What actually changed our bodies in our 50s?

For Judy, it started with getting her hormones addressed so she could finally feel more like herself again. Then Judy and David started strength training together, lifting heavy three mornings a week, focusing on protein and macros, using GLP-1 medications with their clinicians, and paying much more attention to what their health numbers were actually telling them.

In this episode of the Marriage and Menopause Podcast, we’re talking about the menopause workout and midlife fitness changes that became part of our real lives.This isn’t about trying to look 25 again.At 55, Judy cares more about being strong, protecting muscle and bone, having good balance, being able to get up if she falls, improving her health markers, and staying physically capable as she gets older.

At 58, David cares less about looking young and more about being able to move well when he’s 70.And somewhere along the way, working out stopped being something we kept starting and quitting.It became something we plan to do for life.

Judy started around 217 pounds and is now around 170 pounds, but the scale is no longer the only number that matters. We’re also paying attention to skeletal muscle, body fat, hydration, visceral fat, strength, cardiovascular health, and what our doctors are seeing in our labs.We talk about why heavy strength training surprised both of us, including the realization that we were much stronger than we thought.

Judy recently moved almost 11,000 pounds of total training volume in a single workout across 15 sets.That was something she never imagined herself doing a few years ago.We also talk about food and how GLP-1 medications changed the constant food noise for us.Our eating is much more structured now. We focus on higher protein, lower fat, controlled carbohydrates, and meals we can actually repeat in real life.That usually looks like things such as protein shakes, protein ice cream made in the Ninja Creami, rotisserie chicken, lunch salads, ButcherBox or Home Chef dinners, fruit, yogurt, and meals built around protein.

Judy’s protein target is around 130 grams per day.David’s is around 180 grams.Cardio is the newer piece for us.After Judy’s hysterectomy and after seeing changes in cardiovascular markers including LDL, HDL and ApoB, we became more intentional about addressing visceral fat and cardiovascular fitness too.

We’ve started walking the dogs more, we finally got the Peloton screen working again, and we’re trying to build cardio into the days we aren’t lifting.We also talk about hormones, supplements, sleep, testosterone replacement, and why none of those things replace the basics.

For us, supplements are supporting players.The pillars are still strength training, nutrition, movement, medical care, recovery, and consistently showing up.

And consistency may be the biggest change of all.About six months into lifting, we realized we wanted to keep doing it.

Around the one-year mark, we realized something even bigger:For the first time in our entire relationship, we had kept going to the gym.We hadn’t quit.Now we genuinely think this is for life.

If you’re navigating menopause, menopause weight gain, strength training after 50, muscle loss, GLP-1 weight loss, visceral fat, or simply trying to figure out how to feel stronger and healthier in midlife, this episode is our real experience of what finally started working for us.

This is not medical advice and our choices are made with our own clinicians. Our goal is simply to show that there are options.

You can ask questions.You can talk to your doctor.You can find a trainer.You can start lifting.You can learn about menopause treatment.And you don’t have to automatically accept feeling terrible just because you’re getting older.

If this episode hit home, act on it. Share it with your spouse. Sit down. Talk. Lead the change inside your own home.

This show is for couples who refuse to drift. Who refuse to lose a strong marriage to hormones. Who are willing to learn new rules when the old ones stop working.

Stronger marriages.
Direct conversations.
No avoidance.

We Deserve Better.