SPEAKER_00 0:13

Hi there, it's James and Julie here, the team from Fabulous Beyond 40, and welcome back to Empower Your Menopause. Today we're talking about a subject that is, I'd say probably the one that we get asked about more than any other when it comes to our clients. And it's the topic of how do I lose weight during menopause and menopause. Now, from Atkins' zone, many of our clients have tried every diet under the sun. For instance, the average woman in the UK, I saw some research the other day that was showing that they try 126 diets over the course over the course of their lifetime, and they spend about 22 years of their lives on some kind of diet. Now that's a lot, lot of time. So we think it's time for that to stop. So we want to delve into all the things that we can do about that, talk about some of the interventions that can help you crack the menopause weight loss code. At the end of the webinar, we're going to talk a little bit about a webinar that we've got. Sorry, at the end of the podcast, we're going to talk about a webinar that we've got coming up next week, which is actually called Cracking the Menopause Weight Loss Code for Good. And it's a free webinar, so you're more than welcome to join us on that train to get even more insight into this really, really important subject. Now, first of all, before we uh delve into it at all, let's talk a little bit about the fact that Julie and I look as though we're in different locations. If that's if you're watching on video, that is part of the reason for that is that we're actually on vacation, both of us, both of us in the same part of the UK, in different parts of it. I'm in an Airbnb just outside um Paul's S and Julie's over at the other end of the county. Um so we're dialing in using kind of technology that we don't normally use. So apologies if there's the occasional blip here. But Julie, how's your vacation going so far?

SPEAKER_01 2:10

It's going really well. As a matter of fact, I'm finally taking my own advice about unplugging and just relaxing and enjoying being with people that we like being around and not really focusing on um, oh my gosh, should I eat that?

SPEAKER_00 2:29

It's nice to take a bit of time off every so often, isn't it, when it comes to to all that kind of thing. I know that I've been slightly indulging more than I wouldn't normally do if I was back at home. So let's delve into the subject then, Julie. Um you're a woman, you're over 40, you follow or have seen some of the struggles that many of our clients have at this time of life when it comes to weight management. And you and I have spoken quite a bit about that. What do you think tell us a little bit about your personal struggle with weight management? What was your journey?

SPEAKER_01 3:09

Yeah, that's uh that's a great question because this is very near and dear to my heart, of course. I struggled with my weight for a number of years. In addition to the menopause um transition, I also have uh Hashimoto's thyroiditis, which adds a little more complexity to the mix. But I think, like many women of our generation, I was raised with this idea that the scale is all that matters, and we have to weigh a certain amount, we have to wear a certain size clothes, our bodies are supposed to look a certain way, and I always use those external pressures and measures as uh the way I gauged my success. And what really changed for me because it it just seemed to get worse year over year, and I would get more and more frustrated, and I started to really dislike my body, and I used that to to judge my worth as a person for a number of years, and I know that's really common with a lot of the women that we speak to. And I I think what changed for me was working first from the inside out and understanding what was happening with my body, how could I look at it differently and think differently? Because I'm pretty sure I I was good at keeping up the average of those 126 diets for other women. I tried so many different crazy diets. Um, the cabbage soup thing, this lemonade fasting thing, and all and none of it helped. It all ended up just continuing that cycle. And when I finally got some coaching and worked from the inside out, as I said, um, my mindset first changed the way I viewed my body and started looking at how I can be the healthiest version of myself, and then learning about the menopause journey a little bit more so I understood what was happening to my body and why maybe so many of these things that I used to do just weren't working. And it's like the definition of insanity, right? We continue to try the same things over and over, expecting a different outcome, and uh those diets were exactly to me, the dieting industry is a perfect definition of insanity for most women because we're focusing on the wrong things, and when we shift that, it makes the it makes the process so much easier.

SPEAKER_00 5:39

Yeah, I mean there is a natural challenge at this time of life, isn't there? Because there is a hormonal roller coaster that's going on. We've talked about this many times on past episodes, but it's worth just popping over it again. You're in perimenopause, estrogen spikes and then it drops, and then it spikes and then it drops, and then as you approach the menopause itself, that one day when 12 months after your last period, if we're talking about a natural menopause, estrogen starts to drop off. And estrogen is responsible for so many different things in the body and weight management, uh blood sugar control, bone strength, whether we stay lean or or not, and but also indirectly, somewhat where fat is actually stored as as the menopause trans trans transition approaches. So I think it's really interesting that when it comes to looking at this, it's important to understand that when you are younger, absolutely, calories in versus calories out is a huge part of weight loss. You know, I'm on holiday with my daughters at the moment, they're 14. They eat three or four times more than I do, and that is because all that energy is being used somewhere. It's either being used for them to go out and play and run around and swim on the beach and all that kind of stuff, and therefore they can't afford to eat lots of calories because they're expending lots of calories that starts to stop or stops working as being an only factor, the the the older you get for many, many reasons. But I think it's important for us to recognise that what comes into play here are all these other lifestyle elements as well, things like your stress levels, because cortisol, which is one of the stress hormones, lays down fat around around the midriff, whether you're a man or a woman, and cortisol levels are high when we're facing constant levels of of stress. Obviously, those high stress levels that are something that a lot of women over 40 have to deal with because they are trying to cope with so many different things in their lives, so many different stresses, whether it be work, whether it be the kids, whether it be aging parents, whether it be trying to stay in touch with their friends, we've talked again many times about that. And then the adrenal glands that produce cortisol are also the glands that produce estrogen when your ovaries stop producing them. So if your body's prioritizing dealing with stress all the time, it's not prioritizing dealing with with weight loss. And then the other place, of course, that produces estrogen post-menopause is in fat cells. So your body wants to hang on to fat more. So there's lots and lots of things that come into play here that are just beyond this whole idea of calories in, calories out.

SPEAKER_01 8:45

Yeah, totally. And it's and the other thing is I think we've we forget that it's natural for our bodies to change shape a little bit, and that isn't a bad thing. But but remembering that at this time of life, we need to relearn how to prioritize ourselves. We need to learn that it's okay for us to take time to look after ourselves because we've been spending so many years looking after everybody else, and that contributes to the stress, and sleep is so important, and movement is so important. And we've had this conversation this week with my um my relatives that we we become naturally more sedentary because our most of us work uh sedentary jobs, and we get home and we sit in front of the TV or we continue to work in the evening and we sit in front of the computer, and we don't have that kind of active lifestyle. We have so many conveniences, and I think not only do does the self-care time help, the sleep help um with weight management, but also the movement because it's a great stress reducer. It's a great way to keep our bodies fluid and strong and and keep our muscles working that and and prioritizing muscle mass and strength training and protein, which I know we'll talk a little bit about nutrition in a minute, but changing the things that we focus on in that sense to maintain our muscle mass will also help us maintain a leaner physique instead of restricting, restricting, restricting, because we're missing out on a lot of the nutrients our bodies need. And these these crazy diets take away a lot of essential vitamins and minerals that our bodies need to function properly at this at this time of life. So, yeah, calories in, calories out is great when you're younger, but there are way too many other factors involved at this time of life to just focus on diet. I don't like that word very much, but well, it's interesting, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 10:54

Because see, in the word comes from the Greek, um, and uh diet in Greek just means what you eat on a daily basis. It's it's it's it's your your daily food, it's not a restrictive um uh form form of eating that is designed to produce weight loss, it's a it's a it's a form of eating that is how you eat normally to live a normal life. And yet we seem to have it as a it's not a verb. No, it it's almost been demonised, isn't it? And I I think it's interesting as well just to talk about when it comes to those diets, that beyond the old the the whole calories in, calories out debate and what other factors play into it and all the elements that we've just talked about, that there are many other reasons for them failing as well, aren't they? They're very, very hard to strict to because they're so restrictive often when it comes to calories, cutting out old food groups, um leaving you lacking in in energy, and and also there's a mental element to it as well. I know that not every single client that comes to us, but many clients talk to us about the fact that they almost blame themselves when they try a diet and they don't they don't work. People call it falling off the wagon, that's a phrase that I hate, as though they've hitched up to something that is gonna charge them out of this conundrum that they're in, and then they've fallen off it. And it's like I'm not even sure why you were riding that wagon in the first place to fall off it. It's it it they are so so challenging. So I wonder if you could speak a little bit about that mental challenge that many women have where it comes to that blame game of blaming themselves for not being able to lose weight, which is a horrible position to be in.

SPEAKER_01 12:41

It's a horrible position to be in for sure. And the thing we need to understand is that diets are set up to fail because the dieting industry creates customers, they don't create solutions and results. If they created solutions and results, they couldn't make money from it. And I know that sounds a little bit tin hat wearing, but that is the truth. And the more they play on these emotions, because I understand what it's like to feel desperate to shed that weight. Um unfortunately, that sense of desperation is what's helping us hang on to it. But but but I under but I understand it because I've lived it. And so the diet industry will prey on that and and take advantage by promising these miracle solutions with this this special supplement or this special food program. And the other thing it does to us mentally and emotionally, it it does set us up to fail because it's far too restrictive to stick with on any kind of a long-term basis. It isn't healthy for us, and therefore it doesn't work in the sense of helping us maintain a healthy, lean body. And it also makes us feel um it it part of it is it gives us a sense of control, but we're not really in control. Um, it it gives us that emotional attachment to food, it reinforces that emotional attachment with to food by saying, Oh, I can't have that, you know, or or this is bad. We demonize food and we tell it, we say it's either good or bad, and I'm therefore good or bad for having eaten it. It restricts us in social situations. So we feel a bit um ousted or we avoid social situations where we think, oh, I can't control myself around certain foods, and it doesn't help us visit that emotional need or attachment to the food that we think makes us feel better. And it, I mean, this goes way back. We could talk about this for a whole ep a whole episode on its own, but thinking back to our childhood, when we fell down and skinned our knee, mom gave us a cookie to make us feel better. And after a few times, we learned cookies make us feel better. And so we have these emotional attachments to food. So when we take it away, we feel like, oh my gosh, I'm missing out on something. When in fact it's not actually feeding our body what it what it needs. So there's it's a it's a really complex um situation, but but that that that desperation arises from the the sense of restriction, taking away um, I can't have that, I'm good or bad for for eating or doing these things, and it it adds additional stress to the whole the whole idea of how how do we eat, what do we eat, and it takes us away from listening to our bodies. What is it that our bodies need? What do we what are our bodies telling us makes us feel good? And that's different for everybody. It's it's that's another reason why what these one size fits all diets and and supplement programs don't work.

SPEAKER_00 15:53

Yeah. So we've established they don't work, we've established that calories in, calories out is no longer just a sole thing that we need to be looking at when it comes to to weight loss. We've talked about maybe a more integrated approach and also appreciating that our bodies change, what didn't work more uh in the past won't necessarily work now. Getting more into this sort of like a more uh aligned mindset, if you like, about appreciating the changes that take place and being able to find out what happens for us. So let's talk a little bit then because we've talked about everything that doesn't work. What does actually work at this time of life?

SPEAKER_01 16:38

Yeah, I think I think when it comes to what actually does work, it the main let's let's start with the basics. Um understanding how your body feels when you eat certain foods. That's a that's a good thing to tune into. Prioritizing protein would probably be the first place I would start with with anybody who wanted to to change things up and and help themselves in this phase of life, because we don't process protein as efficiently or as effectively as we did before. Our protein needs increase because we're losing muscle mass during this this phase of of life. And especially if we adopt, we'll talk about fitness in another episode, but especially if we're adopting um strength-based training um to help our body maintain some muscle mass and to help with our bone mass as well, um, protein is going to be really key. And I think if we can learn how, first of all, learn what protein is, I'm I'm often surprised that how many people think protein just means eating a whole bunch of meat, um, which there are great forms of of lean protein in in animal products, but it's not the only form. Um and learning to prioritize protein and sometimes beans and legumes and pulses contain good protein, eggs, some dairy, uh you know, poultry, fish. It can be a number of different sources. But when you can construct your meals around that protein source, I think that becomes uh a lot easier um for our bodies to get what they need.

SPEAKER_00 18:17

Yeah, yeah, so protein's really, really important, isn't it? Good, fresh vegetables, a colourful array of vegetables, so you're making sure that you get a nice um complete uh array of vitamins and minerals and antioxidants all going in there. Um and the other thing that I'd add there is the importance of good fats uh in in this time at this time of life. That whole idea of being fat phobic still seems to come from a very sort of like 80s, 90s mentality. Um, when it's a really, really super important nutrient. Most of our hormones are a combination of proteins and fats. Uh, at a time when hormones are challenged, why would you not want one of the main structural elements of um of hormones in your diet in some way, shape, or form? So knowing what the right fats are, and then I think carbs for me, I don't demonize carbs at all, but I think it in perhaps smaller amounts to help with things like fibre, um, more vitamins and minerals, um uh and providing some energy and also for their for their role in the immune system, but not necessarily really, really high carb meals. So that they'd be the constituents of a of a plate then. When it comes to weight loss, how does a woman over 14 know how much of those amounts? If we're not calorie counting, we know that calorie counting doesn't necessarily work because uh you know, calorie labels on foods 20 up to 20% leeway in both the US and the UK, which always makes me think, gosh, you could actually be eating 20% more food throughout the course of a whole day. If you're calorie counting, that is a huge amount of of food to be out by. So I wonder if you could talk a little bit about how women at this stage can it is can can can know what should go on the plate and what should be there.

SPEAKER_01 20:31

Well, and I and I think I think first of all, I think calorie counting is so tedious. I I just I know people love to use the apps to keep track of their calories, but I think the easier way we we like to guide our clients is to use your hand. It's always with you, it's proportionate to your body's needs, and so a serving of protein is the size of the palm of your hand, the width and thickness, minus the fingers. So that's easy, and you start with one palm of protein. Um a serving of fat would be the size of your thumb. Um serving of vegetables would be the size of your fist, ideally two fists per per meal. And um a serving of carbohydrates a portion of carbohydrates would be what fits into your cupped hand. And most of us are served baskets of bread and platters of pasta, and we don't think about how much of that we're eating. If we can get those portion sizes on our plate, that's an amazing place to start. And then I would also suggest not only what we eat but how we eat is really essential. So being able to eat slowly and mindfully, putting your fork down between bites, chewing slowly, savoring your food also helps because it not only makes you more satisfied with what you're eating, but it slows that process down to give your stomach and Your brain time to communicate so your stomach can let your brain know it's full, and that takes about 20 minutes. Who do you know that takes 20 minutes for a meal? Not very many people.

SPEAKER_00 22:10

No, not many people at all. And then, of course, as part of that slowing down eating, that helps that communication between your gut and your brain to know whether you're you're full or not. Quite often the body can also mistake thirst for hunger as well. So getting appropriate hydration is really, really important too, and making sure that you're drinking enough water. Quite often, I find that with many clients who may be craving food or wanting to eat something immediately, if they just have a glass of water, sometimes it is really just a case of being dehydrated and that water giving them what they need, and then they they aren't hungry afterwards. So that can help as well with the amount of food that they're eating and tuning into those hunger signals a little bit better. Yeah, let's talk a little bit then about. So we've talked about nutrition, we've talked about that quite extensively as well in our previous episode. What else can we bring into this team that we want to create of lifestyle interventions that can help? We've talked about mindset, we've talked about nutrition. I suppose the next one really is training. Let's go over that a little bit. For me, strength training, absolute number one. I think it's a really good way of um increasing your metabolism, it's a great way of increasing your your muscle mass. Muscle mass, uh lean muscle burns more calories than fat. Um, so the more muscle you've got, the more your your your metabolism's working better and and and working things out for you. So I would definitely prioritize that. And then for me, some some moderate cardio would be would be the second one. Um maybe with some some occasional spikes in it, but I find these really extreme HIIT sessions can be uh high-intensity interval training can be a real um challenge when it comes to weight loss um for for women at this age, not for everybody, you know. I know there'll be cross-faceted.

SPEAKER_01 24:22

Yeah, they're they're counterpro they're counterproductive. First. Oh, sorry.

SPEAKER_00 24:28

It's okay. Go ahead. They're counterproductive.

SPEAKER_01 24:32

Um, yeah, I find them counterproductive because, first of all, if you're only focused on calorie burn, again, we're focusing on the wrong things for our body's needs. But it it's a it's another way to stress your body by overdoing the cardio. It also um can actually cause muscle loss if you overdo it because you're you're not giving your body that that strength training that it needs, that rest and digest from the stressing. The other thing is it excessive cardio is going to increase your appetite. It's it's causing stress, it's burning a lot of calories, and it's going to increase your appetite. And most people I know um when we first start talking about this will actually justify eating more because they did this really heavy cardio workout. So it it it feeds that cycle. Um but it but it's it's definitely not what our bodies need or want at this at this phase of during this phase of life. Um so I I find excessive cardio is is not helpful. But that's again, that goes back to the nineties and and you know what we learned, right? Hours and hours on the the treadmill or the elliptical trainer just to earn calories or create um create a calorie deficit when when the the strength training is is what really will help. And strength training, I'm not saying that won't increase your appetite, but it won't increase your appetite to the same extent that cardio excessive cardio does. Not all cardio is bad, but uh no people tell me they do for four hit sessions a week, and it's really not good.

SPEAKER_00 26:12

Yeah. Though there will of course be some CrossFitters who are listening to this who will be absolutely pulling their hair out now and saying, I'm really, really lean on CrossFit. And that's true, yeah. It does work for some people. That's the importance of working out an individual approach. So we don't actually demonize anything but find out what works for us at a particular time. But if you aren't if you're if you're doing lots of cardio and you find that you aren't losing weight, the first thing I would be saying to try is to is to start doing some weight training instead and swapping a couple of those cardio sessions out because, as you said, one thing it increases your appetite, so you might be eating more. The other thing is, of course, is that then you are creating potentially more cortisol spikes in the body, and that cortisol can be leading to you hanging on to more weight than you would do as well. What about um the other two great elements then? So kind of skirted over training, we've done nutrition, we've done mindset. Let's talk a little bit about rest, recovery, sleep. How important is stress management, for instance, at this time of life? I'd argue that it's massive when it comes to weight loss.

SPEAKER_01 27:24

I totally agree. I totally agree. It doesn't matter, you can have a perfect, we I say this in air quotes for sure, a perfect diet. You can need the the best quality food available, you can you can do all the right things with movement. But if your body, your body's going to prioritize managing stress because it wants to be in balance, it wants to reach homeostasis. And when cortisol and adrenaline are spike, your body's going to to put most of its energy into managing the stress and trying to recover from the stress or close that stress loop. Um, so it will actually shunt blood away from your digestive tract. It will, as we said earlier, the cortisol will preferentially store fat uh around your midsection because it wants to hang on to what it thinks it needs for energy to manage this ongoing is probably one of, if not the top issue. It's it's one of the top issues for for women at this phase of life. And of course, everybody we say we wear our our stress like a badge of honor, but it really it really isn't. Our bodies are naturally designed to close that stress loop and give our give our body time to get into that parasympathetic nervous system where we're resting and recovering, and that's when everything rebuilds and restores and replenishes and does all of the things it's supposed to do to keep our bodies healthy and strong. So stress is huge.

SPEAKER_00 29:01

Yeah. And then of course there's sleep as well, isn't there? And for me, it's probably the most underrated element of everything that we we do when it comes to trying to prioritize our our health for a number of different reasons. Muscle repair, um, detoxification, your brain and your thoughts re resetting, um hormone production, so many, many different things. And I'm always amazed that when I first start talking to clients and they say, Oh yeah, I think my sleep's pretty good. Okay, so what are you doing then? And everybody knows the basics now, don't they? We've talked about them enough ourselves, and uh people read up on these kind of things. Don't eat before you go to bed, stay away from screens before you go to bed. I was talking to somebody the other day and she went, Oh, yeah, yeah, my last hour before I go to bed, I read a book. Okay, so what do you read? Well, usually sort of like a a Stephen King novel or a horror book or something like that. And really, all you're doing is your intentions are absolutely right to have put the screen down and be reading something and things, but you're absolutely spiking your thought processes there by adding in more excitory stuff. So I don't think it's just necessarily about that pre-bed routine just following a rigid thing of right, I'm not gonna eat three hours before, I'm not going to do any work two hours before, I'm not gonna have screens one hour before. It's also what you're consuming during that time and whether you're actually properly trying to relax or you're just following a list of things that you've been told to do, irrespective of what they might be doing to you when it comes to your thought processes.

unknown 31:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 31:06

Tick tick boxes aren't necessarily useful in that kind of thing, and and everybody's relaxation um process is going to be different. I love to read, but I read books I've already read before, so I don't feel like I'm hanging on every word. If I fall asleep, I don't I'm not missing anything. I love to sip on a cup of herbal tea and dog. I find that like super relaxing before bedtime. And on nights when I do that, because we're not all nobody's perfect at this, but on nights when I do that, I find I sleep a lot better because I have properly let my body come down and and unwind mentally. I'd also like the idea of keeping a a pad of paper and a pen next to the bed. Not my phone. I keep the phone plugged in on the opposite side of the room so that I'm not tempted if I wake up in the night. Um, but if I do wake up and my thoughts are racing, having that pad and pen next to me allows me to write down what's on my mind so then the paper can take care of it and it takes it out of my head. Um, so I don't worry about remembering something or just having those thoughts racing around. Simple things, I think. Everybody finds their own that works.

SPEAKER_00 32:22

Yes. So to recap, then what we're talking about is looking at weight loss as more of a team effort when it comes to the lifestyle interventions that we put in, starting with mindset. We've talked about the nutrition elements that we think are key and portion sizes, getting better in tune with hunger signals, prioritizing strength training over cardio when it comes to working out, stress reduction, and and sleep as all being really important. Now, next week we are doing our free webinar where we're going to dive delve deeper or dive deeper into these subjects and show people how to actually create that team. If you would like to join us on that, the webinar is called Um Cracking the Metopause Weight Loss Code for Good. We've got three different dates on three and three different times, so hopefully, as many of you as possible can join us for that if you'd like to. Um we'll also give you our free bonus guide, which is called How to Become Unstoppable. That's a mindset exercise workbook designed to help you find your unique superpowers if you join us live on the sessions. If you'd like to see when those sessions are, they are next Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. That is September 4th, 5th, and 6th. And as I said, we've got three different times to join us. The web address is weightloss.fabulousbeyond40.com. You can jump on there and you can sign on. And if you do that, we will see you next week. Um, otherwise, we will catch you the next time we do a pod, which should be out next Friday. But until then, it's been James Elliott and Julie Medacy from Fabulous Beyond 40 saying keep up with it and stay fabulous. We'll see you soon.