[00:00:00] Emily Field: Welcome back to the Macros Made Easy podcast. I'm your host, Emily Field, registered dietician and personal trainer, and this is episode 57. If I was your millennial younger sister, here's exactly what I'd tell you about perimenopause and menopause because if we were sisters, we'd probably be staying up too late together splitting a bottle of wine and ordering fries for dinner.

[00:00:23] Emily Field: We'd probably sleep in the next day, skip breakfast because of a hangover, and laugh about it while we drag ourselves to brunch. Maybe we'd go to the gym, but let's be honest, we'd pick the machines we like, keep the weights lighter than we need, and spend half the time chatting. And of course, we'd be the ones who'd run on coffee before water and always say yes to dessert.

[00:00:43] Emily Field: Now, here's the thing. I can get away with some of that right now because I've still got estrogen and progesterone working in my favor. My body is more resilient. It bounces back. But for you, if you're in that perimenopause or menopause stage, those same habits are gonna hit harder. Lower estrogen means your blood sugar isn't as stable, muscle is easier to lose, and cortisol spikes higher and stays higher longer.

[00:01:09] Emily Field: So today I wanna pull back the curtain and talk to you like your younger sister would with honesty, empathy, and maybe a little tough love, because I see how frustrating it feels when your body just doesn't respond the way it used to. And I want you to know that you're not broken and you're not doomed.

[00:01:26] Emily Field: You just need a different kind of care right now. Before I tell you what I would do as your millennial younger sister, let's pause for a second and just acknowledge what you're going through, because here's the reality, you're exhausted no matter how much sleep you get. You feel like you could go to bed at 9:00 PM and you still wake up tired.

[00:01:45] Emily Field: You're gaining weight even though you haven't really changed a thing about your eating or your workouts, and that feels so unfair. Your workouts aren't landing the way they used to. What used to feel energizing now feels draining. You might even feel like you're putting in more effort than ever and getting half the results.

[00:02:01] Emily Field: And then there's the hot flashes, the night sweats, the mood swings. You feel like you're living in someone else's body. And on top of that, there's a layer of frustration, like, is this just me? Am I doing something wrong? Why can't I get a handle on this? Let me just stop and say, you are not making this up and you are not alone.

[00:02:20] Emily Field: Almost every single woman I talk to in midlife has said to me at one point, what the hell is happening to me? So if you've been blaming yourself, beating yourself up, or thinking that you're just failing some invisible tests, please hear me. This is not about your willpower. It's not about being lazy or broken or bad at following through.

[00:02:40] Emily Field: What's happening is that your hormones, specifically, your estrogen and progesterone are shifting. And when they shift, your body feels different, period. End of story. And here's the most important part, yes, things are changing, but that doesn't mean you're doomed to feel like this forever. It just means that your body is asking for a different kind of care than what worked for you in your twenties and thirties.

[00:03:02] Emily Field: Here's where I'm gonna give it to you straight, like only a little sister can. Your body changed the wifi password, the old password, the old hacks, the tricks. They won't log in. But before we reconnect, let's delete a few myths from your browser. Myth number one, starve yourself thinner. I get it. That was the go-to playbook for decades.

[00:03:23] Emily Field: Eat less cut carbs, skip meals, power through your hunger, but in midlife, that will backfire. When you under fuel, your cortisol shoots up, your metabolism downshifts and your body clings onto every calorie because it feels unsafe. Starvation is not the strategy. It's the fast track to feeling even worse.

[00:03:43] Emily Field: Myth number two, cardio is the answer. If you're hammering away on the treadmill or piling on endless HIIT workouts because you think it's the only way to keep weight off, I love you, but please stop. Cardio has its place for heart health, but in perimenopause and menopause muscle is your best insurance policy, and you don't build it with more spin classes.

[00:04:03] Emily Field: You build it with strength training, lifting progressively heavier and recovering well. Myth number three, my metabolism is broken. No, your metabolism isn't broken. It's adaptive. It responds to the inputs you give it. If you've been undereating over exercising, skimping on sleep or running on stress, your metabolism has adapted to protect you, and that's actually really good news because it means you can teach it to adapt in the other direction too.

[00:04:31] Emily Field: With the right fuel, the right training and the right recovery, your body can absolutely respond. So here's the reframe I want you to hold onto. This isn't about fighting against your body. It's about working with it. And the strategies that worked in your twenties and thirties, they might not cut it anymore, and that's not failure, that's just biology.

[00:04:51] Emily Field: The sooner that you honor that, the better you'll feel. Now, let me make this very real for you. If we were actually sisters, here's the kind of stuff we'd be doing together and why it might not be serving you in the same way anymore. Let's start with the late nights and the wine. We book a seven 30 reservation and swear we'll be home by 10, cute by 9 45.

[00:05:16] Emily Field: The server knows our names and we're workshopping our bottle choice like it's a group project Breadbasket arrives. We both pretend we're not doing the bread thing right now until the butter lands and suddenly we are then because we're fun, we order fries for the table and point at the charcuterie like it's a protein plate.

[00:05:34] Emily Field: Three almonds, two ribbons of prosciutto, and a heroic cube of cheddar. We do the one more poor hand signal as if we don't own pajamas, and our water glasses stay as full as our promises to hydrate. We get ready to leave high five, our restraint and congratulate ourselves for not ordering entrees. Now this is gonna hit you harder than it does me.

[00:05:56] Emily Field: Less estrogen means lighter, hotter sleep and big blood sugar swings. Wine as dinner is code for alcohol, plus low protein, plus a late bedtime, and that's gonna mean more night wakings, stronger cravings tomorrow, and a slower recovery for you. I've got a little bit more hormonal buffer and you're gonna feel the invoice.

[00:06:18] Emily Field: Now, if I was your millennial younger sister, I would have a quick sister fix, and that means I might encourage you to a pregame real meal that's 25 to 40 grams of protein, plus some veggies, plus some carbs. Maybe before we start on that wine, before that first sip, I'd probably encourage you to go one for one with alcohol, one water per drink.

[00:06:43] Emily Field: Or maybe go for a drier wine or like a hard liquor plus soda, plus citrus. Even better would be to call it a little bit earlier. Stopping alcohol two to three hours before bed will protect our sleep much better. So we're so good at dinner that we obviously do the most logical thing next. We get dessert.

[00:07:06] Emily Field: The server floats the dessert menu and we grin like kids at a bake sale. We'll share unless it has caramel or chocolate or both. A molten masterpiece arrives vanilla bean ice cream sliding into a glossy sugar lake, powdered sugar lake. First snow. We take courteous tiny bites for exactly three seconds, and then it's synchronized.

[00:07:26] Emily Field: Spooning. We do our standard pep talk. Life's too short Order dessert and clink spoons like champagne. Now this is gonna hit you harder than me. With less estrogen, blood sugar is less stable. A protein like dinner capped with a sugar heavy finale is a quick spike in blood sugar, a very hard dip, and that's gonna lead to cravings and mood swings.

[00:07:49] Emily Field: If it's late or if you've had wine, your heart rate's gonna be higher. Your core temperature is gonna be a bit higher, which means lighter sleep and more night sweat. I bounce back a little bit quicker, but you carry it into tomorrow. And if we were sisters, I'd probably have a quick fix for this as well.

[00:08:08] Emily Field: Again, let's anchor with dinner first, 25 to 40 grams of protein, plus some high fiber veggies and some fat. We can also shrink that crash by sharing one dessert, savoring the best three to five bites, and or maybe just choosing the small but decadent dessert. We could also enjoy that dessert earlier in the night.

[00:08:30] Emily Field: We could do it with dinner or very shortly after dinner. That is gonna buffer us a little bit better for our nighttime blood sugar swing. A bonus move for that blood sugar spike is to take a 10 minute stroll before heading home. So what if we exit that restaurant, walk a couple blocks and catch our Uber somewhere else?

[00:08:49] Emily Field: That 10 minute stroll will do wonders for our blood sugar stability over the night. All right, so we pay, we step out into the night air and we say some famous last words. One quick stop, then home for sure, that one quick stop turns into 12:47 AM and we're barefoot in the booth singing harmonies. We do not possess.

[00:09:09] Emily Field: The DJ keeps hitting our era. We rack up 12,000 dance floor steps on cocktails and salty bar snacks. Every water break becomes after this song, which is code for never. The bartender learns our names. We tip like we own stock ride home together, glitter on cheeks, shoes, and hand wind, and hair truly living.

[00:09:29] Emily Field: Now that's gonna hit you harder than it is me. Less estrogen means tougher, fluid and temperature regulation. We're under hydrated. Plus we have alcohol plus a late bedtime. It's gonna magnify hot flashes, brain fog, and next day fatigue. My sleep is less fragile. Yours fragments more. Now, if I was your younger sister, I'd probably have some quick fixes.

[00:09:53] Emily Field: So while we're out, I'd encourage you to alternate drinks with water and maybe snag a protein bite, maybe like shrimp cocktails, chicken skewers, or at a mame. Then when we get home, it's electrolytes in water, and then I want you to cool down the room to prepare for sleep. If our dinner was light, maybe we sneak in a quick snack that has 10 to 20 grams of protein.

[00:10:16] Emily Field: And when it becomes morning, we're gonna hit protein, water, and easy carbs. Maybe even move into some gentle movement, like a walk, yoga, stretching, something like that. But in this scenario, morning arrives, our hoodies are on, and our sunglasses are required even inside one of us texts the inevitable brunch.

[00:10:38] Emily Field: We get to our favorite spot and we order coffee like it's a defibrillator. The server says sweet or savory, and we chorus. Both pancakes land like a mattress. Syrup forms like a small inland sea. Mimosas feel like vitamins. We conduct a forensic recap of last night, swear. We're drinking so much water this week and order another round because citrus is health, right?

[00:11:00] Emily Field: We leave declaring this counts as breakfast and lunch and float home to nap, like house cats. Now this is gonna hit you harder than me. Morning cortisol runs hotter in midlife and you've lost some estrogen and progesterone breaks. Skipping food keeps stress high and blood sugar wobbly. Then that pancake plus mimosa bomb spikes and crashes you.

[00:11:23] Emily Field: That's gonna lead to irritability, cravings, and a later energy face plant. I can coast on caffeine. Your body needs steadier fuel. Now, if we were to do this morning over again, I'd probably encourage some things first, 16 to 24 ounces of water As soon as you wake up, then get in some good protein source, maybe 20 to 30 grams of protein, plus 15 to 30 grams of carbs.

[00:11:47] Emily Field: Think a protein shake plus a banana or eggs plus toast, or yogurt and berries. I'd encourage you to delay coffee when you wake up. It's water first. Maybe some food, and then coffee or coffee. Alongside that breakfast, even better would be to take a light outdoor walk to help with your cortisol rhythm. But in this scenario, we didn't choose that, and after our cat nap, we're feeling a little bit more human and we decide to be good and text each other.

[00:12:16] Emily Field: The other magic word workout, it's matching leggings, messy buns, and unearned confidence. We gossip, walk on the treadmill, solve our lives problems on the phone, rollers, and pick dumbbells that feel well friendly. Then it's into lateral raises with five pound weights, bicep curls with eights and a seated leg.

[00:12:37] Emily Field: Press three pins from empty. Every time we eye the squat rack, it's mysteriously taken. We dab our faces like we pr negotiate a 32nd plank. We spend laughing through and ReRack the tens like Warriors Mirror Selfie perfect angle caption pending. We are movement queens. Now this type of workout is gonna hit you differently than it is gonna hit me In midlife, you lose muscle and bone faster without a strong signal.

[00:13:05] Emily Field: Cardio only or light lifting won't protect your metabolism, your strength, or your bone density. I might be able to coast more, but you need mechanical tension and progression in order to prevent that all from happening. If I was your sister and I was talking to you straight, I'd have a fix for this. I'd recommend that you train three days a week no matter what, and they will matter.

[00:13:26] Emily Field: Those workouts will matter. You're doing some sort of movement like squat, hinge, push, pull, or carries. The workouts are gonna be 30 to 45 minutes at a minimum. And I want you to train with intent. That's three to four sets of six to 12 reps, finishing with about two reps in reserve, which means that you're really pushing yourself the last few reps of each set.

[00:13:50] Emily Field: You feel like you're moving through mud or moving through slow motion that's gonna indicate that you are really challenging your. I'd also encourage you to progress weekly. That might be one more rep each set or one more set. It might even mean going heavier. You're doing two and a half or five pounds, maybe even 10 pounds on those bigger lifts more than you were doing previously.

[00:14:13] Emily Field: But in this scenario, we didn't do that. And because we're us, we celebrate this quote workout. The only way we know how. Coffee, we beeline to the cafe, scan the pastry case like a museum, and pretend to read the menu though. We always order the same thing. Grande oat milk latte, extra hot ice. Vanilla cold brew with foam.

[00:14:33] Emily Field: Lots of foam. The barista offers water, but we decline. Like hydration is a personality flaw. Someone mentions egg bites. We declare we'll eat later, which is the prequel to cravings. Banana bread winks at us. It has fruit. We rationalize. We plant by the window sip our artful lattes like life force debrief.

[00:14:52] Emily Field: Nothing about training and leave buzzing with zero protein and not a single sip of water. Now this is gonna hit you harder than it is gonna hit me. Lower estrogen means it's easier for you to get dehydrated, and there's gonna be less of a buffer against cortisol. Coffee on an empty stomach spikes stress, and gives zero protein for muscle repair, which is gonna lead to fatigue, cravings, and hotter flashes.

[00:15:18] Emily Field: My system is gonna tolerate that a little bit better, but yours needs a few strategic tweaks. So if I was your sister, here's what I would recommend. Water before coffee. Get 12 to 20 ounces of water in your system. After that workout, add some electrolytes, especially if you sweat a lot, then I'd love to see you having protein with your coffee.

[00:15:38] Emily Field: Maybe we're doing egg bites, Greek yogurt or a ready to drink protein shake. 20 to 30 grams is a great spot to be in. Maybe we're pairing that with 15 to 30 grams of carbs. That's a banana, maybe some oatmeal or just even a piece of toast. I'd also recommend that we have a caffeine cutoff. We wanna do this six to eight hours before bed to protect our night's sleep.

[00:16:02] Emily Field: So now that the loop is complete and you can laugh at a few of our sister, great ideas, let's turn our awareness into momentum. Part four is your simple, sustainable next step. Here's where I'm gonna be the little sister who shows you a different way of doing things. Because my generation, us millennials, we grew up watching you and while you were being told one set of rules, we started catching onto another.

[00:16:28] Emily Field: If we were on the couch together right now, phones out, you'd see how the internet gave my generation a different mirror. Your feed growing up was magazine covers and diet commercials telling you to get smaller. Mine is a 62-year-old powerlifter, deadlifting her body weight. A mom learning to snatch at 45.

[00:16:47] Emily Field: Adaptive athletes crushing marathons, women of every size, hiking, surfing, lifting, dancing, different bodies, different lives, different definitions of fit. You were told to shrink. We were told to get strong. You survived Snackwell Cookies, a hundred calorie snack packs and fat-free everything. Thinness was the gold star.

[00:17:11] Emily Field: My generation learned that muscle is the new skinny. That lifting heavy can be empowering and that fueling your body is a part of self-care, not something to apologize for. And that exposure matters. Seeing women like you doing big, strong, brave things tells your brain, this is possible for me too. And yes, the internet can be noisy, but it also widened the lens.

[00:17:33] Emily Field: It showed us that fitness isn't one. Look, it's a lifestyle. It's prs, hiking with grandkids, sleeping well, and eating enough to have energy for a full life. So it's okay. I mean, more than okay to unlearn the idea that your worth is tied to the size of your jeans. As your millennial younger sister, I'd encourage you to curate your feed.

[00:17:56] Emily Field: Follow midlife lifters, masters athletes, women who model fueling and recovery, mute the shrink at all cost noise. I'd welcome you to upgrade your metrics. Track strength, prs, step counts, sleep quality, how clothes feel, and energy, not just the scale. I'd love to see you adopt athlete habits. That's protein at each meal lifting three times a week with progressive overload, planning, rest like you plan workouts and hydrating like it's your job.

[00:18:26] Emily Field: I'd also love to see you shift your language from I need to be smaller to, I'm building strength, stamina, and resilience. You were also told to earn your food. We were told to fuel our workouts. You probably remember the old line, no carbs after 6:00 PM or burn it to earn it. You went to aerobics, step classes and spin thinking Every bite had to be justified.

[00:18:51] Emily Field: Meanwhile, we've been learning that food is fuel protein before and after lifting carbs to support a long run. Eating more to get stronger. It's okay to let go of that guilt and to start seeing food as support, not punishment. The messaging that you grew up with is landing differently in midlife, under fueling spikes, cortisol tanks, energy, and makes muscle harder to keep exactly what we don't want in perimenopause.

[00:19:18] Emily Field: So if I was your younger sister and you were actually taking advice from me, I would recommend a few things. Before training, that's about 60 to 90 minutes before your workouts. We're gonna have some protein, some carbs, really hitting between that 20 and 30 gram range for protein, maybe even 25 to 40 grams of carbs.

[00:19:35] Emily Field: Think Greek yogurt and fruit, eggs and toast, maybe whey protein powder, and some oats and a protein shake. Then after training. That's like one to two hours after you're done with your workout. Again, 25 to 40 grams of protein, maybe 30 to 60 grams of carbs. That looks like chicken and rice or a protein smoothie and banana or cottage cheese and crackers and fruit.

[00:19:58] Emily Field: I'd encourage you to take rest days, and even if you're not working out on a rest day, that doesn't mean you need less fuel. Keep your calories exactly the same on your rest days and your active days. I'd also tried to nip it in the bud with your language from, I have to burn this off to, I'm fueling to feel strong.

[00:20:19] Emily Field: You were also told that cardio is king. Cardio, cardio, cardio. But millennials have embraced strength. You were praised for running marathons, spending hours on the treadmill, or sweating through endless hit classes. That was the gold standard of fitness. But for millennials, we're signing up for CrossFit, power lifting, orange Theory boutique gyms.

[00:20:40] Emily Field: We care about lifting more, jumping higher, running faster, not just burning calories. It's okay to trade some of the cardio for strength training. Your midlife body needs it even more. Okay. That's because your estrogen drop accelerates muscle and bone loss. Cardio is great for heart health, but it won't preserve what metabolism rides on.

[00:20:59] Emily Field: That's your lean muscle mass. So again, if I was your younger sister and you were taking advice from me, I would recommend three days a week. AST drink training. You're gonna do one bigger lift each time, a squat, a hinge, push, pull or carry, and then three to four sets, sets. Six to 12 reps finishing with two reps in reserve, meaning you're really pushing for those last couple reps of each set.

[00:21:23] Emily Field: I'd love to see you progressing weekly. You're gonna be adding weights, you're gonna be adding reps, maybe adding sets, or doing some sort of progression to keep your body challenged. Maybe one or two times a week, you're doing zone two cardio. That's 20 to 40 minutes of a brisk walk, easy bike ride, maybe swimming.

[00:21:41] Emily Field: You can still speak in full sentences. That's the sweet spot there. Now, if you have extra time and you really do love getting your heart rate up, you can do some optional high intensity interval training, one short session. If your sleep and your stress are well managed, skip that during your high stress weeks.

[00:22:01] Emily Field: I also noticed that you were told to avoid fat, but we were learning to add avocado. Yes. Even if it's extra. You remember the rise of rice cakes in margarine? Remember fearing egg yolks? You were taught that dietary fat equals body fat. My generation put coconut oil in our coffee. Smashed avocado on toast and realized fat isn't the enemy.

[00:22:24] Emily Field: It's essential for our hormones, brain health, and satisfaction with meals. It's okay to ditch the low fat yogurt and put some peanut butter on your toast, and that really matters in midlife because adequate fat can help with your satiety and your mood, and makes for much more macro balanced meals, much more realistic eating.

[00:22:42] Emily Field: So if I was your younger sister and you were taking advice from me, I would recommend that you add one to two thumb size fats per meal. That's your avocado, olive oil, nuts, seeds, maybe some nut butter. I'd welcome you to stop fearing the egg yolk. Choose a higher percent of fat for your yogurt or your cottage cheese.

[00:23:03] Emily Field: I'd also welcome you to pair carbohydrates with fat and protein to smooth out your blood sugar stability. That might be a banana with peanut butter or cottage cheese with fruit, a sort of trail mix with popcorn and mixed nuts. I also noticed that you were told to push through exhaustion, but millennials are learning to honor recovery.

[00:23:25] Emily Field: Your generation wore busy, like a badge of honor. Work harder, do more sleepless. Millennials are starting to value recovery. That's your rest days, maybe meditation apps and sleep tracking. We joke about our Stanleys, but we're also the hydration queens. It's okay to unlearn the hustle and start prioritizing sleep, stress management and recovery.

[00:23:47] Emily Field: And this matters a lot in midlife because you have less of a hormonal buffer, it means you're gonna have higher cortisol and lighter sleep. Your ability to recover well is gonna transform the same workouts you've been doing into better results. Now, if you were my older sister and you were taking advice from me, I would recommend some anchors, not rules.

[00:24:10] Emily Field: One being your sleep window. If you're spending eight to nine hours in bed, maybe 78 hours asleep, a cool dark room, and screens off about an hour before you go to bed. A caffeine cutoff, six to eight hours before bedtime. A hydration habit, 12 to 24 ounces of water on waking electrolytes on your more sweaty days.

[00:24:33] Emily Field: And embracing active recovery walks, mobility flows, gentle yoga on your non lifting days. Now you were told that diets were forever, even if that was like subliminal messaging, but we know that seasons are very normal. Your generation was caught in the cycle of one diet after another, always trying to stick to a plan.

[00:24:56] Emily Field: Millennials are normalizing the idea of maintenance phases, even bulking cutting, and then reversing nutrition is flexible and seasonal. It's okay to unlearn the idea that you have to be in a weight loss mode forever. Sometimes the healthiest move is eating at maintenance and enjoying your life. And this matters so much for midlife because your body thrives with long stretches of maintenance that's fueling well and training hard, and then interrupting that with brief, well-timed cuts when sleep and stress are feeling really good.

[00:25:27] Emily Field: If I was your younger sister and you were taking advice from me, I would recommend that you look into a build and strength phase, which is. Most of your year, you're eating at maintenance, you're lifting heavy, you're chasing prs, and you're protecting sleep. Then when you want to, you can engage in a deficit or cut phase.

[00:25:46] Emily Field: That's anywhere between 6, 8, 10, maybe 12 weeks, and it's always optional. There's never an urgency around fat loss phases. You'll do a small to moderate calorie dip, keeping your protein high, always going for that. Active recovery with your non-exercise activity like walking, and you're engaging in this phase in a short time of your year when your life isn't feeling like chaos, when you're not traveling a ton, when you don't have a lot on your plate, you feel really secure.

[00:26:16] Emily Field: After that short and well timed deficit, you're reversing and recovering from undereating. You're returning to maintenance. You're stabilizing your hunger, your energy, and your sleep because you cannot live in that phase forever. So here's a little bit of the millennial edge I want you to have. It's okay to unlearn.

[00:26:35] Emily Field: It's okay to rewrite the rules you were given. If you've been living under the weight of diet culture, under fueling, over, exercising, obsessing over the scale, I'm inviting you into this millennial mindset where strength, food, freedom, and energy are the real goals. Because here's the truth, those old strategies might have worked when you were 25, but now in perimenopause and menopause, they're not just unhelpful, they're making you feel worse.

[00:27:01] Emily Field: And the good news. Because you don't have to keep carrying them. If I really was your younger millennial sister, I'd still be right there with you laughing over late night wine splitting, dessert dancing until the lights come on. But I'd also be the one nudging you to drink water between glasses to eat some protein before we go out to lift heavier in the gym and to get to bed a little earlier.

[00:27:23] Emily Field: 'cause I want you to feel good, not just for the night, but for the long haul. That means fueling your body, building and protecting muscle, managing stress and recovering well. I know it feels frustrating when your body doesn't respond like it used to. I know it's tempting to blame yourself or to double down on old diet tricks, but you're not broken, you're not failing.

[00:27:44] Emily Field: Your body has simply changed and your strategy needs to change with it. It. The good news is you don't have to do this perfectly. You don't have to overhaul your whole life overnight. You just need to start giving your body the kind of care it actually needs right now. And the payoff is huge. More energy, better sleep, stronger workouts, steadier moods, and a body that feels like it's working with you again instead of against you.

[00:28:09] Emily Field: So if you take one thing from this episode, let it be this. You are not stuck. You are not too old. You are absolutely capable of feeling strong, confident, and vibrant in this chapter of life. Thanks for hanging out with me today and letting me play the role of your younger sister for a while. If this resonated with you, share this episode with a friend who needs the same reminder, and don't forget to follow the show so you never miss an episode.

[00:28:34] Emily Field: Until next time, take care of yourself the way you deserve to be cared for.