.jpg)
Human movement is the fundamental of all human function. From the moment we wake up to when we go to sleep our body is moving. However, basic human movement has become a low priority in a busy schedule.
Sadly, aging impacts our ability to retain muscle mass, bone mass, and hormone declines. This coupled with the impact of menopause can lead to health-related issues which can impair our quality of life.
That is why today we are going to discuss the menopause workout plan. We cover how changing hormone levels affect the body, and how exercise can help.
We also provide a weekly workout plan to help you reinforce bones, strengthen muscles, improve function, and reduce menopause symptoms.
The Importance of Exercise During Menopause
Menopause is a natural condition where the body permanently ends the menstrual cycle due to the cessation of reproductive hormone production. This is identified when we have not had our period for 12 consecutive months. This occurs between the ages 45 and 56 years, with many women experiencing perimenopause (the period before menopause) 40s and sometimes as young as 35.
As we enter menopause, reproductive hormones estrogen and progesterone fluctuate and gradually decline. This results in many symptoms that can impair our sleep, appetite, mood, and quality of life.
Common menopause symptoms include:
- Night Sweats
- Hot Flashes
- Sleep Disruption/Insomnia
- Increase Appetite
- Weight Gain
- Mood Change
- Anxiety/Depression
- Decrease Bone Density
- Increased Inflammation
- Increase Risk of Chronic Illness
- Impaired Cognitive Function
- Fatigue
- Brain Fog
Menopause interventions and treatments range from adjusting nutrition to hormone replacement therapy. However, few interventions have a positive impact on our body like exercise.
Exercise has far-reaching positive impacts on the body. Besides the obvious positive impact on improving our muscle mass, strength, and cardiovascular fitness, it has also been shown to improve mood and cognitive function.
But what is truly remarkable is the ability to delay the onset of 40 chronic health conditions and diseases.
Exercise is the closest thing we have to the fountain of youth, with many of its effects capable of boosting our health and decreasing the severity of menopause symptoms.
Menopause Workout Plan
The benefits of exercise are well established, enabling us to manage our weight and regain control of our quality of life during menopause. Below we have created a weekly workout, to ensure you are covering areas of strength, mobility, and aerobic fitness.
Below we will display the exercises, sets, reps, rest times, and a weekly schedule to help you set up your routine.
Each week will contain two resistance training workouts. This will increase your weight training volume, increasing muscle growth, strength, and function.
Cardio sessions are to be performed twice weekly, alongside one core, mobility, and flexibility session. This is followed by active recovery and a day of complete rest on the weekend.
Weekly Schedule
Monday (Day 1): Full-Body Strength Training (Duration 40–45 Minutes)
Warm-Up
Full-Body Strength Training
Tuesday (Day 2): Flexibility, Mobility and Core Workout (Duration 25–35 Minutes)
Warm-Up
Flexibility & Mobility
Core
Wednesday (Day 3): Cardio Workout (Duration 45 Minutes)
ExerciseSetsRepsRest TimesWarm-Up (Treadmill, bike, elliptical)15 minutes•Cardio (Treadmill Level 7)135 Minutes•Cool-Down (Treadmill, bike, elliptical)15 minutes•
Thursday (Day 4): Full-Body Strength Training (Duration 40–45 Minutes)
Warm-Up
Full-Body Strength Training
Friday (Day 5): Cardio Workout (Duration 40–45 Minutes)
Day 6: Active Recovery (Duration 45 Minutes)
Day 7: Rest and Recovery
Top 8 Benefits of Exercise During Menopause
Exercise has a positive impact on our health, which can be particularly helpful during menopause. Below is a list of benefits of exercise during menopause.
1. Strengthen Muscle Mass
Exercise is excellent for increasing muscle mass and strength. During menopause, the decrease in the reproductive hormone estrogen can lead to a decrease in muscle quality and strength.
Typically age-related muscle loss, also known as sarcopenia affects, 5-13% of people 60 years and older, increasing with age. However, due to the decrease of estrogen, women are susceptible to experiencing it much earlier, between the ages of 45 to 56.
Sarcopenia is characterized by muscular weakness, and poor muscle quality is associated with frailty. This can lead to frailty, disability, and loss of independence. This is exacerbated in inactive adults who experience a 3% to 8% loss of muscle per decade.
Fortunately, we have exercise that allows us to strengthen muscle tissue, improve muscle quality, and enhance strength. Resistance training using body weight, free weights, or machines can help us maintain muscle mass, and increase strength.
By performing regular weight training sessions, two to three times per week, we can reduce the risk of age and menopause-related muscle loss.
2. Maintains Bone Health
Exercise is a powerful tool for maintaining bone mineral density. As our estrogen levels decline, our bone mass decreases, increasing the risk of osteoporosis. Affecting 1 in 3 women, this is the weakening of bones which increases the risk of fractures, amounting to more than 8.9 million fractures annually.
Mechanical stress is one of the biggest determinants of your bone health, which comes from gravity and muscular contractions. Daily movements such as walking, standing, running, and lifting support bone health as our muscles contract to move against gravity to perform each movement.
Resistance training is also fantastic for applying mechanical stress to bone as it allows us to apply significant loads from a variety of directions.
Exercise routines consisting of walking, running, swimming, and resistance training are all excellent for improving bone health.
3. Manages Weight
Exercise is essential for managing our weight and appetite during menopause. During the menopause transition, we can experience an increased appetite, potentially due to the increase of hunger hormone level ghrelin, which also increases with poor sleep. This is exacerbated by the decrease in energy expenditure postmenopause, making it far more difficult to lose weight.
Exercise in the form of resistance training and aerobic exercise can help increase energy expenditure. Resistance training has been shown to increase energy expenditure during workouts, and for between 12-72 hours post-workout.
Aerobic exercise is also excellent for decreasing fat mass or body mass. We recommend combining the two. This will enable you to manage weight while increasing muscle mass, strength, function, and cardiovascular fitness.
4. Boosts Estrogen
During menopause, estrogen levels can decrease two to six times, which can lead to the above symptoms. This can have a significant impact on our health and quality of life. Exercise has been identified as a powerful tool for increasing estrogen levels.
By engaging in an exercise routine consisting of aerobic and resistance training we can elevate estrogen levels. This will alleviate menopause symptoms, enhancing overall health and quality of life.
5. Releases Feel-Good Hormones
Exercise is great for enhancing and maintaining mood. Two major feel-good hormones in the body are serotonin and dopamine. Serotonin is vital for regulating mood, while dopamine is seen as a motivation hormone].
Estrogen is used in dopamine and serotonin synthesis, however, when these levels decline, it can negatively impact both our mood and motivation.
Regular exercise has been shown to increase levels of serotonin and dopamine, improving mood and motivation.
6. Improves Cognitive Function
Physical exercise has been shown to improve cognitive function. This is excellent news for women going through menopause as decreased estrogen levels can impair cognitive function. This is our mental processing, including our perception, understanding, learning, attention, and decision-making.
Physical activity affects neuroplasticity, our brains, and our nervous systems' ability to change. Exercising regularly through resistance training, recreation, or aerobic exercise will positively improve mental processing and clarity.
7. Improve Cardiovascular Health
Exercise has long been associated with improving cardiovascular health. Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of morbidity and mortality globally, accounting for 25% of deaths in the United States each year.
As mentioned, menopause can increase inflammation in the body, negatively impacting cardiovascular health. This can bring on vasomotor issues, and symptoms such as hot flashes and night sweats.
Physical activity is excellent for regulating and improving cardiovascular function. It has been shown to lower blood pressure, raise good cholesterol, reduce inflammation, and reduce the effects of cardiovascular disease.
8. Reduce The Risk of Chronic Illness
Decreased estrogen levels, can lead to increased levels of inflammation in the body. This results in a greater risk of chronic illnesses including, cardiovascular disease, stroke, osteoporosis, diabetes, cancer, dementia, and impaired mental health.
Fortunately, we have exercise which has the ability to prevent and delay the onset of over 40 chronic illnesses. As mentioned, it can preserve bone, muscle, and mental health, while reducing cancer, stroke, cardiovascular disease, and diabetes.
Overview of the Menopause Workout Plan
Building a workout plan should consist of different forms of exercise including resistance training cardio, and mobility. This goes double for those of us in menopause.
Because menopause hurts so many different systems, we recommend you adopt a balanced approach and use a range of exercise modalities to enhance your health.
Below we list each style of training, and how they will help you during menopause.
Strength Training
Strength training or resistance training is essential for your menopause workout plan. As mentioned, resistance training increases muscle mass and bone density, which are vital for maintaining function.
In recent years developing strength has become one of the most important factors in longevity. Grip strength in particular has become an indicator for overall health, including strength, function, bone mineral density, fractures, falls, nutritional status, cognition, and sleep.
Including resistance training exercises in your routine will directly combat some of the symptoms associated with menopause.
Cardio Training
Aerobic exercise or cardio is a valuable component of your menopause workout plan. Aerobic exercise can reduce cardiovascular disease, and improve cholesterol. It has also been shown to improve lung capacity, and cognition while improving our ability to manage weight.
Exercise such as walking, running, swimming, and spin biking are effective types of aerobic exercise. By adding cardio to your program you can alleviate menopause symptoms while improving aerobic fitness and quality of life.
Flexibility & Mobility
Flexibility and mobility training a vital components of your menopause workout plan. These two elements are closely related and often get paired together, however, the different aspects of our training.
Flexibility and mobility have recently been associated with the rate of injury. A 2024 study identified that those with poor movement quality had a six times greater risk of injury. Flexibility and mobility training can help you reduce muscle and joint restriction, improving function, and quality of life.
If you are interested in mobility and flexibility training, we recommend trying yoga and Pilates.
But if you enjoy the high intensity of a resistance training session, consider incorporating a mobility and flexibility routine. This will improve your range of motion and function, decreasing restriction and improving your lift ability.
Key Tips For A Successful Menopause Workout Plan
Following a workout plan is an incredible way to ensure the success of your menopause plan. However, many other elements can help improve results, and reduce the impact of menopause on the body. Below are our key tips for a successful menopause workout plan.
Setting Realistic Fitness Goals
Before you begin your menopause workout plan, it is essential that you set realistic workout goals. While it can be tempting to jump in head first with aspirations of building lean muscle and losing 15kg in the first two months, chances are it won’t happen that quickly.
Sadly, when we don’t hit fitness goals, it can leave us with a feeling of failure, which may lead to us abandoning our workout and diet plan altogether.
Setting realistic and achievable goals enables us to make progress. Marking off that milestone will give you a dopamine hit that motivates you to continue pursuing your goals.
We recommend setting short, medium, and long-term goals. Below are examples of each:
- Short-Term (Weekly): Lose 1 kilogram per week
- Medium-Term (3 Months): Lose 5 kilograms, increase energy, improve sleep
- Long-Term (6 Months): Run 10 kilometers
These are just some simple examples of each goal. The key is to select goals that are unique to you!
Track Nutrition
Tracking your nutrition should be a top priority during your menopause workout plan. There will be an increase in appetite during menopause which can lead to weight gain. Tracking our calories, macronutrients, and micronutrient intake can help us control weight and reduce the severity of menopause symptoms.
To do this we recommend using a calorie and macronutrient calculating app. These contain a database of different foods, complete with their nutritional value. Inside, you can simply put in your daily calorie intake and desired macronutrient ratios. Then it simply requires you to enter the food you eat each day intending to hit your calorie and macronutrient targets.
While this can seem over the top, entering your meals helps you learn your eating patterns, and how different foods affect your energy levels and menopause symptoms.
Furthermore, it will ensure that you are consuming the correct amount of calories to maintain or lose weight, helping you achieve your goals.
Focus On Protein Intake
When it comes to your menopause workout and diet plan, protein intake is essential! While balancing our macronutrients is key to a great balanced diet protein intake helps us stabilize hunger, support muscle mass, and increase energy expenditure.
The recommended daily protein intake for women in a calorie deficit is 1.6 grams per kilogram of body weight daily. For someone weighing 70 kilograms, this is 112 grams.
To make this achievable, we can divide it across four meals, which equates to 28 grams each meal. adding a healthy source of protein to each meal, you will improve satiety, reducing snacks between meals.
Get Your Steps In
Increasing your daily incident step count is one of the easiest ways to improve your fitness, burn additional calories, and improve cognitive function.
Walking has been shown to increase cardiovascular health and reduce the risk of diabetes, blood pressure, and weight.
Hitting 10,000 steps daily has been a benchmark for many, however, we understand this isn’t always achievable for those with sedentary jobs. We suggest setting a number that is achievable for you, and gradually building up.
To boost your daily step count, we recommend getting outside for a 20-minute walk each day. This will help refresh your mind and improve cognition and physical fitness.
Follow A Plan & Track Progress
Following and tracking your progress is an excellent way to ensure you stick to your menopause workout and diet plan. The beginning of activity lifestyle changes often start with a tonne of motivation and energy. However, over weeks, months, and years, we will be faced with challenges that can zap our drive to achieve our goals.
This is where planning and tracking progress comes in. By setting goals and recording measurements, scale weight, energy levels, and fitness achievements, we can document the proof of our achievements. This becomes a powerful motivation tool, allowing us to see how far you have come with your training.
Adjusting for Physical Limitations or Injuries
If you are experiencing or nursing a condition of a current injury, consider speaking to a physical therapist. They will be able to recommend rehabilitation and alternative exercises for effective recovery.
Conclusion: Empower Your Menopause Journey with a Balanced Workout Plan
Exercise is one of the most effective tools for improving quality of life during menopause. Its ability to increase muscle mass and bone density, while improving cognition and mood make it a must for anyone going through menopause,
If you are considering undertaking a menopause workout routine, make sure you set clear goals, track your progress, follow a program, and eat plenty of protein. Follow these tips and you will be well on your way to reducing the impact of menopause symptoms and enhancing your health.
FAQs
What is the best type of exercise during menopause?
The best types of exercise during menopause include strength training, yoga, Pilates, and low-impact cardio like walking or swimming. These exercises help improve bone density, maintain muscle mass, and boost overall well-being.
How often should I work out during menopause?
It's recommended to aim for at least 150 minutes of moderate exercise per week, spread across several days. Incorporating strength training 2-3 times a week and flexibility exercises like yoga or Pilates can also be beneficial.
Can exercise help manage menopause symptoms?
Yes, regular exercise can help manage menopause symptoms such as hot flashes, mood swings, and weight gain. It also promotes better sleep, improves energy levels, and supports heart and bone health.
Is strength training important for menopausal women?
Strength training is crucial during menopause as it helps maintain muscle mass, supports bone density, and boosts metabolism. It can reduce the risk of osteoporosis and improve overall physical function.
What should I avoid in a menopause workout plan?
It's best to avoid high-impact or overly intense exercises that could strain joints or increase the risk of injury. Focus on balanced workouts that include strength, flexibility, and low-impact cardio to support overall health and well-being.
