#28: The big rocks for 40+ Fitness (top tips for feeling great in perimenopause and menopause)

Resources mentioned in the episode: 

• Sign up for beginner group weight training program >
• Check out my walkpad (and other favorite stuff) >
• If you're new to weight training and my podcast, I recommend you start by listening to episodes 2-5. 

About this episode:
✨Are you a woman in her 40s or 50s looking to improve your health and fitness but don't know where to get started? 

There is sooo much information out there about how to feel better in perimenopause and menopause, but what are the most important places to start?

 In this episode, I look at the 4 big rocks to improving your health and fitness in midlfe. 

If you get these 4 things under control, you're going to be ahead of 98% of women and I promise you are going to feel much better than you do today. 

The four big rocks for 40+ fitness are: 

 1️⃣ Sleep:  I know. Boring but sooo essential. And without good sleep everything else is just sooo much harder. I discuss the sleep issues 40+ women face and why and share tips on how to improve your quality of sleep. 

2️⃣ Steps:  We are too sedentary and it's killing our bodies. I share how many steps you should be aiming for (no, the magic number is not 10 000), and tips on how to get there. 

3️⃣ Strength training: Probably no big surprise to anyone who has followed me that strength training is going to be on my list of top things to do. The benefits are real! (check out episode #2 for more about the benefits)

4️⃣ Protein: I discuss the benefits, how much protein to aim for, and share my strategy for getting in enough protein in the day.

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Transcript

#28: The big rocks for 40+ Fitness (top tips for feeling great in perimenopause and menopause)

[00:00:00] Welcome to 40 plus fitness for women. I'm Lynn, your host, and today we are going to talk about the big rocks for 40 plus fitness. Now last week I discussed the biggest mistakes that 40 plus women, so those of us in perimenopause and menopause are making in their fitness. Those were mostly mistakes that are happening in the weight room or in the gym, in our training.

And today it's more generalized. And most of these are actually things that have to do with the rest of your life that are really going to affect how you are feeling and looking. But before we get into that, I wanted to say that I have been sick. All week. So my voice was actually pretty much gone on Tuesday.

I'm recording this on Saturday, and I can still tell that it's not perfect. So [00:01:00] apologies for that in advance, but I did not want to have a week go by without having, uh, an episode. So I am recording that anyway. And, uh, I actually haven't worked out in. Over a week and that's always a bit daunting and I'm thinking about how I'm going to go back in so that I don't end up being extremely, extremely sore.

And so my plan, and this might be relevant for some of you who may have taken a little time off for vacation or been sick like me, because I think there's a lot of this going around, is that, um, today I'm going to be training a short, maybe 30 minutes, 40 minutes max, and not trying to progressively overload, but just do something to get my body back into the feeling of moving again.

And [00:02:00] today I'll do lower body tomorrow. I'll do upper body. And then on Monday, I'll go and If all things are well, I E I haven't suddenly caught another disease, then I will get to start working out a bit harder, but managing getting really sore, I think is the biggest challenge when you've taken a break because the soreness can hinder your recovery, but let's get into today's topic.

So the big rocks for 40 plus fitness, there are four of these. And the first is sleep. Oh my God. So boring, right? But let me tell you, it is such a precious commodity. And I began to realize this when I was in my late thirties because I hit perimenopause then and sleep was just not happening for me. I couldn't fall asleep.

I couldn't sleep well. And as a result, I [00:03:00] was not feeling refreshed when I woke up, I, my brain was not working the way I was used to it working. I was craving sugar and carbs to keep myself going, living on caffeine. It was really a nightmare. And the thing about sleep is it is like the cornerstone of everything.

I think in particular, if you are concerned about maintaining your weight or even losing weight, getting enough sleep is going to be key for that. And the reason that sleep is so important for weight loss and for maintaining your weight. So avoiding weight gain is that when you don't get enough sleep, your hunger And satiety hormones go out of whack.

What this means in practice is that you will feel hungry even when your body actually doesn't need more calories. [00:04:00] And when you eat the signal that tells you that you are full, that you've had enough calories, that signaling pathway doesn't work either. And those two things combined means you will overeat.

I would go so far as to say that sleep is the most underrated weight management tool out there. And imagine if you're just not getting good enough sleep, if you're not getting enough sleep for days or weeks or months or years. and you're just overeating all the time. It is a recipe for disaster. Now, in addition to this hunger regulation, sleep is important for, you know, your brain to be able to function properly for your body to recover from your workouts and your training for your stress levels to be under control.

So it really is so [00:05:00] foundational to fitness and. Particularly it is an issue with women who are in midlife. So going through perimenopause and menopause. So, before anything else you do, right, do the simple, but very hard thing of making sure that you are getting enough sleep. And enough for most people means seven to eight hours.

And no, that doesn't mean that you spend seven hours, you know, in bed from when you're like turning out the lights to when your alarm goes off, because actually it takes you a little while to fall asleep. And most people spend part of the night awake. So I've actually been using the aura ring to track my sleep for probably five years.

And I have learned so much about how to improve the quality of my sleep in particular. But most of them are things [00:06:00] that, well, I'm going to share with you in a few minutes. Um, they really, really, really do make a difference. So for me, for example, there is no way I will ever get up at six o'clock in the morning to go exercise before work.

Unless I have actually gotten eight hours of quality sleep before six o'clock in the morning. I would never sacrifice my sleep for a workout. It's as simple as that. Now, I have the luxury of being able to set my own hours a bit. I work mostly from home. So four days a week, it doesn't matter if I start at eight o'clock, nine o'clock, I can choose.

What I've been doing is I set my alarm clock, uh, when I go to bed, I look at what time it is then. If it's 10 o'clock, I can set my alarm clock for six, six 30. If it's [00:07:00] midnight, when I go to bed, I will set my alarm clock for eight or eight 30 cause I need to make sure I get my sleep. I just don't function as well.

This is something I've learned over time. And I really encourage any of you out there who are having trouble. You know, or not feeling refreshed in the morning to really try a week or two of just getting enough sleep and see what a huge difference it makes in the quality of your life. Now, A lot of times, even if you want to get sleep, even if you set your alarm for 10 hours after you go to bed, you don't get sleep.

And this is so, so typical, especially if you're in midlife because the hormonal changes that are going on in your body and perimenopause and menopause are really, really working against you. So you have progesterone levels. Which are dropping, [00:08:00] and that means that it's actually harder for you to fall asleep and harder for you to stay asleep.

Your estrogen levels are dropping, and this can cause those terrible night sweats that a lot of us suffer with. You know, you wake up and you're just drenched, your sheets are drenched. It really disrupts you to have to get up. And you have less melatonin production and melatonin is important for us to be able to fall asleep and to have good quality of sleep.

So it really is very, very common. And if you notice that you do have issues with your sleep and then the things that I mentioned next, which are some of the things you can do to prepare yourself for sleep, um, don't work, then I do recommend that you go seek help from a medical professional. So I'm a gynecologist who specializes in menopause [00:09:00] symptoms and look at.

whether maybe hormone replacement therapy or, or just melatonin or something else might help you. So for me, I started taking melatonin quite early on cause I had a problem just, just turning my, myself off. I'd be like lying in bed, totally still my brain empty. So it wasn't a matter of stress or reliving something from the day I'd be lying there and just waiting, you know, for the light to go out in my head and it just wouldn't turn off.

And when I started using melatonin, I could actually fall asleep. So that was really wonderful. And then when I started hormone replacement therapy, that helped a lot too. Now, but before you even go to those extremes or those lengths, especially those of you who might be a little concerned about adding things, taking extra pills and whatever, there are a lot of things you might actually be [00:10:00] doing that you don't need to be doing.

Right. And you've heard these all and they're simple and oh my God, you wish you would rather be able to take a pill or pay for some cool contraption or listen to some white noise or something like that. That would help because people really don't want to do these things. So the first one is. really to get off your phone right before bed.

And I am so guilty of this and have had to train myself off this. And especially now that a lot of my work is in social media, my clients are also mostly in the U S so it's hard to extract myself from my phone and from my work in the evenings, but that would be like number one tip. Another thing is Stop doing hard workouts at night.

So skip the evening hit classes or spinning classes [00:11:00] and do something more mellow. Go for a walk instead. Weight training. Yeah, you can play with how much that disturbs your sleep. I do notice that on the days that I go late, it does bother my sleep. So if you can shift your training to earlier in the day, like do it in the afternoon or not too late in the evening.

And if you have a high intensity training, then definitely earlier in the day that should help with your sleep as well. And unwinding with a glass of wine, well, that's one of, let me tell you, the first things I gave up when I started tracking my sleep, my quality of sleep when I got the ring, because I noticed that even that one moment where, you know, you don't even really feel it, you're not drunk, you're not tipsy, nothing, but Oh my God kills your deep sleep and the deep sleep is the one that really flushes your brain out of all the [00:12:00] junk and helps your thinking be more clear the next day.

So skip the wine, save it for parties, or then get rid of it altogether. Your sleep will love you. So will a lot of other things. Eating right before bed is another thing, which keeps your system running and doesn't let your body relax in the same way. So I think for some people, this kind of intermittent fasting where they stop eating earlier in the evening.

They may notice better sleep simply because they've been able to do most of their digesting before they go to bed. I am not an advocate of intermittent fasting for sure not. Um, but I would say intermittent fasting in the sense of, all right, the two hours before you go to bed. Don't eat if you can help it.

I mean, if you can manage to eat sooner, cool room temperature is [00:13:00] really conducive to sleep. For me, I just opened the window because I live in a cold climate. So I opened the window at night, turn on the fan, get the cool air in, but turn your air conditioning up. Make sure your bedroom is cooler than the other rooms.

Being tucked under the blankets feels really, really good. Uh, not having caffeine after about two or three in the afternoon. Try that. Oh my God. The number of people that tell me, Oh, caffeine doesn't affect me really try it for a week or two and see if you notice any kind of a difference. We are human. We respond to caffeine.

Okay. Everybody's going to respond maybe a little bit differently, but I think the general consensus is most of us are not the exception to the rule, right? And then my own personal favorite is cuddling. So before bed, instead of being on your phone, if you have a wonderful [00:14:00] partner, that is a perfect time to have a little cuddle time, connection time, a little smooch time.

And okay, if you don't have a human partner, maybe cuddle your dog or your cat, because it will really lower your stress levels to have that contact with another person or another living creature and, uh, help your sleep. So those are my, my tips for you. So that was the first big rock is get your sleep hygiene and shape and start sleeping better.

Everything else will fall into place after that. So, so much more easily. And I know it's. It's much easier said than done, but that is what I would focus on out of everything. The nice thing is that even if you have a super, super busy schedule, I'm not asking you to go to the weight room four times a week or train or anything like that.

I'm just saying sleep, right? That should be [00:15:00] able to fit into your schedule. Okay, so number two, so I've got S's here, so we had sleep. Now there's steps. So one of the biggest problems we have is that we are too sedentary. We sit on our butts all day in front of our computers and then in the evenings we sit in front of Netflix.

We're not moving and that is not good for our bodies. Now, getting 10, 000 steps a day, there's that kind of magic goal. It's not actually magic. Someone made it up sometime, but nowadays the research has shown that actually there is a little bit of magic around 8, 000 steps a day. It seems that when you get to about 8, 000 steps a day, it actually helps you to not feel as hungry.

So there's some magic to getting enough movement. Now, how do you manage that? I hear you. It is not easy. So, here are some things you can try. Uh, [00:16:00] well obviously we have a dog. Take a little walk in the morning. Take a little walk at lunch. Take a little walk in the evening. Of course that takes time. But, uh, in the work day, take five minutes.

Walk around your house every hour, go up and down the stairs. If you're scrolling social media, pace the room. If you're watching Netflix in the evening, instead of just sitting there and watching it pace or do some kind of marching in place, something where you're just moving your body. body. That's the most important thing.

If you're watching your kid's soccer game, don't just stand in one place watching it walk up and down the sideline as you're doing it, right? You can be inventive with these kinds of things. Of course, ideal would be that all of us would have time to go take an hour and a half walk every day outside in nature with the trees and the breeze blowing through our hair.

We would all love to have that kind of time, but I think the reality is [00:17:00] fairly few of us have that kind of time. And I know for me at one point, because I really was trying to hit this 10, 000 steps a day goal, it was becoming actually a stressor for me that, Oh my God, it's nine o'clock at night. I've only walked 4, 000 steps with all this motion that I've done during my work day.

And now I still should go take a walk outside. Then I get back about 10, still need to chase the kids to bed, all that kind of stuff. I was like, Oh my God, not getting to bed myself before 11 and okay, the sleep is really important. So I bit the bullet and invested in myself and bought myself a walk pad.

Yep. So nowadays, instead of sitting at my desk for eight hours, I actually walk at my desk for about two of them. And that has been a game changer for me, especially when I [00:18:00] was in my calorie deficit, you know, just to get myself out of this chair was really, really important. And if you are considering that you might want to invest in a.

a walk pad as well. I have one which folds in half. So it's really nice. You can like put it under a sofa, under a bed, under a desk. I have it in the corner of my room because I don't have a sofa and my, yeah, can't fit it under my desk. But in any case, I am putting a link in the show notes. So if you are interested in seeing the walk pad that I have, which I can definitely recommend it's worked really nicely.

It takes little space and actually you can get in a whole bunch of different colors. So if you want to be fun with it, then check the show notes..

Okay. So we went through two things so far. We've had sleep and steps. Third S is one that I am only going to mention very, very briefly because I have so many podcast [00:19:00] episodes on this. And the third S is strength training. So once you've gotten your sleep under control, once you've started moving your body every day, then please.

Start working on your muscles and notice there is no aerobic exercise coming before this strength training and, and, you know, people do ask me like, what about the aerobics? Yes, aerobic fitness is important as well. Heart health is important. As well. But the fact of the matter is that you can increase your aerobic fitness much more quickly than you can increase your muscle mass.

So it is much more important than if you have limited time, in my opinion, the way to go is to start strength training and then you can add in aerobics later. I read somewhere that it takes two to four weeks to actually increase your aerobic conditioning. [00:20:00] I mean, it's that quick, right? And any one of you out there who has started weight training, you will know that two to four weeks, you are not going to notice pretty much anything when you start strength training, it is going to take months.

So it is important for you to get started sooner than later. And the thing also about the strength training is that as long as you're putting it off. Your muscles are actually shrinking and getting weaker over time. So you're digging yourself into a bigger hole. Okay. So I need to not, not go too deep into that, but if you are new to this podcast and you're hearing about strength training for the first time, then we are now.

Oh my goodness. I don't even remember which podcast episode this is, but in any case, there are quite a few of them by now. So if you haven't listened to any of my previous podcast episodes, I really recommend that you start with some [00:21:00] of the very earliest ones. So episodes two through five, there I really go through the foundational information.

about like the benefits of weight training, um, how to get started, how muscle mass and strength is actually grown. So I recommend those. So episodes two through five. All right. So that was rock number three covered in just a few minutes. That was really quick for me. And then the last one, rock number four is about what you've been eating.

And that is. Protein. One of the things that few people know about midlife is that actually your body gets worse at processing protein in midlife and protein is important for us to have in order to build muscle. So. If you're in, you know, getting through rocks, one, two, and three, so you've got the [00:22:00] sleep and the steps and you've started strength training, then the next thing you need to focus on is the protein consumption, getting enough protein.

So the protein, even if you're not strength training is a good idea to get because when you have protein, it helps you maintain the muscles that you have. So they hopefully do not decline as quickly as they would without protein. Now, and of course, if you're weight training, you need protein. Protein is made up of amino acids.

And amino acids are the building blocks of muscle. And the thing about amino acids is that your body does not store them. The amino acid stores are your muscles, right? So you need to be giving your body amino acids. every day. It can't be just like once a week. You can't OD on amino acids and think, okay, now I loaded my body up and now I don't need to eat protein for a while.

No, it really should be every day. And don't panic. If you have one day [00:23:00] that you can't, right. I understand that when you're like on the road or you have some company event and Um, or you're traveling, you know, you're given the food you're given. So you're probably not going to hit your protein goals on those days because it's not easy to do, but do your best to get more protein in now.

What is the recommendation? So I recommend, especially if you are already weight training to try to aim for the one gram per pound of body weight. And at least getting the 0. 8, don't try to get it all in one meal that is really not going to happen. So that is a significant amount of protein. I'm not going to kid you there.

And it's not super easy to get. You need to plan for that. And the way that I have found it to be easiest to get that much protein in my day is I [00:24:00] divide it into five Portions. So five, whatever meals. So at breakfast and, and by the way, so in each of these five meals, I get 25 to 30 grams of protein.

Sometimes even more, but the minimum would be 25 to 30. So at breakfast, I do that by having two eggs. You know, you can cook them any way you like them. Two eggs plus Greek yogurt or skur, which is this Icelandic, uh, high protein dairy product. They do have it in the States. I've noticed as well. And then for lunch, I will have at least 150 grams of chicken or ground beef, some kind of high protein source meat.

I am a meat eater, makes life easier. Then I will have a snack, which is a high protein snack. I personally love cottage cheese. So I'll have [00:25:00] nonfat cottage cheese with fruit or, or tomatoes or sandwich or whatever. Um, but having like. It's kind of a big snack of protein. That usually happens before I go to the weight room, right?

Or before I do my training on the training days, then after my workout, or sometime later in the afternoon, if I'm not working out that day, then I will have a protein shake. This just makes it so much easier to hit the protein goal. So I put my way powder. into a container, add water, shake it up and drink it.

And there are so many flavors, especially if you're living in the States. Oh my God. The variety there is insane. So pick one you like and enjoy it. And by the way, you can also mix the protein powders into yogurt. So buy plain yogurt and stick protein powder in it. And then finally dinner, I make sure that I centered around some kind of protein.

So again, [00:26:00] ground beef or steak, not that I have steak very often, uh, chicken, salmon, something like that. So doing that, I do manage to get in my about 145 grams of protein a day. Well, now I'm a little bit lighter. So my, my, um, My goal is a little bit lower, but anyway, and the beauty of protein is not only that you get to help build and maintain muscle, you'll notice that you will not feel as hungry.

When you eat protein, it keeps you satiated longer, which makes managing your calories also a lot easier. And by the way, speaking of calories, so if weight gain or, you know, additional weight gain is an issue for you when you're increasing your protein, you really should be measuring what you're doing because if you just add in more protein [00:27:00] and you haven't.

You know, subtract it out something else, then you're simply going to be eating more calories and that's not what you want to be doing. You want to just turn a larger percentage of the calories that you're eating to be into protein related calories. So episode number 10, by the way, it was all about protein.

So if you want to learn more about protein, then take a listen to that one. So, yeah, that was my thoughts for today. So the four big rocks as you start your fitness journey, what you should focus on is first getting your sleep under control. And that may be so much easier said than done, especially if you're in midlife and you have your hormone fluctuations going on.

It may require. Help from not only changes in [00:28:00] your sleep habits and sleep hygiene, but you may want to look into and consider hormone replacement therapy, melatonin, and other such aids. Second thing is getting in enough steps. Stop being so sedentary. Get some movement. I know it is. Also something that is going to take time.

And that's why I do give the tip that you could get a walk pad. If you can afford that kind of thing, get a walk pad. It will make your life easier. Suggest to your company that they buy a walk pad for the office. And then lots of people can, you know, share it over the course of the day. Um, you will feel better when you haven't been just sitting all day.

Third thing is start strength training, all kinds of podcast episodes around that. And then the fourth thing is to start getting in enough protein. Those are going to be the keys. So [00:29:00] that was it for this week and looking forward to talking to you again next week, hopefully with a little bit more of a voice.

In the meanwhile, happy training.