Where is everyone?

[Velcrocat]

So where did all the 50+ people go to?

I have been trying to figure out if being post menopausal is having any effect on how the weight loss has slowed. Anyone with any ideas?

[Sweet Strudel]

Hey Velcro...I just turned 50 in September so I guess I qualify.

From what I read being post menopausal does slow down weight loss.

Great, just great! NOT

I copied and pasted below, it kinda explains things.

Why does weight gain occur so universally for women during menopause? It depends on the individual, but there are a few causes that are very common. Your fat cells and your hormones are part of a system-wide biofeedback network that orchestrates your appetite, metabolism, heat regulation, digestion, and detoxification. Any chronic disturbance in the crosstalk among systems has the potential to cause weight gain (and a host of other menopausal symptoms, like hot flashes and food cravings).
The causes of unexplained weight gain

Each day we discover more about the intricate nature of hormones and weight, but one vital link is the one between insulin, metabolism and body fat. For years, many women followed the conventional low-fat, high-carbohydrate diet, with lots of processed foods (pasta, breads, most snacks, beer and wine, etc). Over time this diet can create a condition known as insulin resistance. When you are insulin resistant your body converts every calorie it can into fat — even if you’re dieting. The result is that while you are gaining weight, your cells are actually starving!
A second basic link lies between stress and body fat. Stress hormones, like cortisol, block weight loss. This is sometimes called the “famine effect”: despite adequate food, the body interprets prolonged stress as a famine, and once again goes into hoarding mode — which it does very effectively.
Stressors can be emotional, physical, or even diet-related. Bingeing, yo-yo dieting, unaddressed food sensitivities, and severe calorie restriction are all forms of stress. Most of us are under tremendous amounts of stress — often more than we realize — and much of it is prolonged and unremitting, which can lead to chronic inflammation and a metabolic disorder called adrenal fatigue.
These mechanisms all work together — and many of us combine a high-stress life with a low-fat, high-carb diet. This creates such a powerful hormonal imbalance that weight gain is almost inevitable. What’s more, high-carb diets cause neurotransmitter imbalances that lead to food cravings. Because your body can’t readily maintain optimal blood sugar and serotonin levels, you are compelled to have snacks and caffeine to make yourself feel better. But they only exacerbate both insulin resistance and adrenal exhaustion while adding body fat. This is a vicious cycle.
For women in perimenopause, another weight gain issue is widely fluctuating estrogen levels, and for menopausal women, diminished levels of estrogen. As the estrogen production of your ovaries falls, your body turns to secondary production sites, including body fat, skin, and other organs. If your body is struggling to maintain its hormonal balance, body fat becomes more valuable. Often your body is balancing estrogen loss with maintaining bone mass, for which it needs additional fat cells. Of course, if you are stressed and on a low-fat diet, your body will struggle to keep all these balls in the air — and refuse to let go of extra body fat.
Note that artificial sweeteners are not a solution, but part of the problem. They may lack caloric content, but some mimic sugar so well that the body produces insulin to metabolize them — contributing to insulin resistance. This can actually lower your blood sugar level, which is why many of these products contain caffeine to compensate for the drop in energy. Unfortunately, the caffeine also worsens any problems you may have with adrenal fatigue.
In addition, adding more artificial chemicals to your body at this time can exacerbate the “toxic load” you are carrying. By midlife, most women have had years of cumulative exposure to allergens, pesticides, plastics, chemicals, heavy metals, bacteria, and other poisons and irritants. Artificial and biological debris that can’t be eliminated gets stored in our fat cells.
Over time, a woman’s system can get so gummed up by toxins that it just can’t function well — and it is often the case that the more fat cells she has, the more toxins she has stored. When a woman begins to lose weight dramatically, like on a crash diet, these toxins get released into the body in a flood and can cause miserable symptoms. The body at this point just wants to get back to homeostasis (even if what it interprets as normal isn’t healthy), and will sabotage even the best intentions to lose weight.
The toxic load may be just one part of a broader pattern of inflammation — which often shows up during menopause. Dysbiosis, yeast and food sensitivities, and an immune system imbalance can short-circuit weight loss. Toxicity triggers the immune system to be on full alert, as do any unaddressed food allergies. Many women have been sensitive to certain foods for decades but only realize it after they lose estrogen’s soothing effect on the digestive tract.

[Elizellen]

Great informative post Sweet Strudel

It explains a lot.

[Sweet Strudel]

No problem Elizellen...there are a "few" of us 50ish women here on the board going through this I imagine.

A better understanding is always good!

[sallyseachange]

Thanks for sharing this Sweet! Very interesting read.

[Velcrocat]

Wow. SWEET so much information. I think I'll have to reread this a couple of times. What I have found out with my fight against breast cancer is that estrogen is stored in the fat cells. This was one of the reasons I decided to lose the extra weight. I had a estrogen dependent cancer and to help prevent a recurrance I had my ovaries removed. I was also told that the adrenal gland also produces estrogen.

This was one reason I had so many blood tests done including estrogen levels which were all normal or low normal. Estrogen was almost nil, which to my mind is a good thing.

[caroann]

I'm glad someone spoke up! I didn't know if anyone would post again on 50+. I think we're in a special category - because of health issues, menopause, and general aging. I take hormone replacement and steroids for Rheumatoid and I'm worried to death I won't be able to make this work for me. The ones who've posted have inspired me.

Elizellen - Your pictures have made me re-commit. They are STUNNING!!!

Thanks so much,
Caroann

[Sweet Strudel]

I'm glad to see some of us "mature" (although at times for me immature) women posting in this forum.

I agree with caroann we are a special lot. So, any information or support that we can give each other will be helpful to us all.

This whole perimenopause/menopause thing I'm sure has contributed to my losing so slow and struggling with having an actual waist! I am still not as hour glass as I would like to be, but I'm trying to work on that.

I'm hoping more 50+ people will come on over too.

Together we will all succeed and make this journey a more pleasant one in the process!

[sallyseachange]

We may be the tortoises rather than the hares, but I like to think that on average, we're rather better on the willpower front... or is it desperation??

[Velcrocat]

I think the word is determination. We are determined to become what/who we know we can be.