You reach your mid 30s and early 40s and all of a sudden you think – “How the **** did this happen?!?”
A bit of weight tends to go on over the years, and then a bit more. It doesn’t seem to want to go anywhere, and even worse – it keeps going on no matter what you try. Why is that?
Your metabolism is changing
When you were a kid you were probably more active than you are now. As a result kids have a good amount of muscle mass and a great fat burning metabolism.
As people get older they are generally less physically active than they used to be and consequently they lose their muscle mass and their great fat burning metabolism.
Your muscles are your main burner of fat
At some point you get to a critical point of muscle mass loss which means you can’t easily burn the amount of energy you are taking in via your food.
So as your muscle mass reduces so does your fat burning capability, and middle-aged spread creeps up on you.
As a result you store more fat because you have lost your ability to burn it. The weight starts going on.
Food Is Important Too
What you are eating is important, but even if you’re eating a great diet the pounds can be difficult to shift if you haven’t got the muscles to do it with.
One of the keys to combating middle-aged spread is to increase your muscle mass. More muscle means you have more fat burning capability.
If exercise isn’t your thing you’ll want to know how to get the best out of it so you’re not spending any more time on it than necessary.
Middle-Aged Spread – What Can You Do?
The key is increasing your muscle mass.
Muscles burn lots of energy when you’ve restored your great metabolism.
Doing loads of prolonged exercise burns fat while you’re doing it but it also trains your body to store more in preparation for the next round (more coming up on this in a few weeks).
Quality not quantity is the key with exercise.
Get yourself enrolled onto my online weight loss program to learn how you can exercise to lose fat rather than train your body to store more of the stuff.
Until next week
Uber Health to you
Dr Julie
I am carrying about 10lb too much weight. I run 5 miles 4 times every week to keep fit but my weight doesn’t change. What can I do to lose the wieght?
Hi Sally-Anne
If you are enjoying your running that’s great, you have no reason to stop.
If you are doing to help with weight loss then it doesn’t sound like it’s working very well. Personally I don’t want to have to spend a a lot of time on exercise so I concentrate my exercise into short sessions that keep me out of fat the fat burning zone. This way I am encouraging my body to store more energy in my muscles rather than as fat. Interval style exercise is better for fat loss.