Perimenopause Weight Gain - How to Combat it

One of the more annoying problems with getting older, for women, is menopause. The actual problems associated with the eventual conclusion of a woman’s child birthing years actually start years before menopause officially starts. There is a time before that, for just a few years, actually, and it’s called perimenopause. Weight gain during this time becomes amazingly easy.

The ugly phrase, “middle-age spread” can be laid at the door of perimenopause weight gain. Starting sometime in a woman’s 40’s, it can last for a few years, but eventually will lead right into full-blown menopause.

Statistics are reporting that the average woman will add 10-20 pounds without doing anything to cause it, all due to perimenopause weight gain. And even though your weight scale may not reflect it, the waist line of your skirts and slacks will. Perimenopause weight gain tends to accumulate around a woman’s midsection, making tight clothing a miserable experience.

The best way to combat perimenopause weight gain is by learning what, exactly, is going on inside your changing body. Up to this point, the body has been working to stay in balance. Given the levels of stress we all feel in these modern times, it is quite a miraculous feat. The body relies on all of its resources to keep things in top working condition.

When perimenopause weight gain starts creeping on, it’s happening because the body has started shutting down some of its necessary hormone production facilities. In other words, the ovaries are slowing down estrogen production, among other things.

Your body knows it needs estrogen, and so it does what it has always done in times of “famine.” It starts hoarding everything it has and adds as much as it can. The dietary plan you had before may not have changed, but how you body processes the fuel has, and now, your body wants to keep as much fat around as possible. That is the definition of perimenopause weight gain.

Your body is not unfamiliar with hoarding fat supplies. In times of real food famines, survival mode kicked in and got our ancestors through those rough times. But you are not experiencing a food famine, so why does your body want to hang on to fat and cause more perimenopause weight gain?

That’s because fat produces estrogen, too! And since the body isn’t getting it from its usual source, the ovaries, it’s going to hang on to whatever else will produce it. Knowing this little factoid will go a long ways towards strengthening your resolve to eliminate perimenopause weight gain. Now, when you exercise and eat right, and you gain anyway, you at least know why. And, you also understand why that is happening. It isn’t a useless endeavour to try and rid yourself of perimenopause weight gain. It’s just that you've got to learn some new tactics.

Related article:

Menopause and weight gain.