Women's Health
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Next Level: Your Guide to Kicking Ass, Feeling Great, and Crushing Goals Through Menopause and Beyond
A comprehensive, physiology-based guide to peak performance for active women approaching or experiencing menopause-from the author of Roar, renowned exercise and nutrition scientist Dr. Stacy Sims
For active women, menopause hits hard. Overnight, your body doesn't feel like the one you know and love anymore-you're battling new symptoms, might be gaining weight, losing endurance and strength, and taking longer to bounce back from workouts that used to be easy. The things that have always kept you fit and healthy just seem to stop working the way they used to.
But menopause doesn't have to be the end of you kicking ass at the gym, on the trail, in the saddle, or wherever you work out. Once you understand your physiology, you can work with it-not against it-to optimize your performance. That's where Stacy Sims, PhD comes in. In Next Level, you'll learn the underlying causes of menopause: the hormonal changes that are causing all the symptoms you're feeling, and their impact on your wellness and performance. Then, what you really came for-what to do about it. Inside you'll find science-backed advice about training, nutrition, sleep and recovery and supplements, as well as sample exercise routines, meal plans, macronutrient planning charts, and case studies from real women Stacy has coached through the transition. It's the ultimate guide to navigating the Next Level.
For active women, menopause hits hard. Overnight, your body doesn't feel like the one you know and love anymore-you're battling new symptoms, might be gaining weight, losing endurance and strength, and taking longer to bounce back from workouts that used to be easy. The things that have always kept you fit and healthy just seem to stop working the way they used to.
But menopause doesn't have to be the end of you kicking ass at the gym, on the trail, in the saddle, or wherever you work out. Once you understand your physiology, you can work with it-not against it-to optimize your performance. That's where Stacy Sims, PhD comes in. In Next Level, you'll learn the underlying causes of menopause: the hormonal changes that are causing all the symptoms you're feeling, and their impact on your wellness and performance. Then, what you really came for-what to do about it. Inside you'll find science-backed advice about training, nutrition, sleep and recovery and supplements, as well as sample exercise routines, meal plans, macronutrient planning charts, and case studies from real women Stacy has coached through the transition. It's the ultimate guide to navigating the Next Level.
Readers Top Reviews
Clare ZecherClare
A tremendous resource for endurance athletes, strength athletes, and really any active adult woman! This book gives us concrete science and step by step instructions on what to do to maintain our muscle mass, stay lean and competitive, and to find our way to our best health as we age. Thank you Stacy & Selene!
Adrienne L Kramer
Dr Stacy Sims has done it again. Next Level does for peri and post menopausal women what Roar did for all women. She dissects all the components of exercise including fueling, strength, hydration, sleep and more tailored specifically for the needs of women in peri and post menopause to be able to work with their changing bodies instead of fear them. It is supported by case studies and research. The book is easy to read and has useful pictures and details to make it immediately applicable.
simmeredAdrienne
Finally a book that recognizes women of all ages past menopause. As a woman in my 70's, I do not have to be relegated to a rocking chair. I am still vital and this book explains how to maintain and improve strength and muscles. It is easy to read and the exercises easy to understand with pictures. Another winner by Dr. Stacy Sims and Selene Yeager.
SMKsimmeredAdrien
What an informative book and I Highly recommend! Dr. Sims writes in layman terms so it is easy to understand and she gives practical advice. I am so glad Dr Sims tackles the topic of menopause. There is so much stigma about it, even though we all know it's a fact of life with growing older. Just because we are older doesn't mean we have to stop competing or training. She doesn't try to paint menopause as all is rosy (even though our faces may show otherwise - darn, those hot flashes!) but gives straight talk on what to do to be the best we can be. She gives info on training, nutrition, sleep recovery and supplements along with some exercise routines (includes how to pictures) and meal plans. Definitely a must have book and worth it!
SMKsimmered
I took Dr. Sims' Menopause for Athletes course 2 years ago, and I can confidently say this book is 100% derived from all the fresh information in the course. All the information is easy to digest, easy to read, and easy to take action on right away. For any women over 40, struggling with why your athletic performance is declining, or frustrated with how your body is changing, get this book. Im bringing it to all my doctors appointments from now on. The importance of understanding menopause changes as they relate to your entire life cannot be overstated. And let's shred the patriarchy while we are at it.
Short Excerpt Teaser
1
The Stats. The Stigma. The Silence.
How we think and talk about menopause matters.
Life expectancy for women is about 81 years, and the average age at which women hit menopause is 51. In other words, nearly 40 percent of your life is likely to happen after menopause. Factor in those five to seven perimenopausal years when your hormones start to go haywire and you could easily be living half, if not more, of your life on some part of your menopause journey.
When you look at it that way, it's all the more upsetting how negative all the messaging around menopause is and has been for centuries. In the time of Hippocrates, menopause was described as "climacteric syndrome," which was understood to be the stage of a woman's life when she had a weakened uterus, was losing power, and was no longer of much use to society.
The Puritan times weren't much better. If you pore through the historical archives on the witch hunts and identify who was killed at the stake, you find that peri- and menopausal women were primary targets. They were "mad with menopause," or they were using herbs and other natural medicines to help treat other women (so they had to be witches), or they were simply "old crones" who needed to be eliminated for the betterment of society.
Menopause finally surfaced as a recognized medical condition in the 1880s, but the terminology didn't improve. It was described as the "death of the womb." The "experts" of the time also believed that when a woman stopped menstruating, she was no longer able to release "toxins," and it was those toxins that would build up and induce symptoms of high heat in the body, profuse sweating, craziness, and "hysteria." The response of the medical community was to call women insane and lock them up.
Things didn't really get much better even in what we would consider modern times. In the early twentieth century, Sigmund Freud and his followers argued that menopause was a neurosis-again implicating menopausal women as insane. The lack of hormones and the aging process were causing women to go crazy. Even into the latter half of the twentieth century, physicians argued that at ages 45 to 50 women were prone to developing hysterical fits. (Don't worry if reading all this is actually giving you hysterical fits . . . that's a natural and healthy response!)
Moving into the 1960s, physician Robert Wilson wrote a best-seller called Feminine Forever, which described menopause as a disease and "living decay" that should be treated so that women could maintain their youth and sex appeal, That's pretty much what you would expect from a male-centric culture. It was never about us. It was about them.
Fast-forward to today. Though there have been vast improvements in the medical understanding of menopause is, the messaging in the United States and other Western societies, sadly, has not improved. Menopause today is still viewed as our society's arbitrarily established dividing line between sexual, attractive, and even powerful young women and suddenly old, weak women who can no longer contribute to society.
In fact, even now, women "of a certain age" (a phrase I detest) simply "disappear." We basically stop seeing them represented in popular entertainment. Media outlets like Vulture have even made charts showing that as actors like Harrison Ford, Denzel Washington, Johnny Depp, and Tom Cruise get older, the actresses who play opposite them do not-and in fact they are often cast opposite much younger women.
It's no wonder women feel like their lives are over as they age-they're being sent the message that they should just disappear or relegate themselves to the shadows. And when they do finally see some representation, it's often a dated stereotype. Google "menopause" and look at the depictions in the content you find. Compare the depictions of a woman in her sixties with those of men in their sixties. You'll find that there are very different perceptions of what aging is for a man versus what it is for a woman. Rue McClanahan was just 51 years old when she was cast as one of the Golden Girls! That's what we're shown on television and in other media: men can still be strong and powerful, maybe even more so as they become "distinguished" with age, while older women are often shown stooped over with a "dowager's hump" rather than depicted as strong, lean, powerful, or attractive.
After menopause, women are usually dismissed. Is it any wonder that women, especially active women who want to be strong and powerful, are so reluctant to talk about menopause?
Perception Matters
How we view aging culturally and societally influences how we view it personally, and those...
The Stats. The Stigma. The Silence.
How we think and talk about menopause matters.
Life expectancy for women is about 81 years, and the average age at which women hit menopause is 51. In other words, nearly 40 percent of your life is likely to happen after menopause. Factor in those five to seven perimenopausal years when your hormones start to go haywire and you could easily be living half, if not more, of your life on some part of your menopause journey.
When you look at it that way, it's all the more upsetting how negative all the messaging around menopause is and has been for centuries. In the time of Hippocrates, menopause was described as "climacteric syndrome," which was understood to be the stage of a woman's life when she had a weakened uterus, was losing power, and was no longer of much use to society.
The Puritan times weren't much better. If you pore through the historical archives on the witch hunts and identify who was killed at the stake, you find that peri- and menopausal women were primary targets. They were "mad with menopause," or they were using herbs and other natural medicines to help treat other women (so they had to be witches), or they were simply "old crones" who needed to be eliminated for the betterment of society.
Menopause finally surfaced as a recognized medical condition in the 1880s, but the terminology didn't improve. It was described as the "death of the womb." The "experts" of the time also believed that when a woman stopped menstruating, she was no longer able to release "toxins," and it was those toxins that would build up and induce symptoms of high heat in the body, profuse sweating, craziness, and "hysteria." The response of the medical community was to call women insane and lock them up.
Things didn't really get much better even in what we would consider modern times. In the early twentieth century, Sigmund Freud and his followers argued that menopause was a neurosis-again implicating menopausal women as insane. The lack of hormones and the aging process were causing women to go crazy. Even into the latter half of the twentieth century, physicians argued that at ages 45 to 50 women were prone to developing hysterical fits. (Don't worry if reading all this is actually giving you hysterical fits . . . that's a natural and healthy response!)
Moving into the 1960s, physician Robert Wilson wrote a best-seller called Feminine Forever, which described menopause as a disease and "living decay" that should be treated so that women could maintain their youth and sex appeal, That's pretty much what you would expect from a male-centric culture. It was never about us. It was about them.
Fast-forward to today. Though there have been vast improvements in the medical understanding of menopause is, the messaging in the United States and other Western societies, sadly, has not improved. Menopause today is still viewed as our society's arbitrarily established dividing line between sexual, attractive, and even powerful young women and suddenly old, weak women who can no longer contribute to society.
In fact, even now, women "of a certain age" (a phrase I detest) simply "disappear." We basically stop seeing them represented in popular entertainment. Media outlets like Vulture have even made charts showing that as actors like Harrison Ford, Denzel Washington, Johnny Depp, and Tom Cruise get older, the actresses who play opposite them do not-and in fact they are often cast opposite much younger women.
It's no wonder women feel like their lives are over as they age-they're being sent the message that they should just disappear or relegate themselves to the shadows. And when they do finally see some representation, it's often a dated stereotype. Google "menopause" and look at the depictions in the content you find. Compare the depictions of a woman in her sixties with those of men in their sixties. You'll find that there are very different perceptions of what aging is for a man versus what it is for a woman. Rue McClanahan was just 51 years old when she was cast as one of the Golden Girls! That's what we're shown on television and in other media: men can still be strong and powerful, maybe even more so as they become "distinguished" with age, while older women are often shown stooped over with a "dowager's hump" rather than depicted as strong, lean, powerful, or attractive.
After menopause, women are usually dismissed. Is it any wonder that women, especially active women who want to be strong and powerful, are so reluctant to talk about menopause?
Perception Matters
How we view aging culturally and societally influences how we view it personally, and those...
