How to Lose Weight in Perimenopause Without Counting Calories

It’s Friday morning, and you’re secretly excited for a rare breakfast meeting with your team. As you pull on your favorite pair of jeans, you need to jump and tug a bit more than usual to get them over your hips.  

Looking at yourself in the mirror, you’re appalled at the muffin top spilling out over the waistband.  “Where the hell did THAT come from???” you scream silently to yourself. 

Welcome to perimenopause, where suddenly your body behaves like an unruly cat that just won’t listen to a word you say! 

You’ve changed absolutely nothing in your diet or exercise routine (and, it’s true, maybe you’ve enjoyed pizza and brownies a few too many extra times over the past few months). This this extra fluff on your body does not make sense!

Before you jump straight into Noom to “fast-track” your weight loss, let’d dive into the real reasons for this weight gain mystery. I’m spilling the tea on how my female clients - who are all over 35 - successfully drop inches without counting calories or psychologically manhandling their way through mindful healty eating tips!

Why Noom & Weight Watchers Won’t Work for You

If you want perimenopause weight loss without counting calories, steer clear of traditional weight loss methods. 

There’s a reason Weight Watches, Noom and many other weight loss programs are so popular…and it’s not because of an “obesity epidemic”. It’s because they don’t give you long-term results when you try to live life as a real, normal human woman (aka girls’ potluck & wine weekends, date nights at the Brazilian BBQ, or birthday cake to celebrate your loved ones). 

It’s high time we blew the lid off this billion-dollar industry that thrives on misinformation!

Most weight loss coaches harp on one thing: “calories in versus calories out.” Sure, this might work if you’re a man with unchanging hormones or a robot, but for a woman in her 40s, it’s a different story. 

The truth is, this old-school concept is about as outdated as the idea that women were “hysterical” and needed asylums (yep, that was a thing).

If you’re a woman over 40, your hormones are now the boss of your health. They call more shots than calories, carbs, fat, exercise, or supplements ever will.

As a woman in her 40s, your body has been through a lot:  from pregnancies to career stress, from wild experiences to changing hormones, you’re just not the same woman you were in your 20s.  While counting calories may have worked back then, today it feels like you’re just cannot win no matter how little you eat or how much your exercise.  

Besides, constantly checking calories in everything that passes your lips is exhausting. Tracking all your food - even if it’s just taking pictures of it - is so distracting, especially in the middle of candlelit chocolate fondue with your partner. 

And constantly feeling guilty about your food choices? SO unempowering, right?

“Calories in versus calories out” backfires because this strategy makes us feel more stressed, which eventually turns into insane cravings or unexplained hunger that we do give into…with so much shame.  (The number of times I’ve “failed” because of this…wow.) 

So of course when we binge on an entire bag of Chips Ahoy cookies because your cravings are that bad, we feel horrible, and blame our lack of willpower on the inevitable weight gain. 

But the truth is, you’ve just been misled about the best food to lose weight in perimenopause, and it’s not about calories one iota.  

There’s a REAL reason for why you struggle to lose weight after 40 that these weight loss programs aren’t acknowledging: 👇

The 3 Hormonal Shifts That Boost Fat Storage

It’s natural for your hormones to shift once you hit age 35. In fact, did you know that progesterone levels have been naturally declining since you hit puberty? 

Hormonal weight gain is a result of these natural hormonal shifts going a bit haywire, especially because of the way weight loss programs have taught us to eat:

Declining Estrogen and Insulin Resistance

Because weight loss program stress the “importance” of calories, many women opt for lower-calorie carbohydrate-heavy foods. While gluten-free toast, oatmeal and whole grain pasta can be considered “healthy” (in the right meals), these foods fuel a very important hormonal issue for perimenopause women: insulin resistance.

Because as estrogen naturally declines, your cells’ ability to respond to insulin declines too (you lose more and more of the insulin receptors so insulin struggles to get glucose from your healthy carbohydrate diet into cells).  When insulin can’t move glucose into the cells that use it to make energy, metabolism and all the other important functions, that glucose gets shunted to fat cells.

This is the #1 reason why women suddenly feel like they’ve gained weight despite eating healthy and not changing a thing in their diet and exercise.  (Psst, this is your cue to make some changes! It’s a necessary part of perimenopause health.)

This 28-Day Hormonal Fat Loss Challenge is 4 full weeks of delicious fat-burning meal ideas to fire up your metabolism, clear fat storage hormones and elevate total energy production for optimal body composition. Click here to learn more.

Estrogen Dominance and Inflammation

Estrogen dominance is a condition where your ratio of estrogen to progesterone is too high in favor of estrogen.  This doesn’t necessarily mean you have high estrogen - this is a common misconception. 

This condition triggers inflammation. Inflammation is like a tiny little defense army thrown up around all your cells, preventing hormones from connecting to receptors and nutrients from getting inside to promote healthy hormones, energy and everything else. 

With inflammation, insulin resistance worsens, which leads to more fat storage, cravings and unexplained hunger. 

Plus, those fat cells become little inflammation factories, making the problem worse.

Nutrient Gaps and Cortisol Spikes

Your hormones aren’t the problem in perimenopause.  It’s the nutrient gaps the prevent them from staying in or resetting to a healthy, balanced state that’s the root cause. 

Past diets, current trendy food crazes (looking at you, carnivore and adrenal elixirs), or obsessing about gluten, carbs or sugar in that one delicious samosa you decided to treat yourself with this month all leave us nutrient-deficient. 

Nutrient gaps - deficiencies, excesses, steals and drains - spike cortisol (your main stress hormone).  This sends your body into a fat-storage frenzy, triggering even more inflammation. 

Lose Weight in Perimenopause Without Counting Calories

Here’s the funny part…the more restrictive your diet, the more you’re telling your fat-storage hormones—insulin, estrogen, and cortisol—to stash away fat for later. Your body is smart. When you drop calories, it initially burns stored fat. But soon enough, it freaks out, sending you on late-night kitchen raids and chocolate binges.

This happens because your body can’t sustain too few calories for too long. Most importantly, it just doesn’t feel safe and healthy when it’s starved of essential nutrients. 

And THIS is why traditional calorie-counting, macro-tracking weight loss programs work short-term, at best.

Calories Matter Very Little in Weight Loss

Forget calories. Focus on nutrients. 

The fuel you put into your body is the critical piece when it comes to how to lose perimenopause weight. 

Once you understand and move past the destruction that calorie counting diets cause in a woman’s body, eating becomes more enjoyable and free. 

The reason you gain weight isn't due to calories.  It’s due to you not knowing how - the right foods, the right timings of nutrients or the right amounts of specific foods - to eat to support and reverse the root cause of excess weight. (Because no one has taught you this yet.)

Calorie counting - or any type of food tracking process - is like your friends tossing you in the trunk of their car and taking you to a surprise location for your birthday.  You’re fine, you get to the destination, but you have no idea how you got there.  

Traditional diets teach you nothing about how to eat to turn on your body’s natural fat burning tendencies.  So when the weight starts to creep back up, you feel lost - you have no idea what steps it takes to keep the weight off. 

But if you’re in the driver’s seat, have studied the map to get to the destination, should you hit a fork in the road or an uprooted tree on the journey, you can easily reset your course and carry on towards your destination. 

Best Diet to Lose Weight in Perimenopause

Don’t get caught up in the word “diet”.  By definition, diet is just what you eat.  My diet is 90% whole foods, a few cans of beans or coconut milk, and a couple of indulgences each week.  

Your best diet to lose weight in perimenopause starts with this:

1. More Anti-Inflammatory Foods

You know about pro-inflammatory foods like gluten, sugar, seed oils and dairy.  And you probably already try to add more turmeric, ginger and green tea to your diet.  

But the real magic happens when you fill your plate with a variety of colorful plants, more healthy fats like nuts and salmon, and swap olive oil for avocado oil to cook.  

2. Less Packaged, Processed Foods & More Whole Foods

Packaged foods - even so-called “healthy” snacks - break down in your body very differently than real, whole foods. Nutrients are stripped away during the process of digestion processed foods.  

Take a deep breath and ask your body what it really needs in terms of food to help retrain your brain to think about foods as functional - aka they’ll turn on fat burning faster. 

When I feel hungry, I ask myself “What do I need to feel my best today?” and usually foods like “a big salad” or “something with high protein” will pop into my head. That’s how simple food choices get to be. 

3. Eat Specific Foods for Each Phase of Your Cycle

As women, we also get to harness to power and guidance of our monthly cycles. Subtle changes to your diet every week, in alignment with the phase you’re in, will elevate fat burning, energy and overall health, happiness and focus. 

If you're looking for a holistic root cause solution to banish PMS, painful or heavy periods, mood swings, and low sex drive, Restore Hormonal Balance is your cycle-syncing nutrition protocol to regulate your period to get on with your day and month without Aunt Flo getting in the way. Click here to get started.

4. Boost Your Plant Intake

Whole foods are key to lose perimenopause weight without counting calories.  To boost your plant intake to 70%+ of your meals, double or triple the amount a recipe calls for.  Or try to fill half you plate with plants at each meal (yes, even breakfast).

5. Shift Meal Habits to Support Hormones

Speaking of breakfast, popular breakfast foods - cereal, toast, oats, pancakes, pastries, fruit cups, yogurt, granola - are setting you up for insulin resistance at some point. If you’re not already, swap these high glucose foods for veggies, protein and healthy fats.

You can still enjoy your oats, nuts and berries - just move it to a mid-afternoon snack instead. 

6. Eat MORE Food

You’re not eating enough.  I know this because every client I work with isn’t eating enough (even though she thinks she is).  

But don’t rely on calories to know when you’re eating enough.  Start by increasing meal sizes slowly (you’ll probably feel full very quickly at first and that’s okay).  As your metabolism starts repairing itself and your body reactivates its internal fat burning mechanisms, you’ll be hungrier than normal for a few weeks. 

The best way to know you’re eating enough is your pants feel looser, you sleep better, your skin and hair glow, and you feel energized all day long.  

Double Your Weight Loss

You know that dress hiding in the back of your closet? The one that’s a bit too snug to wear but you’re determined to fit back into it because you love it so much?

Pop these fat burning superstars into your daily routine and you’ll be slipping into it with confidence in no time: 

• 30+ minutes of movement
• 20+ minutes of sunshine and fresh air (no sunscreen)
• 10+ minutes of deep breathing and relaxation (a hot bath counts)
• 20+ minutes of fun, play, dance and/or laughter
• Really love what you’re eating - make meals delicious and pretty
• Prioritize sleep and get to bed by 10 PM

Sustainable Weight Loss in Perimenopause Starts Here

You want sustainable weight loss, right? 

Then you need to understand what your body needs each step of the way to get there.  You’re done with band-aid weight loss programs that handcuff you to the kitchen every night and throw up a roadblock for every team lunch.  

If you’re ready to enjoy food again and watch the extra hormone fluff melt away, then it’s time to address the root causes of perimenopause weight gain.  

With over 3000 hours of formal holistic nutrition education and hands-on training, plus dozens of success stories - 

like my client A who dieted for 22 years and kept regaining it all back, until she stopped counting and tracking her food to lose 11 inches in 6 months and keep it off for over 5 years - 

I’ll guide you to understand what YOUR body needs right now to restart fat burning naturally.  We’ll walk through every step in the journey together to heal your fat burning hormones, reactivate your metabolism, fix any digestive problems keeping you stuck, and taming inflammation that blocks energy production. 

All this using simple, real, whole foods you can find in any grocery store - even Wal-mart.

If you’re excited to ditch the calorie counters, food color guides, psychological eating tips, and kitchen scales to embrace nutrient-rich fat-burning foods, click here to find out how to get those skinny jeans effortlessly slipping over your hips without muffin top again. 

Book your 1-hour consultation to get your personalized hormone healing nutrition plan. Click here when you're ready to conquer your symptoms so you can be free to wear anything you want, eat while on vacation guilt-free, walk around naked with the lights on and wake up energized Saturday mornings.