3 Weight Loss Mistakes Keeping You Fat in Your 40’s

If you're over 40 and feel like no matter what you do, the scale won't budge, it's probably because you're making one of these three big mistakes. Most women are following outdated advice that actually makes it harder to lose weight in midlife. Today we're breaking down what you need to stop doing immediately. By the way, I'm Dr. Tabitha. I'm your Christian physician. I'm a triple board certified OB GYN turned functional medicine expert. And I am here to show you another way to get healthy. Let's get into it, miss. Mistake number one, eating too little and over restricting. A lot of women think they need to eat less to lose weight. That's what we're being told. But why is this a huge mistake? When you start to calorie restrict, the research is clear. Your thyroid will downregulate. It will go into this hypothyroid pattern where you're putting your foot on the brake. You're slowing everything down. So there's a decrease in your metabolism, a decrease in your hair growth, you start to get constipated, have dry skin, your hair falls out. Those are all warnings, signs that you are down, regulating your metabolism, and you need to do something about it. It's really important that we eat enough when we do eat. And we need to start eating faith foods, the food that God created for us, the food that nourishes us, gives us energy, helps us heal and thrive. Please stop calorie restricting. You're only making the problem worse. Weight loss becomes so much harder after 40 because our hormones are shifting. Normally. We're in this beautiful city symphony where all our hormones are working together and they sound beautiful and they make beautiful magic. Together. We have our estrogen and progesterone and testosterone. They're keeping us fertile and fit and fabulous. And then we have cortisol, our stress hormone, which helps us get through our day. Let's just be honest. But around 40, things start to shift. All of a sudden, your ovaries aren't producing progesterone the way they used to. And oftentimes we start to see an accumulation of estroge. So this beautiful balance of estrogen and progesterone takes a big shift and progesterone starts to drop. Estrogen starts to creep up, and that leads to weight gain. It also leads to inflammation and just feeling puffy. And the crazy thing, it also affects your gut microbiome. So as soon as your gut starts to change, that's a trigger to your adrenals, that there's a stressor going on. Then your cortisol increases even more. And what happens, you, your thyroid hears all of this conversation and says, hold it, wait a minute. We need to turn down her metabolism. She is struggling, she's dealing with some kind of infection in her gut or she's overstressed. Whatever the case may be, the thyroid responds by decreasing your metabolism. And so we see a lot of women get diagnosed with hypothyroidism in their 40s and it really is because their sex hormones are shifting and their insulin level and their core cortisol level. So you have to look at the bigger picture. And here's the key. You can get this symphony back on track. It can sound beautiful again, get into harmony. But you have to understand the underlying cause of what's driving this. And so much of it is that stress and those gut issues. And the next mistake might be even worse. It's something almost every woman has been told to do. But before I get into it, if you're making these mistakes, don't worry. I've put together a step by step plan that actually works, works for women over 40. Click the link in the description to learn more. Mistake number two, too much cardio, not enough strength training. I see women doing endless cardio trying to lose weight, but it doesn't work if you're over 40 like it did in your 20s. And here is why. Exercise causes stress. Little amounts of stress are good, they're healthy, they're what we need. We need a little dose of cortisol, but in chronic high doses, that is a recipe for weight gain, especially, especially around the middle. Because cortisol, our stress hormone, is a weight gaining hormone. So here's the deal. If you are over exercising, and I would argue women over 40 should not be doing high intensity cardio every single day, that's over exercising. That chronic cortisol production just puts all the weight on your midsection. I see it over and over again in my patients in my practice. They are working out, they're doing all the hit training, the all the orange theory, and they're gaining weight, they're feeling puffy and inflamed. And so we need to switch things up. Over 40, we need to start strength training. We need to focus on flexibility and building our muscles. We still need that cardiovascular support. We need endurance training, just not so much of it. And this last mistake, it's something most women don't even realize, is sabotaging their progress. Mistake number three, ignoring stress and poor sleep. Stress makes it nearly impossible to Lose weight. Here's the deal. Cortisol, our stress hormone, is a fat storing hormone. Every time you make too much cortisol, your body is told to store fat because it thinks that you are under threat. At the end of the day, we have a cave woman body. Our physiology is the same as it was thousands of years ago. And so if our body feels threatened, it will respond accordingly. It doesn't matter if your cognitive frontal lobe says I can handle that, I can handle my boss that I don't like, or all the kids that I need to pick up and all the things I need to do. Your physiology is still going to respond in that ancient way of hunkering down, decreasing your thyroid production and storing the weight for later because it thinks you're either going to run from a tiger or that you're going to hide out in the cave until it is safe. So you have to decrease your stress. That is literally one of the only ways to start losing weight over 40. So for me, I was a stressed out OB GYN. I was delivering babies all night, doing surgery all day and it was life or death. Sometimes a lot of those stressors were just too much for my body to handle. And I know that sounds extreme, not everybody has that crazy lifestyle, but I see this every day with my patients. Just simply going to a job that you dread every day is enough physical stress for your body to hold on and continue to gain weight. I've seen women get rid of their job and the weight goes away or they're in a relationship that it's just eating away at them, at their subconscious. They know they're unhappy so that weight stays on. That is a cortisol response. It is so vital that you figure out how to get control of your stress. It starts with setting boundaries, setting time for self care, believing you are worth it, you are worth a better situation, a better job, a better relationship, and a better body that you feel good in. So let's just get rid of this stress already. Here's a scenario I hear all the time in my fast to faith group. Women are in this vicious cycle of feeling stressed out, feeling overwhelmed, and then it causes weight gain and then the weight gain makes them feel even more stressed because they don't want to go to the gym, they don't want like how they look in their body. You have to break that cycle. And it really does start with shifting your mindset. You have core beliefs that are driving all of your decisions all throughout the day, all the tiny little decisions that add up and make you who you are. And it's not until you really change those belief patterns and believe something better about yourself and for yourself that you will start to do things differently. This has been a game changer in my Fast to Faith program. When we renew our minds and and come at life from a different perspective, like, God's got me. I can do this. I can do all things through Christ. He strengthens me like anything is possible. There are so many promises in the Bible from God, it's mind blowing. There's endless promises for you to actually have an amazing life, to feel good in your body, to thrive, to be able to show up and serve others because you're not struggling and feeling miserable. But you have to tap into that. So my answer is always invite God into this journey. He cares about your body. He cares about how you feel and the choices you make with food and movement and sleep and all of those things. I promise you, he wants to be part of the little stuff every day. So if you invite him into this conversation, everything's gonna shift. Now that you know what not to do, let's talk about what actually works. In this next video, I'll break down the best strategy for burning fat and balancing hormones after 40. Click here and watch it right.