Weight Redistribution With Menopause

There’s a speech we give our daughters when they are nearing puberty: as you age and your hormonal balance shifts, your body goes through a series of changes— and when those changes are finished, your body will look differently than it did before. Of course, this particular speech is not just for young women on the edge of puberty: the very same can be said of menopausal women. Of course, the changes that your body makes during menopause are, in many ways, a near reversal of the changes your body made during puberty— and perhaps not as welcome as those changes were, either.

Nature’s Explanation For Weight Distribution

When your body went through puberty, you gained weight in your chest and rear, preparing you for breastfeeding and creating signifiers of sexual maturity, clearly making you able and ready to have children, physiologically speaking. In order to avoid evolutionary confusion and ensure that the males of the species are not confused, therefore reducing the number of viable offspring, menopause is a time when the body removes the signifiers that show a mate ready to give birth to children. As a result of the reduction in estrogen in your system, the weight that once existed in the breasts and hips can end up shifting to a position on your torso, arms, or legs.

Of course, while that explanation is logical and evolutionarily sound, with today’s population and length of life, Mother Nature’s precautions to preserve the number of viable offspring are no longer necessary— and no one wants to hear that Mother Nature is actively working to make them appear to be less sexually desirable or alluring. As a result, many women approaching menopause may be asking themselves the same question: can anything be done about this impending weight shift?

A Two Pronged Approach

The best ways to keep everything distributed in its normal areas are logical: exercise and estrogen. Estrogen will help keep your body from entirely believing that you need to have all of your weight redistributed for the betterment of the species, and regular exercise will keep you feeling young and healthy, as well as help you shed any amount of weight that shifts to your tummy or other unwanted areas. Of course, it is important to remember that “Estrogen” does not necessarily mean hormone therapy or medication; there are many natural ways to stimulate estrogen supply, especially eating tofu.

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