What’s the Skinny on Weight Gain at Menopause?

By: Red Hot Mamas

Published: August 18, 2025

Written by Karen Giblin

One of the main concerns which women write to me about is about menopause and weight gain. It is actually quite common that women start putting on extra weight as they enter perimenopause. On average, women gain 5 to 8 pounds during the perimenopausal years. This weight gain continues at about a rate of 1.5 pounds each year as women traverse through their 50s. And, this weight gain sometimes causes anxiety.

The good news is that weight gain tends to stabilize especially if women make legitimate efforts to keep down their body weight by paying attention to healthy eating habits and exercising regularly!

It is clear that positive changes which help to maintain a healthy weight increases our chances of obtaining good health. On the other hand, being overweight has been linked to increasing the likelihood of developing heart disease, diabetes and even certain cancers.

So, what can we do to prevent menopause weight gain? Here are a few tips:

Focus on a healthy diet. Pay attention to how you feel – eat when you are hungry and stop when you feel full. Learn to eat less. You might need to eat 200 fewer calories per day. You should remember that changing your dietary habits doesn’t mean deprivation. So, instead of getting calories from ultra-processed food. Eat meat in limited quantities, and replace it with eating fish.

Move more. Add short periods of activity to your day. Include moderate aerobic exercise and strength training to your daily routines. Experts recommend for menopause, aim at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity or 75 minutes of vigorous intensity aerobic exercise per week, alongside strength training at least twice a week. Aerobic exercise includes brisk walking, jogging, swimming, or cycling. Strength training includes weightlifting, resistance bands, or bodyweight exercises. Also, it is important to focus on flexibility and balance. Yoga and Pilates or tai chi helps improve core strength, flexibility and balance.

Unfortunately, we live in a society that claims “you can’t be too rich or too thin”. So, this may cause us to becoming anxious about weight gain and our changing body shapes as we go through menopause. Remember, for the majority of us, it’s difficult to look like a supermodel. So, it is important to learn to accept and appreciate the way we look at this time of our lives. And, we must commit to lifestyle changes that will improve our health at menopause.

I’d like to introduce to you a great new resource which has been developed by The American College of Osteopathic Family Physicians. It provides evidence-based information on weight management, treatment options which can help you better understand and manage your health. This website is www.weightytopics.org. 

Karen Giblin