Less Belly Fat: Muscle Loss is Fat Gain in Menopause

Real quick, before we dive into this episode, I have a little sleep secret I want to tell you about. Look, sleep is crucial for your fitness, but it's crucial for just plain old everyday life and function.

And I find I sleep great unless I have a migraine.

And I've had more than my fair share since perimenopause all the way through postmenopause. My secret weapon was Blue Sky CBD sleep gels. Each gel contains 25 milligrams of CBD and 25 milligrams CBN for deep restorative sleep. Something about it helps to reduce inflammation, which I believe for me was key in helping me get to sleep. But the biggest thing is so many of the over-the-counter solutions, whether for sleep or migraines, can ruin gut health, and liver health. Neither one of those did I want to be problematic for me. So this option is recommended by healthcare providers worldwide and backed by thousands of happy customers, many of whom come from our Flipping 50 community. There is zero THC, so it's non-habit-forming. It's made by a trusted family-owned company that we all can feel good about. Third-party tested for purity and potency. And if you're interested, you too can try a sample for just $6. But even better, you can get 30% off forever with discount code FLIPPING50. That's FLIPPING50. Just go to flipping50.com/blueskycbd. We'll put that link in the show notes and you'll find it everywhere on Flipping 50 at My Favorites.

What are you waiting for? Good night. You want less belly fat?

This is your episode. And look, to the answer to that question, I know no one, no one, even extra skinny people who would say, no, no, no, I'm fine.

Don't really care.

I'll just leave it, especially if it's easy.

We're all probably going to get curious about that question. But if you're a woman in midlife and menopause, Even if you haven't had the scale actually shift, the weight hasn't shifted, you've probably noticed everything has relocated.

And that is in part thanks to the hormonal shift of low estrogen, higher cortisol levels.

That means higher potential blood sugar, that means higher potential insulin.

All of that means a little more fat storage.

But there's one thing that you've got to watch out more. And if we're gonna get all over that in this episode.

Hey, this is Debra Atkinson, and there is one thing you can't do in the gym at your age, and that's get all the protein that you need. You've got to do that in the kitchen. To make it easy for myself, not only to get the protein but the fiber, the fruits and vegetables I want daily, I started drinking a smoothie. A day 30 years ago. But when I realized all the junk, the sugar, and the extras that you don't want, that I don't want, hiding in most protein powders, that's when I finally caved in after years of saying I will never ever ever sell supplements. Stop skipping, skimping, and sabotaging yourself in the morning after workouts by always being prepared Look, yep, I agree, real food first, but it's just not convenient to carry a turkey sandwich. Sometimes the protein, and don't forget the fiber, they kill cravings and they boost satiety. And you've gotta make it easy to do the right thing. You can use code PODCAST for 10% off your first order at flipping50.com today. I'm Debra Atkinson. You're listening to Flipping 50. I started this podcast over a decade ago to answer questions about fitness in menopause and beyond before you knew to ask them. The goal to to help accelerate your results with science and the practical application of proven protocols while living your best life. There's no more powerful health influencer in the world than a midlife woman, and it's not just about you but the 3 generations that you influence. My unique 40-year career career, including being a university senior lecturer in kinesiology, an industry subject matter expert, and an international speaker, to founder of the first and the only exclusively made-for-menopause and beyond fitness membership in the world. Every week I interview experts behind the scenes and the science of optimal hormone balancing, fitness, and longevity, and share answers to our community's questions so you can have the vitality and the energy that you want, need, and deserve.

For less belly fat, I mean, the deep visceral type, you know, it's not for you to wish that is not vanity. Deadly. It's literally disease-causing. Lift weights. That's the answer. That's the number one and the best answer. And I know some of you are going to go to, oh, HIIT, high-intensity exercise training. That's going to be the best. And maybe some of you would also default to walking. Walking is the new black right now. And the answer though, first is always going to be weight training, but here's the caveat. I've had a lot of women in our community say, if weight training is the best, why don't we do it more often? Well, the answer is recovery. So yes, lift weights, but yes, recover. And if you don't, you actually mess with the results that you could have gotten from that lifting weights. So while high-intensity interval training or HIIT is notably recognized by science as a means for removing fat, in fact, in postmenopausal women, it's proven to help support loss of visceral fat. But I think there are a couple things in the small print in studies that you have to be very aware of. These women were not already exhausted. If you're already exhausted, if you're tired all the time, or you're, you're showing signs of insufficient adrenals. So you've got some level of adrenal insufficiency. There's 4 levels, and I'm trying to desperately avoid the use of the term, the lay term adrenal fatigue. I know physicians don't love that. I like to create rapport and good relations with physicians, but if I throw that out, I know some of you have a better idea or feeling of what that is. And it is basically that you're feeling fatigued. The point that many docs will make is your adrenals don't really get fatigued. So yes, HIIT, but I also want you to remember the caveat is not HIIT all the time. Let's say you're thrown under the bus by extra projects at work. You're moving and you're caregiving for an elder in your family. That's a lot. And then you try to keep up your same exercise stressors and exercise, look, is a calculated stressor. Usually it works to our benefit, but if your tipping point is such that your bucket's already pretty full, you might do better doing some yoga, some stretching. Going for a walk instead of doing HIIT and find you get better results. That I know is the, gotta be the end of the sentence because all of us feel like, no, no, no, I don't want to put my goals on hold waiting for this to pass. But you not, what you're doing is actually pulling them closer because you're responding in the right way. So that's an important distinction. But let's get back to weight training. Weight training improves your total body composition. It improves your total body fat, meaning reducing it. For most of us who are going through menopause, we have found that we've gained some fat, specifically abdominal belly fat, and it improves lean muscle resulting in a recomposition. And I lend a nod to my friend JJ Virgin, who actually is really adopting this term, but it's what we want to do for the most part. And historically, the answer to this question, I was constantly putting electrodes on people. Skinfold calipers on people, dunking them in a tank for underwater weight. We were looking at body composition, but inevitably people pre and post want to know, well, can I turn this fat into muscle? Well, that's not really how it works. We lose the fat and we gain the muscle. And if we do them simultaneously, like we help ourselves to lose the weight that we don't want and we do it hopefully without deprivation or fatigue. Because it's a much better way of doing things, adding strength training to your plate, as opposed to just removing things literally off of your plate. Such a better idea, not just turning up the volume in cardio. Also want to give you this: the influence of weight training decreases your risk of heart disease associated with waist girth. So for women, 35 or more inches at your waist is a heart health risk factor. However, if you're a smaller sized woman, you know, if you are lower, more petite, let's say that than 5'4", I would say it's an important note that probably less than 35 inches may still be a risk factor for you. So look in the mirror. What do you see? If you carry your weight there, let's be making an agreement. We need to make a plan and do something about it. And you can. Okay. You can, and no, it's not too late. So there's a few facts that I know by heart, and I wish that I didn't. We started losing 3 to 8%, and that's a range. I know it's fairly significant. 3 to 8% of our lean muscle mass at age 30. We peaked in muscle mass at 25. So if we start losing it at, at age 30 and we're 50. Or hello, 60 is knocking on my door as I do this, but that's 30 years of potential for muscle loss. And that doesn't mean we have. So I have been lifting weights. You may also have been lifting weights for all that time, but did we all know to go heavy? That heavy was best because I don't know about you, but I'm thinking back in my 30s, I might've thought. More repetitions was better. In fact, I probably was training for endurance events. And so I thought maybe if I'm doing endurance events and I want more endurance, I should strength train for endurance. And I'm sure in my 30s I did think that. In my 40s, I got a little smarter. Thank God. Right? But it's really important that you look at what were you doing. And here's the other thing. Don't know about you, but I did start eating more protein. I was conscious of it, at least when I was training, but if I wasn't training for something, I'd have to say that I'm sure my protein intake slipped a little bit, maybe in favor of more carbohydrates sometimes. Right. But we know that since age 30, we have this pull. It's like the magnet started pulling the muscle out and we just had to fight for it a little bit harder, like tug of war. So were we fighting, lifting heavy enough, getting adequate rest and getting protein in? 15% of muscle strength every decade, starting at age 50. That means that I am one decade into— hold on again, you better be holding on to that. Now, over the last couple of years, I got really serious because I was insulted at a DEXA scan 2 years ago, and I'm due for another, but apparently the whole world, we're all DEXA scanning because you can't get in for months. I'm due for another, and I was insulted to find out I had a little osteopenia in my left arm. And they will test your non-dominant arm generally. But I've been lifting really heavy since then and doing power plates since then and very conscious of protein, not only since then, but I think it heightened my awareness of, am I doing everything? Am I? So I've been hitting it hard. The question is, have you? And if you could look at where were you 10 years ago, and kudos to any of you who were not lifting. 10 years ago regularly, and you are now miles ahead. You have probably added years to your life and not only that, life to the years. So go you. And the other fact that I know is at age 60, 1 to 2% loss of muscle mass begins to happen every year if we let it. So it's always if we let it, if we're not doing the right things. So again, things accelerate a little bit more. It was 3 to 8%. Per decade. You know, for those of us who were active, eating more protein, probably it was the least amount, right? And maybe we negated that. This is on average. If we just let nature take its course, certain things will happen. We'll age just like our ancestors did, but we don't have to. So we have choices. We can lift heavy, we can eat more protein because we now know the science about it. We can add some of those supplements, and I'll talk about those in an upcoming podcast. So stay tuned on that one. But let's talk about how it matters, how all of this holding on to our muscle and doing strength training matters. 50% of women over 50 have insulin resistance. Insulin resistance is something that occurs for a lot of women as they move into menopause. They move into menopause. Perimenopause is when we go through the roller coaster, and that's usually late 30s, early 40s, where we will all experience that. So 50% of us have insulin resistance. That means that when our blood sugar goes up, and it can go up for a lot of reasons, by the way, not just based on the foods we eat, but post-meals, it frequently goes up. And when it goes up, insulin should come in to bring it back down because having high blood sugar is not healthy. It causes inflammation, wreaks havoc within your system unless you're about to do a workout and you are like in a marathon where you're putting that fuel to use. Having higher blood sugar available to you is not a good thing. You want it taken out of the bloodstream, removed where it can't do damage. Insulin does a job and that's it. But what happens in menopause is because of changes in other hormones, decline of estrogen, decline of progesterone, testosterone. We have this increase of blood sugar goes up more after meals. We're more sensitive to it because we're more sensitive to negative effects of stress when estrogen comes down and it requires more and more insulin to get that blood sugar back down. So we're resistant to the level that used to work, doesn't anymore. We're resistant to it. So we have to have more to pull it down. And to work for us. When we have lots of insulin in our system, we're in fat storage. Your body can't burn fat when your insulin levels are high. And generally, if that happens, especially if you start with a high carbohydrate breakfast, please don't do that. You're wreaking havoc with your insulin levels. And it's kind of a, you may not be in great shape for the rest of the day. It's really hard to kind of reroute it. So it, you've gotta really be careful. What you have for breakfast sets you up for success or not for the rest of the day. So start with protein, protein and/or fat. Muscle mass loss can be prevented and/or muscle mass can be gained by weight training and by eating adequate protein. Now, for those of you who are doing that and doing that, but still not seeing it, the next question for me is always to you, how are you sleeping? Because if you're not sleeping We don't have the magic, the hormone magic that happens overnight. Cortisol gets put back in its place and it's not cranky the next day. Cause if it's cranky, nothing good happens. And in our deep cycles of sleep, we go through them maybe 4, 5, 6, if you are a long, long sleeper, times a night, we go into stage 3 and stage 4 where we release testosterone and growth hormone. So a lot of good things happen at night. And we need those things to occur in order to reap the rewards from our exercise. Here's the problem. Fewer of us than should be are lifting weights. Less than 20% of people, women specifically, are lifting weights at least twice weekly, which is really what's required in order for you to get results. Now, I know some people who will say, nope, you can lift once a week if you do it hard enough. I would say that if we're doing it that hard, that we need the week to repair and recover, we're probably breaking down, tearing down, and we're starting from scratch again. And we're putting ourselves into endocrine or hormonal disruption. So twice weekly means we can work intensely. We will recover between those workouts and we won't trash our endocrine system. So it's not just about muscles and bones. We have to think about all of it collectively. Right now, when we get down the road, you think you're going to look back and say, I'm so glad that those years when I was so busy, I didn't exercise. I don't think so. You're going to say, look, look, honey, you know, I wanted to stay in my own home longer. I wanted to drive longer. I know that's what my mother would have said. And actually she did. So there's that. But, you know, if we could dig deeper, we would much likely find a smaller percentage of women maybe over 40 who were strength training. Now, I thought that at first, and then I thought maybe we get wiser and we get a little more fear motivated when we're older and more women do start lifting. And there is potential for that. I would love to see you making those weight rooms crowded. So go ahead, come on, let's do this. So we can't just wait for a diagnosis. You know, we can't wait for it to be convenient. It's just not going to be.. And here's the most inconvenient part that I will share with you. The thinking about it before it's a regular routine, before you feel like when you walk into the living room at home where the weights are, that you have been what we all call low maintenance customers. Stop doing that. Go and be a high maintenance person. Say, look, I need somebody to show me around. I need a, I need an orientation here. Give me those free sessions that you offer with membership. Take advantage of those. We really need to do that. And you, if nothing else, if you're listening, I'm preaching to the choir and you lift on a regular basis, take a friend. I mean, this is probably one of the absolute best things that we can do for our friends. And you know what? This is a life-saving thing. And the more of us, the more women that are in the weight room, the more comfortable it is for all of us to go. And then it becomes a social thing. So it doesn't have to rely on wine. And I don't know about you, but I'm finding wine doesn't even agree with me that much anymore. I really love quality sleep and that wine ruins it. And maybe that's because I've never been much of a wine drinker. Those of you who are or do, maybe you feel otherwise, but I've heard a couple of you say that having a glass helps you sleep. And I'm going to say that it probably doesn't really help you sleep Well, we're just avoiding the issue. So I will leave it at that. Let you decide, but nothing good ever is convenient is the bottom line. So throughout time, there's been maybe 2 studies as we talk about visceral and belly fat specifically in the 40 years that I've been doing this. It's always been, I want a core class. Can we do core classes? Cause I need a flat belly. I want to get rid of this. And everybody used to think like, I want to get rid of this. Like, is what's a core exercise I should do? Core exercise strengthens the muscle in the core. It does not help you burn belly fat. And here, for the reason I just discussed, we have belly fat because of insulin resistance. So what we really want to do is how do we support insulin resistance? And you do that by gaining lean muscle all over. You don't want to gain a ton of lean muscle in your core. We just want it there for support. You know, you can build that area up. If you overfocus on anything, you're going to build it up. So do a little core, 2.5 to 5 minutes a day. If you're spending more time than that, and over the course of a week, that's core. You know, if you're slouching, that's That's a different thing, right? So you're not actually using your core very much and you're straining the back. But over time proving that, you know, there's still, we can't spot reduce. There's only been about 2 studies ever that gave some credence to the fact that you might be able to spot reduce with core work. There always has to be time or room for mind change, right? I mean, if new science emerges and says, no, no, no, you're doing it all wrong. We have to be open. I'm not trying to be be right. I think we all like to be right, and we get this certain thing going on. But I don't think, you know, spending half an hour a day or anything close to that on core exercise is a good use of your time. Focus on your maybe high-intensity interval training, your walking, and your resistance training. Do a little bit of core every day. It's great. But really, the biggest benefit of that is postural muscles. Have it help you sit up straight, sit up tall, have better form when you're doing your strength training exercise. And that the heavier you lift, the more you're bracing that core. It's like a built-in plank. So don't overdo your core. Put it into walking where you can reduce your cortisol and your blood sugar levels. Put it into strength training where that strength training will pull that sugar out of your bloodstream and use it in the muscle. So we don't need insulin to be high and we don't need to get into that fat storage mode in the first place. So what else matters when you're lifting weights and you potentially don't see the changes? I talked about protein. So if you're wondering, I'm going to give it to you right here. Aim for 1 gram of protein per pound of your body weight if you're very happy with the weight you're at now. If you want to lose weight, if you want to lose weight, Potentially you need to establish where's your average caloric intake and make sure that you're getting enough. That could be a problem. If you're not, you've shut down your metabolism. But if you know your average, you could figure that out by just recording for 3 to 5 days, take the average of that and know your total caloric expenditure and say, here's your baseline. Then what I want you to do is to give yourself a small realistic, like 250 to 500 calorie deficit. So subtract from that. So just to break it even, what if we said 400 fewer calories every day? But what I want you to do is increase the amount of protein that you have in it. So you're going to figure out, okay, if I'm going to have— I was having 130 grams of protein because say that's your body weight. And I want to lose weight. I'm going to use a caloric deficit, but now I'm going to lose weight and I'm going to try to take in 140 or 150 grams of protein. Remember, a gram of protein is worth 4 kilocalories. So you're going to take 150 times 4, if that's your goal. And then you'll know, okay, that's how many calories should come from protein. And as you track in some kind of an app, tracker, you kind of know where you're at. And if you're trying to lose weight, sometimes that is very helpful. I'm not one who says count all the time, but when you've tried everything and you don't really know what's going on or what's the reason, it may be time to take a snapshot of how many calories you're taking in. How much protein are you taking in? You also might want to take 5 grams of creatine daily. So 3 to 5, if you're a very small person. You might go with 3 or 4. I go with 5. I'm 5'4", I like to say, and a half. I think that's still true. And I'm about 130 pounds. So I take 5 grams daily. Remember, you take that daily, whether you're lifting or not, because you want it constantly in your bloodstream. You want to aim for at least 2.5 to 3 grams of leucine per 25 to 30 grams of protein at multiple meals. Now, if you're doing animal protein, you probably got this nailed, and that would be you know, chicken or salmon, if you're having a 4 or 5 ounce, and I like 5 ounce just to make sure I've got all the protein, ground meat. I like ground bison, ground elk, ground venison, the wild meats, as well as salmon, wild, not farmed. All of those are going to get you the amount of leucine that you want and need. You're going to have a little more leucine probably in something like beef or bison or elk or venison. Than you're going to have in cod or shrimp or poultry, but it's minimal difference. You're still going to reach and achieve it. Now, if you're doing plant-based, you're going to struggle to get the leucine in. So it's more abundant in animal proteins. So you can take a supplement. We carry one. It's called Burn Boost, like burn fat boost, and it's got 2.5 grams of leucine in it. I take it like on a morning when I want to extend my fast, not necessarily on a morning when I'm going to the gym, because I usually break my fast and have fuel in my system before I do any hard workouts, whether it's HIIT or it's weight training. I don't get into that low fuel availability at all. So 2.5 grams of leucine, but keep in mind this, you can't just isolate, it's not just that one amino acid that counts. And now I'm going to be a lean older adult. You got to have the whole party and there are 9 essential amino acids. So if you're not eating well, take a look at that because you're also missing out on other micronutrients. The general guideline is we want somewhere between 4 and 8 sets per muscle group. And that's kind of the equivalent of 2 workouts. Meet daily sleep needs. Know yours. I am a long sleeper, so I like 8 or 9 hours and do best with that. Avoid undereating. So that low energy availability, if you're dieting, dieting, dieting, and you're trying to exercise, exercise. The problem with most of us is we learned this: eat less, exercise more. And it's going to backfire on you. Once you hit perimenopause, that just— you will not get away with it. For your young daughters, daughters-in-law, it's also not really working for them, even though they may be getting away with it, but it's not going to help them get to midlife stronger, leaner. It's going to put them in the same spot we were in. So if we want better for them, share these secrets with them in advance. Okay. Try to walk daily. So get in movement on a daily basis. Go for a walk. Again, built-in puppy. So it comes with pros and cons, right? But one of the things is we get a 30 to an hour of walking in every day and it's non-negotiable, right? Because otherwise he'll be chewing on furniture and all kinds of things. And, you know, it's been probably one of the things that notoriously throughout my life, there are 4 key times. This is one again, where that's the mood needle mover. I trained for iron distance triathlons. I have, you know, trained heavy, been a teacher for teachers, lots of physical training, but it was always the walking that made the difference. You're reducing cortisol. And I think again, you have to open the gate for fat loss to come in. Because if it's shut and all you're doing is stressing, stressing, stressing, you're probably not going to get the rewards that you deserve. Avoid excess cardio. So exchange some of the over-cardio that you're doing, that chronic long extended endurance stuff, and go for a walk. Grace and respect for where you are with also a nudge, nudge, come on. You can have results if you're not getting them. Let's just make a couple changes. So it's what I would do to my best friend or my sister. So hopefully you're letting me in and I'd love to do that for you too, but The whole idea with all of those pieces is you're trying to keep your cortisol and your blood sugar levels in control. Of all things, that is the number one secret to having better results midlife and beyond. It comes down to cortisol. Don't let it get too high because of your exercise and with your exercise, whenever possible, reduce it and control it. And there you have it. That's it. Okay. So we started off with a chat about visceral belly fat, about the statistics that are so true that are contributing to the collective problem that we have with visceral belly fat, total belly fat, really, in the way that we're aging in a way. And I gave you some solutions, some really quick solutions, flipping any You know, tons and tons of core exercise or spending your time walking and doing your weightlifting. Add a little bit of tune-ups and see what happens when you do that. All right. We'll put some links in the show notes. You can get to our Stronger program, the 12-week program that is our bestseller. And we're onboarding right now. If you're listening in real time, there's also at your fingertips. You get when you register this time, 120 coaching sessions with me and they're all topic categorized. So that if you have a question about how much protein again, how is that? What should I eat before cardio? What should I eat before HIIT or weight training is all in there. Questions that women have asked over 2 different 12-week periods. We've given you that library. So it's like having me in your pocket without paying to have me in your pocket. I'm going to link to previous episodes that you also may like talking about low energy availability, how much protein you need, and you can find our show notes for this one at flipping50.com/less-belly-fat. And what are you waiting for?

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