I watched my grandmother die an awful death. She’d been shrinking for years, and eventually started to hunch forward dramatically. When I was a kid, of course, I was so proud to grow taller than her. But after I stopped growing and still seemed to have to lean over farther and farther to kiss her each time I saw her, it was just sad. She was never officially diagnosed with osteoporosis, but it was obvious what was happening long before she finally broke her hip. Just like her mother before her—my nana—Grandma never even came home from the hospital. She struggled through some painful physical therapy, but died within a few months. I remember her telling me a long time ago that it was a shame that her own mother had to suffer so long in the hospital after breaking her hip before she died, though it had given Grandma a chance to adjust to the loss. It didn’t bring me much comfort now.As my mother went into menopause, she started to worry about following in her mother’s and grandmother’s footsteps. Her doctor recommended hormone replacement—which my grandmother certainly never had—and supplements of calcium, vitamin D, and magnesium. She experiments with hand weights, though she hasn’t found a routine she likes well enough to make it a twice-a-week habit, and otherwise gets most of her exercise walking up and down the stairs to her fifth-floor apartment and occasional sessions on the treadmill in the study. She’s generally careful about what she eats, but as a single person running her own very busy business, her meals are often catch-as-catch-can.Nonetheless, the combination appears to be working. A DEXA scan almost five years into menopause showed her bones to be well within the normal range for the average 30-year-old! Even with “bad genes” (her father’s mother also had a few too-easy fractures in the years just before she died), a few simple measures have saved my mother’s life.My mom has inspired me to take the necessary steps to protect my bones. I’ve seen and heard too much of what happens if you don’t. I know my bones are as dense right now as they ever will be (I’m 30), and I want to keep them that way. Throughout my childhood a milk allergy meant I ate no dairy products, so I worry that I’m starting with a disadvantage. I’ve taken calcium supplements since I graduated from college—and religiously while I was pregnant and breastfeeding. I started doing two circuits a week on the weight machines at the gym after I read about how strength training helps build bone—a whole-body workout that takes about half an hour. I take a once-a-week yoga class, and usually either swim or ride the stationary bike twice. I also walk about two miles a day, taking my daughter to and from school.But the most important changes of all may be the ones I made for my daughter Rose. She’s still small enough that I control most of what she eats, so I make sure she gets a vitamin with extra calcium, some cottage cheese made with extra calcium, and a glass of calcium-fortified orange juice every day. She’s never been much of a milk drinker—aside from on her cereal—and I’ve been known to bribe her by stirring in some chocolate syrup. She does like broccoli and beans, though, and we eat one or the other just about every day. The whole family eats vegetarian about half the time, with chicken or fish a few dinners a week, so Rose gets small amounts of meat protein. I’m hoping these good habits will be well ingrained by the time she makes her own decisions about what to eat. And I’m glad she’ll never have to see her grandmother go through what mine did. Or her mother, either.*21\228\2*
