A baseline for the bones I’ve been taking for granted
By Jenny Peterson
Last month, I got a bone density scan for no reason.
Well, no reason that I — or my insurance company — felt was “necessary.”
There was no diagnosis, no specific concern. Just me, a 43-year-old woman with the word “perimenopause” suddenly in my face.
A perimenopause specialist I interviewed for an article (see page 20) told me women should start thinking about bone density before declining estrogen levels arrive. Of all the things I’d heard about perimenopause, I’d never considered my bones.
So I booked a scan at a Mount Pleasant clinic called DEXA for about $100 out of pocket.
I still wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do with the information. Would I have to drink more milk?
I called my 80-year-old mother, who’d had bone scans.
“Do I have to take my clothes off?” I asked.
No, she said. You just lie on a table while a machine passes over you.
She was sort of right: I was asked to trade my thick denim jeans for provided paper shorts.
I’d imagined a full-body skeletal portrait, but the evaluation measures only your hips and spine. Apparently, your wrists and ankles are another doctor’s problem.
I had my results within minutes. All my numbers were in the green. Green is good.
My left hip, however, was hanging out at the lower end of “green,” inching toward orange. Orange means osteopenia, a precursor to osteoporosis — a word I’d never heard before (and assumed was solved by drinking more milk.)
The advice was straightforward: add weight-bearing exercise, like strength training. In other words: Lift more weights. Hmm. I was starting to want my $100 back.
For weeks, I told everyone about my scan with the stubbornness of someone who had paid to be told to do something she already knew she should be doing.
Then a friend who works in a hospital put it simply: Brittle bones can turn an ordinary fall into a serious fracture. What might have been a sprain can become a break.
Bones are easy to ignore because you can’t feel them getting weaker. They’re a little like cholesterol — quietly misbehaving while you go about your day.
Eat the salad now so you don’t need medication later.
For bone density? Lift the weights now so you don’t have to accessorize with a cast later.
Turns out, the $100 bought me more than a scan. It bought me a baseline. And a reason to pick up the weights.
