Why Women Over 40 Need More Protein for Muscle and Fat Loss

Nikkiey: Real quick, the only ask I could ever have of you guys is to help spread the word so we can help more women lose body fat, build muscle, reach their goals and feel insanely confident. And the only way we can do that is if you rate, review and share this podcast. So the single thing I ask you to do is leave a review. It will take you 10 seconds, and it will mean the absolute world to me and may change the world of someone else.

Eating more protein helps with muscle development. It helps with fat loss. It helps if you're eating a high-protein protocol on a day-to-day basis. Like I said, it helps you to stay satiated longer. It helps you to reduce cravings.

Yo, yo, yo. What is going on, you guys? Welcome back to The WarriorBabe Show with Nikkiey Stott, co-founder of WarriorBabe. On this podcast, we talk about mindset, methodologies and tactics that will help you lose body fat, build muscle, be strong and feel insanely confident. I am your host, Nikkiey Stott, and welcome to today's episode, episode number 174. Holy moly, we're 26 episodes away from 200. That's crazy.

First of all, before we dive into the topic, I've got to give a huge shout-out to you guys, to you listeners. I appreciate the heck out of you. You guys are what help me go into filming these episodes, knowing that I'm helping you and serving you, and you're gaining something from these podcasts and doing something in your life that's going to make you better. It is one of my values, part of my mission, to leave people better than where I met them. Depending on where they may be, it may be emotionally, it may be strategically, it may be any which way.

So whenever I come to recording this podcast, I just think to myself, the only goal I have from this episode today is to help whoever is listening right now, wherever they are in their fitness journey, with whatever light bulb needs to go off or whatever piece of advice is going to move them forward in their day-to-day. You guys are what make me want to show up that way. I am so excited to record these podcasts, and I do it for you guys. I appreciate you so much for being a listener of this podcast.

We've reached 500,000 podcast downloads, and I'm going to share that soon. Just celebrating that and reading your testimonials, which I've been reading, and I freaking love them. It's so cool to hear your stories. Anyway, I just appreciate the heck out of you guys. So thank you so much.

Now, for today's episode, this topic has just been in my space. You guys know that whenever something is heavily in my space, I want to bring it to a podcast episode, because if it's heavily in my space, then more people are thinking about it, more people need to hear it, more people need to know it. And it's protein. It's getting deeper into understanding why protein is so important and why it plays a huge role in muscle development and fat loss. For women, whether you're 40, 45, 50, 55, 60, or 30, 35, 25, or 18, it plays a huge role in so many aspects.

What's crazy to me is that when I'm talking about this topic with people in my space right now, it confirms that people don't have enough knowledge about this macronutrient, because what I'm hearing is that people don't eat enough of it on a day-to-day basis.

I was sitting down with a friend for lunch the other day, and he was talking about his fiancée. She's running, she's doing marathons, which is so freaking awesome. Shout-out to you if you're listening. I wanted to take this to the podcast because I think other women need to hear it. She wants to get rid of the pooch in her stomach, right? And so do so many women, especially those doing activities like running and marathons, and people who are 45 and older and dealing with a menopot. That's the term being tossed around the fitness space for the belly that women start to get in their older years.

This topic came up, and he asked what's one thing she needs to do to get rid of that. And I said, outside of exercise, it's not doing more leg raises. It's not doing more ab workouts. While that's secondary, and yes, you should do that, it's not the primary focus of what you should be doing. It comes down to eating more protein.

So that's one topic that came up in my space. Another was talking with the coaching team and hearing how many women are eating only 20 to 40 grams of protein, or don't know how much protein they're actually eating in a day, and wondering why they're not getting the results they want. It's because their protein intake is not where it needs to be.

I feel this to my core, because this is something I struggled with at the beginning of my journey: figuring out what foods even have protein in them. I didn't know that I was supposed to be eating upwards of my body weight in protein. I had no idea. But protein is what I call the macronutrient. It's the most important of all the macronutrients, in my opinion, because it facilitates huge results.

So that's what I want to talk about today: sharing with you the role of protein in muscle development, the role of protein in fat loss, the role of protein in day-to-day life in curbing your cravings, and how it's going to help you see the results you want in your body composition, whether that's the little bit of stomach flap you want to get rid of, the more tone you want to see or the more energy you want to have.

I can confidently say this, and it's one of the things that came up at that lunch: it's not more exercise. It's not that you have to go do more running. It's not that you have to go do more strength training. It's not that you have to do more leg raises. It's not that you have to do more working out. It's that you have to pay attention to your nutrition, to what you're eating on a day-to-day basis.

I know I've drilled this in so many recent episodes and in previous episodes, of the 174 that I've recorded so far. What I can say confidently is that nutrition is king. Exercise is queen. Hand in hand, they're both important, but in my opinion, nutrition is hands down one of the most important pillars, and yet one of the hardest for someone to dedicate and commit themselves to and build better habits with. It's the pillar of going out to eat with friends and socializing. When people are bored, they eat. When people need to come up with plans, eating is the plan. There are events. There's so much that eating is a part of in our society.

But it is one of the most important things to grasp, understand and change when it comes to facilitating any result you want with your body composition, internally with your hormones, and so much more: building muscle, burning body fat, feeling better, sleeping better. It's just an important macronutrient. God, I say that through and through and all the time.

Like I've said on podcasts before, it's an epidemic within the fitness space, the amount women are consuming on a day-to-day basis. I believe I talked about this in the episode with Esther Blum, where she talked about how people consume 20, 40, 60 grams of protein on a day-to-day basis. That is similar to what a dialysis patient consumes on a day-to-day basis.

Ladies, are you feeling frustrated with body changes you're experiencing during menopause? It's time to take control. If you're between 45 and 65 years old and tired of struggling with body fat and muscle loss, WarriorBabe is here for you. At WarriorBabe, we've helped over 18,000 women just like you lose body fat, build toned muscle and understand their bodies better with personalized plans based on hormone and thyroid testing and more. Imagine knowing exactly what your body needs to see real results, and results that last. Don't wait anymore. Take charge of your health and join our community of strong, empowered women. Visit warriorbabe.com/apply today to start your transformation. That's warriorbabe.com/apply. All right, let's get back to the show.

Ladies, are you feeling frustrated with body changes you're experiencing during menopause? It's time to take control. If you're between 45 and 65 years old and tired of struggling with body fat and muscle loss, WarriorBabe is here for you. At WarriorBabe, we've helped over 18,000 women just like you lose body fat, build toned muscle and understand their bodies better with personalized plans based on hormone and thyroid testing and more. Imagine knowing exactly what your body needs to see real results, and results that last. Don't wait anymore. Take charge of your health and join our community of strong, empowered women. Visit warriorbabe.com/apply today to start your transformation. That's warriorbabe.com/apply. All right, let's get back to the show.

To dive in a little more and get into the episode, because I feel like I'm going on a rant right now, and thanks for sticking with me, I'm going to get to the points I want to share. I want to drive it home if that's you: you're struggling, it's hard to get it in, and you know protein is something you need to work on. I'm going to drill in why it's so freaking important and why it could be the missing link. You don't necessarily need to go do more exercise. You just need to adjust the nutrition aspect of your journey, and it could be an absolute game changer for you.

I know that because over 18,000 women have been inside WarriorBabe. I've personally had a hand on all of those babes, because they've watched videos of me and gone through the education, and our coaches have coached the majority of the 2,000 babes inside our VIP program. So I can say confidently that people usually lean on thinking they need to do more exercise. Then once we pull back on the exercise pillar, actually do less of it, and focus more on getting nutrition right, that's where the majority of the changes start to happen.

As we get older, hormonal changes are happening regardless of age, even at 18 while you're growing up, but more women experience it when they're 45 to 55 and going through menopause. There's a natural decline at that age in muscle mass and in your metabolic rate. When you understand the importance of protein intake and implement strategies to optimize it and eat more of it throughout the day, that can effectively support muscle growth, enhance fat loss and help level out imbalances you may be experiencing with the hormonal changes you're feeling.

If you're going through menopause and experiencing hot flashes and night sweats, yes, that's part of the hormonal shifts that are inevitably going to happen. But if your daily nutritional intake is balanced and you're eating enough of the right macronutrients, one being protein, you're going to see fewer of the symptoms you would experience with menopause.

So, broadly speaking, why is protein so important? One, it's a building block of muscle. It provides the necessary amino acids to repair and grow muscle mass. As women age, the body becomes less efficient at utilizing protein, making it vital to get an adequate intake on a day-to-day basis to achieve the results you're seeking.

Consuming enough protein can help preserve the existing muscle mass on your body, prevent muscle breakdown and support the development of new muscle tissue. If you're not consuming enough protein day to day, and you're one of the women I'm speaking to on this podcast, you will see more of a decline in your existing muscle mass.

Why do you think people get weaker as they get older? They're not eating enough nutrients day to day to facilitate a strong body. As people age, they eat less. And there are so many nutrients in protein, fats, carbs and whole foods that give the body what it needs to be strong, without getting too science-y, down to the cellular processes, the organs, the muscle tissue, the hormones, everything.

When I used to work in the ER and saw anybody come in whose health was declining, one of the things I was always curious about was what they were eating day to day and how they were eating. And 90% of the time they were eating one meal a day, and that one meal was fats and carbs. They weren't eating enough in general to maintain a strong, thriving body.

Another important thing about protein, secondary to preserving lean muscle and building new muscle tissue, is that it has a thermic effect. That means when you're digesting protein, you're also burning calories. I forget the exact stat, but that should be selling point enough for you to want to eat more protein, because you're burning calories as you digest it.

Another thing: think about the end of the day. This is you. You're like, man, I'm hungry, I want to snack. Most likely, 90% of the time, that's because you didn't have enough protein throughout the day to balance your insulin levels, curb your cravings and keep you satiated and fuller for longer. That's why at the end of the night, those of you who find yourselves snacking on the couch, watching Netflix, bored and hungry, it's because you didn't give your body what it needed throughout the rest of the day, and that's protein.

Protein is huge in helping you feel fuller for longer and keeping you satiated. When you have a meal and you put 20 to 30 grams of protein in it, you're not going to find yourself wanting to keep snacking afterward. Compare that to a carb-heavy meal, which isn't going to make you feel fuller. With a carb-heavy meal, whether it's a whole carb or a simple carb, you're going to have a bit of an insulin spike. If it's a simple carb, you're going to have a huge insulin spike, which is going to make you want to eat more.

All in all, it's so freaking important. I'm going to talk at the end about the protein amount I'd recommend. I've mentioned it numerous times in previous episodes, but I believe in repetition. I believe in repeating myself over and over until what I'm saying lands with an individual. Like I've said before, you could listen to my podcast over and over, but it might not be until the sixth month that something I said in episode 70 resonates with you. So I'm always going to repeat myself. You're going to hear what I think is important over and over again.

In terms of the role protein plays when you're looking to develop muscle: a lot of people, as I said at the beginning, are working out, strength training, running, doing some type of physical activity, but the majority of you aren't doing it with enough protein. The key is that when you do have enough protein, your training stimulates muscle growth and breaks down muscle fibers, and when you have protein either pre- or post-workout, you're giving your body the amino acids it needs to repair and rebuild those fibers.

I always say this: in the gym, you're breaking down the muscle. Post-workout, in the 24 to 48 hours outside the gym, what you eat truly freaking matters, along with how you sleep, how you hydrate and all the things. But what you eat, aka getting enough protein post-workout, is so necessary to give your body the nutrients it needs to repair and rebuild the fibers you just broke down during your session. If you're not consuming the protein your body composition needs day to day, that's not going to happen, and you're probably only accomplishing maybe 20 to 30% of the results you think you're getting from a workout.

If that made sense: if you're doing a workout but not giving yourself the nutrition you need to build the body you want, then every single time you work out, you're working out at about 40 to 50% of your true potential. Think of it like that. I hope that nails it home.

Regardless of whether it's protein or carbs and fats, if you're religious about working out and doing four to five training sessions a week, but you're not consistently following through with your nutrition, which again is the hardest thing for people to do, you won't get there. I think I recorded a podcast early on about why people can't stick to a nutritional protocol and why it's so hard. I did research on that and found studies on why it's so hard for people to follow through. Think about it: if it were so easy, everybody would be doing it. Everybody would be walking around with goddess bodies, looking amazing and feeling so good. But it's one of the hardest things to do. Trust that if you put your mind to it and you're dedicated, you will be able to follow through and get the results you want.

Hey, I just want to drop a huge appreciation to you guys listening to the show. It means a lot. I hope you're enjoying it, and there's so much more to come. If you are enjoying it, hit the subscribe button. I'd appreciate that tons, and it would help this podcast reach others who need to hear these messages too. Thanks so much, guys. Let's get back to the show.

So that's how it pertains to muscle development. Making sure you give your body a sufficient amount of protein grams per day is going to stimulate muscle growth and promote muscle breakdown, so that afterward you have enough protein to repair and rebuild those muscle fibers. I could dive into protein synthesis, and that's essentially what I'm talking about here. There are other episodes on that. But protein makes sure protein synthesis is happening in your body, and it's the building block of building more muscle.

When you build more muscle, you're going to look more toned. That's the toned word. It's having more muscle mass on your body and decreasing the body fat around it. I've talked about the difference between weight loss and fat loss. Maybe I need to bring that back. When you're eating enough protein, you're preserving the lean muscle mass you already have and giving yourself the ability to build more. Then you focus on a protocol for losing body fat, not just weight loss, because with weight loss you're losing a little bit of everything. You're losing muscle mass in that process, and a lot of it. When you're decreasing body fat, you will lose a little bit of muscle mass, but not nearly as much as when you just focus on weight loss. So you're preserving the lean muscle mass and decreasing the body fat around that muscle, and that is what makes you look more toned. But in order to be more toned, you have to build more muscle. And in order to build more muscle, you have to eat the right amount of protein for you on a daily basis.

When it comes to fat loss, protein requires more energy for digestion and absorption compared to the carbohydrates and fats you eat daily. As I mentioned, this is known as the thermic effect of food. It results in increased calorie expenditure and boosts your metabolism when you consume more protein day to day. So when you eat more protein, you increase your ability to burn calories, you increase your calorie expenditure and you rev up your metabolism just by consuming protein.

At the same time, you're preserving lean muscle. When you preserve lean muscle and build more of it, you naturally increase your BMR, so you burn more calories even at rest. So the more muscle you have on your body, which again comes from eating more protein, the more calories you burn at rest and the more you naturally increase your basal metabolic rate. I don't know exactly what mine was when I first started my fitness journey, because it wasn't a metric I honed in on.

To plug in really quickly: your metabolic rate decreases as you age. So if you're proactive in the sense that you're strength training, building more muscle and eating the protein you need, you can almost counteract that process, because the more muscle mass you have, the more it naturally increases your BMR. As you age, your BMR decreases, so if you're naturally increasing your BMR, that helps the metabolic processes stay in a good state, where your metabolism is trained and knows what it needs to do to lose body fat.

Without getting too high-level, I'm hoping I'm saying this in terms that are easy to understand. Those are the ways eating more protein helps with muscle development. It helps with fat loss. It helps if you're eating a high-protein protocol day to day. Like I said, it helps you stay satiated longer. It helps you reduce cravings. So it supports overall calorie control and management throughout the day. Whereas if you're not eating the protein your specific body needs, that's when you'll have cravings and want to eat whatever you want at the end of the day. That's where you can get into territory you don't want to be in when you want results with your body composition, because it can easily throw you over your calorie requirement for the day.

So here are some recommendations you can take with you from this podcast. Obviously, you need to eat more protein. Here's what I'd suggest, and it's what we do for all our WarriorBabes when they first join our program. You probably have no idea how much protein you're eating right now, and that's okay. That's normal. The key is finding out how much protein you're eating and adjusting from there.

So just pay attention to how you normally eat for seven days and log it in MyFitnessPal. This is where you need to start taking it seriously, because the only way you're going to get the results you want is by changing what you're doing now. The first step is awareness, and the second step is taking action on the process. So download MyFitnessPal. You can use the free version. Log the food you consume for the next seven days as you normally would. Don't try to do anything different. Don't start trying to eat more protein. Just log as you normally would, because that's going to give you a true, honest baseline.

After seven days, look at the average in MyFitnessPal, and you'll be like, wow. It will be entirely eye-opening, entirely shocking. I guarantee it. You'll be able to see, okay, I'm only at an average of 60 grams of protein a day. Maybe you're at 80. You're definitely under 100, I can say that. For those of you who are above, that's freaking awesome. Now you just need to get to your body weight. But for those of you under 100, make it a goal to get to 100 grams of protein a day.

What I would recommend is that you get to your body weight. That can be your North Star. But it's going to feel overwhelming at first to try to go from 60 grams to, say, 160 grams. That's not ideal. And if you're 250 pounds, you wouldn't be eating 250 grams of protein. You would base it on your ideal body weight and eat that amount of protein per day.

But anyway, aim for 100. And then don't move. Don't go up in grams until you hit 100 consistently for at least 7 to 14 days. Then you can talk about moving it up, getting to your body weight and going from there. But you have to consistently follow through. You can't do two days of eating 100 grams of protein and then try to bump it up, because you're going to do it too fast. Also, consuming more protein could disrupt your digestive tract a little, and that's normal because your body just isn't used to it. You may get what people call protein farts. That's totally normal.

So do that. Find out where you're at right now. Bring awareness to how much you're consuming each day. Then make it a priority to get yourself to 100, and make that a goal. That's a short-term goal. You should be able to do that within another seven days or so. Then follow that for 7 to 14 days and go from there.

Or join WarriorBabe so you don't have to think about this. We can help you get to these goals by working with a coach one-on-one. She can give you the protocol, and all you have to do is follow it. That way you don't have to think about it or overthink it, which a lot of people do, or get in your own way and not actually do it. That's what a coach is for. She's going to hold your hand, guide you and support you along the way, call you out wherever you need it and celebrate you wherever you need it. Okay? The link is warriorbabe.com/apply.

To wrap this up: protein is so freaking important, my friends. It is so important. Most of the time right now I'm intuitively eating, because I've gone through the macronutrient world, which I praise, and I want you guys to get macros down as a foundation, because it will serve you for the rest of your life with eating and nutrition and all the things. But if I'm going through a hectic day of meetings and I wasn't able to eat everything I need to eat, I will just slam protein. No questions asked.

I hope that helped you focus on your protein. Get more protein. It's so key and so crucial for muscle development, which is what you need in order to look more toned, change the way your body composition looks, facilitate fat loss and do it in a way that's enjoyable. All right? I hope you enjoyed this podcast. Appreciate y'all. See you in the next one. Peace out.

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