Menopause Sleep and Stress

8 Week Yoga Program for Menopause Sleep and Stress

You wake at three and lie there. The temper you did not use to have arrives over nothing. Everything feels one degree too warm and one notch too loud, and the tiredness that follows a bad night has started to feel like the baseline rather than the exception.

Our yoga teachers built this eight week program around what the research actually supports, which is sleep and mood rather than hot flushes. An evening sequence every week, standing work that is worth doing for its own sake, and a cooling breath you learn before you need it.

Twice a week plus an evening session, for eight weeks. Four sequences. Eight weeks is not a round number here: it is the length of the one trial that tested a full programme in perimenopausal women.

Length

8 weeks

Practices

24 in total

Rhythm

Twice a week, plus one evening session

Made for

Perimenopause and after, aimed at the symptoms with the evidence behind them

What the research says

The most useful trial in this area is the one that did not find what it was looking for. 249 women were randomised to twelve weeks of yoga or to ordinary daily activity, with hot flush frequency as the primary outcome. Hot flushes fell in both groups and there was no difference between them. Insomnia severity did improve significantly in the yoga group. Sixty-eight percent of the yoga participants said the practice had improved their menopause symptoms anyway, which is worth sitting with.

Two meta-analyses by the same lead author disagree, and both belong here. The 2012 one found moderate evidence for psychological symptoms and no evidence for vasomotor, somatic or urogenital symptoms. The 2018 one, with 13 trials and 1,306 participants, found effects across all of those against no treatment, and against exercise controls only for vasomotor symptoms. The newer, larger analysis is more positive and its own authors note the effects were not robust against detection and attrition bias.

Where the evidence is steadier is sleep and mood. In a trial of postmenopausal women with diagnosed insomnia, yoga reduced insomnia severity significantly more than both a control group and a passive stretching group, while the sleep laboratory measurements showed no difference between groups. In another, 88 postmenopausal women did twelve weeks of hatha yoga, exercise, or nothing, and the yoga group came out ahead of both on menopause symptoms, stress and depression.

See every study and guideline behind this program →

How the program works

3 phases, and you stay with the same practices for the whole of each one. That repetition is the plan rather than a shortage of ideas. A body changes when the same ask comes back often enough, and the trials this program follows repeated for weeks before they made anything harder.

Weeks 1 to 3MoveEstablish the evening practice and learn the cooling breath.Open week 1 →Weeks 4 to 6BuildAdd standing strength without losing the ending.Open week 4 →Weeks 7 to 8IntegrateArrive at something short enough to survive a difficult month.Open week 7 →

Two main sessions a week plus one evening session, for eight weeks. Open a session below to see every pose and its timing. Three things run through all eight weeks: an evening sequence aimed directly at sleep, twists that stay at half range on purpose, and a cooling breath practised before you need it.

Who this is for

·You are in perimenopause or past it, and sleep or mood is the main problem.
·You wake in the night, or the days feel shorter tempered than they used to.
·You want something honest about what it can and cannot change.
·If you have osteoporosis or risk factors for it, you have had a bone density check or are willing to get one.
·You can find thirty minutes twice a week and twenty minutes one evening.

Before you start

This is for perimenopause and after. The sleep and mood effects are the ones with evidence behind them: the strongest single trial found no difference in hot flushes against ordinary daily activity. If you have osteoporosis or risk factors for it, get a bone density check before starting, keep twists gentle and leave out deep backbends: vertebral fractures after forced flexion and rotation in people with low bone density are documented. Any bleeding after the menopause needs a doctor regardless.

Read the full safety notes in the practice guide →

The practice

Pick a week to see what it asks for and the practices that carry it. The same practices run for a whole phase, so a week changes what you do with them rather than replacing them.

Move

Build

Integrate

Move · Weeks 1 to 3

Learn the cooling breath cold

Practise it eight rounds at a time when you are perfectly comfortable. A technique learned during a hot flush is a technique you will not remember during the next one.

Main session · Twice a week

30 Minute Yoga Sequence for Menopause, Sleep and Stress

30 min · 10 poses

Thirty minutes. Twelve standing, eighteen lower down.

1.Mountain Pose3 min
2.Upward Salute2 min
3.Mountain Pose with Side Bend1 min each side
4.Warrior II1 min each side
5.Standing Forward Bend2 min
6.Cat Pose2 min
7.Cow Pose2 min
8.Bharadvaja's Twist2 min each side
9.Legs Up the Wall5 min
10.Corpse Pose5 min

Open the full sequence →

Evening session · Once a week

20 Minute Evening Yoga Sequence for Menopause Sleep

20 min · 8 poses

Twenty minutes, about an hour before bed. This is the sleep one.

1.Easy Pose2 min
2.Cat Pose2 min
3.Cow Pose1 min
4.Head-to-Knee Forward Bend3 min each side
5.Reclining Hand-to-Big-Toe Pose90 sec each side
6.Legs Up the Wall4 min
7.Knees to Chest Pose1 min
8.Corpse Pose4 min

Open the full sequence →

← Back to the menopause sleep and stress practice guide

The research behind it

This program is based on studies from

Read what each study found →

The 18 poses in this program

Every pose has its own page with alignment, common mistakes and the energetic effect. Look one up when a shape does not make sense in your body.

Mountain Pose Upward Salute Mountain Pose with Side Bend Warrior II Standing Forward Bend Cat Pose Cow Pose Bharadvaja's Twist Legs Up the Wall Corpse Pose Easy Pose Head-to-Knee Forward Bend Reclining Hand-to-Big-Toe Pose Knees to Chest Pose Triangle Pose Chair Pose Downward-Facing Dog Bridge Pose

Go to the Asana Lab →

The guide behind this program

Why these poses and not others

The Menopause Sleep and Stress practice guide explains what each pose does and why it belongs to this goal. It also carries the safety notes and every study this program is built on. Read it if you want the reasoning rather than the plan.

Read the guide →

Frequently Asked Questions

Does yoga help with hot flushes?

Less clearly than you would hope. In the strongest single trial, 249 women did twelve weeks of yoga or carried on with ordinary activity, and hot flushes fell by a similar amount in both groups. An older meta-analysis found no evidence for vasomotor symptoms; a newer, larger one did find an effect. We have built this program around the outcomes that do not depend on which review you read.

What does it help with then?

Sleep and mood, consistently. In that same trial insomnia severity improved significantly more in the yoga group. In a trial of postmenopausal women with diagnosed insomnia, yoga beat both a control group and a stretching group. In another, yoga improved menopause symptom scores, stress and depression more than an exercise group did.

Why is there a cooling breath if hot flush frequency does not change?

Because having something to do in the moment is worth having, and because it was part of the protocol in the trial that found no change in frequency. It is a tool for the ninety seconds you are in, not a treatment for how often those ninety seconds happen.

Will this help my bones?

Not on the available evidence, and we would rather say so. A meta-analysis of eleven studies in mostly postmenopausal women found no significant effect of Pilates or yoga on bone density. Weight bearing standing work is worth doing for strength and balance. It is not a bone density intervention.

I have osteoporosis. Can I do this?

With a bone density check and a doctor knowing about it first. Then: twists stay gentle and never forced, deep backbends are out, and forward bends come from the hip crease with a long spine rather than rounding. Vertebral compression fractures after forced flexion and rotation in people with low bone density are documented, which is why those two movements are limited throughout this program rather than in a footnote.

Is it different before and after the menopause?

The one trial that looked at this directly found the largest symptom reduction in postmenopausal women, a smaller one in perimenopausal women, and no significant sleep improvement in premenopausal women who were included for comparison. So: this is for perimenopause and after.

Creator of this program

Manish Rana

Founder of Asanaverse.de. Manish writes about yoga, Ayurveda and meditation, and owes his deep connection to yoga to his Indian roots. With over 1,000 hours of Yoga Alliance Teacher Training, he shares his knowledge with the community.

More about Manish →

Where to next

All programs

See the other programs

Every program here was built around one complaint and around the trials that studied it. Back, neck, knees, hips, sleep and stress, each one running for as long as the research says it takes.

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