How to lose weight when over Age 40

abbyjack2

I have found it difficult to lose weight once I hit my 40's. Things I used to do when younger doesn't seem to work as well. I am 5' 3" and have always weighed between 125-140 lbs. Once I hit 40, my weight as slowly gone up to what I am at right now of 157 lbs. I feel like I eat pretty healthy, work out on the treadmill in the morning for 30 minutes, do work out videos in the afternoon for 10-30 minutes. I don't drink soda, I have shake for breakfast, snack on almonds or beef jerky for snacks. Just want to see what other suggestions people may have who are in the same situation and what had worked for them. Thanks in advance for the input.

L1zardQueen

Almonds are my nemesis. I'm 58 and had no trouble losing weight, count your calories accurately.

cwolfman13

If you are gaining weight slowly, you're in a slight calorie surplus. You just need a calorie deficit to lose weight.

Age actually doesn't have a whole lot to do with it...it's more that we typically move less than when we are younger that is the issue more than age in and of itself.

Put your stats in and your desired rate of loss and MFP will give you a calorie target to lose weight.

Eating healthy is good, but it doesn't mean you're in a calorie deficit. I eat very healthfully and I put on 8-10 Lbs every winter because my activity level drops and my eating puts me in a calorie surplus.

lutzsher

Yes, as we age it gets a bit harder because everything "slows down", but in truth weight loss is "made in the kitchen" and even healthy foods will make you gain weight unless you accurately weight and measure every morsel and stay within your calorie goal. I found that I actually didn't eat enough so had to focus on making sure I ate my 3 meals per day.
You should focus on eating a full healthy 3 meals per day where 1/2 your plate is veggies and if you want a snack choose a cup of green grapes, sugar snap peas, cucumber . . . low calorie snacks. Have you ever read the beef jerkey package? There are an awful lot of things on the ingredients list that I can't pronounce and the sodium is often high. This is not a great snack unless you have done an intensive weight resistance workout in truth. Limit the almonds as well or count out exactly 15 of them for a quick 100 calorie snack. It is way too easy to overdo it on those as they are pretty calorie dense.
I rarely eat snacks as I make sure to have 3 good healthy meals per day so Im usually not hungry enough for snacks myself, plus it is too easy to go over on calories adding those in.

brightresolve

61 here, just lost 20 and determined to maintain here. What those above said is true: calorie deficit for weight loss, just like at any age; but it is also true that if we are not doing strength/resistance training we generally lose muscle as we age and therefore don't burn as many calories, especially people like me that don't lift anything on the job heavier than my mouse.

Deficit plus strength training appears to be the ticket.

kommodevaran

I started losing weight with MFP at 43, lost 50 pounds in a year, didn't find it difficult at all. I see no mention of calories (the things that make you lose, gain or maintain weight). Are you tracking your food intake?

MostlyWater

I would not say I've given up, but I'm not hopeful. The best thing is to eat right and exercise and not let it go too far.

JeromeBarry1

Compare the sort of stuff you did each weekday in your 20's to the sort of stuff you do each weekday now in your 40's. That's your answer. Kids then? Grown now. Stand-up job then? Sit-down job now? As all above have said, losing at any age is simple. Not always easy, but always simple. Calories.

kimny72

The only reason weight loss gets harder as we get older is because we tend to get subtly less and less active and lose muscle. "How" to lose weight is luckily exactly the same!

Log your food accurately and consistently. Try to focus on getting more activity into your day to day life. Try adding strength training into your repertoire. And be patient . These boards are full of people in their 40s, 50s, 60s, and beyond who got down to a healthy weight by logging. Good luck!

abbyjack2

Thanks for all the input. I think one thing I used to do more regularly was log the food that I ate. I stopped after a while because I left like I didn't need to do it.

I do feel like I am more active now than I was when I was younger. I have a standing work station for my computer at work so I wouldn't be sitting as often. I cut back on how often I eat out for lunch. It used to be 2x a week and now it is only when work brings in a lunch for meetings which is 1x month. For the month of January I gave up drinking alcohol thinking it would jump start my weigh loss, but i only lost 5 lbs and have stayed there since. At New Years I weighed 161 lbs. By mid-feburary I had gotten down to 155 lbs. Now I seem to be stuck at around 157.

I just started the Jillian Michels Revolution workouts this week so we'll see if it helps with my weight loss journey. Maybe changing my snacks and finding something healthier than beef jerky. Thanks everyone for the help.

dsboohead

Age is just a number so do not use it as an excuse! I am 61 and losing weight! People are noticing it to boot!

kommodevaran

abbyjack2 wrote: »

Thanks for all the input. I think one thing I used to do more regularly was log the food that I ate. I stopped after a while because I left like I didn't need to do it.

I do feel like I am more active now than I was when I was younger. I have a standing work station for my computer at work so I wouldn't be sitting as often. I cut back on how often I eat out for lunch. It used to be 2x a week and now it is only when work brings in a lunch for meetings which is 1x month. For the month of January I gave up drinking alcohol thinking it would jump start my weigh loss, but i only lost 5 lbs and have stayed there since. At New Years I weighed 161 lbs. By mid-feburary I had gotten down to 155 lbs. Now I seem to be stuck at around 157.

I just started the Jillian Michels Revolution workouts this week so we'll see if it helps with my weight loss journey. Maybe changing my snacks and finding something healthier than beef jerky. Thanks everyone for the help.

Weight up/down is purely math (CICO), that's a fact, but we are also living things with emotions, thoughs and commitments, so our mindset has also a lot to do with it. "Feeling" that you're more active than before, can be that you're finding exercise more burdensome than when you were younger. Eating out more rarely, and stop drinking, can make you make up for it by choosing more, and more calorie dense, food, not just when you eat out, but for every meal. You won't know this for sure unless you log.

New exercise can make you retain water. Water has weight. Beef jerky is a perfectly healthy snack. ("Woo" means "broscience".)

rimir74

44 this year. On MFP the last two years. Lost 7kg in 6 months or so. Have been maintaining successfully with very little or no exercise - eating within TDEE. Tracking, more tracking and you know more tracking is all I need it seems.

h1udd

healthier than beef jerky ??? .... good luck on that mission, Beef jerky is one of the more perfect food sources IMO .... 33g of protein, 25g of fat and 11g of carbs .. boooom ! ... possibly a little high on the sodium, but if you are working out and sweating loads then a little extra salt is good !

Unknown

This content has been removed.

abbyjack2

h1udd wrote: »

healthier than beef jerky ??? .... good luck on that mission, Beef jerky is one of the more perfect food sources IMO .... 33g of protein, 25g of fat and 11g of carbs .. boooom ! ... possibly a little high on the sodium, but if you are working out and sweating loads then a little extra salt is good !

I always liked beef jerky too because of the high protein. I'm glad other people think that beef jerky isn't that bad to eat. Thanks,

mom23mangos

Keep the jerky!!! Make your own if you are concerned with salt/preservatives.

abbyjack2

So this week I am limiting the amount of snacking I do in the evening. It seems to be helping with my weight going down this week. I think if I can get below 155 lbs, I will consider it a small victory.

NovusDies

Just make sure you log the jerky. It is not without calories and you can eat too much of it. For that matter you should log everything. As far as your evening snacking as a rule I try not to eat anything 4 hours before I go to bed.

WilmaValley

It is a bit harder as we age because our energy level wanes. Just do it anyway and you will succeed!!!!

bikecheryl

L1zardQueen wrote: »

Almonds are my nemesis. I'm 58 and had no trouble losing weight, count your calories accurately.

lol.... wow.... everything is the same for me.... including the age.....lol.

And it's exactly what I was going to say.

angel7472

I turned 46 just a couple weeks ago. Been maintaining my weight for the past 4 years. I have gained and lost the same 5-10 pounds. Nothing hard about it. Sometimes I work out sometimes I don't (hence the gain). I log everything!!! Get a food scale!! Measure it out. Don't count out 15 almonds, measure then by grams. I stalled and found out the measuring cups and counting them out was drastically over in calories. Got a food scale and got down to 122. I'm 5'5". I'm at 128 as we speak. I eat whatever I want within my calories. No secret science here. It's all CICO. That's it. Good luck

abbyjack2

It is amazing on how much calories is in a sub. I had a cheesesteak sub from the local sub shop for lunch and it had 688 calories!!! Needless say, i busted my calorie limit today.

NovusDies

It is amazing how many calories there is in almost all restaurant food. Last week I thought I was being smart and ordered vegetarian fajitas. They came swimming in oil. They had actually cooled just enough to see the nasty orange color starting to form. It was too disgusting to even consider eating.

PowerliftingMom

I'm 59 and lifting weights was the best thing I've ever done! I'm only 5' and I consume 2200 calories. And that's actually a maintenance diet for me now. Lifting will help increase muscle mass and the more muscle you have the more calories you will burn. Doing 100% cardio is boring and is great for heart health but not as good as a combo of cardio/lifting.

abbyjack2

PowerliftingMom wrote: »

I'm 59 and lifting weights was the best thing I've ever done! I'm only 5' and I consume 2200 calories. And that's actually a maintenance diet for me now. Lifting will help increase muscle mass and the more muscle you have the more calories you will burn. Doing 100% cardio is boring and is great for heart health but not as good as a combo of cardio/lifting.

I had heard that lifting weights is good to help build muscle. I started doing jillian michels revolution workout and alot of the moves use weights. I may need to get heavier weights since the biggest i have is 5 lb weights. I do have a kettleball that I don't use very often. thanks for the advice.

LivingtheLeanDream

Losing weight over 40 is no different than at any other age - eat less than you burn
I didn't 'find' MFP until 2012 and I was 42, once I started counting calories and moving more weight loss happened and I've not looked back since. (I'm approaching year 5 at maintenance)

abbyjack2

I am 42 years old, trying to lose 20 lbs . Seem to be stuck at 156 lbs. My goal weight is 140. Seems even with the logging what I eat, being active, working out, eating healthy, nothing seems to work. Starting to think there is no hope..short of eating nothing...not sure what else to do.

rimir74

Perhaps the preset logging calories are wrong? If CICO still has you maintaining and you feel you need to lose - log in a multiple of a food item. If food xx is 400 calories - log it in as 1.1 or some multiple. Perhaps that's the more accurate calorie count. If it gets you losing weight - then it likely is...