Fasting Over 40 Be Like: I’m Doing What I Used to Do. Where Are the Results?!

Then you stopped fasting.

Because… life.

But lately you haven’t been feeling like yourself. Maybe your favourite jeans are suddenly requiring negotiations. You couldn’t say no to those office donuts if your life depended on it. “Damn you, Susan!” So you think, I know what works. I’ll start fasting again.

Except this time…

Nothing.

Or at least, you’re not getting the results you remember getting before.

WTF happened?

Before you respond by fasting longer, eating less and adding another workout, let’s look at what might actually be going on.

1. Your old version of fasting may have been a starvation diet in disguise

Let’s be honest about this one.

Sometimes when people tell me how amazing intermittent fasting worked for them before, what they describe sounds less like a sustainable fasting practice and more like…

“I barely ate.”

You skipped breakfast. Had a tiny lunch. Ate a no carb dinner. Of course the scale moved. You were eating a lot less.

But aggressive diets tend to have an obvious problem: they end. You go back to eating more, the weight comes back, and eventually you’re back trying to lose it again.

So let’s say you really are eating just as little this time. Why might the scale still be moving more slowly than it did years ago?

Because your energy needs may be lower now. If you’ve lost muscle over the years, your body generally needs fewer calories. If you’re moving less throughout the day, you’re burning less too. Even dieting itself can temporarily reduce energy expenditure, including some of that unconscious everyday movement known as NEAT.

So the same 1,500 calories that created a big deficit years ago may create a much smaller one now. You’re still eating less. You’re just not necessarily creating the same deficit you did before.

That doesn’t mean eating less somehow prevents weight loss. It means endlessly returning to the same aggressive diet and expecting the same result may not be the best strategy anymore.

2. Perimenopause has entered the chat

Hormonal changes during the menopausal transition can change body composition and where you store fat, particularly around your middle.

That doesn’t mean hormones have sentenced you to a spare tire for life. Women get stronger, leaner and healthier in their 40s, 50s and beyond.

But hormones are part of the picture now, and pretending they aren’t isn’t helpful either.

3. You’re exhausted and stressed out of your mind

Sleep and stress aren’t sexy answers.

Nobody wants to hear:

“Have you tried going to bed earlier?”

when what they really want is the secret fasting window that melts belly fat.

But they matter.

Poor sleep can affect hunger, appetite and food choices. Stress can affect eating behaviour, sleep, activity and how much mental energy you have left for healthy habits.

Sometimes it’s also much less complicated than we make it. You’re exhausted, you don’t feel like training or cooking, and the cookies require zero preparation.

And now you’re trying to white-knuckle an 18-hour fast on top of everything else.

Extending it to 20 hours may not be the brilliant solution you were hoping for.

Sometimes fasting isn’t the first thing I’d work on.

4. You’re obsessed with when you’re eating and ignoring what’s happening when you actually eat

I love fasting.

Obviously. It’s literally in the name.

But fasting doesn’t give you immunity from everything else we know about nutrition.

You can fast for 16 hours and still eat more energy than your body needs.

You can also eat far too little, spend the entire afternoon thinking about food and eventually find yourself standing in the kitchen eating everything that isn’t nailed down.

Neither is particularly helpful.

What you eat and how much you eat still matter. So do protein, nutrients and portions.

Fasting is a tool. It isn’t a hall pass that makes everything happening inside your eating window irrelevant.

5. You work out, but are you actually moving?

You might still go to the gym three times a week and think, I’m just as active as I used to be.

Maybe.

But what does the rest of your week look like?

• Maybe you used to walk everywhere and now you drive.
• Maybe your old job had you on your feet all day and now you’re sitting in meetings.
• Maybe you used to take the stairs, run errands on foot and generally move around more without ever calling it “exercise.”

Formal workouts matter, especially resistance training as we get older.

But so does all the boring, unsexy movement you do throughout the rest of your day.

6. There may actually be something else going on

Not every plateau is a mindset problem.

And not every answer is try harder.

Certain medications and health conditions can affect appetite, body weight or energy expenditure. Perimenopause may be part of what’s changing for you. Conditions such as hypothyroidism or PCOS can also affect weight regulation.

So if you’re consistently doing the things that should reasonably be moving you toward your goal and nothing is changing, especially if you’re also experiencing new or unexplained symptoms, don’t respond by immediately eating less and fasting longer.

Talk to an appropriate healthcare professional and find out whether there’s something else worth investigating.

That’s not giving up.

That’s being smart.

Okay, so what do I do now?

Before you turn your 16-hour fast into an 18-hour fast, cut another 500 calories and add six days of cardio because apparently we’re choosing violence, try looking at the whole picture.

• Look at what you’re actually eating. Are you getting enough protein and nutrients? Are your portions appropriate for your goals? Are you eating very little all week and then making up for it on the weekend without realizing it?
• Reassess your fasting window. The fasting schedule that worked five years ago doesn’t get lifetime membership. Shorten it, change it or take a break from fasting altogether if that’s what makes sense right now.
• Stop treating hunger like a character flaw. If you’re constantly ravenous, that’s information. Look at what you’re eating, how much you’re eating, your sleep, your activity and whether your current fasting schedule is helping or making everything harder.
• Lift weights. Resistance training becomes increasingly important as we age because maintaining muscle matters for strength, function and body composition.
• Move outside the gym. Walk. Take the stairs. Get outside. Pace around while you’re on the phone. Your workouts aren’t the only movement that counts.
• Take your sleep seriously. If you’re regularly surviving on five hours, I’d rather look at that than immediately add another two hours to your fast.
• Look at your stress load. If life is already asking everything from you, adding more rules isn’t always the answer.
• Stop trying to recreate your old diet. Your goal isn’t to reproduce exactly what made the scale move fastest ten years ago. It’s to find what supports your health and goals now.
• Look beyond the scale. Pay attention to your waist measurements, strength, energy, hunger, sleep, how your clothes fit and how you actually feel.
• Consider whether fasting is even the right tool right now. Yes, I’m a fasting coach telling you that sometimes the answer is don’t fast. You can work on nutrition, protein, movement, sleep and your overall health without a fasting window.
• Get medical input when something doesn’t add up. If you’re doing the work and your body is giving you signals you don’t understand, investigate rather than punish.

If you aren’t seeing results with fasting, it doesn’t necessarily mean you need to be more aggressive with your routine.

Your body may be different. Your lifestyle may be different. Your sleep, stress, activity, hormones, eating habits or relationship with dieting may be different.

So instead of asking: “How do I make my old plan work again?”

Ask, “What does my body and my life need from me now?”

That’s a much better place to start.