I absolutely love connecting with all of you in our community, so I'm thrilled to be answering your burning questions in this episode! Today, I share my advice on some really important topics like: What's the best way to tackle strength training and weight loss around perimenopause? How can you get lean if your body fat percentage is too high, even though you have no weight to lose? And for those dealing with arthritis, how can you strengthen your glutes when you have knee and lower back issues or pain? 

I'm constantly amazed by my clients and students who are transforming their bodies and feeling more energized every day. And guess what? If they can do it, so can you!. Whether you're battling stubborn body fat, riding the wave of menopausal symptoms, or dealing with achy joints, this episode is for you! 

Head over to hollyperkins.com/review where you can upload a screenshot of your review and gain immediate access to my four-week strength training plan, Strength Without Stress!

Topics Covered:

• My top tips for strength training and weight loss during perimenopause 
• How to improve your body fat percentage if you have no weight to lose 
• Using nutrition to improve blood glucose regulation
• Why you can still build muscle with arthritis 
• Single joint exercises to activate and strengthen your glutes 

Resources Mentioned:

• Listen to the first 38 episodes of Holly Perkins Health Podcast HERE
• See the research on menopause HERE
• Do you have a burning question? Ask me HERE
• Check out The Body Composition Project HERE
• Check out my Women's Strength Nation YouTube channel HERE
• Find The Glutes Project HERE
• Transcripts can be found on the official blog page for this episode at hollyperkins.com/blog

Follow Me: 

Find me on Instagram: @hollyperkins

Learn more on my website: hollyperkins.com

Connect with me on Facebook: facebook.com/HollyPerkinsFitness/

Disclaimer: Content and information as part of The Holly Perkins Health Podcast is for general interest, education, and entertainment purposes only. The use of information on this podcast or materials or products linked from this podcast or website is at the user’s own risk. The content of this podcast is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Users should not disregard or delay in obtaining medical advice for any medical or mental health condition they may have and should seek the assistance of their health care professionals for any such conditions.

Muscle is medicine and is the solution to so many of your ailments, including arthritis, high body fat percentage and the frustrating symptoms of perimenopause and menopause. After 30 years in practice, I've narrowed my focus to helping women improve the quality and quantity of their lean muscle mass so they can eliminate uncomfortable symptoms and create a strong, lean body on all levels. Today, I'm answering your questions, so keep listening. Hello and welcome. If you are new around here, thanks for tuning in. I'm Holly, and I help women use strength training and intentional nutrition to create the body that you need to keep up with the life that you love. I am so excited for this episode of Ask Holly, where I will be answering some questions submitted on my website. If you have a question for me, come on over to Holly perkins.com forward slash, ask Holly and let me know, and then stay tuned for my answer in upcoming episodes.

So a while back, Oprah interviewed Cher and Tina Turner when they were 61 and 68 respectively, in a gesture to celebrate how fabulous they both were at those ages, the audience applauded in support, and then Oprah said, it's unbelievable. So how do you feel about getting older, as if it was a positive thing? And Cher paused, looked at Tina Turner and said, I think it sucks. And the audience erupted in laughter. And I did too, because so often we don't want to really belabor the labor of getting older. And if we're going to be real, real here, aging isn't for the faint of heart. And if we're going to be honest, I have to agree that it kind of stinks. It's okay to acknowledge that now that doesn't mean that we can't make the best of it, and it doesn't mean that life is a slow decline here on out, quite the opposite. I believe that there are really wonderful things that come as a result of life experience. And while you might be feeling your age, I bet if you looked closely, you'd agree that still, you're a better version of yourself as a result of your years on this earth. The good news is that I am here to prove to you that you can feel better now at every age, and you can improve your health so that you're biologically younger at whatever chronological age you're at, you can use strength training to reduce body fat and lose weight, if that's important for you, address arthritis and improve your body composition, even around perimenopause and menopause. In this episode, you'll learn what I suggest to address strength training and weight loss around perimenopause, what to do if you're at a healthy weight but you've got too much body fat, and how to improve glute strength and quality, even if you have arthritis. And guess what, I don't care how old or frustrated you feel right now, I promise it's possible to become better than ever. Every day, my clients and students are reducing body fat, improving muscle and eliminating aches pains and fatigue, and I know if they can do it, so can you, because there was a time when they were just like you. One thing to note is that I am not a doctor. If you didn't know, and any suggestions that I make today in response to the questions should not replace professional guidance. Please check with your doctor or trusted medical advisor before taking action on anything that I might suggest, and I'm going to do my best to give you some solutions. So let's get to the questions. Before I do I wanted to announce that there is another brand new round of the body composition project starting in September, the body composition project is my six week guided hands on coaching training program for women only, where I take a small group of women through a six month targeted strength training plan to help you become more muscle and less fat. If that's something that. Interested to learn more about please come over to Holly perkins.com forward slash body comp to either learn more or get on the wait list. That's Holly perkins.com forward slash body comp, B, O, D, y, C, O, M, P,all one word

The first question today comes from Patricia B and she asks, What's the best way to tackle strength training and weight loss around perimenopause? I love this question because strength training and the process of burning off extra body fat changes in the years before menopause. It really does. Your biology changes big time. In fact, according to the National Institutes on Aging and other relevant research that I've seen, the menopausal transition most often begins between the ages of 45 and 55 and it usually lasts about seven years, but it can last as long as 14 years, which has been the case for me personally, the biggest mistake that I see women make is to think that there's nothing they can do about the symptoms that come in those years between The early 40s and early 50s, as I often say, there are some women out there who sail through menopause without a single hot flash. It's true. And why is that? Well, the research says that it's related to lifestyle choices, your diet. Have you ever been a smoker? Do you exercise? Do you strength train? Is your body fat? High and lifestyle factors like those, also ethnicity and genetic predisposition, as each woman naturally produces a different amount of estrogen and testosterone, so when they start to fluctuate. Some of your symptoms really do depend on what's your starting point. So the good news Patricia is that there are ways to address weight loss during the perimenopausal years. And from my perspective, one of the most important things that you can do is strength train, because estrogen is beginning to decline and therefore causes an automatic increase in inflammation. Estrogen is an anti inflammatory. It is important to be intentional about strength training because it too causes an increase in inflammation. Now in this case, it's good inflammation, and it's ultimately going to be good for you in the long run, once your body recovers, but it's inflammation nonetheless. So your programming and protocol is very important. I've got three suggestions for addressing strength training and weight loss for you, number one, follow a progressive resistance program consistently, and this means getting your hands on a real program. This doesn't mean haphazardly putting together ideas and things that you've gotten off of social media. Get a professional program that very specifically focuses on progressive resistance, and this is one where you do the same workouts, the same protocol for at least 12 weeks, and focus on slowly increasing your weight loads over time. Each week, you want to do the same workouts so that your body becomes familiar with the stress from the workout and avoid workouts that are super intense. Number two, focus on lifting heavy. And now I know this is subjective. As I always say, heavy is relative. It's subjective to what that feels like to you in general. My definition of heavy is that whatever your strength training protocol is telling you for the number of repetitions, I believe 10 reps is that golden number. It's harder to build muscle with repetitions higher than that, because then you're not using a heavy enough weight load to really spark muscle growth. Lifting heavy is finding a weight load where your technique for the majority of your reps is really beautiful. You want near perfect technique for almost all of the reps in every single set, except for the last two to three reps, the last two to three reps of every single set. Of every single exercise should be so hard that you're starting to lose good technique. At the end of a set of 10 reps, you should say to yourself, I could not do more reps with good technique that is lifting heavy during this time in your life, it's even harder to build muscle. So you need a protocol that allows rest in between sets, so that you can work hard during the set, not the workout. And this is usually what we call a straight set protocol, where you do one set of an exercise so that it's at a hard intensity, as I just spelled out, rest for a certain period of time, repeat that same exercise, rest again, and then complete a third or more set of that same exact Exercise. This is a straight set protocol, and this is different than circuit training or a hit class, or any kind of workout where you keep moving instead you want your intensity to be intra set in the set. The set is the workout. The Workout is not the workout you want your heart rate to reduce during a time of rest, so that when you come back to your second or third or fourth set, you're recovered and you can lift heavier. The rest between exercises allows recovery so that you can lift as heavy as possible, so that you've got the energetic reserves to lift a heavier weight load on any given set. I'm not a fan of HIIT workouts or classes that intend to keep your heart rate up throughout the whole entire class, because the intensity limits your ability to focus on lifting heavy. So if you're working hard and expending energy in a workout so that your heart rate is elevated the whole time, you will not have the power or the energetic reserves to really dedicate enough force, enough energy to moving a heavier weight load so that it taxes your muscle, enough so that when you recover, it rebuilds and becomes stronger and hopefully also becomes bigger.

Regarding weight loss during this time Patricia, it's important to first have that strength training program as the foundation, because it really helps with overall biology in general. Strength training improves how your body manages carbohydrates, insulin and cortisol, and this means better blood sugar regulation, which is essential for weight loss. Once your strength training is in place and you're consistent, then all you have to do is simply reduce your calories by one or 200 calories per day, and then sit tight for two weeks, stay consistent if after two weeks, you don't feel any different, or don't experience any signs of leanness or the release of body fat, then you're going to reduce your calories again by 100 maybe 200 and wait for two weeks again. If you do this and you stay consistent. It works every time you do have to be conscious about your eating patterns, especially during weekdays versus weekends. If you're someone who tends to eat a bit more on the weekends, you'll need to eat a bit less during the week to compensate for that, we want to look at your total energy balance on a given week, not necessarily just day by day. And it really can be this simple, but it starts with that foundation of strength training, and that does the heavy lifting so that you can be in a mild calorie deficit that doesn't destabilize you too much or cause too much hunger or food cravings.

The second question today comes from Sarah G and she asks, I am five seven 130 pounds, but too much fat, like around 34% How Do I Get Lean? This is such a great question, because, as you see, Sarah's body weight is just fine. She is not overweight by anyone's definition. I see this a lot in my community. Some people call this skin. Skinny fat. You look thin. Your body weight is healthy, but if your body fat is above 30% we need to look a bit closer. If you've been around here for a while, you know that I am passionate about changing the conversation on body fat, and I believe that we should be focusing on lean muscle mass instead. Your first goal is to reach at least 70% lean muscle mass. In Sarah's case, she's currently around 66% lean muscle, and we need to get that percentage up. Sarah The great news is that you don't need to lose weight, and that is huge. But in order to optimize your health, reduce your risk of disease and improve your metabolic health overall, it's time that we get you up to that point where you're at least 70% lean muscle, hopefully better. Similar to the first question today, it's absolutely critical that you get on and stay on a muscle building program. We've got to get your muscle up so that it can help to improve your body fat percentage, I've found that it's way more productive to focus on building up muscle, rather than how do I get my fat down or putting you on a fat loss program, per se, especially if your body weight Is good which yours is. So for you, I recommend a two pronged approach. The first is to get consistent with both strength training and cardio workouts. Again, I find a straight set protocol with three or more strength workouts each week is best where each workout focuses on two to three muscle groups only. This is called a split training protocol. It should be a hypertrophy program that emphasizes muscle building. Now don't be afraid of bulking up. It takes a lot of effort and dedication and determination and years to really bulk up for any woman, especially if you're over the age of 30 or 35 In fact, I would actually challenge you to try and bulk up. And that is great advice for anyone listening today, if you think you're afraid of it, please just go try and if it happens, I will coach you for free and then help you release any of that muscle that you just happen to accumulate. It pretty much never happens. So go for it, and I want you to really focus on building muscle, then the right cardio programming will ensure that you also reduce body fat, so that the end result is that you're lean, but not necessarily heavier. The cardio also tends to offset your ability to build, quote, unquote, too much muscle. Listen, in my experience, it pretty much never happens in 30 years of coaching women, I've had one female client who was actually able to put muscle on easily in 30 years of coaching people, it rarely happens with women. Your cardio should be three dedicated cardio sessions per week where you get your heart rate between 70 and 75% of your theoretical maximum heart rate for about 30 minutes or so. I find this kind of moderate, steady state cardio really works great when it comes to managing body fat. You can also get in some low intensity steps each day, if you like. But to me, that's simply additional activity in the form of what we call neat non exercise activity time, and you can absolutely do that as that helps to improve glucose regulation, and it is separate and distinct from the dedicated cardio sessions that I just recommended.

The second prong here is to use nutrition specifically, very specifically, to improve blood glucose regulation, this is super key in improving fat burning, but also the release of any extra body fat. Now it's not about losing weight for you, but we do want your metabolism to use up and burn off some of that. Fat, extra body fat, and this isn't so much about a calorie deficit here. It's really about eating consistently every three to four hours, and then balancing your macronutrients at every meal and emphasizing high fiber, carbs and vegetables. This is what's going to stabilize your blood sugar so that you don't have to eat less your body will naturally, automatically start to manage your body fat. And while this might sound like simple advice, it's actually really powerful. If you improve the quality of your workouts to build muscle, then that will lead to a natural reduction in body fat without having to focus on losing fat specifically. I hope you can see how I'm being very specific and deliberate with my language. This isn't about losing fat shift the way you're looking at it, to building muscle and improving your body composition. And when you do that and stay consistent, your body fat is going to naturally come down. And can you see how the first two questions today are similar, and yet they're totally different in their focus for both I strongly encourage strength workouts to be the foundation. But then how you layer cardio and nutrition on top is actually quite different here, and it really can be this simple.

Onto the last question for this episode of Ask Holly. This one comes from Stephanie D, and she asks, How do I get stronger glutes if I have bone on bone, arthritis in my knees and arthritis in my lumbar lower back, and to that, I say, Ooh, Stephanie, it is all about building up the muscles around your points of arthritis, but first, Stephanie, please be sure to check with your doctor on the arthritis in your lumbar spine if it's mild and you're not in any pain, my suggestions could help, but please check in with your doctor before, especially if you're Dealing with any kind of acute issues or pain, these kind of questions are always a little tricky when I'm answering them publicly, because some of it really is dependent on where you are. I'm going to hope for the best and that you have been diagnosed with arthritis, but that it's not really, really limiting you from a pain perspective, the first thing to understand that I think is super important a lot of people don't get is that arthritis, by nature, is the result of weak muscles. Your muscles are the very thing that hold your joints in place. Your muscles hold you up in space, not your bones. You move about your life because your muscles push and pull on the bones. And there is movement where the bones articulate at a joint. That is so that you're bendy. That's so that your knees can bend, your hips can bend, your elbows, your shoulders, etc, but it's your muscles that are causing the movement, and it's your muscles that are directing the articulation of your joints. So when a muscle is weak, it causes a change in the alignment of its associated joint, and it tends to cause a change in alignment further up the chain, in this case, Stephanie, there's a good chance that your knee arthritis is because of weak glutes. So you're right on point, and wanting to improve your glute strength, your glutes are designed by nature to be the largest muscle group in your entire body. And in my experience, nine out of 10 clients that come to me and people I know are severely underserved in the glutes department, especially if you're a woman, most women tend to have weak or dysfunctional or underdeveloped glutes. Your glutes are directly responsible for the position of your pelvis, and your pelvis is the foundation to your spine. Weak glutes tend to cause an overly anteriorly rotated pelvis. This leads to a change in the muscles that directly impact your spine further up the chain, but also your knees down the chain and more specific. Basically those muscles are your adductors, your quadriceps, the muscles on the front of your thighs and your hamstrings, the muscles on the back of your thighs so weak glutes are directly related to problematic knees, even though you would never think of that because your knees are nowhere near your pelvis or your glutes. When I have a client with issues like yours, I have them first focus on single joint exercises to strengthen the glutes.

Now this is going to depend on your knee function as well as your lower back spinal function, and again, check with your doctor. But most people and almost all physical therapy protocols, start with things that are single joint exercises to really focus on activating the glutes and then strengthening them, things like hip extension with an ankle weight, where you've got an ankle weight around one ankle, and you are on one knee on an exercise bench, and you keep the opposite leg straight, and you're just extending that leg up back behind you into a hip extension movement really targets the glutes in a way that limits spinal flexion or extension, and it also doesn't involve the knee, but it's also strengthening the hamstrings that do influence the knee. I also love this exercise because it takes the quads out of the equation, and it can help to calibrate and balance any imbalance that's happening at the knee joint. I also love a side lying abduction again, putting an ankle weight around one ankle, let's say your right ankle, and then laying on your left side, keeping the hip and knee straight, you're going to lift your leg up towards the ceiling and bring it back down towards the ground. That's abduction. It's moving your leg and your thigh away from the midline of your body out to the side. And this really targets the glute medius muscle, which is what I often called the General Manager of the pelvis. It's the smallest of the glute muscles, but it's really impactful in terms of stabilizing the pelvis. And then lastly, I love really gentle, low weight leg curls to improve the hamstrings, second to weak glutes. I generally see a lot of weak hamstrings in my female clients. You can find video tutorials for all of these exercises over on my women's strength nation YouTube channel. Just search those exercises that I mentioned and you'll find the video tutorials. These are simple but powerful exercises to get you started strengthening your glutes so that your pelvis is more stable to support your spine. In general, you'll want to work around any exercises that cause pain if you're having it, but great glute strengthening exercises that are usually well tolerated. In addition to the ones that I just mentioned, are glute bridges from the floor, a lower weight load leg press, ensuring that you really got the right technique. So either scrutinize your technique and be committed to it, or work with someone who can check you. I love dumbbell Romanian deadlifts. Depending on that lumbar ability that you've gotten, any discomfort that you might have in your lower back, you may need to be careful with this movement. But this is also great because, again, it doesn't involve direct flexion and extension at the knee. And then the last exercise I love is a standing band hip extension to target the glutes again without involving the spine or the knees too much similar to the first two questions, I encourage you to get a glute focused strength training plan that is progressive that first starts with glute activation exercises. Depending on how deconditioned you are right now, or maybe you're in great shape, I don't know, but depending on where your starting fitness level is, you might need to first focus on glute activation to get those glutes firing before we can make them stronger.

Because the glutes are so influential in overall body mechanics as well as body composition, this is why I created my program, the glutes project, years ago. It's still one of my best selling programs, but. Because if we really focus on strengthening the glutes alongside all of your other major muscle groups in your body, it really impacts so much about how you move and how you feel. In particular the glutes project activate, which is a mini course specifically designed to activate your glutes using eight exercise, which I call the activate eight exercises for the glutes, would be a really great place to start. If you don't know where to start, you can find that on my website, Holly perkins.com or just reach out to me directly, and that is it for today's episode of Ask Holly. I love getting your questions. I love answering your questions. I hope that my suggestions today were helpful, and if you have a specific question and you want to hear my suggestions, come on over to Holly perkins.com, forward slash, ask Holly. Send me a note, and then stay tuned for future episodes. Listen, I know if you're a woman, there's a tendency to be stuck in your suffering. I think it's something that a lot of women have in common and that we share. We have such a tendency to think that if there's something that we don't like about our health or our body, we're stuck with it, and the truth is that is just not true. There is always something that you can do to improve any complaint that you have. I so encourage you to stay positive. Look for the solution, take action, and above all, please stay consistent and stay tuned for another brand new episode on Tuesday of next week. Stay strong, my friend.