Weight Loss in menopause
Peri
"I Found ME Again"
This is one of our amazing Peri Menopausal Clients who came to us with an array of menopausal symptoms, weight concerns and severe gut issues.
Like many, she had been trying for YEARS to not only lose weight but more importantly figure out WHY what worked before suddenly did not anymore.
She exercised REGULARLY and consumed a HEALTHY diet but her energy kept declining, her gut kept getting worse and her weight kept going up.
1.
Initial Screening
Our first step with working with ANY woman is to do a full deep dive. An initial screening is conducted with ALL women we work with to gather a baseline on the below.
- Current menopausal health (symptoms, challenges menopause has presented etc)
- Gut Health
- Pelvic Health (joint pain, sexual health, bladder changes)
- Hormonal Health (signs of high cortisol, signs of hunger hormones dysregulated, signs of mood hormones dysregulated etc)
- Sleep Health
- Energy Levels
- Current Food Choices (preferences, how time influences your ability to prep, cook etc)
This gives us a very good understanding of the FOODS this individual should avoid and the ones she needs to eat, gives us an understanding of WHAT type and volume of exercise to do and so on. You see, your menopausal symptoms tell a story – in order to reach your goal you need to learn what that story is telling you.
For example if we have a woman telling us she is dealing with
- Brain fog: This would point to anti inflammatory foods
- Hot flashes: This would point to removing refined sugars and working on fiber intake to begin with
- Night sweats - This would point to certain protein sources to avoid
- Skin issues like itching etc - This would point to foods high in vitamin B12
- Joint pain - This would point to anti inflammatory foods as well as FOODS high in calcium
So the screenings outlined above tell us a STORY. How we build the nutrition and exercise plan for each woman depends on what that story is telling us.
Build
A Nutritional Plan
We build a tailored nutrition plan that includes the correct volume of food, proper protein targets, magnesium, fiber, vitamin D, omega 3’s, B12, probiotics, and more that would not only drive this womans weight loss goal but also to reduce her symptoms.
This nutrition plan also had to be realistic for HER- we don’t want temporary results – we want to help build a LIFESTYLE!!
Providing a large range of recipes always kept the nutrition fun, exciting and easy.
As we were monitoring menopause symptoms on a weekly basis we were able to continue tweaking the nutrition plan based on results each week.
Gut
Health
As this client was experiencing a LOT of gut issues and as we know a LOT of our hormonal health is driven by our gut health this is the first place we started with this particular client.
She came into her journey with us taking a LARGE amount of supplements so we removed a LOT of these straight away. If you have a very disrupted gut health pouring endless supplements in on top makes the issue worse in many cases.
Simply removing all these additional supplements relieved a lot of inflammation in her gut.
We then got stuck into tracking her bloating, bowel movements and any energy slumps so we could start eliminating any foods that her gut could no longer tolerate before adding gut enhancing foods.
We usually track a woman’s gut movements for 10 days before we start eliminating the foods causing concern. Every woman’s gut is different so we need to get to know HER gut instead of thinking there’s a “one size fits all” food lost, because there’s not.
REMEMBER: All women experience a shift in the diversity of healthy bacteria in their gut around the age of 45 causing an array of gut issues in many cases.
Disruption to our gut bacterial balance is linked with inflammation, mental well being, weight gain, hormone imbalances, metabolic health, autoimmune diseases..to mention a few
Sleep
Health
As she led a hectic and high demanding life her stress levels were very high, this was filtering into a lot of health factors – sleep being one
She was having those typical 2am, 3am wake ups and was struggling to have a proper nights sleep hence causing more hormonal concerns, more fatigue issues and even skewed hunger levels
Sleep is one of the most overlooked and underrated tools when it comes to overhauls and individuals health. Why? Because when we sleep OPTIMALLY our body performs a lot of our major health activities that leads to hormone regulation, metabolism optimization and muscle repair (after training)
There can be lots of signs of cortisol dysregulation that we look for in the initial hormonal symptom screenings we perform. To name a few:
- Fatigue
- Brain fog feeling
- Poor immunity or getting unwell often
- Weight gain, especially around the tummy
- Reduced sex drive
- Broken sleep (trouble falling asleep or disruptions to sleep)
- 2am, 3am wake ups
- Unexplained feelings of higher stress/anxiety
- Skin issues (acne, dry skin, random blemishes)
Menopause is not optional, suffering through it IS...
There are many ways to reduce and regulate cortisol levels – below are some of the basics
- Reduce caffeine
- DELAY Caffeine intake
- Introducing a schedule for sleep and wake times
- Enhance your bedroom environment
- Exposure to natural sunlight as earlier as possible
- Blue block glasses in the evenings
- Reduce exercise intensity while regulating
- High Fiber intake
- Anti inflammatory diet
Working on her stress and regulating her cortisol levels allowed her to FINALLY get a peaceful nights sleep
Nutrition
Vitamins & Minerals
A lot of her menopausal symptoms pointed towards inflammation (like in most cases; joint pain, brain fog, hot flashes and so on)
So we worked on removing any inflammatory foods and adding anti inflammatory foods that suited HER life – she has little time and her days change a lot so providing a very flexible meal plan was key here
Again each woman is different and we not only need to consider what foods will work for her health but also for HER LIFE: ie what her family likes to eat, the time she has to cook, where she shops and so on
Making sure we have the BASICS in place first is key.
– Protein
– Wholegrain carbs
– Healthy Fats
– Fruit/veg
We never do any specific food changes until the basics are in place because its the BASICS that drive most results, everything else on top keeps results moving forward.
Giving her the POWER of knowledge was key
Teaching her WHY her body felt different
WHY she was experiencing certain symptoms
And VALIDATING her correct thoughts that the array of challenges she was now experiencing was menopausal related and not because she “must not be following her diet or exercising anymore” like she had been told so many times before..
Give a woman the right tools and watch her THRIVE again – the goal for ALL menopausal women
Menopause is until END of life so EDUCATION is so important – so not only did we focus on the goals this client was working on RIGHT NOW we wanted to ensure she was set up for the rest of her menopause journey
This meant Lifetime access to our comprehensive education portal, which is curated to empower and provide knowledge in every stage of the menopause journey with topics such as HRT, Pelvic Health, Bone Health, Heart Health and more.
Access to evidence based guidelines on menopause, providing you with reliable information to make informed decisions about your health
Library of informative articles, practical tips, support session videos, and masterclasses led by myself and my team of coaches
If you are interested in a FREE Menopausal Consultation with myself we have a handful of times available next week and you can book a time via the link below
- They are 30mins. I will ask you about your Menopausal Symptoms, your experience of menopause so far, any health implications since going into menopause – ie gathering as much information as possible about YOUR menopausal health
- I will ask about your GUT health as well as PELVIC health (joint pains, sexual health changes, bladder changes etc)
- We can explore your current nutrition and exercise together and based on the above I will be able to advise of gaps or possible incorrect approaches to both
- We can explore possible lifestyle factors that may be causing challenges like sleep, stress, time and so on
