Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Summary
On episode 677 of 40+ Fitness, Coach Allan sits down with Cara Metz, who hosts a widely followed account for perimenopause and menopause fitness on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. A 30-year veteran of the fitness industry who began her career as a professional Latin American and ballroom dancer, Cara is the creator of the Cara Fitness app for women over 40 and the author of The Menopause Metabolism Fix.
Cara breaks down why stress and sugar become so much more consequential once estrogen production from the ovaries declines. Your adrenal glands try to step in as a backup source of estrogen, but chronic stress floods the body with cortisol and adrenaline instead, and the body responds by storing fat around the belly, which can also produce estrogen. She walks through her top six menopause symptoms and why simply cutting calories to extreme lows backfires at this stage of life.
The conversation covers practical, sustainable steps: whole foods over packaged ones, protein and fiber, the 80/20 approach to eating, and short, consistent 15-minute workouts that people can actually stick with for years.
Links
- https://www.instagram.com/carametz_
- https://carafitness.co.uk
Key Takeaways
- When ovarian estrogen declines, the adrenal glands try to step in as a backup source, but stress sabotages that plan. Cara calls ovarian estrogen “Plan A,” which naturally fades with age, and adrenal-produced estrogen “Plan B.” Chronic stress causes the adrenal glands to pump out cortisol and adrenaline instead, crowding out the estrogen production the body was trying to provide.
- Belly fat during menopause is partly the body’s own workaround for lost estrogen. Fat cells can produce estrogen, so when stress blocks the adrenal backup supply, the body stores fat around the midsection as another source. This is a physiological response, not simply a matter of willpower or eating too much.
- Sugar spikes and crashes trigger the same stress-hormone cascade as chronic stress does. A blood sugar crash prompts the body to release cortisol and adrenaline for quick energy, which is why limiting added sugar matters just as much as managing stress for regulating hormones during this transition.
- Cara’s top six menopause symptoms are belly fat, hot flashes, brain fog, anxiety and overwhelm, sleep disturbances, and low libido. She built a symptom quiz because many women, including herself, do not recognize what they are experiencing as menopause if they never get hot flashes. Her own wake-up call was brain fog and disrupted sleep, which she initially feared was early dementia.
- Cutting calories to extremely low levels does not work for midlife weight and can make things worse. Cara tried the high-cardio, very-low-calorie approach on herself as a fitness professional in her mid-40s and saw no results. Visceral fat responds to food quality, not just calorie counting, so she focuses clients on whole foods, adequate protein, complex carbohydrates, and reducing processed food and inflammation instead.
- The 80/20 rule replaces deprivation with sustainable balance. Eighty percent of the time you eat, move, manage stress, and sleep in ways that serve you, and the other 20 percent leaves room for wine, cake, or a meal out without guilt. Cara argues this mindset actually produces better choices than an all-or-nothing approach.
- Hot flashes are driven by the hypothalamus, the body’s internal thermostat, going haywire from hormone fluctuation. Keeping a food and mood journal can help identify personal triggers like spicy food, caffeine, or stress, even though the underlying cause is hormonal rather than something within full personal control.
- Fifteen minutes a day works because it is sustainable, not because it is the physiologically ideal dose. Cara has run her own 15-minute daily workouts for 15 to 16 years and argues that consistency beats intensity: an hour five days a week sounds better on paper, but most people abandon it by week three when life gets in the way.
- Cara’s three strategies to get and stay well: set small, specific weekly goals instead of one big overwhelming target; build non-negotiables into your schedule, like a daily 15-minute workout or morning coffee ritual, that happen no matter what; and live by the 80/20 rule while refusing to beat yourself up over the days that do not go to plan.
“You’ve got to eat well, you gotta get your sleep, you gotta bring your stress down. It’s not actually rocket science.”
Cara Metz
Another Episode You May Enjoy
Episode 687 – How to menopause with Tamsen Fadal
Episode Notes
Podcast: 40+ Fitness
Episode: 677
Published: 2025-01-14
Host: Allan Misner (aka Coach Allan), author of The Wellness Roadmap
Guest(s): Cara Metz, author of The Menopause Metabolism Fix
Listen & Subscribe: Apple Podcasts · Spotify · YouTube (audio only)