KRISTY RAM­NAR­INE

kristy.ram­nar­ine@cnc3.co.tt

Menopause isn’t just a new chap­ter in your life—it’s one that can af­fect your health in ways you might not ex­pect. Bio­chemist Ke­le­sha Sar­jeant is re­mind­ing women that hor­mon­al changes dur­ing menopause can in­crease the risk of Type 2 di­a­betes. Sar­jeant is the founder and man­ag­ing di­rec­tor of Crys­tal Tech­nolo­gies & De­signs Lim­it­ed.

A Fran­cis­can Schol­ar and Huel Perkins Fel­low, Sar­jeant com­bines her sci­en­tif­ic ex­per­tise with a flair for mak­ing com­plex health in­sights re­lat­able. A sci­en­tist-mar­keter, she who works with lab­o­ra­to­ries and field-test­ing com­pa­nies to make analy­ses more ef­fi­cient and ac­cu­rate.

Ref­er­enc­ing the Na­tion­al In­sti­tutes of Health, Sar­jeant ex­plained that menopause oc­curs in all men­stru­at­ing women due to nat­ur­al es­tro­gen de­cline—high­light­ing why this life stage de­serves at­ten­tion and proac­tive care.

“In­ter­est­ing­ly, it is this de­ple­tion in serum es­tro­gen lev­els that could act as a dri­ving force for in­sulin re­sis­tance, par­tic­u­lar­ly if there is a pre-ex­ist­ing risk of Type 2 Di­a­betes,” said Sar­jeant.

“These risk fac­tors in­clude: high body weight, ha­bit­u­al con­sump­tion of processed, ul­tra-processed, and high-sug­ar foods, and pre­vi­ous ges­ta­tion­al di­a­betes, just to name a few.”

Ac­cord­ing to the Di­a­betes As­so­ci­a­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go (DATT), Type 2 di­a­betes is a con­di­tion where the in­sulin your pan­creas makes can­not work prop­er­ly, or your pan­creas can­not make enough in­sulin. 

“This means your blood glu­cose (sug­ar) lev­els keep ris­ing and ris­ing. Learn­ing how to live with type 2 di­a­betes can be chal­leng­ing. Some peo­ple can man­age it through health­i­er eat­ing, be­ing more ac­tive, or los­ing weight. But even­tu­al­ly, most peo­ple will need med­ica­tion to bring their blood sug­ar down to their tar­get lev­el,” DATT stat­ed.

Sar­jeant said the de­cline in es­tro­gen can al­so lead to oth­er un­wel­come symp­toms such as joint pain, sleep dis­rup­tion, in­creased cho­les­terol lev­els, and weight gain, par­tic­u­lar­ly in the ab­dom­i­nal area.

“It is this in­crease in vis­cer­al fat that in­creas­es a woman’s risk of de­vel­op­ing in­sulin re­sis­tance in menopause, there­by es­tab­lish­ing the as­so­ci­a­tion of Type 2 di­a­betes and menopause,” she added.

“In­sulin re­sis­tance is the term used when your cells be­come less sen­si­tive to blood in­sulin. This lack of sen­si­tiv­i­ty oc­curs even while your pan­creas re­leas­es in­sulin in­to your body in re­sponse to in­creased blood glu­cose lev­els.”

Menopause, in most cas­es, is a nat­ur­al and per­ma­nent tran­si­tion that women around the world ex­pe­ri­ence. In some cas­es, how­ev­er, women may en­ter menopause sur­gi­cal­ly through pro­ce­dures such as bi­lat­er­al oophorec­to­my. Med­ical­ly, menopause is de­fined as the dis­con­tin­u­a­tion of men­stru­al pe­ri­ods for twelve con­sec­u­tive months, typ­i­cal­ly oc­cur­ring be­tween the ages of 45 and 56.

“When we think of menopause, terms like night sweats, mood swings, and the in­fa­mous hot flash­es may im­me­di­ate­ly come to mind,” ex­plained Sar­jeant. “How­ev­er, a deep­er dive elu­ci­dates a par­al­lel di­men­sion of what oc­curs in a woman’s body on an en­docrino­log­i­cal lev­el, where­in the dis­rup­tion of a woman’s re­pro­duc­tive hor­mon­al cas­cade re­sults in this mul­ti­fac­eted life stage.”

Spot­ting the symp­toms

Sar­jeant em­pha­sised that not all women will de­vel­op in­sulin re­sis­tance dur­ing menopause, but there are some tell-tale signs to watch for, in­clud­ing:

• Acan­tho­sis ni­gri­cans—dark­ened, thick­ened skin in the un­der­arms, groin, or neck

• In­creased triglyc­eride lev­els

• Fa­tigue af­ter car­bo­hy­drate-rich meals

• Un­want­ed weight gain

Pre­ven­ta­tive steps

To re­duce the risk of in­sulin re­sis­tance and main­tain over­all health dur­ing menopause, Sar­jeant rec­om­mends the fol­low­ing lifestyle changes:

• Eat whole foods: Lim­it sug­ary and processed foods while fo­cus­ing on nu­tri­ent-rich, whole food choic­es.

• Get ac­tive: En­gage in en­joy­able phys­i­cal ac­tiv­i­ties such as walk­ing, danc­ing, or strength train­ing – just keep mov­ing.

• Man­age stress: Prac­tice mind­ful­ness, med­i­ta­tion, or oth­er tech­niques to help con­trol cor­ti­sol lev­els.

• Main­tain a healthy weight: Grad­ual, sus­tain­able weight loss can sig­nif­i­cant­ly im­prove in­sulin sen­si­tiv­i­ty.

“Menopause is a nat­ur­al tran­si­tion,” Sar­jeant con­clud­ed.

“Women can pre­pare by as­sem­bling a sup­port­ive team of med­ical, well­ness, and emo­tion­al pro­fes­sion­als. Con­nect­ing with oth­er women go­ing through sim­i­lar ex­pe­ri­ences can al­so be em­pow­er­ing. Em­brace the change and wear it with ho­n­our.”