Get In Shape After 40.com

Think of the worst traffic jam in Los Angeles and you have a good idea of what we do to our ourselves when we consume our all-time favorite foods.  Fried Chicken, french fries and rolls with lots of butter or margarine are creating a traffic jam within our bodies and clogging our arteries at an alarming rate. 

Partially hydrogenated oil, vegetable shortening, or margarines that are loaded with trans fats are to blame for much of the congestion. 

Heart Disease is on the rise and has been determined to be  the number one killer in the United States.

We have always known that too much  saturated fat is to blame for heart disease, but now we have “trans fat”, a much more secretive and deadlier killer.

About one hundred years ago, plain old cheap vegetable oil was processed through hydrogenation adding more bulk to the oil so it didn’t spoil as easily and wasn’t as greasy.  Why?  It was much cheaper than butter or lard and would last much longer.  Instead of having a 2-3 day shelf life, products could now last much longer and have a better chance at getting sold.  Brilliant.  Except for the fact that, 100 years later, we are finding that this process created nasty little critters called trans fats.

Anything with “partially hydrogenated vegetable oil” is a danger.  Unfortunately, it is found in most things that are crunchy, crispy, creamy and sits on your grocery shelf for weeks on end disguised as  “bakery products” or in your favorite fast food fried foods.

Things are looking up though. In 2006, the New York City board of health was the first to ban all trans fats from its restaurants including their fast-food restaurants.

Of course there are other reasons for clogged arteries and a sedentary lifestyle is probably at the top of the list.

When we exercise and raise our heartbeat, our arteries widen to accommodate the increase in blood flow. This stretching helps to reduce the hardening of the arteries.

Most women who are overweight do not exercise and eat way too much. Overeating, or eating the wrong things, is a major contributor to that lethargic feeling we get when stuffed.

Lethargy and overeating is a major cause in not being able to motivate yourself to exercise and getting on your way to a healthier heart. Start your get in shape trip today and avoid those traffic jams in your arteries. Decide on a goal each week. Start here -

Goal for 1 week: No Soda and No fried Foods.

I believe women have much more common sense after 40.  By now we have tried all the fad diets and traveled all the dead end trails to keeping weight off.

I hate to say it but, diets do work.  They work for short-term weight loss.  However, we are a society that does not like to be deprived, at least not for very long. Once the diet has made us feel deprived, we head straight back to our old habits that got us in trouble in the first place.

So instead of making ourselves feel deprived, we are going to keep all of the foods that we love, but eliminate a couple things that will put our future health in danger. 

1.  Sugar - the calorie thief.  Things to eliminate: soft drinks or any drinks that contain sugar, cookies, candy, muffins.  These are empty calories and americans consume way too much sugar. This has a direct impact on our health and the health of our children because it adds fat to our waistline. One factor in developing Type 2 Diabetes is unhealthy fat but, more than just unhealthy fat, it effects our fat to muscle ratio. Another good reason to increase our muscle mass. What is a major cause in this rise in unhealthy fat?  Sugar, the empty calorie.

1 can of Pepsi has approximately 10 teaspoons of sugar.  Put 10 teaspoons of sugar in a bowl and try to eat it.  You would never knowingly do this because you have common sense right? So, our first challenge is to eliminate all soft drinks from our diet and eliminate them forever. 

Our first reaction of course is to switch to diet drinks.  (Not wanting to feel deprived.)  This is a big danger that most people are not even aware of.  Diet drinks contain aspertame. Three byproducts of aspartame are methanol, formaldehyde, and formate.  Do I need say more?  If you doubt that the american public would be put at such a health risk by having these chemicals added to our soft drinks, just consider cigarettes and their affect on our health.  It really comes down to big companies making big money and and having billions of dollars to lose.  Make your own choice, but for me, I am sticking with the healthy drink.  Water. 

Our heathy lifestyle change for today is to rid all soft drinks from our diets.  We will not replace them with diet drinks that have added chemicals that can do damage to our bodies.

Tomorrow we will gladly say goodbye to commercially fried foods.

I feel like a foolish 40ish woman.  I never really paid any attention to the word “metabolism”, also known as BMR, until I started the 40 something weight gain. Looking for an answer and a cure, I now realize my darn BMR is too low.

There are 3 ways to determine your BMR and the easiest way is to multiply your current (honest) weight by 10.  In order to keep this number higher and burn more calories per day, there are changes that must be made in the 40+ lifestyle. 

Exercise is the number one answer.  But, no longer will the stroll around the neighboorhood suffice.  Walking is a great way to burn a few calories, but walking alone will not work to increase our BMR levels or our muscle mass.  What then? 

Weight training should be the number two answer right under exercise.   We need to change our body flab to muscle.  Ok, the term is body fat but we all know that women have flab. Especially around the hips and belly.  Pretty plain and simple. Weight training will increase our muscle mass and we all know that muscle burns more calories than fat.  Working our muscles keeps our metabolism humming for a good 6-8 hours after we are done with our workout. The harder the workout, the higher the hum.

We still need to walk, but to truly get in shape after the age of 40, we need to be aggresive in our workouts.  We need to really ”feel the burn,” we need to sweat heavy, be red-faced, push ourselves to the limit and do the things we never dreamed possible.   Find your limits and then exceed them and for that moment you will find true and complete happiness. 

My first step to getting fit in my 40’s is understanding why I am gaining weight in the first place. I always assumed that I was destined to be plagued by the “middle age spread,” just like my mother and her sisters. The good “go spread it on the mountain” news is that we do not have to settle into our mother’s bodies!

There are two major factors that play into why we struggle with weight after 40. First is your BMR (Basal metabolic rate) and second is your activity intensity level. Your BMR is scary. It is the calories you burn just by being alive. ( I get a mere 1,300 per day) Each day, your body will burn a certain amount of calories by; beating your heart, breathing, blinking, etc. If I live a sedetary life, then I get to add about 250 more calories to that daily total. I have approximately 1,550 calories in food that I can eat just to maintain my weight because that is all the calories that I burn during one day. Scary, very scary when you consider dinner and a glass of wine can easily add up to 800 or 900 calories. See how easy it is to gain weight?

The good news is, we can change this if we have the desire to lead a more healthier life. After 40 years of age, most people simply slow down. We move less and eat more.

Our lives are not as hectic as they once were and we are at a new stage in life where things start to get a little easier. Our calorie intake is going up (or staying the same) and we are burning less off. Now it is much easier for me to see why the after 40 weight gain is so easy for women.

We need to change our lifestyles from sedetary to active, reduce our caloric numbers and; we need to change them in a big way. Lets get started!

When I told my sister I was thinking of starting a blog on getting in shape after 40, she replied “that’s been done to death.”   Well, if it’s been done to death then someone forgot to invite me to the funeral. 

If you look around at the majority of women over the age of 40,  weight still seems to be a major struggle.  Woman our age have more access to weight loss help & information than any other generation in history.   Why is it that we struggle when we have been educated to death on the perils of aging poorly?