#119: Protein: Why It Matters, How Much You Need, and Practical Tips to Eat Enough

Struggling to get enough protein in your day? Most of us aren’t eating enough — and how do I know? Because it’s almost impossible to do without conscious effort and some level of meal planning.

So let’s talk about protein.

In this episode, I share:

1. Why protein is especially important in midlife
2. How much you really need
3. How to calculate your daily target
4. What to look for in a good protein powder
5. A practical, real-life way to plan your meals to hit your protein goal without stress

P.S. If you have questions about protein, send them to me — I’d love to do a future episode answering your FAQs. Send me a message via Instagram >>

Enjoy the show!

Resources mentioned in the episode: 

– Protein powder recommendations >>  

– Midlife Fat Loss Formula >>

Transcript

#119: Protein: Why It Matters, How Much You Need, and Practical Tips to Eat Enough


[00:00:00] Welcome to today's show. I'm Lynn Sederlöf-Airisto, and I'm a menopause fitness coach, helping women to get started weight training and continue along their journeys to being strong and healthy and fit in their forties, fifties, and beyond. And today we are gonna talk about protein. This is something that I get so many questions about, how on earth am I going to get in all the protein that I need to get in, and how much do I need in the first place?
So those are questions that will be answered today. 
So it's actually interesting the journey that one goes on when one starts weight training or focusing in general on building muscle and getting stronger. The first step, of course, is for you to start lifting weights in the proper fashion. So applying progressive overload, following a good program, doing it consistently, all the things that I talk about here [00:01:00] on the podcast.
And then the second step is to make sure that you are doing the things that. Support your muscle growth, and one of the most important on this front is getting in enough protein and then. The journey that that takes you on going forward is you kind of revamp how you eat and that can lead to you being able to better control your weight actually.
So the tips that I'm gonna give today, on how to make sure that you're getting in enough protein in a day are. The kinds of tips that I give in my fat loss formula, which is my little course, it's an hour long course, to help you lose weight. It's the exact way that I did it. And it's a system. It is a very clear system that if you follow it, you will lose fat.
So [00:02:00] anyway, let's get into the protein piece.
All right, so protein is something that's really important for us women in midlife to be focusing on getting enough of. It is something I think they don't naturally eat a lot of, especially women who have been trying to watch their weight and eating more salads and well, eating very little in general, like trying to keep their calories at their magical 1200 calories a day line.
Which is not magical by the way. That was complete sarcasm there anyway. And the thing that we're battling with also is that as we age, our bodies are worse at making use of the protein that we do consume. So if we're not eating enough protein and then we're not making as much use, we're not able to use the protein that we are eating, then our bodies end up in a little bit of a protein deficit.
And even if you weren't to be [00:03:00] strength training. Even eating more protein will help to preserve your muscle. So it is important and it's important for other things besides muscle. So let's make sure that you're getting enough protein. I recommend if you're trying to build and maintain muscle, that you aim for one gram per pound of ideal body weight.
So if you're a lot overweight, think about what is a weight that. Your height person would be with your bone build and all that kind of thing. if you were normal weight or at your ideal weight? I mean, this is not an exact exact science, but you know, if, if you are very much overweight and you try to calculate your daily protein intake based on that, it's gonna be so much that nobody, nobody can eat that.
Okay. So go with one gram per pound thinking about your ideal weight and [00:04:00] in kilogram that makes 2.2, grams of protein per kilogram. So for me, for example, my protein goal is 140 grams a day, and that is not something that is easy to achieve just by winging it. And so it forced me to really get into a system of eating protein.
Now, one thing that will very much help you in achieving your protein goals is if you start having a big shot of protein after your training sessions. So the recommendation from Dr. Stacy Sims, who is really one of the leading experts on menopause, uh, physiology and, and. Muscle and and performance is to get 30 to 40 grams of protein in within a half an hour max, 45 minutes [00:05:00] of ending your training session.
And so if you start by incorporating that habit that already knocks out 40 grams of your daily protein intake, which is great.
Now this is of course best done by consuming a protein powder. What I do is I get my protein shaker, I put the powder in it. I take it with me to the gym, and right after my class or my session. I grab that, add in some water, shake it up and drink it. Okay? So that makes it super easy for me. 
Now,  you do want to think about the fact that if you simply add a, protein shake to your day and you don't make any other changes in your eating habits, then that is additional calories that you're gonna be consuming that day.
In fact, my protein shake is about 200 calories. So if I were simply to keep eating the way that I've always been eating and I [00:06:00] add that protein shake, I am adding quite a bit of calories to my day, and over time, that will start showing up on my body, right? I will gain weight. So you do want to consider. okay, so I'm having this protein shake so I don't have something else. You need to look at the bigger picture. 
And then the other thing to keep in mind is that not all protein powders are built alike. Some of them are more like recovery drinks and what is like a recovery drink?
What I think of is if you're an athlete or a young growing person, like my son when he was like 15, 16 playing ice hockey and. He was at a tournament and you needed quick calories into him so that he could go to the next game, you know, and not be starving. 'cause you can't be like feeding them real meals.
So you had to do things like give them recovery drinks to help out. But the recovery drink has like very little protein for the amount of calories. It's got like [00:07:00] a lot of other stuff in there, a lot of carbs, of course. What you would need if you are ice hockey player and you're gonna go play another game, you've got 20 minutes down, right? And you don't wanna eat a whole meal and then be weighed down by that. 
So you really wanna look at the nutritional information of the protein powder that you are considering buying. Now, if the protein powder was a hundred percent protein, there was nothing else there. All the calories came from protein, it would be four calories per gram of protein.
All right. Some powders get close. The closest I've found is five calories per gram of protein. So when I do my protein powder, I get 40 grams of protein. I. And I pay 200 calories for it. So look at the nutritional information on the package. Divide the number of calories by the grams of protein, and hopefully [00:08:00] that is a number closer to four. Maybe it's five, but if it gets above 10, then that's not a good option at all. And if you're thinking about which numbers to look on the nutritional information, it doesn't matter which column you're looking at. Uh, you can look at the per a hundred grams or per serving or whatever, but you take the number of calories.
And you look down that same exact column for the number of, grams of protein, and you divide the calories by the grams of protein, and that's how you come up with that number. And you want that number once again to be as close to four. I mean, four is as low as it could possibly be, and most likely it's gonna have something else in it besides protein.
So five is a very good protein powder as far as having mostly protein in it. If it gets up close to 10, then go for another brand, because you're gonna get a lot of additional calories in that protein [00:09:00] shake. 
All right, so you have got this protein shake as one source of protein and I would suggest you eat, you drink that. I was gonna say eat, but drink that every day, whether you train or don't train. 'cause remember when you're training your weight training sessions, those are the stimulus. For you to build muscle, but then the muscle is built on your recovery days, so you do need that source of protein on your recovery days.
Another good thing to to know is that your body can't store the amino acids. Those are the building blocks of protein. Uh, the thing that you're basically getting when you eat protein, your body breaks it down into amino acids and then it uses the amino acids in different places. Okay? So your body can't store those amino acids.
 You do need to be feeding yourself amino acids protein on a regular basis. On a daily [00:10:00] basis, okay? So it's not just on the days you work out, it's every day that you need to be eating protein, but so once you've got that protein shake that's already 40 grams of protein in your life, then you think about.
How many meals are you going to eat in general? Are you gonna have breakfast, lunch, dinner? Are you gonna have breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner? So how many times a day are you going to eat And you need to plan how you're gonna split the other grams of protein that you need to eat between those other meals.
Now in my case, I eat four times a day. I have breakfast, lunch, snack, and dinner. So I've knocked out 40 of my 140 grams of protein in my protein shake. So I need to somehow, in those four meals get another a hundred grams of protein. And [00:11:00] that is actually not that hard to achieve as long as you plan it right?
So I have planned that my breakfast and my snack are kind of smaller meals. And that my lunch and my dinner are bigger meals. In fact, what I eat for lunch and what I eat for dinner are pretty much interchangeable. It's usually for lunch, it's spaghetti sauce or leftovers from the previous dinner. So some kind of chicken and something.
 And then I have a couple of breakfasts that I know have a certain amount of protein in them. So my two options at breakfast are to have, two eggs, some toast. I have coffee with milk in it, so milk has some protein in it. And then I'll have, a little bit of Greek yogurt to make up for it. So I get 20 to 25 grams of protein in my breakfast. 
The other option for my breakfast is oatmeal. So I have, instant oats, which is just [00:12:00] plain instant oats, doesn't have any flavor in it. And then I add a, a flavored protein powder to it, so it gives it some flavor, plus it adds the protein to it. And then I have my coffee with my milk, so that also gives me plenty of protein. So it's not like this huge, huge effort. Right? I wanted to give these examples because it's not like I'm eating something crazy unusual, right? Two eggs and some Greek yogurt on one day. And on the other days I have my porridge with, some protein powder. And on both days I'm having milk in my coffee. So those are my protein sources. 
 Then my lunch is something that I try to get 25 to 30 grams of protein in. So I have either my spaghetti with my spaghetti sauce, and I know how many grams of my spaghetti sauce I need to put on the plate so that I, you know, fulfill that amount.
Plus I have a coffee after [00:13:00] my lunch, and that again has some skim milk in it. So that, again, has a little bit of protein. And the option is that I'm having leftovers from the previous night's dinner, which is generally some kind of chicken and vegetables, you know, kind of thing. So I will weigh out the chicken to make sure there's enough chicken to cover that 25 to 30 grams of protein. And then I have the milk with my coffee. Okay, so that's not. Crazy either. And my dinner is pretty much the same as my lunch.
And then, snack is, I have cottage cheese, so I have two options for the snack. Either I get cottage cheese, so non-fat, cottage cheese, and I put tomatoes or some fruit. I happen to like having pears in it and it helps with fiber. I guess I should switch to apples 'cause that would be even better. But the pears are just somehow so juicy and nice. [00:14:00] But I have that, or then I have Greek yogurt, which is plain low-fat Greek yogurt, and I put protein powder in that for flavor. So there you go. Fairly easy, like two high protein types of food that I can have as my snack.
And I wanna say that I do, I do also eat carbs. So in my breakfast I have a piece of bread with it. And of course when I'm having the oatmeal, that's carbs, right? And then for lunch, I mean, I've got the spaghetti and if I'm having chicken, I usually have rice or some kind of pasta with it.
I, I'm a, I'm a carbs. Person. I, I do like to get some of my calories with carbs. I just feel like I do better that way. And then when I'm having the snack, which is either the yogurt or the, cottage cheese, I like to have these very crunchy rye [00:15:00] breads with it. And I put a little bit of, of, low cholesterol spread that I use on it.
Okay. So. Basically that is how you can achieve that amount of protein without having to eat it all at once. You need to plan first of all, right? You need to think about like, so how much protein do I need to get in a day? How many times am I going to eat each day? And then you plan your meals around the protein source.
And then, um, to those of you who are doing intermittent fasting, this can be much more challenging. I mean, if you're in a very small eating window, getting in 140 grams of protein would be kind of, well, I have to say, I'm gonna have a really hard time [00:16:00] forcing. All of that protein, down all at once.
So that's gonna be challenging. But intermittent fasting is not something I don't, personally, I don't do it, and it has not been recommended for women in menopause. The experts that I've learned from, one of which is Dr. Stacy Sims does not recommend intermittent fasting for women.
Though though I do notice myself, I've used one form of intermittent fasting, which is that I decided when I was in my calorie deficit , this was two years ago. What helped me then was that I decided I'm not eating after 8:00 PM because. After 8:00 PM is when I snack, so that's when I'm like running to the kitchen a lot because I'm tired and I'm trying to get some energy. So just doing that kind of, uh, pseudo intermittent fasting helped me to manage not having those last minute calories at [00:17:00] the end of the day. 
All right, so to summarize, you wanna get in one gram per pound of body weight of protein per day. And if you are, trying to build muscle, have the 30 to 40 gram shot of protein after your strength training session, or if you're doing cardio that day, have it after your cardio session.
And if you're taking a day off, have it at some point that day. It doesn't really matter what time. So I'll do it just when I'm feeling peckish. And sometimes I'll do it right before dinner. So that I'm not so hungry at dinner, rather than first eating dinner and then trying to have the protein shake and realizing, oh, I'm having to force, force it down., 
 Then split your remainder of your protein goal into however many meals you have. So if you're eating three times a day or four times a day, split the remaining amount between those [00:18:00] meals and do some meal planning.
It is a really good idea to have a couple meals on hand. Like I was able to describe, I eat one of these two breakfasts. I ate one of these two snacks. My dinners generally look like this, and my lunches generally look like this. When you have that kind of a rinse, repeat, meal. Planning. I, I mean that's, meal planning is such a fancy term, and some people put them in boxes and put them in their fridge for the whole week.
I don't do that. I just kind of have this idea of what I'm going to eat. Of course the boxes thing. That's great. I just have never, yeah. I haven't gone that far with it. 
And by the way. This is one of the things that I teach in my fat loss formula because this can be applied to fat loss and keeping the weight off.
So if you are thinking that, hmm, I really need to [00:19:00] rethink how I eat, I give you a lot of tools in the fat loss formula for planning your meals and. Also tips on, good things to be eating, to feel full that don't have a lot of calories, but have a good amount of fiber. Uh, what are some good low fat protein sources, et cetera.
So if you are thinking about doing kind of an. Nutrition overhaul for yourself, or a eating habit overhaul for yourself. That is a really good resource, even if you're not planning on dieting, because the tools that I teach there, you can use in just daily life, and in fact, that's how you keep the weight off, is that you apply the tools in your fat loss phase and then you keep it off by continuing to apply those same principles forever for your whole life. Okay. And that's available on my website .
All right. So I hope that was helpful as far as the [00:20:00] protein goes, and I would love it if you have questions about the protein, please do send them to me because I could do a q and a, episode on protein. Also, by the way, some protein powders. My customers and clients have liked and recommend I have them gathered on a page on my website. So visit my website, www.befitafter40.com/stuff and on that page, I have some good protein powders listed so you can check that out.
My audience is from all over the world, so you know, the ones that I use aren't necessarily available where you are, and that's why I've tried to gather a list of some good ones. Okay, and with that, I wish you Happy Protein eating and also of course, happy training.