61: How To Lose 1 Lb/Week In Perimenopause

Feel like you'll never get anywhere with perimenopause weight loss? You're not alone!

It can feel like your body is working against you, making it impossible to see consistent results. You might be exhausted, feeling a little fluffy around the middle, and wondering if this is just your new normal. I see you, and I get it.

But what if you didn’t have to give up? What if there was a different way?

This week, I’m sharing five simple, powerful steps to help you lose one pound a week consistently, so you can stop yo-yo dieting forever.

It's not about doing more; it's about doing things differently, in a way that actually works with your body in perimenopause. This approach should feel different from anything you've tried before, but that’s the whole point.

In this episode, we’ll uncover:

📌 The REAL reason you’ve struggled with consistency in the past, and how to fix it from the inside out. (Hint: it’s not willpower!)
📌 The one simple habit you need to ditch right now if you want to lose weight and stop cravings in their tracks.
📌 A game-changing breakfast swap that will stabilize your blood sugar, boost your energy, and keep you full all day long.
📌 How to move differently, to reduce inflammation and finally build a strong, lean, and energetic body.
📌 The secret to lasting weight loss that will help you break free from the frustrating cycle of dieting and give you a sense of peace and control.

If you’re ready to stop feeling defeated and start feeling strong and in control again, this episode is for you. Let's make this the beginning of your most consistent and confident health journey yet!

Mentioned in this episode:

FREE GUIDE: 5 Steps To Lose 1 Lb/Week in Perimenopause

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Transcript

Hello there, my friend, and welcome back to the Family Fork.

Now, if you are in perimenopause or menopause, you already know that it seems hard enough to lose weight. You can feel those extra pounds packing on and you're probably noticing a little bit of that menobelly, which is like that extra belly fat that just hangs around your lower abdomen. You probably are more tired than usual and I'm guessing that you've just completely lost motivation. I see you.

Maybe you've even tried to change up your nutrition or you've added in some supplements in hopes that you could, you know, drop a few pounds, right? And maybe you have even started hormone replacement therapy, HRT, but with all of that, you're still not losing weight.

At this point, you're probably taking one of two different tracks. So maybe you've just essentially given up because you figure that weight loss is just nearly impossible as you get older. I mean, after all, you have tried everything and nothing seems to work. So it's really frustrating to just keep trying anymore. But maybe you're on the path where you are still looking for something that will really help you to lose the weight so that you can feel fit.

and strong and healthy as you get older. Maybe you're the type of person that's really frustrated, but you refuse to give up.

Well, the good news is that I have something for you no matter which track or path that you find yourself in. Losing weight in perimenopause, it requires a really different approach. And oftentimes that can feel super overwhelming with everything else that you're doing in your life. I get it. You're working full time and you're taking care of your family. You're cooking meals. You're doing the laundry. You're walking the dog. I mean, seriously.

who has time to figure out how to lose weight also, especially when it means that you have to learn and try new things.

So today, I am going to make it super, super simple for you. I have five easy steps that will help you to lose one pound a week consistently. And that's the key because I know you know how to figure out how to lose a few pounds, right? But then life gets crazy, your schedule gets chaotic, you're going on a vacation. And before you know it, you have gained those pounds right back.

So I wanna get you out of this yo-yo dieting and on a path towards consistent weight loss that is specifically designed for moms in perimenopause.

I'm also giving you a resource that lays out this entire approach in depth. So you can head to the show notes and grab that guide, but I really want you to listen to this episode first because it's giving you the foundation that you need to be able to lose one pound a week in perimenopause and to be able to do that consistently week over week. Sounds pretty great, right?

All right, so let's jump right into it. The first step, the most important step that you need to take is learning how to rewire your brain. Now, you might think I would say food or workouts first, but not so, because without thinking the right way, literally none of the other things will stick. And I guarantee this is exactly why you have struggled with being able to be consistent

in your nutrition or consistent with working out or consistent in losing weight in the past.

the way you think is absolutely the most important element in change and transformation. So let's talk about what that actually looks like. But before I give you some examples, I want to remind you if you haven't heard this on the podcast before.

Your brain only has three jobs, avoid pain, seek pleasure, and conserve energy. So when you learn to become aware when your brain is actually doing its job, but it's causing you not to make progress on your weight loss journey, that's when the shift will start to happen for you. So let's look at some concrete examples so that that makes a little bit more sense.

Let's talk about excuses. Maybe you say, you know what, I am just not a morning person. And so the assumption is there that like, you just can't go to the gym or do a workout first thing before you start your day because you are not a morning person, right? But here's what's happening in your brain.

your brain sees working out first thing in the morning as really painful because you have to like get up early and that's you're not a morning person, right? So your brain doesn't like to do that. It also recognizes that a workout first thing in the morning is going to take energy. And if you remember the brain, it's going to avoid pain. It's going to look for things that feel good. It's going to seek pleasure and then it's going to conserve energy. So not being a morning person,

and expecting yourself to get up in the morning and work out, your brain says, I'm sorry, but this is not who we are. Also, at the same time, your brain is turning off your creative problem solving center and...

And when that happens, it makes it difficult for you to find different alternatives. So here you are believing I am not a morning person. I cannot get up early and do a workout first thing in the day. Therefore you don't do the workout. You don't schedule it in later. Maybe you make more excuses, but that creative problem solving center of your brain has been turned off. So you can't come up with new solutions.

And as a result, you don't lose weight.

Let's look at another example. This one is sort of around justifying. So I hear this a lot from women that I work with, this idea that like I have earned something. So it was such a long week. I have earned another glass of wine or I've earned an extra dessert. Or sometimes women say, you know what, I'm in perimenopause and my hormones are just all over the board. It is so impossible to lose weight as I get older.

Here you are justifying the situation that you're in. know, gosh, I worked so hard, therefore I have earned something else or justifying your weight gain to say, well, it's the fault of perimenopause, right? My hormones are all over the board. I have no control over it. By justifying your situation and making those excuses that we talked about, you are literally stopping yourself from losing weight.

either because you're adding in those extra calories because you you earned it or you're not actually doing the work that's required to actually lose the weight like doing a workout right.

So the solution here is to start becoming aware of when your brain is trying to avoid pain, seek pleasure or conserve energy. And the best way to do this is just to start practicing. know, when you don't wanna get up early for a workout, your brain, it's avoiding that pain and it's conserving energy. Are you feeling like you've earned that extra glass of wine? Your brain is seeking pleasure.

And so once you can start identifying where your brain is getting in the way of your progress, you can actually start to work on those isolated situations. But until you have that awareness, it's really difficult to figure out why you're struggling and what you can do about it.

So of our five steps for losing one pound a week,

Learning how to rewire your brain is going to be the most important and impactful step that you can take. The second step I want you to take is to say goodbye to ultra processed foods. So I'm going to call them UPFs. The UPFs are absolutely sabotaging your weight loss effort.

Even if you are one of those people that eats pretty healthy, but maybe you're sneaking in like some protein bars or some of those pre-mixed protein shakes, and maybe you're adding in some prepackaged frozen dinners, you are actually making it harder for yourself to make progress and lose the weight. Those UPFs, the ultra processed fruits, they actually drive systemic inflammation in your body. They are terrible for your gut health.

And when you have bad gut health, it causes a lot of other issues like weight gain, inflammation, brain fog, sore joints, all of those things, they are just not a recipe for feeling motivated and for physically being able to lose weight. And the thing about UPFs is that the ingredients that they're made with, they're engineered to make you want more, whether your body actually needs the calories or not.

So you will be surprised by removing those processed foods, the ultra processed foods. You're going to be so amazed at how much easier it becomes to lose weight because without those ingredients in your body causing disruption, you will lower your inflammation. You will definitely have fewer cravings and you'll have less desire for these like unhealthy snacks because you're not.

eating those ingredients that actually crave you because you're not eating the ingredients that actually make you crave more of that.

So if you can very quickly say goodbye to ultra processed foods, it is going to make it so much easier to hit that one pound a week weight loss goal.

All right, step number three, we're going to ditch the morning grains. So think back to what you are having for breakfast and are you starting your breakfast or starting your day with like overnight oats or maybe even a bagel? Maybe you're opting for a gluten-free bagel because you are trying to be healthier and eat less gluten. So what's hard here is that you think you're doing the right thing. Overnight oats, maybe you're making them really healthy and you're

adding in some protein and some fruit and some nuts so that looks healthy or maybe with your gluten-free bagel, you're adding an egg on the side.

The trouble here is that having high starch and high sugar first thing in the morning is going to set you up for a day of cravings. And oatmeal, while it's not terrible for you, it is pretty high in starch. And starch converts in your body the same way that sugar does. So when you do that, you're going to have an entire day filled with cravings.

that starch and that sugar, it's going to spike your blood sugar. And if you do that first thing in the morning, it can be really difficult to help your body recover unless you do what your body craves, which is give it more starch and more sugar. So I want you to think about it. Like when you eat overnight oats in the morning, do you find that you are hungry before lunchtime? Or maybe when you have your overnight oats, first thing,

you find that you're having a ton of cravings at like two or three in the afternoon. If that's the case, it's really helpful to ditch those greens first thing in the morning. It's also just by nature of doing this, it's going to help you to steer clear of some more ultra processed foods like cereal or commercially processed granolas so that you can have a healthier start to your day. So then you're probably asking, okay,

cool Ashley, but what am I supposed to eat in the morning? So step number four is that I want you to get in 40 grams of protein before 10 a.m.

You

There is no doubt about it that having a high protein breakfast is going to keep you fuller longer. Protein, when you eat it first thing in the morning, it is going to regulate your blood sugar and that is going to lead you to having fewer cravings before lunch and fewer cravings in the mid-afternoon. Because we're regulating our blood sugar first thing in the day, it's going to stay more consistent throughout the rest of the day.

And what does that mean for you? If you have fewer cravings, you're going to do less snacking and less snacking means it's going to help you if you want to lose weight. So what does this look like first thing in the morning? Remember to grab that guide in the show notes because I've given you some ideas for breakfast there. But what I don't want you to do first thing in the morning is grab a processed protein bar just to hit your protein goals.

So let me tell you what I eat first thing in the morning. So right after my workout, I have a protein shake and I don't use a dairy-based protein powder. I use a product called Prime Protein. It's from the company called Equip and I use one scoop of that and I add a scoop of collagen, which, hey, that's good for my aging skin too. So that works out.

And that is sort of right after my workout. And then for breakfast, I have a delicious bowl that's filled with, and it's a savory bowl. So it's filled with roasted potatoes and steamed carrots. I usually throw in like roasted broccoli or green beans, and then I add a healthy dose of grilled chicken. And because that sounds dry, usually put a little drizzle of bitchin' sauce, which is like an almond-based, I don't know, sauce. It's delicious.

And so right there between my protein shake that's not dairy based and my savory breakfast bowl, I am getting well over 40 grams of protein before 10 a.m.

So I want you to try this. I want you to try having more protein, aim for 40 grams before 10 a.m. and then really track how you feel for the rest of the day. Do you have cravings? Do you find that you are not as hungry between breakfast and lunch? Do you find that you have a little bit more energy in the afternoon? By stabilizing your blood sugar first thing in the day and sort of ditching those grains and going for more like whole food sources like

carbs and protein and veggies, it's really going to help you hit your goal of losing one pound a week.

Finally, step number five, I want you to get rid of cardio. Yes, please, right? So traditional cardio, like we're all used to from the 80s, the 90s, the 2000s, unfortunately, all that does is increase inflammation. It puts more stress on your joints.

And with more inflammation, more systemic inflammation, it's going to be harder for you to lose weight. So what's the alternative? I really want you to get into lifting weights and strength training. The more muscle you have, it's going to help your body burn fat more efficiently. Now I find women that I work with, one of the hardest shifts to make is that if you're used to getting your heart rate up,

with a cardio class or running on the treadmill or something like that, strength training can feel really, really different. This is where we have to go back to step one in your mindset and the way that you think about your workout.

It's a complete mind shift to recognize that a higher heart rate does not actually mean that you're burning more fat. A higher heart rate can actually be increasing inflammation. So lifting weights, we do this at a different pace than traditional cardio, but it's actually gonna give you the results that you are looking for. Because when you put less stress on your body with lifting weights, you're going to have lower inflammation.

and that's positive. Like we've talked about, that's going to make it easier for you to lose weight.

Building lean muscle is really essential as you get older and it's going to help you protect your joints. So ultimately having more muscle is going to help you burn calories even when you're sitting at your desk or you're driving carpool to and from sports practices. And that just losing weight by driving like that is going to really help you hit this goal of losing one pound a week.

So that's it, five pretty simple things. And not any one of these things on their own is very difficult, but I do know that you have to think about these five steps differently than you have before if you're really serious about wanting to lose weight. So to help you out, I have put all of this together in a really handy guide so that you can get started today. You can find a link for that in the show notes.

In the guide, you'll find more information on the five steps that will help you to lose one pound a week consistently. So let's review. We've got learning to rewire your brain for success, saying goodbye to UPFs, our ultra processed foods, ditch the morning grains, eat 40 grams of protein by 10 a.m. and quit doing that intense cardio and pick up some really heavy weights instead.

Now I know you can figure out how to lose a few pounds. have done it before, but consistency is one of the biggest frustrations that I hear from the women that I work with. So these five steps are going to help you build consistency honestly that feels effortless getting you to that point where you're losing weight week over week.

and really understanding what it takes to keep going until you hit your goal weight. So I want you to remember to download that guide in the show notes so you have your step-by-step plan for getting this started today. And I cannot wait to hear your wins after you've put these steps in place for just a week. I want you to reach out to me on Instagram at the Ashley Malik and tell me how is it going for you? I want to help you celebrate.

your newfound consistency and that little burst of motivation. Thanks for joining me this week on The Family Fork and I will see you back here next week.