• Dieting thins your hair. Dieting at any age has been linked to hair loss. But as we reach the menopause, we lose hair naturally from lower oestrogen levels, then we lose even more hair by dieting. One in three women is reporting significant hair thinning during the transition, making hair loss one of the fastest-growing (pardon the pun) midlife complaints.
• Dieting thins your muscle. You are already losing a half pound of muscle each year during the transition, and you’ll lose it even faster by dieting. About 30 per cent of the weight lost on low-calorie diets comes from muscle breakdown. So, if you starve yourself to lose 10 pounds in a month, that’s 3 pounds of muscle lost, and you’ve aged your body by 6 years in 30 days!
• Dieting thins your skin. Dieting decreases the strength of connective tissue so that your muscles don’t adhere to your fat and skin like they used to, and the tissue sags. Dieting also decreases skin tone and elasticity, making lines and wrinkles more apparent. The dieting-wrinkle connection is often the motivating factor for women to stop dieting once and for all.
• Dieting thins your bones. Dieting makes your bones more porous and fragile, increasing the likelihood of fractures and increasing your risk of osteoporosis. With dieting, calcium intake is often lower, too, adding to the loss of bone density.
• Dieting thins your thinking. The Institute of Food Research has found that dieting dulls memory and decreases mental acuity within 48 hours.
Dieting also decreases concentration, attention span, productivity and reaction time. It takes longer to complete tasks, figure out problems, react in an emergency and generally get things done. Maybe dieting is the real culprit, not the menopause. Our lack of mental efficiency may be caused by an excess in dieting.
A client rang me up after reading about dieting’s effects on memory and concentration and concluded, ‘I may have been foolish to diet, but I’m not stupid. I’m never dieting again.’ She was a professor at a prestigious university and perhaps more clever than anyone I know, but this research is what got her to stop dieting and start using her intellect to really outsmart her midlife fat cells.
You, too, can stop dieting and start using your smarts. What you’ve done in the past isn’t as important as what you do in the future. If you haven’t been consistent with exercise, if you have been consistent with dieting – that’s OK. You have another opportunity to do something good for your body. The most important one of your life.
Even if you’ve been on a hundred diets, you can reverse the damage. The question is not ‘What have I done?’, it’s ‘What can I do differently now?’ You can turn the page and start taking The Meno-Positive Approach to a Trimmer Transition.
Chapter 3 The Meno-Positive Approach to a Trimmer Transition
After a few months of making phone calls in hopes of finding a weight management programme designed specifically for menopausal women, Michelle rang me. She began by giving me a detailed history of her weight, eating habits and lifestyle, and explaining that she had kept her weight perfectly stable until two years ago. I sat back in my chair listening sympathetically, ready to take my turn to explain her menopausal weight gain. But Michelle immediately went into her list of 10 specific questions for me to answer on my approach and philosophies.
I was impressed with her level of organization and commitment to finding a programme that was right for both her life and her body. She was impressed with my honest answers and knowledge about women’s health and weight loss. At the end of our conversation, she said that she thought she wanted to work with me, but had one last question: ‘What do you call your positive approach to helping women control their weight during the menopause?’ I responded, ‘I call it The Meno-Positive Approach to a Trimmer Transition.’
Michelle loved the name of my programme, but more important, she felt that this approach made complete sense from a physiological standpoint. Menopausal fat cells are undergoing enormous changes, so eating and exercise habits have to change with them.
I asked Michelle to share her list of 10 questions, because they may be the same questions you have, and answering them now will prepare you for The Meno-Positive Approach.
1 What’s the most important change I can make during the transition to lose weight? Without hesitation, the answer is exercise. Aerobic exercise combined with strength-building is the only way to stimulate the release of fat from your fat cells. During the menopause, your fat cells are storing more, but the right exercise programme can counteract at least half of that storage. That’s why we’ll first focus on tailoring your exercise programme to work for the menopause.
2 How many menopausal women have you worked with? Over 2,000 at various stages of the transition. Through their experiences and my own research, I’ve discovered what works and what doesn’t. But it’s important to keep in mind that we are all different physiologically and psychologically, and the changes we make must realistically fit into our day-to-day lifestyles.
3 What is your success rate? 100 per cent if the measure of success is a greater understanding and acceptance of our bodies during the transition – which for me is the most important measurement. If I help you to change your attitudes and habits to enhance your body image, fitness and well-being, then I have accomplished my primary goals. Most women, however, evaluate success by the numbers on the scales. I cannot guarantee that you’ll reach your preconceived weight goal (which may not be realistic), but I can guarantee that you’ll reach a healthy weight, lose your preoccupation with dieting and gain muscle, stamina and strength from your exercise programme.
4 How much weight can I expect to lose? It’s impossible to give you a single answer because it depends on where you are when you start the programme. If you’ve been moderate with eating and committed to exercise and have still gained weight, then at a minimum you’ll prevent any additional weight gain and may lose a few pounds of fat. If you’ve already gained too much body fat because of repeated dieting and overeating, then you’ll lose that excess amount – it may be 3 pounds or 3 stone. Since most perimenopausal women are gaining more weight than they need to, nearly all of my clients lose some fat.
5 How do you measure results? Not by the scales. I don’t have them in my office – or in my home, for that matter. Your own perceptions of body changes – such as how your clothes fit and how you feel – are most important. I do, however, recommend and use body composition analysis so that we can measure pounds of muscle gained and pounds of fat lost over time. For example, if you gain 3 pounds of muscle and lose 3 pounds of fat, the numbers on the scales won’t have changed, but your body will have. It will be leaner and smaller because muscle is more compact than fat.
6 Do you have weekly meal plans for me to follow? No, structured meal plans work only for as long as you’re following them, which is often only two weeks or a month at best. Instead, I’ll help you to follow your body’s optimal meal plan by getting in touch with your menopausal food needs and responding to your signals of hunger and fullness.
7 Will you have me count calories and grams of fat? No, if counting calories and grammes of fat were the secret to weight loss, your search would have been over years ago. What you eat is less important than why, when and how much you eat.
8 Do I have to give up any of my favourite foods? Absolutely not! In fact, I recommend the opposite: incorporating your favourite foods into a healthy lifestyle. As you know all too well, restriction only cries out for overindulgence. Whatever you resist, persists. But the more satisfied you are with what you’re eating, the less you’ll need to eat, and the better you’ll feel.
9 Do you sell any products like fat-burning supplements or prepackaged foods?