I was only going to do the number that I felt was right, that I had the solid information for about how to lose weight effectively.

00:48:18 Jane: And yeah, I mean, it's been really well received. People have told me, somebody said this is a diet I can follow. I've lost wasn't a lot, it was something like 4 pounds in eight weeks. But she said, "I haven't been dieting." So that seems to be what's happening to people is they're losing weight, they're keeping it off, and it's no big deal because they're trying. So there's different things. Not all of them will work for everybody. So what I suggest is people work their way through it and pick out maybe one or two that they like and apply those and see if they work for them. And once they're part of their lives, then to add some more. And there's the references, so you can check the references. I've done lots of scientific references.

00:49:06 Jane: I mean, this comes from really simple things. Somebody did some work, for example, on clenching a muscle. So we all have different things that tempt us. But if you're in the supermarket and you're wanting to buy cookies or something and think, I shouldn't be buying cookies because I know I'll just go home and eat the packet, or I'll eat the packet in the car on the way home. What this research shows is if you tense the muscles, you are less likely than to give in to temptation . So you're in the supermarket thinking I want biscuits, I want biscuits. So you could just clench your fists or push your hands, elbows against your side or something like that. And just that simple act means you're less likely to buy that temptation.

00:50:03 Jane: Also, there was interesting things like... I can't remember what the date is. It's something like from 1988 to 2002, I think it was the average dinner plate size in the US up to 2002 grew by 44% the area of it the dinner plate. So if you've got a bigger plate, you put more food on it, you're more likely to eat the food. You know, plates have grown in size and so has the obesity crisis. And that was like between 1988, I think it wasn't 2002. I mean, between 2002 and now, I'm sure plate sizes have got even bigger and bigger. Eating off smaller plates, eating off colored plates can help people eat less. So there is mixed evidence about what colors work. So what I actually say is try different colored plates, like a red plate or a blue plate, and see which one works for you. Just buy a cheap one and see if it works and you can use it more regularly. So there's lots of very simple things.

00:51:15 Maya: Is mindful eating part of one of your hacks?

00:51:18 Jane: Yes, of course. I think mindful eating is really, really important and the more people are able to do that, the better. But for some people, I think people who have real food problems, mindful eating is too difficult, it's too far away from where they are. So maybe trying some of the other simpler hacks that may help. I mean, chewing, chewing them while you're in a supermarket, you tend to buy less of the sort of rubbish processed food. If you're chewing gum as you walk around and doing your shopping. There's some really simple things that we know work.

00:52:01 Maya: Yeah. So you recommend going through the book and seeing which ones kind of resonate with you or seem doable for you. It sounds like some of those are like biohacks, almost like overriding our natural tendency to do one thing or the other. For example, the clenching seems like overriding that natural desire that you have, or the craving to purchase certain foods. I have found that cooking at home, I eat less when I cook at home. Something is happening biologically, physiologically within me when I'm cooking that by the time I sit down and eat with my husband, I usually serve myself less. And he teases me and he says, it's because you're eating as you go. And I say, actually, I don't eat as I'm cooking. I'll taste the seasoning, but I'm not eating. So by the time I sit down, my portion is much smaller than his. I just eat less when I'm cooking at home as opposed to when I eat out.

00:53:06 Jane: Yeah. So for you, that's something that would work. I don't think there's anything that works for everybody. A couple of people have criticized it, saying, "Oh, you should offer a plan." But I said, "Well, I don't, because what I say is everybody is at a different place in terms of their relationship with food." So it's a matter of looking through these 190 hacks, which are backed up by scientific evidence and finding the ones that like, "Oh, I could do that. Yeah, I could start to do that one. That one actually wouldn't be that difficult. Okay, I'll do that one." And you do that and see how you get on. Then you add another one and another one.

00:53:47 Maya: Yeah, I agree. I don't know that a plan necessarily works for everyone, because then some people have tendencies to go extreme and restrict and diet, and you and I know that that's not the best solution , and it's not healthy when it comes to a long term healthy relationship with food. But some people like myself, I don't have a problem if I do, do a cookie to say I'll have the one cookie and I'm done. Some people can't. They may not be able to regulate that and control that as easily. So you have to know yourself and what works for you. But I still appreciate that you put this book together because it's very resourceful for people.

00:54:29 Jane: Yeah. And that's the aim of it, to give people the resources and then they can plan their own sort of strategy for how they use it.

00:54:39 Maya: Exactly. Is there anything else that you'd like to share with my listeners? Maybe some accomplishments on your end in terms of weight lifting or exercise or anything else that we haven't talked about ?

00:54:51 Jane: I mean, I love Deadlifting, which is where you lift something off the ground. For me, apart from anything else, I cannot think about anything else while I'm doing that. It doesn't matter how stressed, how upset, anything I am, the only thing I can do is think about that. I mean, I would say to people, you're never too old to start just because you've never been fit in your life. If anything, it's a huge advantage. My partner, he's been fit all his life, and so he's the same age as me, so he's now finding that he's not as fit as he used to be. When he was 20, 30, 40, he was incredibly fit, incredibly fast. He was a very good amateur cyclist and did really well. Now, he can't perform like he did.

00:55:44 Jane: But me, who started going to the gym in my 60s, I'm now doing things in my 70s that I never dreamt I would be able to do. So there's a huge advantage to starting late. That would be my big bit of advice. Get started. I mean, I love that phrase. Motion is solution and movement is medicine. The more of it you do, it's a real medicine for your body. I'm sure lots of your listeners are really keen on plant-based eating, and plant based eating is really, really important. It's a big bit of that puzzle of how to age well, but equally important is exercise. Doing exercise. Just start. Just do it as somebody said.

00:56:36 Maya: And by the way, as someone said, yes, just do it. You talked about briefly, and I've heard your story that you were mainly vegetarian most of your life, and then you made a decision to go fully plant-based. So you're an ethical vegan, is that right?

00:56:53 Jane: Yeah, that's right.

00:56:54 Maya: Tell us a little bit about that, and if you want to give us any tips in terms of recovery foods after a good deadlifting program there.

00:57:04 Jane: Yeah, I became vegan seven years ago. I mean, I'd known for quite some time about the horrors of how milk is produced and how eggs are produced and things like that, but I kept on refusing to consider it. It's like I'm doing my bit, I'm I'm vegetarian, you know, I'm not eating dead animals, I'm doing my bit. But then seven years ago, I met Jane and Matthew, who are the founders of Veganuary. Veganuary is the Go Vegan in January. Try eating vegan for one month in January. It's huge in the UK and it's now starting in Germany, in the US, it's getting better known and in South America as well.

00:57:54 Jane: And I met them and it was sort of a bit of a light bulb moment. And I went home and I said to my partner I'm going vegan. And he said all right. I mean, he made no further comment, and I didn't expect him to go vegan either. And then a few days later, I heard him

talking to somebody and he said, "Well, of course, we're a vegan household now." And I said, "What?" And he said, "Well, I'm only eating up the cheese and cheese and milk and eggs we've got, but then I'm going to go vegan as well." So that was great. And it's just hugely beneficial. Ethically, I don't feel compromised. Looking back, it's given me a lot of freedom. I mean, people say, "Oh, so restricted the diets," and stuff. But I have this huge sense of freedom because my life feels that much more aligned because I'm not causing that suffering.

00:58:50 Jane: In terms of weight lifting and stuff, I do actually have a protein shake, a vegan protein shake, after I finish my workout and then before I bike home, which is about 4 miles. So I sit and have my protein shakes, say hello to some of the other gym people, and then get off my bike and bike home. Plant-based food, there's just so much choice and things. And I think people over complicate it. One of the things I say to people is if you cook at home, how many different recipes do you have? Most people actually maybe do five or six things. They do, I don't know, a spaghetti Bolognese or something like that. They may maybe make a homemade pizza occasionally. They have just a few recipes that they use over and over again.

00:59:42 Jane: So I say, well, what you need to do is find the vegan equivalent of that or find how you can veganize that. And that's where you start with it. You don't need... somehow people think, as a meat eater, they cook five or six different meals every week, and it's the same five or six every week, or maybe a few more than that. But as soon as they contemplate becoming vegan, they say, "Oh, I need a repertoire of 200 recipes."  No, you don't. You just need five or six vegan recipes if you've been functioning before that with five or six meat recipes. And it's just getting so much easier.

01:00:23 Maya: And I think also I I forgot the percentage associated with how often people in general eat out. You know, that they don't cook very often at home. So when you're just thinking about that the Western diet or we say here, the standard American diet when you're living-- 

01:00:42 Jane: Which is SAD.

01:00:43 Maya: Right. Which is SAD. When you're thinking of just a regular routine that people have where they probably skip breakfast, eat out during their lunchtime with their colleagues, and then on the way home, pick up something and then bring it home. They're used to thinking of, "What am I going to eat today?" Italian burgers, whatever it may be, Chinese food, whatever people are thinking. So they're used to thinking that every day they have a choice in terms of eating a different meal, because they're probably not cooking the meal. Then you start to think of transitioning to preparing foods at home, and you cannot realistically have that kind of variety at home. It's just too much. But you can get creative with the ingredients that you have.

01:01:34 Maya: And I've had to kind of do that with my husband sometimes where I say, "Today we're eating whatever we have in the refrigerator because I'm not going to cook another new meal." But you take out the quinoa that's left over from another dish and combine it with what you already have. Diced tomatoes, onions, jalapenos, if you'd like that, and corn, whatever it may be. And there you have a salad. So it's just about understanding how food works and understanding how you can simplify. Simplify, make these things easier. Just like you said, we might only really enjoy about five or six different types of meals on a regular basis, but it's coming back.

01:02:17 Jane: I mean, some people go to the same takeaway every day and order the same thing.

01:02:20 Maya: That's true.

01:02:22 Jane: I mean, they don't even have five or six different meals. A lot of people eat the same breakfast all the time. So you can find a plant-based version of that.

01:02:34 Maya: Yeah. And by the way, I'm familiar with the Veganuary. I've known about them for quite a while. And I live across a bookstore that is called Half Price, so the books are discounted. I have found several copies of their books, and I usually buy these things and keep them so that I can give them away when it's appropriate. .

01:02:53 Jane: Yeah. Oh, nice.

01:02:55 Maya: I'm familiar with the fact that they just started a podcast as well. And I did see that you're involved with either their board or as an advisor.

01:03:06 Jane: Yeah, I'm a trustee.

01:03:07 Maya: A trustee.

01:03:09 Jane: It's actually a charity and not for profit. So I'm very honored, I feel, to be in charge. I mean, it's completely changed things in the UK in terms of all the major manufacturers and chains launch new products in January, is just now. And they have Veganuary all over the place. So McDonald's, even the companies like McDonald's and so on, they'll launch new vegan products in January. The supermarkets are covered with vegan options for January. Try Veganuary. It's all over the place. It's just huge in the UK.

01:03:53 Maya: Yeah, so I'm glad you covered that because I'm subscribed to the newsletter and I know that every year as they're promoting Veganuary, they have this challenge and they ask people to subscribe and you can receive one tip, every day for the month of January. I didn't know about the other component, at least in the UK where these companies are all jumping in and offering vegan options through their launching of new products. So that's exciting to hear.

01:04:23 Jane: Yeah, that's really exciting. It was a huge thing when one of the UK chains launched a sausage roll, a vegan sausage roll. And it’s just acres and acres of publicity event.

01:04:36 Maya: Oh my goodness. That's awesome.

01:04:40 Jane: Because one of the things behind Veganuary is to try and make it easier for people to be vegan, be plant-based.

01:04:46 Maya: That is true.

01:04:47 Jane: So that, you know, you can go out with your friends and go to a chain, and you'll have a choice of maybe three or four different things. And that's really happening now in the UK.

01:04:57 Maya: It really is. The momentum, the percentage of people jumping on board is incredible. I hope to say that soon here. I mean, in our city, we lost during the pandemic a few plant-based or vegan restaurants, but also there's been a launch of new ones. So we're not going away.

01:05:17 Jane: We are the future.

01:05:18 Maya: Yeah, we are. We really are. This is awesome. It's been such a pleasure speaking with you, getting to know you, Jane, and I just want to make sure that our listeners can follow up with you if they're interested. So would you tell us what's the best way that they can reach you? And do you want to provide any website, social media content ?

01:05:36 Jane: Well, if they want to see my gym videos, then Instagram is the place for that. And my Instagram handle is @thrivingjane. So I post gym videos, I post bits of advice, inspirational quotes, sometimes vegan food pictures as well, things like that. And then I have a blog website where I put lots of things about health, happiness, wellbeing, healthy, aging, weight loss, all that sort of thing. And that's janethurnellread.com. Those are both the best ways to contact me. And then, of course, buy my books.

01:06:16 Maya: Yes, definitely. We'll definitely put links on there and, well, on your website, you can also buy them through there, right ?

01:06:23 Jane: Yeah.

01:06:24 Maya: Okay, awesome. Well, thank you, Jane. It's been a pleasure having you.

01:06:28 Jane: I've loved it. Thank you very much indeed. It's been great.

01:06:30 Maya: Thank you.

01:06:31 Jane: It's been so nice. Thank you.

01:06:33 Maya: You've been listening to the Healthy Lifestyle Solutions Podcast with your host, Maya Acosta. If you've enjoyed this podcast, do us a favor and share with one friend who can benefit from this episode. Feel free to leave us an honest review on Apple podcast that helps us to spread our message. Thanks for listening.