His vs hers: Fat, metabolism, and weight loss, explained
Just a few weeks left before the beach season. He loses weight quickly, but she still sees slower results despite working just as hard. He tolerates heavier after-dinner snacks of leftover tikoy from Chinese New Year without much consequence, and she wakes up feeling sluggish and bloated.
How do these familiar scenarios happen? Is this unfairness or science?
Men and women, especially in midlife, do not build muscle, lose weight, or recover the same way. When a midlife woman forces herself to follow her husband’s fasting and diet and pushes herself to go all out with weights and cardio, the opposite happens.
If last week’s column was about supporting oneself to show and give love naturally to the other person, this week, we tackle the most common issues that confuse people. This includes the most talked-about topics in exercise, diet, fat loss, metabolism, cravings, and stress—basically the ultimate issues everyone should understand in the growing modern world of health and wellness.
Body composition and weight loss
Men have about 10 to 20 times more testosterone than women, which supports their muscle-building potential. And because muscles burn more calories even at rest, fat loss happens faster and more steadily for them. Because of fewer hormonal fluctuations, men can consistently and progressively lift their usual heavy weights.
Meanwhile, women need to adjust to their cycles, energy levels, and even moods each month, due to changing estrogen and progesterone levels, especially in midlife, which can lead to slower muscle gain and fat loss. Plus, women are more susceptible to stressors that negatively affect body composition goals.
And yes, women should prioritize consistency in lifting weights to gain more muscle—the body’s machine for strength, metabolism, and longevity. Heavy or light weights? It depends on the cycle phase: It is beneficial to go heavier during the first two weeks (the follicular phase) and use lighter weights with higher reps in the last two weeks before the period (the luteal phase).
Also, they should make sure to get enough rest and eat well. If not, effort won’t produce the expected results because pushing the body too hard all month can lead to excessive cortisol buildup, which can negate those results.
Cardiovascular workouts and muscle preservation
You might often hear this as well, especially these days: “Too much cardio can cause one to lose muscle.” Well, it depends. Men can tolerate more cardio than women because their bodies have more pronounced fast-twitch muscle fibers and, as discussed, higher testosterone levels.
Conversely, midlife women should avoid relying on high-volume endurance training, as this can increase stress hormones and, without resistance training, accelerate muscle loss. The best routine is still a good balance of cardio and strength.
Cardio days can be alternated with or combined with strength workouts, and the balance between the two can be achieved by recognizing how each can be performed the next day, which depends on the cycle stage, sleep, food intake, and overall daily tasks and load.
And during breaks, when access to resistance training equipment is not feasible, efforts should be made to maintain muscle mass, even with bodyweight exercises, at least twice a week, to avoid strength deterioration that can already be felt in two weeks.
Fasting
Men can stick to shorter eating windows—thanks to higher muscle mass and hormonal profile, allowing them to shift to stored fuel and maintain blood sugar levels more efficiently. Provided, however, that stress levels are not excessive because a small eating window in a stressful life can chronically increase cortisol levels, which can attract more body fat.
On the other hand, women’s response to fasting is cycle and stress-dependent. When energy intake drops too low for too long, the body can interpret it as a threat, which increases cortisol production, especially during the luteal phase. The same goes for when the body experiences more stress from daily life encounters and lifestyle factors (lack of sleep, overexercise, and/or under-eating).
Fasting for women can work, even with a longer eight-hour window or more if tolerated, when the body is in its best condition at the perfect time (the follicular phase). But during the luteal phase, they should not force themselves to fast for long periods. They can stick to a 12-hour (or shorter) fasting window.
The goal is always to protect the body from stress to avoid hormonal irregularities and to prevent fat-loss plateaus.
Cravings and fat accumulation from overeating
Cravings for certain foods (usually carbs) can differ between men and women. Men usually crave high-calorie savory foods like chips and burgers because they have a higher calorie output. When women crave, it is often due to stress and hormones. And they usually crave sweets.
Carbohydrate tolerance can be influenced by muscle mass, activity level, hormone stability, caloric expenditure, and stress levels. So when it comes to diet type, men can tolerate more carbs than women because of higher metabolism and greater insulin sensitivity. Midlife women, on the other hand, are more stress-sensitive due to fluctuating hormones, so their bodies may perceive excessive carb intake as additional stress, leading to fat gain, especially if the right balance of physical activity is not prioritized.
Focusing on real foods the body can use is a game-changer: protein for muscle protein synthesis, vegetables for fiber to support digestion and gut health, and good carbs for your workouts.
If the excess calories came mostly from fat in deep-fried breading or pork fat and chicken skin, and from ultra-processed carbs such as pizza, chips, and sugar-laden foods like cakes, sweet drinks, and pastries, then the fat can be deposited in several areas of the body. When men overeat, coupled with underexercise, excess calories will go to the belly, and for women, it usually goes in their thighs.
But for midlife women, it can go straight to the belly as well.
Sleep and recovery
Late-night indulgences in foods negatively affect sleep quality, quantity, and patterns. Really prioritize sleep—earlier if possible—for deep sleep (first phase of the night: one to two hours) and REM (mostly in the second half: 1.5 to 2.5 hours), which are the phases when muscle growth and metabolic regulation occur. That way, you can recover, build more lean mass, and maximize your body’s fat-burning capacity even while sleeping.
Men may recover faster from late-night eating and sleep deficits because of their overall physiological capacity, which stems from greater muscle mass and lower levels of stress-related hormones. Conversely, women can experience frequent sleep disruptions, especially in the middle of the night, and can take longer to recover from the hormonal effects of age and their cycle. They can even experience bloating, more cravings, and even mood swings the next day.
******
Get real-time news updates: inqnews.net/inqviber
