Category
Menopause
If you’ve reached menopause and you’re wondering what you should actually be eating now, it’s worth stepping back from the endless “menopause diet” plans and asking a bigger question: what does your body need for the decades ahead, not just the next few months?
You’re on HRT. Your sleep may be better, the hot flushes may have eased – but the weight either isn’t shifting, or it’s still creeping up, and you want to know how to actually lose it. Not why it’s happening – you want a plan that works.
If you’re carrying new weight around your middle since menopause and looking for the foods that will shift it, there’s something worth knowing before you start cutting things out: menopause belly fat responds far better to what you build your meals around than to what you take away. The women who make progress with it rarely do so by eating less – they do it by eating differently.
You did the hard part. Your periods have stopped, the hot flushes may have settled, and you expected your body to find some equilibrium at last. Instead, the weight is still creeping up – often faster than before, and stubbornly around your middle – and no one warned you it would keep happening after menopause, not just during it.
If you’re considering HRT – or already taking it – and you’re worried it will make you gain weight, you’re in very good company. Fear of weight gain is one of the most common reasons women hesitate over hormone therapy, or stop taking it. It’s also, according to the evidence, largely misplaced.