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Summary
On episode 575 of 40+ Fitness, Coach Allan sits down with Gabrielle O’Hare, a personal trainer who retrained after being laid off just before the COVID lockdowns and now coaches women over 40 through weight loss, to discuss her book Why Women Over 40 Can’t Lose Weight.
Gabrielle argues the real barrier isn’t willpower, it’s six overlapping blockers, self-neglect, stress, menopause, emotional eating, sabotage from friends and family, and constant exposure to engineered ultra-processed food, that build up gradually until women feel like they’re failing alone, when in fact almost everyone hits the same wall.
The conversation covers why self-neglect is usually the biggest driver, how menopause reroutes estrogen production toward fat cells and stress hormones, why a “priority mindset” has to come before any diet change sticks, and a calorie-free way to eat built around whole food, protein, and spacing meals four to five hours apart.
Links
- https://gabrielleohare.com
Key Takeaways
- Six blockers keep women over 40 from losing weight. Self-neglect, stress, menopause-driven hormone shifts, emotional eating, sabotage, and constant exposure to engineered processed food combine to make weight loss far harder than “eat less, move more” accounts for.
- Self-neglect is usually the biggest one, and it’s learned, not a personal failing. Years of prioritizing kids, career, and parents train women to grab whatever food is available in the moment rather than what actually serves their health.
- Menopause reroutes where estrogen comes from, and stress hijacks that process. As the ovaries produce less estrogen, the body increasingly relies on fat cells and the adrenal glands to make it, but the adrenals default to producing stress hormones when you’re stressed, which indirectly encourages more fat storage, especially around the waist.
- Change starts with a “priority mindset,” not a new diet. Deciding you are your own priority the same absolute way you’d decide to get married or buy a house, rather than treating your health as a nice-to-have that gets bumped by everyone else’s needs, is what actually makes a plan stick.
- Ultra-processed food is engineered to make you eat more of it. It’s often low in protein and nutrients but high in calories and hyper-palatable, so the body keeps signaling “eat more” because it isn’t getting the nutrients it needs, even as calorie intake climbs.
- A calorie-free approach that works: whole food, protein, and spacing. Build meals around protein, vegetables, and healthy fat, cut empty carbs like bread, pasta, rice, and potatoes, and leave four to five hours between three meals so the body has time to dip into fat stores instead of constantly topping up.
- Your actions, not your stated intentions, reveal your real priorities. If you’re not doing the workout or making the healthier meal, health isn’t actually the priority yet, no matter what you say out loud.
- Gabrielle’s three strategies to get and stay well: align your health and fitness goals with what actually makes you happy instead of treating them purely as weight-loss tools; free up mental space by getting food out of your head, out of the constant negotiation of cravings and guilt; and learn to love and accept yourself as you are now instead of waiting for a future body to feel worthy.
“The game changer for anyone who’s tired and struggling is more energy, not a smaller waist.”
Gabrielle O’Hare
Another Episode You May Enjoy
Episode 597 – The five keys to sustainable weight loss over 40
Episode Notes
Podcast: 40+ Fitness
Episode: 575
Published: 2023-01-31
Host: Allan Misner (aka Coach Allan), author of The Wellness Roadmap
Guest(s): Gabrielle O’Hare, our co-host, Coach Rachel, Why Women Over 40 Can’t Lose Weight
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