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Managing body weight once you are over 40 has new challenges

Updated: Jun 26, 2024

If you are over 40 and your weight is stable then don't be too smug. During our 30s our muscles start to waste or shrink (called sarcopenia) This means if you are not doing resistance exercise and your weight is stable then you are probably losing muscle and gaining fat. This is a disastrous picture from a metabolic health standpoint.


A recent study titled "The paradox of obesity with normal weight" highlighted this point. Of the 3000 people studied around 1000 people had 'normal BMI'. When they did proper body composition scans of these people they found 26% of the men and 38% of the women had excess fat.



In other words, people who were 'a healthy weight' according to normal medical standards were overweight or, in the words of the study, 'metabolically obese'!


Interestingly, the study showed that waist circumference was unlikely to pick up the metabolically obese men. Blood tests markers (triglycerides and LDL cholesterol) were the best identifiers. Waist circumference didn't give much away.


What's the learning from this?


1. No change in weight after age 40 is not a good thing (unless you are doing resistance exercise regularly).


2. Bathroom scales are useless for measuring health in around 30% of us. Scales are great for population based research and medical settings, but for personal health (n=1) they are NOT useful. You can read more about other options for tracking your 'weight' here.


3. If you are a man please go and get some blood tests - if your triglycerides are over 1.2mmol/L or your LDL is raised then please come and see me. (And - per this study - don't rely on your waist circumference being <102cm to confirm good health).




Lahav, Y., Kfir, A., & Gepner, Y. (2023). The paradox of obesity with normal weight; a cross-sectional study. Frontiers in nutrition, 10, 1173488. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnut.2023.1173488

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