Why Do I Still Have Belly Fat Even Though I Exercise?

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What are you waiting for? Good night. Why do I still have belly fat even though I exercise? First, it's important to know that what you were once taught and what you may still hear or read—eat less and exercise more, and I'm making air quotes here—will backfire if it's causing your stress levels, aka your cortisol hormone, to go too high. If you have been in fact fueling well, eating adequate protein— and by the way, that's more than most women think— and exercising, it's likely that you're doing the wrong style of exercise training. I'm Debra Atkinson. You're listening to Flipping 50, where I address your top struggles and concerns. And we are definitely hitting a top struggle and concern right now, here today. I share what to eat, how to move, and how to change your mindset so you can have the energy and vitality that you want, need, and deserve. In this second and better half. And I'm gonna give you a shameless plug because there's urgency to this. We're releasing this podcast on July 23rd. This is the very last day of open enrollment for the Flipping 50 membership. I'm the host and the home at Flipping 50 of the first and only exclusively made-for-menopause fitness membership in the world. No one else did this, started this, had it on their radar. When we began realizing that there was way too little science about training women, period, and that every woman has phases of hormone challenges she's going through at the moment, and unlike men, and that women in menopause with rapidly fluctuating hormones need a very different exercise plan, and it starts with a blueprint. And we are now training Flipping 50 Menopause Fitness Specialists. And by the way, it's your moment to get in on that too. So don't miss the show notes today. Flipping50.com/podcast will get you to all the podcasts, specifically this one. But let's jump in. My goal and mission is that with any podcast, any blog, any Flipping 50 TV channel, that whether or not you take a next step with us, that you get something out of it. You have some insight into, oh my gosh, now, now I know. Why I thought I was doing the right thing and it's not working. And you have a better idea of maybe better questions to ask the next person, the practitioner you're working with, or challenges, things to ask your trainer, and then ask specifically about you and your needs. But when you are ready to take another step, that we're here, and we hope that we're your first choice. So let's dive into this. So how could exercise go wrong in menopause? And I asked that tongue-in-cheek because so much could go wrong. When your hormones change, your, your exercise also needs to change. Women in menopause go through perimenopause for up to about 11 years, and I've got to say, that's probably average, and no woman is average, so some are longer and some are shorter. And menopause transition, that is harder to predict until it's actually happened, and then you go through postmenopause. So we could say there's 3 phases, and not all practitioners will say or agree with me. They'll say there's perimenopause, you hit menopause, that's a bleep, and then you're in postmenopause. And I would agree, but I do think there are significant changes in physiology— your muscle and your bone health, by the way— that happen in that menopause transition. The couple years before menopause, when it's true— we don't know that that's happening— and the couple years afterward. But I think there are signs along the way that tell you you're getting closer to that menopause transition. And that should be very much a wake-up call for— this should be the time when I'm changing my exercise priorities right now. And if we did that, we had done that, we'd be in better shape sailing through our post-menopause. But we can do that for our daughters and our daughters-in-law and those younger women that we mentor and talk to about it, because thankfully we are talking. Even your certified trainer may not be certified specifically in menopause fitness. And this is an extremely important distinction for you to make. They may be popular, they may be— everybody loves them, they may look great, but that does not mean they can get you to where you need to go unless they understand what's happening and what questions to ask you. Only 39% of all exercise research features female subjects, subjects with very different hormones than, say, the athletic males so often chosen as the subjects. For women, in menopause transition. Not only do they— you maybe have lingering periods or not regular at all, which makes exercise planning more challenging, but your hormones could be trending downward overall and yet still going up and down. And every woman's experience is different. I mean, that does make us a challenge for researchers. I get it. But it is why we need the research the most. It's why we at Flipping 50 teach trainers and coaches a blueprint So they have a starting point and then we teach them how to adapt each individual woman's signs and symptoms to what steps do we need to take. You can do the same for yourself. And ideally, all aging individuals, strength training will become a higher priority. Ideally, right? Because as we age, we're further and further from that moment in time at 25 when we had peak muscle mass. Peak bone density at 30. We definitely need more and more strength in our lives to counteract the time of loss being much easier than gaining. That, however, is not to be confused with greater frequency. When we say strength training is a bigger priority, it doesn't mean do it more often, like do it every day, because that's a question I get in the community as we talk about it. It's like If it's so important, why don't we do it more often? Because recovery from strength training is equally important. Prioritizing strength training boosts lean muscle strength and mass, and that in turn boosts metabolism. And what can't be forgotten is the recovery between exercise is when fitness happens. We cannot forget that. And So often we do, we just think, I gotta go again. And I tell you, for a lot of women who maybe flirt with— and don't we all flirt a little bit with depression, flirt a little bit with anxiety, flirt just with the adrenaline, the tension, I can't take it— and we need to purge it. And there is something to be said for exercise helps us move emotion through our body and cope better. And that is not mine, I wish I could say that, but I first heard those words from Dr. Sharon Melnick. Shout out to her, and I will try and remember to put a link to her prior episode in the podcast. But we talked about her book not too long ago about stepping into your power and what that actually means. But it is then when she mentioned this, and I was like, oh yes, that's exactly right what she said. So I hadn't— I didn't say it, but it's, it's very, very important. Okay, so if you still have belly fat even though you exercise, what do you do? Here we go. To optimize strength training for belly fat reduction, what that means is plan at least 2 days. And I say ideally 2 days, and here's why. And you may disagree with me, but in the literature, the, the research— I mean, and I'm talking collectively notoriously for decades, when they say 2 and 3 times per week of strength training or resistance training, there is no significant difference in the benefits that occur, whether it's 2 or it's 3. That's an important thing to take away when I know that having worked with baby boomer women and midlife and older women my entire 39-year career, and exclusively worked with them for the last decade, most of them almost, not quite 100%, already arrive in some kind of adrenal insufficiency, meaning adrenal stress. They're already tired. Many of them use the words, I'm tired, all the time. Like if they went to a movie matinee, they would fall asleep because simply it got dark and they had a chance to fall asleep, right? That's if that's you. We don't want more exercise causing more exhaustion. We want the minimum viable exercise so that you get stronger, you gain more lean muscle mass, and you have the energy now to use that to play. Like to, yes, have more energy at your work and have more energy still when you get home at the end of the day to enjoy your family, go do things you love to do, walk the dog, do the things, and it feel like you're actually living your life and not just going through this hamster wheel every single day. That's the goal. So So this is why I say start with 2 days a week. Can you always increase? Of course you can. But if you're doing 3 days a week and you're not getting results right now, I would certainly back off of that and say, I'm gonna try it this way because this is certainly not working. And you get to conduct your own experiment. I'm not trying to be right. I'm just trying to give you the most beneficial thing and base it on research, not on something that is make-believe or a study of one, which would be, well, this is where it works for me. That's not good enough. That is just not good enough. Okay, so now if you plan 2 days a week strength training— and, and I'm giving an example of Monday, Thursday, but it could be Tuesday, Friday, it could be you have to do it Monday and you have to do it Friday— and as long as there's 72 hours between whenever you will do it again, there could be more, it's not just 72 hours. Now you've prioritized the exercise and the required recovery time, at least in terms of frequency. All right, on the days you're not strength training, if you're in good energy state, you're sleeping well, you may also want to add high-intensity interval training 1 or 2 times a week if you're in perimenopause, maybe 3 and up to 4 times a week. These are short sessions if you're in postmenopause because your hormones, remember, they're more stable now. They may be lower, but they're more stable, and there is not that exhaustion of constant up, down, up, down, up, down. Of, you know, the roller coaster when hormones are just taking you for a ride. And we do find that. So if you're a woman who used to love exercise, right now it's not working for you, hang in there. Because first of all, we're going to give you some solutions to change that, and it's going to get better. You're not going to be in perimenopause the rest of your life, I promise you. You will be in postmenopause the rest of your life. Nothing we can do about that. But hopefully it's a long one as well. So remember those HIIT sessions, whether I'm talking 1, 2, 3, or 4, they're short because higher the intensity goes, the shorter the session should be. And when we're talking about the actual hard and then easy recovery and hard and easy recovery in that pattern, that during a single session may be 10 minutes long, 15 at most. You're not trying to do high-intensity interval training for 45 minutes. In fact, it's 45 minutes total per week. The injury risk rate goes up tremendously after that point. And even if you're doing it in a swimming pool or on an elliptical where there's not impact, there still is a lot of more stress and tearing that occurs. Micro tearing in little muscles does happen with exercise, all exercise, more so the harder you go. If you were running, it would be even more. Than compared to swimming, but there still is some. So it's not non-existent if you're doing a lower impact version. So remember that again, I'm going to say it, at about 45 minutes of high intensity interval training, especially if the mode has more impact, injury rates start to climb. And for women in menopause, stress levels do too. And all of that stress, you know, the very reason you're doing HIIT is because cortisol levels went up making your belly fat deposit greater than if you're doing HIIT, making it go up further. What's happening? You're contributing to the problem. And this is going to shock you. So we're 13 minutes in. I want to give you this answer. If you're doing really high intensity, it's not that you're working or not working hard enough. Potentially you're just doing too much and your body is like, stop it, just stop it. So do it for a week. What if you just went for walks outside? And I don't know, I say that, it's 118 here, that's not a good plan. But go for a walk, dance around in your living room, and do something that you can safely in an outdoor environment if possible, or in one you love otherwise. Maybe that's adding music, maybe it's moving with people you love, or watching a video that you enjoy. And all of that just to cut down on the intensity while moving, but not for the point of burning more calories or trying to burn more fat, you may need to remove the roadblock, which is too much cortisol. I'm gonna say that again. You may need to remove the roadblock first, which is more cortisol, which is stopping you from burning fat, because while you have lots of cortisol and stress, your body is gonna go into fat storage mode. It's just a body preservation. It's just from age old. If you're under stress, your body doesn't know that you're not sick, doesn't know that you're not starving, doesn't know, you know, numbers of things, but that make it, oh, oh, we're going to conserve, we're going to hold on to fat, we're going to store fat right now just in case we need it for the rainy day, right? We don't love that, I know, but it's— it is what is happening inside of your body. So we want to decrease that. All right, so do strength training protocols that support muscle. This is important, again, support muscle for women in menopause. Total body workouts are actually far more effective than split routines for elevating the metabolism in women who can't dedicate, uh, daily time to strength training, calculated high protein meals, several of them during the day, and keep their lives focused around their exercise. If you're a woman who, you know, there's no way I can live that bodybuilding figure competing kind of lifestyle, then twice weekly is like, okay, realistically, I could do this. I could do this. 45 minutes twice a week, I can do that. That's really what you're after. So, you know, bodybuilders also, they're proving it can be done, they can look great, but they cycle through some really severe cut phases right before competition, and they admit it's not sustainable. It's not sustainable for good health. And so, you know, we have to argue things that are not sustainable for long term for good health? Are they things that we should be doing, you know, in our normal everyday lives? So it can set you up for an end goal that you really can get but only see once, and then you can't have it again. That can be a little hard for women's minds to handle. For a woman with some chronic fatigue or adrenal insufficiency, too infrequent high-intensity exercise such as lifting heavy isn't going to work, meaning you decide this is what I need, it's going to backfire on you. So if you do choose to do this type of training, working a little heavier with weights, do so knowing you need to first feel good, get a good night's sleep, have stable energy throughout the day. And if you're not there yet, focus on that. Focus on good sleep hygiene, good sleep quality. There are a lot of little tips and tricks that can help you get better sleep. I'm not going to go into those now, but I've got dozens of them that we use, and I use with women that I privately coach and that are coached inside of our fitness membership. And people can report sleeping as much as 2 hours more a night. Now, desperately she needed it, right? If she needed 2 hours more. But it's possible to sleep well even if you haven't for decades. Bodybuilders are also eating pre- and post-workout and even evenly distributed meals throughout the day, and they don't skip or skimp on what they need. So if you want to do a split routine, you want to work out, strength train every day, that means different muscle groups every day, and you really want to fuel just like they're doing, that may be a path for you. I'm probably not your girl if that's your goal, but no, no discounting that. Okay, but make sure you feel good before you dive into that. Could supplements help you lose body fat in menopause? Supplements may be something to address for belly fat challenge. Definitely, if you're not eating adequate animal protein, the levels of essential amino acids that you're consuming is probably extremely lower than necessary to serve as the building blocks for muscle. An essential amino acid supplement would be the first additional support that I would suggest. Essential amino acid, not branched-chain amino acids, because if you're not eating enough protein, you need all of them. You need the team all there, right? I swore once I would never ever— in fact, I swore for 30 years I would never ever sell supplements like protein powders. And until I began to use them at about age 31 out of convenience and a need to bump my protein intake while I was training for my first marathon in the year after becoming a mother— and yes, by the way, endurance athletes need more protein too, and potentially more because there's more muscle breakdown in endurance athletes I realized I was using— and this was years later— chemical and sugar-laden protein powders full of heavy metals. And I didn't even know what I didn't even know at first when I started. And I swore, you know, that I'd never sell supplements. And then I was taking that back because women kept asking me, what do you use? And so I would be sharing, and then I would be like, this is ridiculous. I— why am I not— why don't we have our own brand and limit the ingredients, because I don't like extras. I don't like extra greens. I don't like extra vitamins in them, because if you're taking vitamins and you're also getting extra in your foods— I know we've been led to believe that's a good thing, but they're competing, so you're not absorbing all of them. So take the supplements that you need based on the testing that you've done, and just take protein, clean protein. That's all you need. You also need to know it's wonderful for stabilizing blood sugar. I also sell a protein or a fiber product because the combination of protein and fiber together stabilize blood sugar and keep you full for much longer. Just a word here about collagen versus muscle-supporting protein for belly fat. Collagen protein may state on the outside it has all the essential amino acids. That doesn't mean it has a high enough level of them to support muscle protein synthesis. It's a very important distinction. The level of essential amino acids you're going to get in a piece of steak is very, very different than what you're going to get in collagen protein. And you can't say, well, I had 20 grams of protein and call those two equal. It just doesn't happen that way. But muscle protein synthesis requires a top-level essential amino acid level, particularly one called leucine that has been associated with gaining and maintaining lean muscle tissue in older adults specifically. But I hate to isolate that one if you're not getting all of them. I would focus on getting them all first and then diving down deeply into— if you're not eating animal protein, if you're a vegan vegetarian, definitely I would be taking essential amino acid supplements, and then I would be looking to taking leucine after that. If you're eating your body weight in pounds in grams of protein daily and you're lifting to muscle fatigue but you're still not seeing any results and you're using a protocol designed for women in menopause, that's when I would say maybe specific branched-chain amino acids— that's just 3 of these crucial ones for muscle building: leucine I mentioned, valine, and isoleucine. And with the leucine, you want about 2.5 to 3 grams per meal. Ideally, you get that in a steak. You don't get that in beans and rice. Or 5 grams a day at least is recommended. Creatine is another supplement I'm going to mention. So although protein powders you may see as supplements, I actually don't. I guess it's because it's been 28 years that I've been using them because it helps boost protein intake over the day. It's not all I ate, right? I, I love my meat, but, um, it's just an easy shake. It's an easy breakfast. It's an easy treat. I'll show you some ways I make ice cream. Um, and I'll put a link to our protein products as well. You can save 10% right out of the go signing up for Subscribe and Save. And in the 4th month of your regular delivery, you start saving 15% from there on out. So it is possible to have belly fat even though you exercise, but these things should help solve that. Creatine is the other one that I mentioned briefly. Want to say that again, it's been proven safe, been proven effective for enhancing the ability to gain lean muscle and preserve bone health in older adults with no negative side effects. Previously, this was just like a bodybuilders do that thing, but not anymore. So it is a staple. I take it. It's an everyday thing. Yes, you need that same amount of protein every day. You need the supplements every day, even on the days you don't lift, because you're creating a body that is that. It doesn't go away on the days off. Potentially you need it more. I'm going to put the resources in the show notes that I've mentioned, the protein. I'm going to also put in the café Don't bypass that. If you need some help, if this resonated with you, if it made sense, if you do have the belly fat and you're still like, you're doing the things but it's not working, join us. All right, what are you waiting for? Let's start Flipping 50 together. You'll find the show notes at flipping50.com/bellyfateventhoughiexercise. It's a long one.