Fighting 40s Flab
Metabolism is really only a small part of why it's harder to lose weight after 40
By Neil Osterweil
WebMD Weight Loss Clinic - Feature
Reviewed By Charlotte E. Grayson, MD
It ranks right up there with "the check is in the mail," "the dog ate my homework," and "I will never lie to the American people." Of course, we're talking about "It isn't me, it's my metabolism."
Well, if you're over age 40, the oldest cop-out in the book may have some truth to it after all. Yes Virginia, you really can blame it on your metabolism.
But only a little.
Even if you're sitting or lying down while reading this article, your body is still burning calories; the rate at which it does so is called your resting metabolic rate. As you age, your metabolism tends to decelerate by about 5% for every decade of life past age 40, so that if your resting metabolic rate is, say, 1,200 calories per day at age 40, it will be around 1,140 at age 50.
"At age 40 to maintain your weight, that is to not gain weight, you're going to have to eat 100 calories less a day, and that has nothing to do with anything other than the natural course of aging. That means your resting metabolic rate," Madelyn Fernstrom, PhD, director of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Weight Management Center and associate director of the UPMC Nutrition Center in Pittsburgh, tells WebMD.
But metabolism is really only a small part of the story. Age and life tend to conspire against us in the battle to lose weight over 40, Fernstrom says.
"As we age, our lives become more complicated, whether it's with children, with work, with aging parents, and so we have less time really to be more physically active and pay attention to what we're eating. Food is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, in large portions that are relatively economical and so food is always around, and we tend to have more mindless eating and cut down on activities," she says.
Mass Exodus
When it comes to pinning blame on changes in metabolism there are handful of prime suspects, says Pamela Peeke, MD, assistant clinical professor of medicine at the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore, who specializes in nutrition and stress, particularly among adults on the far side of 40.
"Metabolism is based upon three different factors," Peeke tells WebMD. "The first factor is genetics. We're good, but we can't fudge with that yet -- give us time, however.
"Number two is thyroid function, and interestingly enough, here's where we get gender specificity. Women have much greater thyroid issues than men, by a at least 10 to 1, and it's quite gradual, so women may find that they're losing some of that metabolic edge during their 40s also because thyroid issues begin to spring up."
The third factor affecting metabolism, Peeke says, is muscle mass. In the 40s and beyond, "lifestyle changes rather dramatically and it's sort of a keen grasp of the obvious that everyone's sitting on their ass. So what's happening is if you don't use it, you lose it, and in your 40s you don't just lose it, it melts."
Recent research suggests that women on average will lose muscle mass twice as fast as men the same age, and that can make a huge difference in their ability to lose or at least maintain weight, Peeke says. Muscle is far more "metabolically active" than fat, meaning that lean, more muscular people have an easier time burning calories at rest than to people with higher proportions of body fat.
"Let's say I've worked out at the gym and I have a new pound on board, or, for that matter, I take an old muscle mass on me that's untrained and now I train it and preserve that pound. That muscle mass may now burn between 35 to 50 calories extra a day, versus the same pound of fat, which would burn anywhere from 5-10 calories a day.
"So it's extremely important to know that muscle is very metabolically active and that you don't want to lose it. That being said, a typical can man can lose over the course of the age of 30 through the age of 50 anywhere between 5 and 10 pounds of muscle mass. A woman could definitely lose that -- that's a given because she, through repeated dieting and decreased physical activity, will lose that," Peeke says.
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