Best Macros for Menopause Belly Fat: A 32/30/38 Split

Nikkiey: I transformed a woman's body who was struggling with menopause symptoms to being the most shredded she's ever been. Here's how I did it. Also, stay until the end and I'm going to give you the exact macro breakdown that you can start using today to get the type of results that you're going to see throughout this video.

I've been working with a client for almost three years now, and a year and a half ago she checked in with me mentioning symptoms of what I know to be pre-menopause: hot flashes, night sweats, mood swings, having an irregular period. But more importantly, her progress literally just stopped. What we had been doing wasn't working anymore. Actually, the opposite started to happen. More unwanted fat around her abdomen started to creep on even though she was doing everything right.

What you will learn in this video today is how I got that unwanted abdominal fat to stop creeping on and helped her to create an unbelievable transformation, all while enduring these pre-menopausal symptoms. By the way, she is now primed for menopause and will be able to tackle this unique phase of life with no problem and still get incredible results. And I'm going to show you how too.

So let's first chat about what menopause is. Menopause is a natural biological process that marks the end of a woman's reproductive years. During menopause, the levels of estrogen, testosterone and progesterone in a woman's body decrease, which can lead to a variety of symptoms including hot flashes, night sweats, mood swings and unwanted fat gain, especially in the abdominal region.

One of the main reasons women tend to gain fat during menopause is because of these changes in their hormonal levels. Estrogen and progesterone play a critical role in metabolism and fat storage in women. When these hormones decline, the body tends to store more fat, especially, like I just mentioned, around the midsection. So the key is to understand how hormonal changes affect fat loss and to implement effective strategies to overcome these challenges.

In my client's case, during the period of progress literally stopping, this hormonal shift was happening. What I helped my client do, and what I will talk about in this video in a second, is adopt a new, healthy way of working out and eating right to support this phase of life.

There are two paths of life after menopause, depending on whether you don't or do strength train and eat right. Number one, let's say you continue to do more of what you're doing right now: not working out consistently and not eating right or enough. Doing that through and past menopause could result in more doctor's visits, a higher likelihood of injuries, and even potentially walking with a walker or having to be wheeled around by your family in a wheelchair.

Or number two, let's say you start to take working out and eating right seriously and consistently. Doing that through and past menopause could result in fewer doctor's visits, less likelihood of injuries, and not having to use a walker, and instead being the one chasing your grandkids around at family gatherings. Which future path do you want?

I hope that you chose the second one, because what I'm going to share with you now are literal action steps you can implement to put yourself on that second path. Let's dive into some real-life experiences of how I was able to help my client do this.

The first one was adjusting her nutritional focus. First off, as I stated, as women go through menopause their bodies undergo significant hormonal changes, which can lead to a reduction in muscle mass and an increase in body fat, particularly around the abdomen. To combat this, it's important to maintain a healthy, balanced diet that supports muscle growth and promotes fat loss.

One of the most effective ways to achieve this is to eat a diet that's high in protein. However, not many women focus at all on eating enough protein. Many at the beginning of their journey are unaware of how to get enough protein into their diet, let alone the recommended daily amount, which is one gram of protein per pound of body weight. So for example, a woman who weighs 150 pounds would need at least 150 grams of protein per day. If you aren't doing that, I'd highly recommend getting more protein into your daily diet. Good sources of protein include lean meats, poultry, fish, eggs, dairy products, beans and lentils.

Now, in the case of my client, she was already focused on getting enough protein daily, but there is a second layer needed when it comes to nutritional needs during this phase of life. I adjusted the way her body utilized energy through fats and carbohydrates. Menopausal women get better results when their percentage of fat intake is higher than their carbohydrate intake.

As I mentioned, during menopause your hormones are shifting, so it's important that you work with them, not against them. During the hormonal and metabolic shifts that happen, women can become more carbohydrate sensitive and insulin resistant. Fats are the one macronutrient that directly supports hormones and may help manage symptoms of menopause such as hot flashes and mood swings. So having a slightly higher fat intake during these years can be an absolute game changer for the results that you see with your body. And no, not keto. You'll see why when I share the macro percentage breakdown that I would recommend at the end of this video.

I kept her at the same calories, yet changed up her fat and carb ratios. And bam, these results happened: less body fat around her abdomen and way more muscle definition.

Now, obviously, seeing these results happen led to a huge mental shift in how she sees her body, now and forever as she continues to progress. Which is the second thing that I want to talk about when it comes to overcoming the hormonal hurdle, achieving your fat loss goals and building more muscle, all through menopause.

I've seen many women experience a range of emotions from the hormonal shifts happening, including mood swings, anxiety, depression and just hating the way that their body looks. It's so important to maintain a positive mindset and take care of your mental health during this time. One of the most effective ways to do this is to practice mindfulness and develop a positive attitude towards yourself and your body.

Practicing gratitude and being grateful for the small wins you're making daily, weekly and monthly is so important: knowing that it's more than what you were doing before you started, that those wins will compound over time, and that you'll see all of your hard work pay off in the months to come. That will keep you going. And positive self-talk can help you maintain a positive outlook and develop a healthy relationship with your body.

Nothing good is going to come from beating yourself up. Only more negative will be attracted: more snacking, more inaction and more blaming menopause. You aren't a victim of menopause and these hormonal changes. Your body just requires you to do something different than what you've been doing up until this point. You are in control, not menopause. Just like age isn't a factor, menopause isn't either. It's up to you to make the change and implement these things that I'm sharing with you today.

The last thing that I want to touch on here is strength training. As I've touched on, during menopause the body experiences a decline in hormones such as estrogen and testosterone. As these hormones decrease, muscle mass and strength can decrease as well. This can make it harder to perform everyday activities and can also increase the risk of falls and injuries.

However, strength training can help counteract these changes by building and maintaining more muscle mass. Strength training can also help with bone density, which is important for preventing osteoporosis, a condition that can occur as a result of hormonal changes during menopause. Strength training is so important for you to implement during this phase of life.

If you're not following a well-structured workout routine, or if you're not pushing yourself hard enough during your workouts, you may not see the results that you're looking for with building muscle and changing your body composition. The well-structured workout routine that I put together for my client incorporates progressive overload, meaning that you gradually increase the difficulty of your workouts through a combination of things like increasing sets and reps, playing with your rest time, adding in drop sets and other ways to keep challenging your muscles.

If you're not increasing the weight or the intensity of your workouts over time, your muscles may not continue to grow or adapt. You have to give your muscles a reason to do that, and you do that with progressive overload techniques and by pushing yourself in every single workout that you do. By pushing yourself, I mean that in the last two to three reps of a set, you should feel challenged to push through the weight that you've got on the barbell or with dumbbells. Please stop just going through the motions and doing random things daily. Put intention into your workouts and challenge yourself.

So, as I promised at the beginning of this video, here is the macro percentage breakdown that I used to help my client through her journey: 32% protein, 30% carbs, 38% fats.

We help thousands of women inside of WarriorBabe get these same results. If you'd like to apply to become a WarriorBabe yourself, click the link in the description below. I hope that you all enjoyed this video today and found it super helpful. Remember to subscribe to this channel so that you're up to date when we drop more videos like this.