Fosomax caused a huge jaw issue with me. This was before it was a documented issue and my doctor and dentist kept telling me it wasn’t the fosomax. So…I told them I wasn’t taking it anymore.
I also haven’t had a bone scan since because I won’t be taking medicine to treat this.
Oddly, I have actually grown more than 1/2 an inch this year. Seems like I should be shrinking…but I’m not…yet.
Does anyone have a preferred brand for Vitamin D and calcium?
This is my supplement stash - but you should get recommendations for your body from your doc. All from Costco.
I take one fish oil, one Vitamin D And 2 calcium pills each morning. First thing I do when I come down the stairs - take with a big glass of water which helps also get me hydrated!
You need K too.
(corrected earlier type that had K3! K2 and K1 are the ones that were recommended to me)
@compmom i only take what supplements my doc recommends.
My regime vs anyone’s regime may be different by needed design.
A can of sardines has plenty of omega-3 fats plus calcium from edible bones and vitamin D.
Which is why sardines are always on the high calcium food list! Not something I usually choose to eat though!
Thank you everyone! As always you are a wealth of information. Meds scare me. I’m more than willing to up my exercise and calcium loaded diet. @kelsmom , do you really do 90 min. Of exercise daily? After an hour I’m sick of it.
PM’ed you
My doctor was surprisingly un-pushy about the meds. That is, she brought up the subject in an “if you want” kind of way, and didn’t push back at all when I said that I had done some research of my own and didn’t want to start right now. In my case, my first DEXA scan at age 65 is also the baseline - so we really have no other info to go on. For all I know I sustained most of the bone loss earlier on, right after menopause, and had already stabilized. I paid a lot of attention to the FRAX score and am willing to live with the risk for now. I had a T-score of -2.9 in lumbar spine, -2.3 femoral neck.
I actually saw my chiropractor first, ahead of the MD. That’s just the way appointment scheduling works – but I figured my chiropractor knows more about my spine anyway. He recommended that I work with weights at the gym 4 days a week, and also had suggestions for supplements. He gave me an article about Vitamin K that I found to be helpful. Told me to eat sardines for calcium.
It’s not just calcium – you need to consider other supplements as well. (vitamin D, various minerals). I’d recommend that you start by keeping a food diary for a couple of weeks – record what you eat (along with amounts), just with your normal diet. Then you will have an idea of how much you are getting from your normal diet and how much you might want to supplement. I was already taking some calcium and I switched to a different supplement and increased my daily supplementation slightly, but I also tend to consume a lot of dairy and other dietary calcium – so I factored that in.
For supplements, I found it worthwhile to subscribe to the website at https://www.consumerlab.com/
They have information about common brands of supplements and lots of regularly updated information about scientific studies. For example, my chiropractor had recommended large doses of vitamin D – but there are several studies showing that higher levels of vitamin D are actually associated with an increased fracture rate – so I cut back on the extra supplementation. “Extra” because the calcium supplement I chose already has vitamin D-- so I did the math and figured that was enough.
I found this website (& books & videos) very helpful for figuring out exercise, as well as good modifications for my yoga routine:
I also found this website helpful – definitely a good place if you are averse to taking meds right now. But I take some of the info on this site with a grain of salt – she strongly advocates an alkaline diet but other sources lead me to doubt the science behind that. But there is a lot of other great info on the site, so worth checking out:
@conmama , I do. I am not working, and I can’t say that I don’t have time - so I “just do it.” I split it up, doing the workout when I wake up and walking later. When I first started walking, I was so bored after 20 minutes. Over time, I have learned to enjoy that hour of no distractions. H sometimes walks 20-30 minutes with me, but when I walk alone, I am alone with my thoughts. It has helped me to keep my stress level down. I walk in rain & cold, but I have missed a couple times when the road was too slippery.
Kale, Swiss chard, mustard greens, and collard greens are good sources of vitamin K.
I buy Kirkland Calcium with Zinc plus D3.
https://www.costco.com/kirkland-signature-calcium-citrate-magnesium-and-zinc%2C-500-tablets.product.11672433.html
I’m not sure if it is the best but it’s definitely the most economical choice.
I take an MK-7 supplement. Basically the same daily dosage that was used in whatever study I read. (There were a couple) I do also eat a lot of greens. I usually buy baby spinach or baby kale because I can pretty much add bunches to whatever I am cooking or eating. Green smoothie. Spinach omelet, etc. Just pretty handy to have around.
Margaret Martin has a MelioGuide program that discusses movements to avoid, and she has videos that demonstrate safe movements. I subscribe to her email newsletter. I use some of her ideas to modify my workouts, making them more osteo-friendly. I consider my workouts more advanced than what she demonstrates, but the ideas are good.
I recommended Margaret Martin’s site above. I also find her exercise videos to be rather slow for my tastes, but it’s good to get the information and then work it into the other things that I have been doing. I’m age 67 and don’t really consider myself to be much of an exerciser, but I realized after awhile that a lot of blogs & exercise info with bone health in mind is geared to people who really are a lot more frail than I am. My lawyer-brain understands why they want to be careful about what they recommend to people with diagnosed osteoporosis – but I know I am a lot stronger. I did modify my yoga routine with awareness that want to avoid curving my spine forward or putting pressure on my lower back - so no more rolling up from a forward bend. Before the yoga studio shut down, there was one teacher in particular who was a great model for me – I could watch her and try to emulate her posture.
Recently at home I’ve been doing barre work (mostly BodyBarre videos) – I have no idea whether it’s helpful or not for osteoporosis but it is definitely weight bearing with lots of plies and releves – I can feel in my muscles that I am getting a good workout. My rationale is that even if bone density doesn’t improve, stronger muscles will help protect the bones.
I’m planning to start going back to the gym again in 3 weeks. The gym here just opened a couple of days ago, I get my second Covid vac dose in a couple of days, so 2 weeks out from that I’ll feel safe at the gym again.
I usually also exercise at least an hour a day. I split it up doing 30 minutes of something before work and then 30
Minutes after work.
But I think quantity isn’t as important as the fact that what you do will
Be beneficial to bone health. So weight bearing and weight lifting! That doesn’t mean you have to lift barbells!
@calmom, I don’t know how I missed your link to Margaret’s site (probably because I clicked on the Dr. Susan Brown one right away). I agree that the information seems to be geared toward women who are quite frail, but the ideas are helpful. I do Beach Body P90X3, which requires some carefully considered adjustments on my part. I appreciate every new piece of information I acquire as I research osteoporosis (thanks for the Dr. Brown info).
Medication is going to be a wise choice for many women, just not for me (right now). I don’t want to be one of those holier than thou people - we are all different, and we must do what is best for ourselves.
I like this author/provider because he had severe osteoporosis himself.
I agree that each person needs to make their own choices – both as to medications & exercise regimen.
I don’t lift free weights (except for hand dumbbells) – but when I can use the gym, I work out with the weight machines. The reason is simply that I’m afraid of injury if I were to slip with a free weight – especially knowing that my spine is a weak spot So I just feel safer with the machines – but I definitely miss that a lot over the past year.
My latest exercise toy is a home vibration plate, like this - https://www.amazon.com/LifePro-Vibration-Plate-Exercise-Machine/dp/B07MQLDJLW
I actually got the idea from a Margaret Martin video about low-intensity vibration therapy. They advertise that they are good for bone density but I read the studies and they are all done on gym or therapeutic quality machines that vibrate much faster than the low-cost home machine. The home machine oscillates at a maximum of 12hz, whereas studies are done on machines that are 30hz +
So there really is no evidence at all that the home machine will do anything for bone health – I just bought it out of boredom, mostly to add something new to motivate me to get out of my chair. But it can’t hurt, and it feels really good to stand on the thing.
