The truth about menopause and weight gain

Menopause and weight gain seem to go hand in hand. So what can you do to mitigate middle-age spread?

Menopause and weight gain seem to go hand in hand.

“I went to sleep and I woke up the next day, and I promise you, I’ve gained 20 pounds.” That’s the complaint Dr. Monica Christmas hears all the time as director of the menopause program at University of Chicago Medicine, where she is also an associate professor of obstetrics and gynecology.

This phenomenon isn’t limited to her patients, Christmas told CNN Chief Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta on his recent podcast. “I looked around at my own family members or maybe other people that I knew that were in that age range, and it did seem like, wow, they did seem to gain a lot of weight in a short period of time,” she said.

Women do gain about 1½ pounds per year during their 40s and 50s. And a lot of that extra weight seems to land in the midsection, setting the stage for metabolic problems including high blood pressure, high blood sugar and high cholesterol, all of which increase the risk of cardiovascular disease.

But is menopause really to blame for women’s midlife weight gain? As with so many health issues, it’s complicated.

Christmas said it’s impossible to talk about weight gain around menopause without talking about the other elephant in the room: aging. “Menopause is inextricably tied to the aging process,” she said.

“Aging in general is associated with weight gain, more so because of lifestyle changes: being more sedentary, not as active as we once were,” Christmas said.