Metabolism Changes with Aging

Have you heard that your metabolism changes as you age? While this is true, it doesn't need to be as daunting as most people make it. 
In this episode we explain the most common ways that your body changes with age: body composition changes, hormones, insulin response, stress, digestive changes, and nutrient absorption. 
We explain what happens in all these areas as we age, and also give you some tips that you can incorporate now that will make your future self thank you.

If you have questions, or topics that you want to hear about, head over to our Instagrams https://www.instagram.com/nucrewnutrition/ or https://www.instagram.com/themomminnutritionist/ and send us a DM!

If you are interested in working with us in Metabolism Makeover you can sign up here! https://metabolismmakeover.co/programs/metabolism-makeover/earlybird/?affiliate=mocktailminutes

Featured Mocktails:
Just Ingredients - https://www.instagram.com/just.ingredients/
Cure - https://www.instagram.com/cure/

Click play, sip back, and be empowered.

Transcript

0:23

Hello, everyone. Welcome back to this week's episode of Mocktail Minutes. This is Bailey. And this is Brianna. This week, I am drinking Just Ingredients. They're like flavored drinks. It's not the electrolyte one. It's just the flavored strawberry limeade, I think is the flavor. And I'm eating my orange. Because it's snack time. Plus my IQ board, so we have protein, of course. What am I doing? Oh, I'm doing Cure Electrolytes, I finally got some. I'm doing the lime ones, I didn't love it by itself, but I added like a little bit of tart cherry juice and it's actually super good. Okay. I do like that. But you know what, I'm not really like a big just lime by itself person. Okay. See, I like lime. Yeah. So, if you like lime, you'll probably really like it. Yeah, it's not a whole splash of tart cherry juice. I, I love cherry juice too. The frozen cherries, like the dark red cherries, those are so good for a smoothie or I'll pack them for lunches and they're like Semi frozen when you get to lunchtime if you keep it in the fridge That's pretty good I like I like adding those like the night before to like some yogurt or oats and then in the morning they're kind of like I don't know if gooey is the right word, but you know what I mean? They're like, they got a little bit of, like a gel ish. Yeah, it's like kind of like a jelly, but not, I don't know. It's really good. That's like my favorite hack if you're, it's cheaper for frozen fruits and they just last longer. So, you know, if you don't want to keep making the same things every day, you're just like two weeks from now, you'll still have cherries in your freezer. Yeah, I'm going to get some this week and use them for lunches. Not going to try it for breakfast because. Baby doesn't like anything, but it's bananas. So lunches, he knows what he likes, right? Stubborn little guy. we actually, I had my 24 week appointment yesterday and they haven't been able to get like a picture of his face or anything. He always just like shoves it in my placenta. And so he just. Doesn't want anyone to look at him, which is very ironic for having a mom who's in front of a camera every day. All the time. Maybe he's like dad. Does Josh like being in front of the camera? I mean, yes and no. He doesn't have a problem with it. I mean, he's not like taking selfies, I guess. But like He's fine if I take a picture. Okay, yeah. He literally like put his hand up in front of his face. As soon as he would get to a spot, he literally put his hand up in front of his face. We have one picture of his face. That's it. Cute. He's just like, I'm not ready. No. Aww. I'm excited. You little turd. And so it begins. Huh. My little stubborn guy already. Can't wait. I love it. Yes. But today we're talking about metabolism changes with aging. I mean, I, we hear this all the time. It's like, I turned 40, I turned 30, I turned 50. And it's like, what the heck happened type of feeling. And we've done an episode similar to this, but we're going to dive in a little bit more on to, Like, is your metabolism actually changing? What is going on at this point in my life that's like all of a sudden what I was doing in my 20s no longer works. So, what's happening? And for this one, there's definitely some reasons, right? Like, we have like some science, we have like what's going on in your body as you age, what's like going on, because there is changes that are happening that can make weight loss harder. muscle harder. But the ot I always try to encourage about is like your life l As you age, so you know, you, you get away with a lot in your early twenties. I feel like you, or you can get away with more. Mm-Hmm, you know, suddenly like skipping breakfast, only doing cardio, sleeping four hours, five hours a night, drinking every day of the week. Eventually that catches up to you because of like the compounding stress and everything that you have as you just. get older. Like your body wants you to take care of it. And so you can't get away with that anymore. So that's, it's like a twofold thing. Yeah. It's definitely something that, yeah, it might've worked for you in your twenties, but guess what? You're not 20 anymore. And probably because you did that in your twenties, that led to what's going on now as well, because of all that stress built up, skipping breakfast every day, going crazy at the gym after sleeping for four hours. Yeah, it doesn't work out well for you in the long run. So I know you're thinking like, okay, I won't pass my twenties. So what do I do now? Type of thing. So let's go into like explaining what it could be happening. Like what. To do about it type of thing. I would say the first major thing is like your body composition changes. And I mean, as we age, especially women, we lose muscle mass. So even thinking about this, like one of the most important things you can do starting now. Is get that protein in get strength training in your body will thank you not only for how you're going to feel today, but also how you're going to feel in the next five years, because your muscle is going to be like gold yeah, we use that, that like phrase and metabolism makeover, like muscle is money. You want more of it, especially as you age, because the more that you have, the better off you're going to be. And you do, you naturally start to lose muscle mass. It's like three to 8 percent each decade. Like once you turn 30, it's like three to 8 percent each decade is how much of your muscle mass that people lose. And then again, this increases after 60. And so this is why I try to get women to think like, Yes, I know right now you want to lose weight and you want to be thin, right? And like totally fine. We've done episodes on why like losing weight is totally okay, but doing it in the right way is so important because if you're just losing muscle, how is your body going to respond when you're 40, years old, right? Like what, at what expense is my whole thing? so losing weight in a way that doesn't. jeopardize your muscle is super, super important. And then in turn, it's going to make it easier for you to keep that weight off when you start to age and just gradually, naturally lose muscle. And it's so hard to think about too, because I mean, so many companies are just focused on let's get these people quick results. So that way they tell everyone about our company. And then when they're no longer able to sustain it, then it's their fault. Yeah. And it's not, it looks good on us, but that's not what we do as your dietitian, if you work with us one on one or in metabolism makeover. And I think it is hard because you're having to unlearn, you're still having to decipher, like, what do I follow? And I think when it comes to that, like if you were hiring someone to be your coach, then that's a time to kind of quiet the outside noise, because The internet is not looking at your lifestyle. The internet is not looking at your personal history. They're not looking at you as a person. They're just looking at a bunch of different things. It's just more like the general public. So. I think it can be a little bit hard to think about the long term when we are so surrounded by all these short term things. And I would say that's part of our job as being a dietitian is to point out these amazing wins that you are having. Even if you're like, well, the scale is moving. Okay. Scale's not moving, but you lost two inches. Scale's not moving, but instead of eating a thousand calories a day, you're now eating 1, 400 and you're feeling. More energy. You can actually make it through your day and you can play with your kids better after work. Those are amazing things. I mean, digestion, like pooping every day. That is a great win that we brush off the shoulder. I'm like, that's amazing that you are pooping every day. I love to hear it type of thing. you wanna see Yes. We have to think about the long term, even though. I'm a weight loss dietitian. Of course, I'm okay with you wanting to lose weight. That's what you're coming to me for. But, I'm not okay with just chasing a number. We have to look at all of these aspects and think about the other areas. Yeah. These numbers can be great goals, but we have to have other goals around it. And I actually was talking to someone about this was yesterday where she's like, I just want to be under. The specific number. I was like, why she's like, well, cause I just want to lose weight. I'm like, why, like, why do you just want to lose weight? And so it came to be about like confidence. I want my clothes to fit better. I want to shop in a normal section of a store and feel confident with not being like, okay, if I put this on, it's going to, suction to me type of feeling. So those types of reasonings go way beyond just what does the scale say? Especially because, and I tell clients this too, the scale might say something different than you think it will. Right. So I'm like, you know, you may look the way you want to look, be the size that you want to be fit into the clothes that you want to fit into. And the scale might say something higher. You have to come to terms with that being okay. Because for me, if I'm like, wow, you lost all these inches, you know, you're feeling good in your skin, but the scale is like, maybe, you know, higher, or it might be not as low as you think it is to me. That tells me, okay, we've like held on to your muscle mass or we've built muscle mass. And I think for a lot of women, like the number on the scale, just it haunts them. It haunts them. Like I will see women who are like, I don't want to weight train. Because I'm terrified for the scale to go up. But you're being very short sighted about it. And really, the scale just gets in the way. I'm always, yes, being a weight loss dietitian, people have goals. I always want, I dig deeper. Why is that number? Cause everybody has a number. Like I guarantee you, if you're listening right now, you're like, I have a number in my head. And if that number is a number. That was in your early 20s or maybe even like mid 20s and you are 40 years old, I want you to get rid of that number because that number, we don't even finish putting on our full muscle mass or our full bone mass until like our mid 20s. So if you're hanging on to like your college weight or your like pre marriage weight, pre baby weight, and you're like, that's the number I want to be, but that was the number before like, Your bones were matured and your muscles were matured. You shouldn't have that as you're aging. I like to use a number like asking them, where do you feel good at? Because that's going to be more important. And if you're someone who has weighed yourself before, you know what number you felt good at. I mean, a lot of people come to me and they'll use like the ideal weight they find online. And I'll tell you this. I mean, I'm higher than my ideal weight and that's okay. I always think it's funny too because we are like ideal body weight, ideal body weight, BMI, like all this stuff. And then as soon as somebody turns 60, Suddenly it's like anything under a BMI of 24 is considered unhealthy for an aging adult, right? And it's like, Oh, I'm trying to be like 20, 20 BMI my whole life. And suddenly it's like a bad thing. And then same thing with ideal body weight, like in a clinical setting. Most people over the age of 60 who are anything less than like 110 percent or 120 percent of their ideal body weight have health issues as in like bone mass, muscle mass, that sort of thing. So it's just funny. I wish like we would start thinking about these things earlier instead of being like, you must be thinner, must be thinner, must be thinner. And then all of a sudden you turn like 60 and it's like, Oh wow, you're unhealthy. You need to like gain weight and muscle mass. It's like, well, now it's the wrong time. Now is not the great time. Now. I mean, you can totally put on muscle mass in your sixties and you should definitely be like working on that. But if that's where you're starting, you're at a disadvantage and that's what I see. And it's never too late to start. Like, don't feel like, cause you're 60 years old. You can't hop into the gym. Absolutely. And you don't have to start at 20 pound dumbbells. Start at body weight, start at five pounds, just start somewhere and you're going to see the benefits because your metabolism changing, I mean, part of it is like your basal metabolic rate declines, which this represents the amount of energy your body needs to maintain just your basic life functions. We can't really change anything with this except for our muscle mass. If we change our muscle mass and prevent. Or help prevent that loss of muscle mass. So that's called sarcopenia. Then we're going to keep that basal metabolic rate up higher because muscle tissue is more metabolically active than fat tissue. And it's not like, even if you were like, okay, well, in my thirties, I worked out all the time. I had all this muscle and then it like turned into fat. Like, that's not a thing. Your muscle does not turn into fat. They're different tissues, but if your life looks different and you're no longer. Getting those workouts in your eating has changed. Then you lost muscle and you gained fat mass. So that's going to look and feel different. So his body composition changes happen, which kind of brings us to another part that changes is what does your life look like now? What is your stress look like now at these time periods? It's often. Weird times in your life where it's like, maybe kids are moving out or kids are in college, so now you're kind of stressed about that. Or maybe you're about to retire and you're like, I really enjoy working. You're like, I don't know what I'm going to do with my life. Like, what do I do with this part? My next stage of life or you're stressed because all of a sudden you're gaining weight and you're not sure why, or, you know, just like so many things can come up. It's just, you're in a different life stage. Navigating. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's why, you know, like call back to all of our like, Oh, stress management mindset things. It's so important to have a good mindset and stress management techniques because everybody seems to think like, once I just get done with this life, won't be as stressful. Like once my kids get a little bit older or once I retire or once I achieve this in my career or whatever, but life is always stressful. It's just a different type of stress. Really, the only time you're kind of stress-free is when you're naive to it, which doesn't happen anymore as we get older, you know? And all that affects it. It affects how we deal with stress and what we use as stress management totally impacts us. So if you're someone who like is maybe a little bit more of an emotional eater, or you like to drink alcohol a little bit more, or you do a little bit more self-sabotaging things as you get older. It's much more difficult to maintain the weight you want to maintain because your body is now starting to work even more against you and the things that you're doing is you're working against your body. Yeah, we have to stop waiting for the perfect time to do anything. We have to stop waiting for life to slow down. We have to stop waiting for all these different areas of our life and using stress as our crutch, which we talked about last episode. So we're not going to go into it, but stress is a big piece that can contribute to weight gain. Once you're aging or feeling like your metabolism is slowing. I mean, even stress that you're putting on your body, if you're not eating enough, Yeah, that's a stressor. If you're not eating enough plus over exercising, that's a stressor. If we have poor gut health, that's a stressor. So lots of different things can contribute to that. I think we also have to stop blaming our hormones for everything. Yeah. Do they play, do they change and do they play a part? Absolutely. But to just kind of throw in the towel and be like, I'm gaining weight because of my hormones, but we haven't even looked at what you're eating, what your movement looks like, what your stress management looks like, what your gut health looks like, what your sleep looks like. We can't just sit here and blame our hormones. And when we start to focus on those pieces, a lot of times your hormones can even out. It's not like you had to do all these. or anything. I mean, yeah, change, but there's something about it. Hormones can play a part. But I think it's so easy like, you know what? It's and that's why this is hap that feels good to us and how do we fix our hormone we do? That's not lifestyl it's so hard to be like, You know, what's really, yeah, maybe it is your hormones, but it's what you're doing to impact those hormones. And I think people have a hard time accepting that. I mean, as we age, like, yes, going through menopause and the changes in like estrogen and progesterone, like, yes. They absolutely do change. We're not saying they're not changing and they're not affecting you. Right. But if you aren't willing to do certain lifestyle changes, that's going to help you as your age and your hormones change, it's not really going to matter. Like, yeah, you could do HRT. And that's something like, I definitely think. More women should do absolutely. But we lean on a lot of these things as like, I'll just do this HRT or I'll just, I'll just get on this medication and then like, that'll be fine. And we're just thinking about short term again, when it's like, really your hormones is like a compounding issue of a lot of things that you've been doing for a long time. Yes, absolutely. And I think sometimes it feels better to just be like, it's my hormones. Then I just need to change my eating because it's like, okay, now we have a specific reason we're. Sometimes with the nutrition, we have to play around with it a little bit. And there's a lot more to it than, you know, just, I don't know. So like, I think it's just easier almost to be like, it's just my hormones instead of like, Oh, it's not me or anything I'm doing. It's just my hormones and acting as if like what we do doesn't impact our hormones. You know what I mean? It, I mean, there's even like the last couple of years period. Yes. That's a good, that's something I just thought of. So like thinking about if for the women, when you're on your period and we're like, it's just my hormones, I'm craving so much, well, something like adjusting your magnesium intake, adjusting your starchy carb intake, then you can have improved symptoms, not feel as crummy on your period. And then we just stop blaming our shitty eating habits on our period, on our hormones, we learn to balance it out and we still can have dark chocolate if we want it. It's just like, what can I do a little bit differently to support myself right now to really feel good? Whatever this is that I'm feeling or that I'm going through kids. Yeah hormones definitely impact it But yeah, like you said, it's almost like a crutch like we we in a sense are like, oh, it's our hormones We can't control it. It is what it is And I think so many women find themselves they're like, oh it is what it is And then you have a lot of doctors who are like it is what it is You know what you need and for your insulin resistance or for whatever you need this when it's like, okay, maybe you do need a little bit of help with medication. Totally fine. But if you're just doing medication and you're not looking into lifestyle changes, it's like a huge disservice to you. It really is. And so, but to each his own, right. But I do feel like I, this is like a hot topic. And I feel like we should have someone come in and talk about it a little bit more because I feel like so many women are just like, It's my hormones. I can't do anything. I'm aging. I'm aging. So this is why I can't lose weight. This is why I can't gain muscle. There's nothing I could do about it. And they just kind of feel defeated. And it's like, well, no, you can absolutely do something about it. There's something you can do to be supportive. Not saying that we don't need to adjust to hormones or anything like through HRT or whatever it is, but there's something you can do, like start taking your power back. And you mentioned like insulin resistance. So that's like another thing where when it comes to just aging in general, so estrogen loss impairs glucose metabolism. So because of this, we just, we have to be more conscious of our carbohydrate intake with aging. So adjusting how many starchy carbs you're doing and really prioritizing those complex carbs over simple carbohydrates. But that's not to say we're not eating carbs. We just have to be more conscious of it. And you could take that as dieting or you could take that as supporting your body. And that's going to feel a lot different, whatever way you choose to take it. Exactly. Exactly. And with comes with that is, you know, what else helps with, you know, a decreased ability to metabolize carbohydrates as well is increasing other nutrients, like protein, which is why I'm just like, why aren't we doing this earlier in life? I don't know. Cause we weren't taught. Yeah, that's it. And, you know, and everyone just like, Oh, you just need 0. 8 kilograms per body weight. And no, I'm not saying everybody needs to be eating 150 to 200 grams of protein a day. No, but I do think we can maybe shoot a little higher than that. The 30 to 40 grams that most people are eating because I think that's what sucks is when you go through your whole life really dieting, really restricting food, doing cardio all the time, you're doing all these things and then it comes a point in your life where that seriously doesn't work anymore and you're forced to do something else. It's really hard to be like, I'm going to, what's happening. I'm good. I was just choking on my water. I couldn't find the mute button. I was like, what happened? I didn't hear you. But no, I think it's harder to all of a sudden start prioritizing protein and understanding carbs and lifting weights and, you know. It's a learning curve and it's something that I'm really, I feel like I've always empathized with it with my clients because I mean, we're changing things. It's a learning curve. It's a process, but I'm really recognizing it more, especially like through the pregnancy. I had to increase my carbs. I had to change my meal timing. It's not something that I'm used to doing after three years of eating a certain way, especially like the starchy carbs where logically I know I need more carbs. And that's totally okay. But, and it's not like I've been scared to include starchy carbs. It's just not something that I've been doing. I'm used to eating a different way. So it takes time and it's just a learning curve to be honest. and that's what I try to tell clients too is like, there are so many things that I've adjusted and learned and like had to kind of, you know, switch around and Do things different as like I'm in different seasons. Like it's okay. Give yourself permission to do that. Cause I think that's another really important piece as we age or metabolism is changing, our body is changing is to allow ourselves to play around with different things and know that the same things that used to work aren't going to work anymore. And that doesn't mean you're a failure or like something happened. It's just, you're in a different season of life. Like, It's okay. I think we're just like, we're just so used to being like, I'm a failure or I failed, this doesn't work for me. And it's like this defeating thing rather than being like, how amazing is it that I know my body enough to know what I need to adjust. And I can make that decision and support my body better. You know, like that, just that shift in thinking is so different, but as women, we're definitely not taught to think that we're taught to think like. You shouldn't have an appetite and you're lazy and what you do, you're, you know, you're fat cause you suck. And like all of, you know what I mean? It's like, wow, cool. Sucks. Sometimes I think that is such a good when I hear from clients is when they come to me and they're like, I failed because I stopped tracking. And then I noticed that I wasn't eating enough protein. So I'm like, okay, how'd you know that if you're not tracking? Well, my meals weren't keeping me as full as long, and I just felt like I needed more protein. I also recognized I wasn't getting enough fiber because I didn't have my veggies. So I'm like, that is a great. revelation before you were deciphering what you were eating based on this number that you're tracking now, you literally know exactly why. This meal affected you differently. Like you literally just told me the information you learned, you know, exactly what to change. And that's amazing when you understand how your body works, which is exactly what we teach you. But yeah, we just have changes. And another thing that changes while aging is your digestive system. So this is where fiber comes in super important because a few things can happen. I mean, we have slower transit. So our food's going to move a little bit slower at times. And this is due to that decrease in estrogen. So it's just going to move a little bit slower, but this can be what leads to bloating, constipation. Just like that feeling of fullness, not feeling so great. Other things that can happen. I mean, IBS flare is up because you're just at an increased risk of GI disorders, but a lot of times with IBS. I find that there's things that we can do about it where it's kind of just like, as soon as we adjust their eating, they're perfectly fine. I'm like, Oh, look at that. We kind of covered it. As you age, you need a little bit more fiber all the time. But yeah, you'd have that decrease in motility things kind of slowed down a bit. You need to help move it along, both up your stool. Yeah, because your bowel habits can also change. I mean, you can become irregular, you can become constipated, you can have diarrhea. It can be a little bit different for everyone. And then, so again, that fiber piece comes in handy, that blood sugar balance comes in handy. If like weight gain happens, especially around the abdomen, then this change in body composition will affect your digestive health and maybe it increases like heartburn. So now you're uncomfortable to eat different things like that. Even like your bone health and your calcium absorption can be. adjusted. So again, estrogen are super fun. Hormone plays a role in maintaining bone density and with it declining during like menopause. This increases your risk for osteoporosis. So adequate calcium absorption is going to be essential for bone health and changes in hormone levels can affect calcium metabolism and absorption and your digestive system. System. So even like nutrition, absorption in general is affected. So I mean, decreased digestive enzymes, changes in your gut microbiota, those are going to be, things can like make you feel bloated. And even like, you know, as you age, it's normal to maybe be on certain medications. Those have a lot of side effects. That's okay. You know, also, I just feel like because our movement is so closely related to our digestion as well, as we age, we kind of start slowing down a bit, you know, you're probably not moving around as much. You're a little bit more sedentary, so that has a lot to do with it to, you know, like, get up, move around because you will have digestion issues and it will slow if you're not moving a lot. That's just what's going to happen. So basically you have body composition changes, your hormones are changing, but it doesn't mean we have to blame them for everything. Your insulin response changes, our stress changes, whether that's external or internal stressors. We have digestive changes, we have nutrient absorption changes. There's a lot going on right now. But the good news is something like blood sugar balancing can actually help in all of those areas I just listed. So it's not as daunting as I feel like it might sound where it's like, holy crap, that's a lot of things that are happening. Yes. Like simple lifestyle tweaks, like really making sure you're having a balanced diet with all the nutrients in a ratio that does help balance your blood sugar. Really trying to build and maintain lean muscle mass, having good stress management habits, being active every day. However, that may look like decrease in sedentary time. Like All of this is going to help you as you age. And I feel like, I mean, I see it all the time. So many people are like, I wish I would have known this sooner. I wish I would have started this sooner because it feels really defeating when all of a sudden you're in a place in life where all these things are kind of sacked up against you and you haven't, you haven't really you know, put together a solid game plan for how your body is going to react to aging. So, but again, you can start at any age and there is very simple interventions. Like if you work with us one on one, we have it. Okay. We have like a couple of things that we can help you start doing right now. That's like, okay, I'm already feeling so much better. Like I'm building momentum. This is good. It doesn't feel so daunting because we quiet the noise. Really is what it is. Or else you're going to be wanting to try all these things. Yes. We help you quiet the noise and we give you kind of a game plan. So that way you also don't feel like you don't have to implement every single thing at one time, because that is overwhelming and that's going to be a lot harder to sustain. So we just do baby steps and that's, what's going to get you those wins. Exactly. So we hope that you found this helpful and. I don't know. Empowering, maybe helped you understand your body a little bit more. That's what we're aiming to do here. Yeah, your metabolism is changing, but that doesn't mean you're doomed. We can help you out here. Our whole focus is on supporting your metabolic ecosystem. That's literally our job. So, feel empowered. Don't feel so overwhelmed. Stop just blaming your hormones. Stop waiting for the right time. Stop waiting for the kids to move out. Stop. Just stop waiting. Take an action step today. I don't care what it is, but take action and take control of your life. You're going to feel good doing that. You're never going to go wrong with it. All right, everyone. Well, thank you for listening to another episode of Mocktail Minutes, and we will talk to you next week. Bye. All right. Bye.