The Feed My Health Podcast

Hormonal Weight Gain: Why Your Body Isn't Responding Like It Used To

• Rosalind Tapper

Share episode

Send us a text

Hormonal weight gain affects women of all ages, but especially those in perimenopause and beyond who find their old weight loss strategies no longer work despite their best efforts. This frustrating reality is not about lack of willpower but about hormonal changes requiring a completely different approach to health and weight management.

• Three key hormones affect weight gain: estrogen (regulates metabolism and fat distribution), progesterone (balances estrogen, supports sleep), and cortisol (stress hormone)
• As estrogen declines, metabolism slows and fat redistributes to the midsection
• Progesterone drops faster than estrogen, creating "estrogen dominance" that disrupts sleep and increases anxiety
• High cortisol from any type of stress (emotional, physical, nutritional) signals your body to store fat
• Old weight loss methods like severe calorie restriction and excessive exercise actually increase stress hormones
• Women's bodies are biologically programmed to preserve fat during stress, unlike men's bodies
• Building muscle is crucial for metabolism, insulin regulation, and burning calories at rest
• The 90-10 rule: eat nourishing foods 90% of the time, enjoy treat foods 10% of the time without guilt
• Consistent, adequate protein intake supports muscle maintenance and satiety
• Mindful movement like walking and Pilates supports fat loss without increasing stress hormones

Please share this episode with someone who needs to hear this message because understanding the role of hormones could be the gift that helps them stop blaming themselves and start finding solutions that actually work.


If you'd like me and my team to help you improve your daily habits, to lose pounds every week, and keep them off forever...

Apply Here

Speaker 1:

Hello everybody, welcome back to another episode of the Feed my Health podcast with your host, Rosalind Tapper, and today we are going to be talking all about something that we all have all experienced struggles with, and is an episode not just for women, but also for the men in your life. If you have a man in your life, if you have a woman in your life, this episode is for you. Share it with them so that they can understand what's going on, not just with you, potentially, but with other women in their lives siblings, mothers, aunties you name it children. Let's talk about hormones. So one of the things that I know so many of you are battling with is hormonal weight gain, and the thing is as well that not only are you battling with hormonal weight gain, but you're also doing all of the things that used to work to help you to lose weight and feeling very frustrated by it. So I want to give you a little bit of clarity today on what's going on and what you can do to progress things a little bit more. So things that I see women doing quite a lot is slashing their calories, thinking that they're eating healthily and exercising full pelt, but your body isn't doing what you think that it should be doing or it isn't responding in the way that it used to. So you potentially feel more heavy, you feel more tired, you feel out of control, especially around food, and, worst of all, you're actually blaming yourself and saying that you just lack willpower, you just lack discipline and the problem with that is your self-esteem then gets lower and lower and lower. And I see this and I hear this across the board in women in their 40s, in women in their 50s and women in their 60s and 70s. I had a conversation this week with a lady in her 70s who says her self-esteem is so incredibly low because she's struggling with this and wanting to lose weight. And I think to myself how you know, I feel really sad because when you're in your 70s, that's your time to enjoy your life. You know you're not working anymore, hopefully, and you're able to go and maybe do a bit of bit of exploring and traveling and just doing things for you. And if you feel like your self esteem is low, that's really going to hinder a lot of how you show up for yourself and the things that you you do on a daily basis. So we really want to get you out of that position. If this is sounding at all familiar, then this episode is definitely for you, and I want you to know that what you're going through, what you're struggling with right now, is not your fault, and once you understand what's happening inside your body, you can stop fighting it and you can actually start working with it instead. So I want to dive into what's really going on hormonally, metabolically and emotionally, and what you can actually do to change this in the long term.

Speaker 1:

So let's talk about your hormones for a second. Now I'm going to break this down quite simply because sometimes I feel like it's over complicated, and I apologize now if I'm dumbing this down too much, but I feel like sometimes simplicity is key when it comes to explaining things, and I also think as well that it helps. You know, you know you can share this to more than one kind of demographic, and hopefully most people will understand. So your hormones they are like little messengers, ok. So they're like chemical signals that your body uses to regulate almost everything. Almost everything, so your appetite, your metabolism, your fat storage, your mood, your sleep, your energy and even where your body stores fat. So when I'm talking in my content on Instagram about hormones, I'm not.

Speaker 1:

I think a lot of people think that I'm talking about their sex hormones. I'm not just talking about that. I'm talking about, you know, their appetite, regulating hormones and things like that. So, just so you have a good understanding now, once you hit your late 30s and into your 40s, typically I'm just I'm just going with typical um ages and numbers here. I mean, some people can have early onset menopause. You know things like that. It's everybody's very, very different, but typically so once you hit thirties and forties, perimenopause kicks in, and this hormonal shift is absolutely not subtle at all at all. For some people they can have a really nice transition in people. They can have a really nice transition in maybe don't get too many symptoms and that's amazing, um, but for a lot of people, the reality is that it can kind of hit you like a what's the phrase? Hit you with a, like a ton of breaks. There we go, that's. I think that's the right one.

Speaker 1:

So the three major hormones that start shifting are your oestrogen, your progesterone and your cortisol. So we're going to break each one of those three down, just so it's more clear about what the role is for each of them. So oestrogen or estrogen, I never really know which one to say, but we'll go with oestrogen. It plays a huge role in fat distribution, insulin sensitivity and metabolism and as estrogen begins to fluctuate and eventually decline, a few things can happen. So your metabolism can slow down, you become more insulin resistant, meaning you store more fat from the same foods that you would have eaten before, and you begin to store more fat around the same foods that you would have eaten before, and you begin to store more fat around your midsection, and this is why the belly can suddenly become a problem zone when it never really used to be before.

Speaker 1:

Then you've got your progesterone. So this is your calming, it's your anti-anxiety, it's your sleep supporting hormone and it balances oestrogen and keeps inflammation down. The thing is, with progesterone it drops faster than oestrogen and this creates something that is called oestrogen dominance. So this happens even when oestrogen is low, by the way. So with less progesterone, you might start to notice things like poor sleep, higher anxiety or mood swings, a tendency to crave sugar, to crave soul or wine to calm yourself. And what does poor sleep lead to? More cortisol, which brings us to the cortisol hormone. So this is your stress hormone and your body doesn't know the difference between emotional stress, work stress or physical stress, like skipping meals or over exercising, and it all adds up to one thing, which is essentially elevated cortisol. And when cortisol is consistently high, your body thinks it's in danger and it goes into fat preservation mode, especially around your belly. It also increases cravings, appetite and the desire for comfort foods. So if you're stuck in a cycle of high stress, poor sleep, under eating, your body is in typically what's called survival mode, um, not fat burning mode.

Speaker 1:

Okay, now I want you to think about back in the day when our ancestors were catching lions and you know all the rest of it. If you think about that, if you were out of food, if you didn't have any food, you're the woman would go into stress. You know fight or flight, almost know and their body will do the natural thing, which is to preserve fat, because the woman's body is designed for reproduction. If you don't have enough fat on your body, your body can't reproduce and that's a problem. So that's just innately what happens we put fat on.

Speaker 1:

A fun little fact for you is let's talk about the difference between a man and a woman in this scenario. So a man will then go out to hunt the lion, right, or the tiger, or hunt for the food. The woman will go into hunting, um kind of right, how can we, how can we, uh, solve this? You know, not not thinking about like the practical side of things, not going out and like hunting the lion. The woman will be like, right, I need to preserve, I need to retreat, almost and here's a little bit of a fun fact that I learned that if you, if a woman, eats like slashes, her calories really, really low, her body will go. Oh my god, I need to hold on to my fat because I need that. I need that to reproduce, whereas if a man does that, they will get leaner so that they're ready and primed to be able to run out and go and get that lion.

Speaker 1:

So if you've ever been in that situation where you, you and your partner, both go on a diet, you'll find that the man drops weight significantly faster than the woman. I mean, there are lots of other reasons for this happening. By the way, this is not the only reason. Like, for example, a man has more muscle mass, so when you have more muscle on your body, you're more metabolically active, so you burn more calories at rest, which is why, for women, it's so critical to retain their muscle on their body and work to either increase their muscle or to retain what they already have. Because the more muscle you have on your body as a female, the more metabolically active you will be as well. But just because of the sex, the men typically have more muscle on their bodies than females do, and so they're naturally more metabolically active. So if you've ever been on a diet or you both eat the same kind of portion sizes, you'll notice that the man will drop body fat or maintain a lot easier than a woman. And that's just the reality. It's just how we were created.

Speaker 1:

But just a little fun fact about the retreating versus the hunting the lion thing I thought was really interesting. So we need to talk about why your old approach doesn't work anymore. This is where so many women are going wrong and they feel like the weight is creeping on and they go and then turn to the usual tricks. They go to eat less, they go to skip meals, they think they need to do more cardio, they cut out carbs, they think they need to cut back on the biscuits, they think they need to start swimming. Well, because their friend Jane is having such success on it. You know we go back to all of the things that used to work, but all that that does is increase stress on your body, and I want you to think.

Speaker 1:

A super simple way to think about this is your job, if you did nothing else is to reduce the amount of stress that you experience every single day. Now, how can you do this? Well, let's think about it. Focus on your sleep, focus on saying no, focus on delegating all of the things that we absolutely are terrible at as females but absolutely need to make priority. So if you are not focusing every single day on how to increase, decrease sorry your stress levels, that needs to be your number one priority moving forward. So skipping meals will get will basically um, I'm really struggling today to get my words out, I feel like it's just the end of the week um, it will encourage cortisol spikes, lowering your calories.

Speaker 1:

Your metabolism will slow down to accommodate what your body, what fuel your body has. If you put one piece of coal in the fire, that fire will not burn. It will burn to the level of the coal If you put in a whole thing of fire. I don't know what the technical term is. But let's say you ram your fire with coal and really stock it up, that fire is going to roar. It's exactly the same with your foods. If you think about your metabolism in that way, that's a really great way of understanding.

Speaker 1:

Too much exercise creates stress and inflammation. There are women young women as well not just women in the 30s, 40s, 50s, but younger women in their 20s who are actually losing their periods because of the amount of stress and inflammation that their body is under due to under eating and over exercising. Now this backfires long term because it reinforces the exact hormonal state that's causing the weight gain in the first place. So meanwhile, all right, your insulin sensitivity is dropping, so you're storing more fat from the food you do eat, and then muscle loss is accelerating because of lower estrogen and protein intake, and the result of that is you're doing more but you're eating less and you're gaining weight. Make sense, okay.

Speaker 1:

Now there are lots of other little nuances going on here. Okay, we're not just, I'm not just saying that the reason why perhaps you're struggling is solely down to hormones. There are so of other little nuances going on here. Okay, we're not just, I'm not just saying that the reason why perhaps you're struggling is solely down to hormones. There are so many other factors at play. This is just one element and hopefully just by talking about this one element on its own, it will help to understand this component of it. We can talk about other other reasons why you might be struggling in another episode lifestyle, for example, and all the rest of it, but this is just focusing on the hormonal piece.

Speaker 1:

So let's talk about the science of fat burning, because this is really really interesting. So what does work? You might be thinking like this is all well and good, but what actually does work? And here's what we know from the science. So, just like I was saying before, muscle is everything. Everything. It will help you regulate your insulin, keeps your metabolism high and it burns more calories, even at rest. Okay, so if you are thinking, oh, I really want to start maybe doing some strength training, or maybe I need to be more consistent with my strength training, or even if you have a strength training program and you are not showing up consistently every single week to do it, let this be your message. Let this be your sign that muscle is everything If you want to be able to eat a good amount of food, maintain a great body composition, feel good, have energy.

Speaker 1:

You need to have muscle on your body. It is your body's armor. Okay, it will not ever make you look bulky to have muscle. You are not genetically dispositioned to look bulky. It's. Even if you take a man who is genetically predispositioned to have muscle and can look very, very bulky, it takes them years, absolutely years, to get to a position where they look bulky. And that's also coupled with the right nutrition. Okay, most women don't eat the right foods and they don't train with enough intensity. Even if you're training three, four times a week, every single week, and you you never miss, you probably aren't training with the intensity required to become bulky, so don't even let that be a thing. You absolutely need muscle in order for you to be safe in your body.

Speaker 1:

Okay, now, protein supports muscle. It will stabilize your blood sugar and it will keep you full. Absolutely critical Balanced meals and consistent eating reduce cortisol and keep hunger hormones in check. So make sure you aren't skipping meals. Make sure you aren't cutting out food sources. I know that there was this whole trend of like only keto, or I know there was a whole trend of let's let's reduce carbs or let's get rid of carbs. That is not a balanced meal and that is going to result in high cortisol levels.

Speaker 1:

And then mindful movement. Okay, so we're not just talking about exercise in terms of intense workouts. Mindful movement will support your nervous system regulation and long-term fat loss. So so we're thinking zone two, zone two activities walking, zumba, pilates. You know, just nice gentle, and in fact I would say that Pilates is probably. Yeah, I would say Pilates is probably as a zone two, but that's why I think it's so important to have it, but use it as a kind of a mindful movement practice, rather than I'm doing this to transform and build muscle, because resistance training really is where it's at.

Speaker 1:

For that now, your body after 40 doesn't need punishment. This is what you know. If you think back to the top of this episode, where I was saying your number one priority every single day needs to be focusing on how you can reduce the stress in your life. So if you are waking up every day thinking, right, what can I cut out? What do I need to do to punish myself, ultimately that's completely going to be counteractive for what you want to achieve. Your body needs nourishment, it needs care, and this is why I like to teach the 90-10 rule. I like to teach the 90-10 rule.

Speaker 1:

So 90% of the time you eat in a way that nourishes and supports your hormones and your metabolism and your values and makes you feel good from the inside out. And then 10% of the time you include foods that you love and I'm not saying that you don't love the 90%, because that's absolutely critical. But when I say love, I mean things that you would typically think you shouldn't have. So you know, like the taboo foods or the unclean foods or, however you want to put it, like the real stuff. The real stuff, the stuff that you struggle to enjoy and also get results because you don't know how to manage them. So we're talking, you know, your gin and tonic. We're talking your burger and fries. We're talking your pasta, garlic, bread and tiramisu when you go out to the Italian. You know, we're talking about those kinds of things. They, yes, of course have nutrients in them, but they are less nutritionally dense than the 90% in them. But they are less nutritionally dense than the 90%. So, wine, chocolate, meals out.

Speaker 1:

It's not about cutting them out. You will not really get anywhere in life, in happiness, in composition of your body, if you're constantly thinking about cutting things out. It's about learning to include them in a way that aligns with your goals. This is how you create a lifestyle that you can actually live with, not just another diet you abandon. This is why I absolutely detest fad diets where there are like meal plans or you know like something well protocols or things like that. That's not real life. You can do that for a period of time, but anybody that I've ever met that's done those things puts the weight back on again when they start to eat quote unquote normally, and normally is the thing that you need to work on. Normally is the thing that you is the way you want to eat all of the time. So we need to focus on what normally looks like for you, and that's what we do inside feed my health the first week.

Speaker 1:

Inside feed my health, we actually want to give everybody a bit of a diet audit, but we do that based on the foods that they enjoy, because if they don't enjoy what they eat, you know I don't shop at the same supermarket as they might shop at. So if I go and I say right, I want you to go to this obscure supermarket. I'm not that I shop at an supermarket. We literally shop at Lidl and Sainsbury's, but let's just say, hypothetically, I said right, you've got to buy quinoa and you've got to buy tamarind paste and you've got to buy coconut milk and all of this stuff, and they've never had that before in their lives. Do you think they're going to a enjoy that, b get excited about it and c stick at it?

Speaker 1:

No, so it's very important that we look at where a client is, what they're eating, what things do they, are they happy about eating? What things do they are they happy to maybe get rid of off their own back? You know this is not for me to tell them. We look at, right, what can we add, what do we need to include more of, and how can we actually enjoy meals that you want to enjoy and still get results? That's that's how you're going to stick at something. It's not, it's a lifestyle, it's not even something you have to stick to, because it's just what you enjoy and that is a game changer. So we're not talking about just another diet that you kind of do for a few weeks and then you go back to real life again.

Speaker 1:

Okay, now, if you're listening to this and you're thinking, I just want to feel like me again, because that's where I was and I know that's where a lot of you are. It's really not shallow and it's really not vain. That's a deep need to reconnect with yourself, like you've lost your identity and you want to find yourself again. Because when you're confident in your clothes, when you're full of energy and you feel strong and in control not only in control of your body, but in control of what you're doing with it and how you're eating you show up completely differently, and not just for yourself. You show up differently in your relationships. Your choices shift, your whole life feels so much better and so much more aligned with who you are and who you want to be.

Speaker 1:

This is the deeper emotional outcome that my clients feel Okay. They stop obsessing over food, they wake up with energy and with purpose, they stop hiding and they start living fully, and they do all of this without giving up wine, without giving up their weekends. You know, that's one thing that I think a lot of people struggle with is their weekends. They do it all without spending hours in the gym, without restricting carbs, you know, without cutting things out, and it's all about learning how to work with your hormones and not against them. And remember let me just preface this again by saying this this whole concept of like trying to get to the ultimate body composition and feeling happy and healthy and in tune with yourself, it is more than just hormones. This is just one piece of it, but it's a big piece that's often misunderstood and that's why I'm hoping that this episode will help. So this is what I help women with every single day, because when you understand what's going on in your body, that guilt will start to melt away and the results will start to come.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so hormones is a really critical piece of the puzzle. So if you've been beating yourself up, you've been feeling stuck in a cycle of on-off diets, you're exhausted by workouts or just not any direction around your workouts, maybe you're not even working out at all and you're frustrated with your body and how it's changing and changed over the years, then this is the episode for you to listen to. To come back to just when you need a little bit of clarity and understanding. You need to stop fighting yourself. You are not broken, you are not lazy, you just need a different approach now. And that's fine? Okay, we all do. And the truth is when you start fueling your body properly, when you start building strength and supporting your hormones instead of working against them, everything will change for you, everything.

Speaker 1:

So, please, please, please. There is going to be somebody in your world right now a friend, a neighbor, a colleague, a family member, somebody in your circle who needs to hear this message. So please share this with somebody that you love, because it could be the greatest gift that you ever give them, just to understand that it's not their fault and that there are things that they can do, to even just understand. When you understand and you have clarity on what's going on, that can absolutely change your entire day around, and you have the power to do that for somebody. So please do it. Do not be a gatekeeper. Please do that. And if you found it helpful, please give this podcast a little review. I'd be so incredibly grateful. Um, and yeah, I just hope you found it insightful. So until the next episode, please keep feeding your health and have a wonderful, wonderful rest of your week.