Your hip isn't a part that just wears down with age.
Your body is rebuilding it all the time. The cartilage gets renewed.
The tendons get repaired overnight from the wear of just walking around.
The inflammation in your bursa is supposed to get cleared out by your own repair cells.
The fluid in the joint gets refreshed.
All of that upkeep runs on something called NAD+.
Think of it as the fuel your repair cells run on.
When menopause hits, two things happen at the same time.
Your estrogen drops. And your NAD+ drops with it. They're connected.
Estrogen doesn't just handle the hot flashes.
It also helps keep that tissue getting repaired.
When there's less of it, less repair happens.
And when NAD+ drops, the repair cells lose their power.
By age 50, most women have about half the NAD+ they had at 30.
Half the fuel. For a hip that's been working without a break for five decades.
The repair cells are still there. They still show up.
They just can't finish the job anymore.
So the damage builds up faster than the repair.
The cartilage thins, month by month.
The tendons stay sore because the repair never finishes.
The bursa stays inflamed because the cells that should clear it don't have the fuel to do it.
This isn't wear and tear.
It's a fuel problem.