6. Top Strategies for Successful Meal Planning for Menopausal Weight Loss

Get ready to transform your weight loss journey during menopause!

In this week's episode, we equip you with practical advice and effective strategies to understand your body better and manage your weight, focusing on belly fat reduction.

Have you always struggled to create a nutrition plan that fits your needs? Together, we'll tackle how to determine your ideal body weight, daily calorie intake, and the effects of losing estrogen and muscle mass when you hit menopause.

As we move into the second segment, we delve deeper into the significance of protein in our diet. With the tendency to lose muscle mass as we age, protein becomes a crucial ally in replenishing it. We'll guide you on how to calculate your protein intake, share insights on high-protein breakfast options and shed light on why your breakfast and dinner should be high in protein and low in carbohydrates.

Moreover, learn how to make healthier choices when it comes to carbohydrates and fats, including how to pick unprocessed options and calculate your daily fat intake. By the end of this episode, you'll walk away with a wealth of knowledge to make informed choices for your nutrition and weight loss journey during menopause.

Join us as we thrive through menopause, together!

***
Just in case you missed it:

Join my10:21 Day Weight Loss Boot Camp, to be apart of our vibrant community and kickstart your journey!

See you there!

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

This is the podcast. This is the one. This is the one you've been waiting for. If you are struggling with your weight or with belly fat, I want you to stick here with me and listen in, because today we will be talking about nutrition. I'm going to give you a nutrition guide that will help you get on stock and set you on your way to a successful menopausal weight loss. We'll be talking about strategies for meal planning. We will be talking about the macro nutrients proteins, carbohydrates and fats, how much we need to consume. So stick with me through this one.

Speaker 2: 0:37

Welcome to the Thriving Through Menopause podcast. Dr Inaka Yembe, your host, is dedicated to helping you navigate the transformative journey of menopause and perimenopause, particularly focused on achieving menopausal weight loss and reducing belly fat. As a post-menopausal physician herself who has helped thousands of women experiencing the significant life stage, she understands the unique challenges you face. Listen in as we explore a wide range of topics aimed at supporting you in your health and wellness journey. Hopefully, the practical tips and strategies offered potentially help you adopt an empowering approach towards menopausal weight loss and belly fat reduction. And now here's your host, Dr Inaka Yembe. Hello there.

Speaker 1: 1:22

My name is Dr Inaka Yembe and I am your host for this podcast. I am a weight loss expert and obesity expert. I actually have an online program, the 1021 Day Bootcamp, that I have been running now for three years. I also have an outpatient clinic in the hospital where people come and meet me face to face to talk about the things that I need to do to lose weight and maintain it. I have people from the ages of seven all the way up to the 70s, so weight loss really is a problem now that you can overcome. It gets a little bit more difficult when a woman is in menopause, I do agree, because we are facing several hormonal imbalances that make it a little bit more challenging for us to lose the weight. Anyway, what I will discuss today is for everyone. We will be talking about strategies for male planning how to create a healthy game plan. Regardless of whether you're a male or female, and regardless of your nutrition lifestyle, whether or not you are vegan, vegetarian, keto lifestyle, paleo whatever you have chosen to be your lifestyle you can still follow this guide that we will be talking about today. And, yes, this is a menopausal weight loss channel, so we will be a little bit more biased in sharing the information when it comes to menopause. Anyway, I want you to go ahead and grab your pen and paper and take some notes. So, menopausal women, let's take a little step back and discuss some fundamentals that we need to have in the back of our minds when we are male prepping and every single time that we come to the table to eat. So fundamentals, number one estrogen starts declining around the age of 35. Why do I want to mention this? Because it's going to help you understand why you need to prioritize proteins, which is the first macronutrient that we'll talk about. So estrogen starts to decline and with that decline in estrogen levels from age 35 for most women. And above comes a decline in your muscle mass. Declining muscle mass decreases our basal metabolic rate and makes it a little bit more difficult to lose weight and a little easier for us to gain the weight. Declining muscle mass is really one of the biggest challenges that we have for everyone, male or female. Every time that you go on a diet let's call it diet and you restrict your calories, your body will lose fat and muscle, and if you restrict your calories too too much for too long, you can get in a vine because you've lost too much muscle now. So when I talk about how you should meal prep, you will understand also why we prioritize proteins for everyone male, females and regardless of age.

Speaker 1: 4:20

Let's also look at some things that we need to do prior to male planning Preliminaries, fundamentals, preparations. I say this because it's important for successful weight loss and successful male planning. If you don't plan ahead of time, if you don't make some basic plans, then you may fail. Failing to plan is planning to fail. So what fundamentals am I talking about?

Speaker 1: 4:45

Number one is how many calories we need to consume per day. We cannot male plan successfully or lose weight successfully and keep it off if we don't understand exactly how many calories we need to consume per day. That's very, very important. So I want everybody to go to a BMI chart. Bmi chart, go to Google online and Google BMI chart, look at your height and your weight and it will tell you a BMI between a certain number. Typically between 18 and 24 is a normal weight, but your BMI depends on your height. So you must also know your height. Don't guess your height. Don't be like me. I used to think I was six feet and at some point I thought I was a five 11. I was just guessing. And when you guess, then you may actually make some errors in calculating how many calories you need to consume per day. So if you don't know your height, please take the time and measure yourself. Oh, go to the doctor's office, like I did, and get measured.

Speaker 1: 5:54

So, number one, you need to know how many calories you want to consume per day. Prior to that, I want you to figure out what is an ideal body weight for you. Ideal body weight doesn't mean how much I want to weigh. I may be 250 pounds and I just want to be 200 pounds. That's great, that's a good goal, but it's not your ideal body weight. Your ideal body weight you're going to get that from a BMI chart. For me, when I measured myself recently, I was five feet eight and a half inches, and so when I look at the BMI chart, I picked a number of 155 pounds, and that is my ideal body weight. So write that down somewhere.

Speaker 1: 6:38

Let's talk about some other preliminaries fundamentals that we need to do to prepare or plan to create a nutrition plan for ourselves that can take us through the rest of our lives. When I say you create a nutrition plan now. It doesn't mean you're going to be eating exactly the same things. You've got to be flexible. We're going to tweak this along the way as we get older, but you would know the fundamentals and you would know your macros.

Speaker 1: 7:06

So, number one planning back to planning. Every single time that you want to meal prep or you want to create a menu for yourself, or you want to prepare your foods, I want you to think about what you're going to be eating and I want you to create a shopping list. A shopping list is very, very important and when you go shopping, you get into the grocery store. Please stick to your shopping list. Creating a shopping list is really very important. It eliminates distractions. I want you to forget about things like sales. When you go into grocery store. There are sales everywhere. I look at it this way the grocery store or the companies they have these sales out there. They're not to my benefit, they're still to the benefit of the company themselves. So stick to your shopping list, because if you get distracted when you're shopping, then you come home with things that maybe you don't intend to eat and most of the time, these things may be unhealthy. So creating that shopping list is important. Stick to it and it will reduce your margin of error and also save you some money, all right.

Speaker 1: 8:08

Number two when it comes to planning, I want you to think about the schedule. How will you eat? Are you going to be intermittent fasting? Are you going to be eating once a day? Are you going to be eating four times a day? And also what times? Because when you give your brain these specifics and create an eating schedule, it once again reduces your chances of error and your body falls into a sudden rhythm and stays consistent with you. It will also help you decrease distractions and it will also help you stay on track. So, again, create or think about an eating schedule.

Speaker 1: 8:46

Number three this one here is a little tricky for some people, but it really helps you if you prepare your own food. Eating out is great, it's fun, we have time to just chat and not have to prepare the meal, but the fact is, if you're struggling with your weight and you eat out too often, you are eating out and consuming things that you're not really sure what's in the food. Even though restaurants nowadays have, then, total calories, you still don't know. Did they add sugar? How much sugar? Did they have oil? How much oil. So, in order to lose weight and keep it off, if you really really are struggling, I want you to also take control of what you put in your body by preparing your own food. Okay, that said, there's some people who preparing their own food is really way out of their comfort zone and they just can't. They just can't. This is when you research one of those healthy meal prep companies and register with them and order the food, because some of these healthy meal prep companies actually have every single thing that's in the food listed on the container. So I would go with that one. All right.

Speaker 1: 9:53

Number four anytime that you plan your meal or you're planning your nutrition, of course you make a plan, but sometimes, if you're like me, I used to do quite a bit of research and I used to plan. I used to tell myself I'm going to do this, I'll do that. I wasted time just planning, but the key to success is actually working your plan. I want you to execute the plan and you will feel very accomplished. There is a quote that says action changes things, so when you plan, please take action as well. All right, the next thing, preliminary, that I want to discuss is just managing your expectations.

Speaker 1: 10:31

Losing weight for us, especially in menopause, is tricky. It is a little bit difficult, and one of the things that really discourages us is when we are impatient, we don't give ourselves the time to get accustomed to a new way of eating, we don't give ourselves time for our bodies to respond to how and what we're eating, and we get discouraged and discouraged our own selves when we don't see the results weekly. I want you to expect things to happen slowly. In fact, when you lose weight slowly, you have a higher chance of success. So, generally, losing a half to one pound a week is healthy and sustainable long term.

Speaker 1: 11:11

Tip number six when it comes to planning, don't wait to be motivated. Most of us just wait and say, hey, I don't feel like it, my motivation is low, I just don't want to meal prep right now, I just don't want to do it, I'm waiting for something magical to happen and come in and motivate me. Motivation, yes, it's there sometimes, but most of the time it's really isn't. I want you to be disciplined. Be disciplined enough that when you make a plan, you jump in and they execute it. Think about this If you have a child, a child turned four years old little Johnny. You took little Johnny to kindergarten at the age of four. He did not like it, you did not like it, but you both toughed it out consistently every day, every day, every day, until months down the line. Little Johnny was used to it. You were disciplined enough to tough it through those hard times. I want you to be disciplined and consistent with yourself.

Speaker 1: 12:04

All right, let's get into the nitty gritty of what we should be eating and how much. Remember, in the beginning I told you to go to a BMI chart and figure out what is your ideal body weight. We are going to use that ideal body weight to calculate our three macronutrients proteins, carbohydrates and fats. This is the framework of what you will be eating, or what you should be eating, in order to lose weight. Proteins when I talk about proteins, I want you to make them healthy, whole, unprocessed. So things like chicken, fish, turkey eggs, greek yogurt, edamame, tofu, those kinds of single ingredient, clean foods that are not processed. The majority of your protein should be unprocessed. So think about proteins first.

Speaker 1: 13:00

If I'm trying to lose weight, I want to prioritize protein. Why? Because if I'm in menopause, I'm losing muscle mass. I need proteins to replenish my muscle mass. If I cut down on my calories, I'm losing muscle mass, so I need proteins In addition to that. When you maintain your muscles, muscles are metabolically more active. So how much protein do we need to consume? Take your ideal body weight, multiply that by one, and that's how much protein you need to eat.

Speaker 1: 13:30

I, my ideal body weight, is 155 pounds, so I'm going to consume 155 grams of protein per day. So exactly what am I talking about? 155 grams of protein. How does that translate to real life? So, for example, if I look at an egg, a whole egg a whole egg is 70 calories a large egg and it contains 6 grams of protein per egg. If I eat two eggs for breakfast, that's 12 grams of protein in those two eggs. However, that's not enough. I want you to try to get to 30 to 35 grams of protein per meal. This way, you can accomplish your goal of hitting your protein goal for me, 155 grams of protein by the end of the day. So what will I do in real life? I'm going to eat two eggs. I'm also going to add egg whites. Egg whites have high protein, the low in calories, so I'll add about four or five ounces of egg whites to beef up the protein content without giving me too many calories. So, right there, I can add about 12 grams of protein in the egg whites. I have 12 grams of protein in two eggs and together that's about 24 grams of protein. And I want to bring it a little bit higher and I'm going to add one slice of Ezekiel bread, which is 80 calories and five grams of protein, and that gives me a total of 29 grams of protein Pretty close to 30 grams of protein.

Speaker 1: 15:01

I want you to think this way each time you are eating, and meal prep really makes it easy. When I'm doing my meal prep, I prepare breakfast this scrambled egg or omelet that I'm telling you. I actually prepare enough for three days every single week on Sunday. Why is that? I'm so busy, I don't have time to wake up in the morning and make the eggs, so I make them ahead of time for three days and I have them ready for me. Other things you can have for breakfast include things like salmon. So smoked salmon works really well for some people, sugar-free bacon works really well. So just look up the foods, make your shopping list, go shopping, but think about high protein meals all of them. Another thing you want to remember is that we're trying to maintain muscle. If we are in menopause, we're also somewhat insulin resistant.

Speaker 1: 15:52

The biggest thing I want you to do when it comes to eating your meals is to have especially that first meal in the morning. Make it high protein, very low in carbohydrate. And the last meal of the day, make it very high protein, very low in carbohydrate. So for dinner I may have, say, salmon and asparagus or green beans, or I may have a steak and green beans or a side salad, you know things like that. But make sure your first and your last meals, your buffer meals, are high protein. Those just really work better for you for weight loss. But prioritizing protein is key. Again, one gram of protein per pound of your ideal body weight, all right.

Speaker 1: 16:36

Second micronutrient is going to be carbohydrate. It's really easiest way to think about it is just, you eat as much carbohydrate as you eat protein and don't demonize the carbohydrates. Okay, not all carbs are made equal, so some carbohydrates really are highly processed, so I would eat those that are unprocessed. If it's a green leafy, it's better. So things like spinach, kale. So I go with the leaves, I go with things like sweet potato. You do need some carbohydrates.

Speaker 1: 17:08

How much per day is an equal amount of protein and carbohydrates? So if I consume 155 grams of protein per day, I want to consume 155 grams of carbohydrates per day. And you're looking at the carbohydrate content of the food that you're eating. For example, if you consume, say, 30 grams of oats or half a cup of oats oatmeal, go to the package, the nutrition facts on the package, and look at the carbohydrate content. It will tell you something, and I'm just guessing. This may not be accurate. This is just a guess. So a half a cup of oats may have 150 calories, 5 grams of protein and maybe 27 or 28 grams of carbohydrates. So you want to consume an equal amount of protein and carbohydrate in grams per day.

Speaker 1: 17:59

Again, go with the healthy carbohydrate, not the processed ones. The ones that are processed really are things like fruit juice. If I want fruit, I will eat the whole fruit and not fruit juice. If I wanted to eat rice, I will eat brown rice or white rice and not rice pudding. If I want to eat corn, I'll eat the corn on the cob and not corn flakes. These highly processed foods, what do they do? What does the manufacturer do they take out all the goodness. So take out all the fiber and all the vitamins from the product and in the processing they also add a lot of sugar, salt and preservatives that are not good for you. And if you're struggling with your weight, last thing that you need is added sugars, because those just promote insulin spikes. Insulin crashes make you want to snack all the time and then make you store body fat and belly fat.

Speaker 1: 18:58

Go with unprocessed carbohydrates. I say if it's a leaf and if it's green, I'm going for it. Okay, so your carbohydrates and your proteins should be equal amount in grams. All right, the last macronutrient is fat. How much fat do you need to consume per day?

Speaker 1: 19:17

This is a very easy mathematical calculation. So I know and stick with me here. I know that one gram of protein and one gram of carbohydrate each contain four calories. So for me, for example, if I'm consuming 155 grams of protein and 155 grams of carbohydrate, I would multiply each of these per by four to give me the amount of calories that I'm consuming in protein and carbs per day. So for me, I'm consuming 155 grams of protein, 155 grams of carbohydrates. I would simply add both and multiply by four, and that gives me 1240 calories that I am consuming in carbohydrate and protein. The balance I'm left now with 460 calories, because I weigh 155 pounds and, following the formula, it tells me I needed to consume 1700 calories per day. So if I take 1700 and subtract 1240, I'm left with 460 calories. Those calories need to come from fat. So the way to figure it out, I know that one gram of fat has nine calories, so I'll simply take 460 divided by nine, and that gives me 51 51 grams of fat per day. I want this to be healthy fat, so I would be consuming fats like olive oil, avocado oil, nuts and seeds. Also, salmon contains healthy fats. My beef contains healthy fats, so it all really adds up.

Speaker 1: 21:10

When it comes to how do I fix my plate or how do I meal prep Generally, if I'm meal prepping for a day or if I'm meal prepping for three days, I will use olive oil to cook my food or to stir fry my vegetables, and I use the fat content in those oils that I'm using to meal prep my foods. I also factor that in my calculation. One of the biggest mistakes that most people make is they don't factor in the oil, and then that can just throw your calculations off, so I want you to think about that also. All right, so in summary, we've really touched on a few things and hopefully this has set the stage for you for successful meal prep. We touched on some fundamentals here how to set up yourself for success, understanding why you need to prioritize proteins. Planning, including scheduling your eating pattern, thinking about what kinds of foods you will actually be eating. Planning to prepare your own food so you can get a good handle of what's going into your body. Thinking about the type of nutrition, executing your plan and being disciplined. We've really also talked about how much of each macro you need to consume of each macronutrient. So protein one gram per pound of ideal body weight, carbohydrate, one gram per pound of your ideal body weight, and the rest of your calories come from healthy fats. I hope this information really helps you to create a healthy nutrition plan or meal plan that you can use successfully for weight loss.

Speaker 1: 22:44

I always say track what you are eating, and a lot of people are squeamish about tracking, but tracking is something that we do anyway by default. Just imagine if you're driving down the street and the speed limit says 30 miles per hour. You may not like it, but you're going to track it anyway. You're going to be looking at what the speed limit is. You're going to be tracking that on your speedometer, so I want you to track what you're eating for at least one week better two weeks. It gives you a handle of what you're eating. It gives you a handle of how much you should be eating and it's also going to give you a handle of how your body is responding to what you're putting in it.

Speaker 1: 23:24

So I want to thank you for joining me in this podcast. Let's stay together as we thrive through menopause. I really hope that the insights and tips that we shared in this episode inspire and empower you to be successful in your own path in losing weight and maintaining a healthy weight through menopause. Remember, you are capable, you are resilient and you are deserving of thriving through menopause. Thank you, bye.

Speaker 2: 23:55

Thank you for tuning in to this episode of Thriving Through Menopause. We hope you found valuable insights and practical advice to support your journey. If you enjoyed today's episode, be sure to subscribe to the podcast, share it and review. Your feedback is greatly appreciated. Remember, menopause doesn't have to be a challenge. It can be an opportunity for growth, renewal and self-care. Connect with us on social media, where we share additional resources, tips and advice to help you along your path. Once again, thanks for listening in and we hope you'll join us again on the next episode of Thriving Through Menopause. Until then,