Success Stories

There are 3 things that Jo learnt on the MyMT™ Transform Me programme to lose weight: 

1. It’s not ‘menopause’ that’s the problem. We all go through this life stage. The ‘problem’ is that we aren’t changing up how we look after ourselves. 
2. Loving our liver in menopause matters. This powerful organ changes in structure and function as we age and therefore, the type, timing and amount of food that we eat in our 50’s and into post-menopause matters. 
3. Sleep matters. If you are going to lose weight and reduce hot flushes, then discovering how to sleep all night again matters.

If you really think about it, the problem isn’t menopause – this is our natural transition into our biological ageing.  As I discovered too, the ‘problem’ is that we are the first generation of women to go into menopause in the context of our busy, lifestyle and the fact that for decades we have been eating and exercising in ways that better suit men and athletes. Jo was the same. Running a  business and a busy household, she was feeding young teenage athletes who were always hungry.

When we don’t change our lifestyle to suit our menopause transition this stage of our life can become the ‘game-changer’.  Our symptoms often start with not sleeping and then the joints become sore and the weight can go on. Not all women put on weight obviously, but many do. Jo put on 10 kg. When she first contacted me she felt frustrated and fed-up. Because nothing she was doing was working. And I knew why. 

When Jo first contacted me, I explained that if we don’t allow our body to adjust properly and change our lifestyle to suit our hormonal changes and our biological ageing, then our body goes into ‘distress’. Putting on weight is another sign of inflammation in our fat cells. And it often arrives when we aren’t sleeping and when we have the wrong diet to suit us at this stage of life. I was the same too.  

That’s why I decided to put some proper research into this stage of life and better understand how to put menopause into ‘wellness’, not ‘sickness’ and better understand exactly what we need to do to lose weight, sleep better, improve sore joints, reduce hot flushes without HRT (which I was on at the time too) and manage our emotional turmoil too. 

 It’s such a confusing time of our lives isn’t it?

 Jo was confused too.

Before Jo came into the MyMT Transform Me menopause weight loss programme, she had bought a nutrition programme that was from the United Kingdom. When she told me what it was, I realised it was not designed for her changing hormones in menopause.

Like many of the programmes that are marketed to women, it was designed to be very high in protein and animal fats. For many years, high protein diets have been promoted in the fitness industry. This is because our body needs protein, and in exercising women doing a lot of weight-training, protein is well known to help to repair muscles. The other thing that high protein diets are renowned to do, is to boost metabolism. But there is another thing that high protein diets do too – and for women in menopause it can lead to much frustration and confusion – because too much protein puts up our blood pressure and metabolism causing more hot flushes and sore joints in women who are overweight. 

When I discovered the diet that Jo was on and how high it was in protein and animal fats, I explained to her that these types of diets don’t take into consideration the changes that occur in our liver and muscles as we move through menopause and into post-menopause. As well, high protein diets cause women to feel hot. With lowering oestrogen, our blood vessels become more constricted and we don’t sweat as much. Then because protein is ‘thermo-genic’ [which is a physiological term meaning heat generating], the tendency for women is to overheat when they are on a high protein diet and aren’t doing the resistance training that is designed to go with these high protein diets. Body-builders have known for years that protein not only repairs and grows damaged muscles, but it is a food that requires a lot of metabolic energy to digest and absorb. 

Many women don’t need high protein diets as they go through menopause, because they aren’t doing the amount of training that maybe they used to do – many are too exhausted and because so many of us struggle with sleep, then our body isn’t able to do the repairing of muscle tissue that it used to do in the past. Jo was the same. As a business-woman running a house-hold with busy teenagers, Jo’s activity levels were mainly cardio – running around after everyone else! But because she thought she was on a weight-loss diet, her confusion and frustration was mounting by the day. She felt bloated, heavy and her clothes felt tight and uncomfortable and her energy levels were at rock-bottom.

That’s why I implored Jo to at least try my MyMT™ Transform Me programme. With oestrogen dominance being the main cause of our weight gain as we transition through menopause, I have researched exactly the step-by-step lifestyle solutions that we need to put into place to reduce this condition which makes our fat cells store excess oestrogen. I have also designed the programme from the studies that have emerged more recently from women’s healthy ageing research, which was the topic of my doctoral studies. 

Menopause is the transition to the next phase of our lives – our ageing. And in a completely new hormonal environment, what we have done in the past to look after ourselves may no longer work. I also told Jo, that once she had done the programme and learnt how to sleep, eat and move to suit her changing hormonal environment, she would have the template for maintaining improved energy levels, so imagine my surprise, when I received this email from her:

“Before doing your programme, I felt Heavy, bloated and was going weight by the day despite being on a nutrition progamme designed by someone, who I now realise, didn’t understand menopause. I’ve now lost 12 kgs, I sleep all night, hot flushes are gone and I have more energy to exercise. It’s amazing the difference I feel to a year ago.”