Menopause and Weight Gain

Yet Another Reason That Menopause Sucks

I’m reading books about menopause and peri-menopause and can’t help but notice a common theme, that menopause is a wonderful and freeing time in a woman’s life when she comes into her own, is finally comfortable in her own skin and experiences a deeper knowledge and understanding of herself and the world at large.

WTF?

Sorry, but I’m not buying it. Menopause sucks. And so does its predecessor peri-menopause.

How dare I, you may ask, go against current popular wisdom, buck the tide, kick the trend to the curb and call out menopause as a difficult – to put it mildly – time in a woman’s life? Well, I dare because it sucks. The headaches suck. The hot flashes suck. The night sweats suck. (See my post on coldfront, which doesn’t suck at all and is the only product I’ve found that makes the aforementioned sucky symptoms bearable.) Where was I? Oh yeah. The suckiness of menopause. The brain fog sucks. The mood swings suck. Just ask my husband two seconds after I’ve cried into his shoulder for no reason at all and then chewed his head off for, again, no reason at all. The inability to fall asleep and stay asleep sucks. The exhaustion sucks. And the weight gain? It really sucks! I’ve read the books that say weight gain is not a requirement for this time in life. Yeah, yeah. Talk to my once concave abdomen. It begs to disagree.

I have come to the unhappy conclusion that as women’s estrogen drops and we lose the last of our eggs, we begin, more and more, to become shaped like one. Oh please. Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed that too. It sucks.

Yes, there are those among us who, either by virtue of incredible genes, a grueling schedule of daily marathon training or both, maintain their sleek figures and flat stomachs. I’m going to blame the following comment on a sudden estrogen drop that brought on a massive mood swing but, those women suck. Ok, they don’t (my estrogen levels must be rising) but stubborn weight gain does. Couple weight gain with my newfound comfort in my own skin and it’s a disastrous combination that all but guarantees that I’m never gonna lose this weight. Why? Because in order for me to lose it, I need to care that I gained it in the first place. But my newly heightened skin to comfort level ratio prevents me from caring much at all. In fact, I kinda want to flaunt my newfound lack of vanity at my formerly vain self and eat myself into muumuu heaven.

But wait, there’s still a tiny, little speck of vanity left in this slightly ovate body and it’s screaming for answers to the big question “why? Why do I gain weight so easily and why is it so hard to take it off?”

Hey, this is not my imagination. Even the most flat-stomached among us may notice an extra and difficult-to-get-rid-of layer of fat on our stomachs as we age. Research indicates that, when it comes to fat, younger women tend to carry excess weight in their hips, thighs and butts while men carry it in their stomachs. But, after menopause, many women’s fat storage patterns change and begin to resemble those of men. In other words, as women go through menopause and produce less estrogen, their body fat storage changes. (Did we really need research to tell us that?) But abdominal weight gain is not just a matter of vanity. You’ve probably heard medical experts talk about the dangers of fat in “apple-shaped” people who carry their excess weight in their midsections versus “pear-shaped” ones who carry their weight in their lower bodies. Excess abdominal fat has been associated with an increased risk of diabetes, cardiovascular disease and certain cancers. And that sucks big time.

While the connection between fat storage patterns and estrogen has been researched and documented, the reasons for why lower estrogen results in increased abdominal fat remained misunderstood. Until now.

Sylvia Santosa, assistant professor, Concordia University, Department of Exercise Science and Chair in Clinical Nutrition, researched the connection between fat storage and estrogen by examining the former at the cellular level. She compared fat storage in pre- and post-menopausal women and found that certain proteins and enzymes that correspond with fat storage are more active in post-menopausal women. While the study found that these increased levels of fat storing activity were not isolated to the abdomen, more overall body fat equals more visceral fat equals another reason that menopause sucks.

To make matters even worse, post-menopausal women burned less fat than their younger counterparts making weight loss more difficult. Suck, suck, suck.

“The fat stored on our hips and thighs, is relatively harmless,” says Santosa. “But the fat stored around the abdomen is more dangerous. It has been associated with diabetes, heart disease, stroke and even some cancers. When post-menopausal women put on more abdominal fat, they dramatically increase their risk for these health problems. Given these dangers, it is very important to understand how the lower levels of estrogen associated with menopause changes where fat is stored.”

Santosa says her research is important because “the information revealed by our study is valuable not only to post-menopausal women and their doctors, but to obesity studies more generally. A clearer picture of which proteins and enzymes increase fat storage makes those productive targets for future medical advances in the fight against obesity.”

Future medical advances? That sucks. What about right-now-this-second-I-want-to-lose-my-belly-this-instant medical advances?

I guess for now, I’ll have to take up marathon training or practice yoga for seven hours a day. Hell, I don’t care. I’m comfortable in my ever-increasing skin. I’ll think about my abdomen right after I finish this book on a woman’s enlightening journey through menopause. Yeah, I’ll do it right after that.

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