Improving Our Health as Older Mothers

As a homeschooling mother of a large family, keeping my health and energy in tip top shape has always been an important thing. When I was younger, that was not a problem, as it seemed to be a natural, given part of youth and I never thought much about it. However, when I hit my fifties, I slowed down considerably. On top of getting older, we added our eighth, ninth and tenth children to our family through foster care adoption. These children came into our home as two babies and a two and a half year old, so I was suddenly an older mother with very young children.

At first, I just accepted that my energy level was low and I ached all the time as a normal part of aging. I knew that raising babies at an older age was going to take a toll on my body, but I had always been so healthy. Soon it was causing problems with my children who were entering their teens. They had a lot of things to learn and do, and having a tired, hurting mother was not good.

I soon realized that something was going to have to change if I was going to give my children a happy, educational upbringing. But what could I do to boost my own lagging energy level, and stop the aches and pains?

First off, I decided to put more thought into what we ate. I knew from past experience that if I ate raw food for the first half of the day, it gave me a lot more energy to get the main part of my work done. So I implemented that again, and also tried to get the children to eat this way. The easiest way to do this was to make fruit smoothies in the morning. I used a variety of recipes, some with milk, some with juice, and sometimes, with diet lemon lime soda. My children and I soon came to crave these smoothies to start out our day. With one five year old who didn't like to eat at all, if I could just get this down her, and it wasn't hard, I felt like she had had enough.

An upshot to eating raw for half a day was that some of the weight dropped off. I didn't have a lot to loose, only ten or fifteen pounds, but on my less than five feet tall frame, that made quite a difference. It wasn't just the dropping off of the extra weight I was carrying around, but the improvement of my appearance that made me feel better. Soon I was shopping for new clothes with my almost teenage daughter, and thrilled to find I was only one size bigger than she was!

My next project was to tackle my aching body. I decided to try the chiropractor before a doctor and pain pills, and made an appointment. She said my body was very tight, and I went into her office once a week for a month at first. It was the third visit before I really began to feel an improvement. Then I went twice a month for a while. Now I'm down to once a month. It's amazing how much difference this has made. I can hardly believe I just accepted hurting for such a long time, thinking it was just a part of aging.

With my new thinner body and the aches mostly gone, I have discovered once again that life can be fun. I do more things with my children, and have begun to tackle redecorating my house. All these things I tried were simple and not time consuming or overly expensive. Except for the chiropractor visits, I didn't have to leave home to improve my health. Now my goal is to keep it this way!