Midlife Belly Fat: Part 2-The Hormone Story

Belly Fat - Part 2
What do hormones have to do with belly fat? As it turns out, a lot!

In this episode, you'll hear:

1. The impact of stress on belly fat and hormonal changes during midlife, specifically the effects of chronic stress on cortisol and insulin levels.

2. Natural methods and tools to lower stress levels, such as adaptogens, herbal teas, and breathing exercises, as well as the importance of controlling insulin and cortisol levels to combat belly fat.

3. The significance of body composition changes and the measurement of visceral fat, emphasizing the need to focus on reducing visceral fat for overall health during midlife.

Join the Midlife Mommas this week as we explore the topic of belly fat in midlife. From drop in estrogen to the role insulin and cortisol play into the prevalent expanding midsection in midlife. This is a must listen.

00:00 Two dangerous kinds of belly fat explained.
04:52 Body composition scan reveals lean muscle and fat.
07:48 Chronic stress triggers fight or flight response.
10:44 Caffeine can cause anxiety and stress. Be cautious.
13:03 Different forms of stress affect body equally.
15:04 Commitment to support husband despite late dinner.
21:15 Mental resilience requires active daily practice.
23:15 Forgot magnesium, tried different supplement formulations, recommends research.
26:02 Inhale deeply, exhale slowly to reduce stress.
29:51 Body fat holding? Balance out, don't get mad.

Stay Connected!
Amelia

• Website: https://www.thehelpfulplate.com/
• IG: https://www.instagram.com/thehelpfulplate/

Cam

• Website: https://www.camoyler.com/
• IG: https://www.instagram.com/heymomma_cam/
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Midlife Mommas IG: https://www.instagram.com/midlife.mommas/

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Transcript

0:00

Knock, knock. Who's there? Lettuce. Lettuce who? Let us find ways to de stress and enjoy midlife. Hi. I'm Cam, holistic health coach, mom to 2 humans and 4 pets. Hi. I'm Amelia, laboratory scientist by day and food scientist by night. Welcome to our show. Join us as we share our holistic approach to life after 50. You can expect real life stories with a dash of humor and a ton of truth. If it happens in midlife, we're going to talk about it. So hit that subscribe button and follow along. We're the Midlife Mommas. Oh, you got your radio voice on, Amilia. Hi. Welcome to the podcast. We're talking about stress today and good old belly fat. And believe it or not, they're very related. And so last week, we talked to you about belly fat. That was part 1. We talked about how exercise relates to to belly fat. We touched on a few other things too, but you'll really wanna listen to the episode today because we talk about hormones and how they affect your belly fat. Yes. And, unfortunately, this is a fact. The average menopause weight gain is anywhere from 5 to £8, sometimes more depending on your actual hormones, and that is because we're losing our sex hormones, estrogen and progesterone, during midlife, during menopause. It is a sad truth, Cam, and I know that I've had times where my jeans don't fit. And so depending on how you like to wear your jeans, that may be the first sign that you have put on some weight, especially in the middle. Because I went my whole adult life not having a significant amount of weight in my middle. I have lots of junk in my trunk, but not a whole lot in the middle. And this midlife weight gain was the first time I'd had experienced that. I'm exactly the same way. That is one place I never carried weight. In my butt, yes. In my thighs, absolutely. Thick thighs saves lives. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Anyway, and yeah. So it was very shocking when menopause came knocking and all of a sudden there was weight gain in a place that never had weight gain before. Yeah. And even if you don't and even if the scale doesn't change, your body composition could change. This is what we're talking about. Changes in your estrogen and your stress hormones send fat to our bellies. Hello. We know this for real life. And we're naturally losing muscle, so it's a really yucky combination. So part 1 was about muscle. So today, we're talking about hormones. Yeah. Absolutely. And so let's talk about the 2 different kinds of belly fat because they're both dangerous, but, you know, there there is a difference. So there is surface fat, which is sometimes called subcutaneous, and that just means just under the skin. But one of the really dangerous kinds is visceral fat, and you've probably heard this term in maybe some ads or, I don't know, maybe even in a doctor's office. And these are this is deep inside your core, and it's fat around your vital muscles. So, visceral fat is a huge, risk factor for all sorts of thing, cardiovascular disease, heart attack, stroke, and all of that. So we want to try to not have much of it. Yeah. It's very dangerous. And I know you've had a DEXA cam, so that's one way you can measure the fat around your organs is through a DEXA scan. So what is a DEXA scan? What was your process? What was it like? Really good question, Cam. It's super easy and not quite as expensive as I had feared. It was around $100, And you go into the doctor's office. You do fill out a few questions. I don't think that they were significant as far as, you know, medical history. They do ask you if you have any implants because I have a radio head implant, from a really bad cycling accident and surgery. Anyhoo, you kind of lay on what looks like a wide, obviously, flat bed. It's not it doesn't have a pad. Almost think about a really wide conveyor belt. That's kinda what it looked like. And you just you lay there. They put a band, not a restrictive band, just to hold your ankles kinda together, and you lay very, very still. And this giant arm that kind of goes on top of this, bed, very, very slowly scans you from the top of your head all the way to your feet. And it's actually measuring, I think it's a density gradient sort of measurement. I can't remember the exact, like, scientific words to use, but it scans your body for fat, and then you get a printout. And the printout is like, you know, a picture of a person laying there and it's like a heat map. So it shows you the places where your body has, you know, muscle, that lean muscle mass, it shows you your skeleton. And in my case, it actually had a little dot where my little radial head implant is, and then you have the yellow and red parts that are the fat. And lucky for me, my fat deposits weren't around my belly, but I did have some around my hips, which is not surprising. And I actually was surprised, Cam, that I had some, on my arm. So I've been working, doing a little more arm work in the last few months. I had this done in November, but it's a super easy and very painless thing, but it does cause you to have to pay about a$100 to have it done. Yeah. And I would say that's a good thing. In 2024, that's gonna be on my list, and I think you can do it annually to actually Yeah. Track your body composition changes. Like, we don't want fat in the belly. We want more muscle, and so you can actually see your progress on the scan versus just in the mirror or how your genes fit. There's like a a look inside, if you will. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. And it's more scientific than some other ways to measure body fat. You may have a trainer or a gym or a nutrition shop that has an InBody scan. Mhmm. That's not horrible. It's better than guessing, but, supposedly, the the DXA scan is more accurate than that. I've also had fat measurement with calipers. That's been many years ago, and I will tell you of all of those, the DXA scan showed my body fat to be a higher percentage. But I wasn't super unhappy with it. I was a tiny bit surprised, But because the fat was deposited in places where I kind of knew it was already there anyway, it gave me hope that this is not a horrible thing, that I can, you know, actually build muscle in some of those areas. So it's really cool. I actually had to go to a town about an hour away to get mine. So depending on where you live, you just look up DEXA scan, d e x a, and, find somebody that does it. Well, thanks for sharing that. I think that's very helpful, and it's just a tool on your tool tool chest to say, are you improving your health? And let's get rid of the visceral visceral fat at all cost. Right. Exactly. That must mean you're measuring or maintaining your stress levels at a lower level, Amelia. So way to go. Absolutely. Well, I've been working on that, but that really does bring us to the hormones that we wanna talk about today, which are cortisol and insulin. And we talk about cortisol and insulin a lot, but, you know, they're especially poignant when we talk about belly fat. And I just wanna give a shout out to cortisol. All cortisol is not bad. Corticosol is your get up and go hormone in the morning, and it does work on daylight. So it's highest it should be highest in the morning and lowest in the evening. And it it is our get up and go, and actually in the right amount, it's anti inflammatory, which is awesome. Right? We like we like that. It's our resilience. It's like I said, it's your get up and go. The problem is when we're running on cortisol day in and day out, and we're in midlife menopause, it does not work out out so well. No. Exactly. And it's that fight or flight mechanism. You know, when when you do need to, we've said this before, get away from the woolly mammoth, you know, it gives you that extra energy. Your blood vessels dilate. Your heart starts to to beat faster. All of the blood goes to the working muscles to allow you to flee. The problem with chronic stress is that we're not literally in danger of our lives, but our bodies, when we feel that stress and experience that stress, it behaves as it as if we were in an immortal danger, and that's just not a good place to live. Yeah. And so when the cortisol is released and you're under this imaginary danger of getting chased away, what happens is your cells release the glucose, and so that's going to raise your blood sugar so you have energy to run away. The problem is we're not running. So now we just have high blood sugar and high cortisol and yeah, there's no danger. And it's crazy, Cam, because when I was coaching triathletes, I would tell them you know, your body stress is your body stress. And what you think of is exercise stress and what do you think of is work stress or family stress or whatever, you perceive it to be handled differently. But in some aspects, all of that's the same. Your body is still receiving a stress response based on what you're doing and how you're reacting. And, I think that that that it is such I would even venture to call it an epidemic in our culture. Absolutely. So this leads to something called metabolic disease, and there was a study, I think it was 2,000 20 or 21, that 88% of Americans have some form of metabolic disease, which is on the road to diabetes, and that should scare everyone. Yeah. This should wake you up. Yeah. Absolutely. And in fact, I wanna say it's been a long time ago, but I think we did an entire episode kind of defining what that metabolic disease is. I'd have to look that up and reference it. But we've talked about that before, but yes, shocking numbers. We're seeing more and more people with type 2 diabetes and not all of these people have weight issues. So it just goes to the fact that metabolically, that we're having trouble processing. And it's the cortisol, you know, we we live in a cortisol fueled environment. Absolutely. And and this is just the fact that we're in midlife and menopause, we're more sensitive. We're more insulin resistant, basically. I wanna say sensitive, meaning it doesn't work as well, but that's the wrong word. It's actually insulin resistant. So the insulin so you have blood sugar and your pancreas is like, hey, I need to get rid of this blood sugar. It's too high because our body wants this perfect balance. Mhmm. So pancreas sends out insulin, insulin shuttles the glucose to the cells, and the cells don't let it in. And that's what insulin resistance is. It's like a roadblock. So your blood sugar just stays up. Your pancreas just sends out more and more insulin, and it's not working as efficiently as it used to. Yes. That's what it is. One thing I'd like to comment and ask a question about with regarding, stress, and, you know, this borders on anxiety because there's physiologic effects, and that's the use of caffeine because I I can over caffeinate. In fact, I think one of my kids, Snapchatted me either today or it can really hijack you. It does make my heart rate go up, and I do feel more anxious and stressed. So if you're like that, if you're super sensitive to it, be very careful. At least I I like to be. I always have, like, some kind of detox or adaptogen tea ready. In case I feel like I need to, like, calm down a little bit, it does help. But caffeine is is, I don't know, it's a dangerous substance for me sometimes, Cam. I gotta admit that I love coffee, but dang. I I do too. I have a built in, like, slowdown system because I take a thyroid pill every morning, and I have to wait 30 minutes to get my coffee. That's just the way you take the medicine. And so I'm not, like, guzzling coffee immediately when I wake up. I there is, like, a little pause, so lets my body, like, do what it's supposed to do, and then I add the caffeine. But I know what you're saying. That busy behind the eyes feeling, that's when I know I've over caffeinated myself. Or here's my other one. Like the side of my chest, under my armpit. I'm very sensitive when I get too much caffeine and the, like, my cat walks across my chest. I'm like, oh, dial it back, girl. You're drinking too much caffeine. That's so interesting. And, you know, for me sometimes that caffeine sensitivity isn't tied to a specific amount of coffee. I haven't quite dialed into what the parameters are because I limit it to 1 cup of caffeinated coffee in the morning, which I gotta be honest, I think those mugs are probably 12 ounces. But even then, sometimes, depending on what else is going on, that may be too much. And then I switch to decaf or herbal tea or something like that. But if you're sensitive to caffeine, or God forbid you're already having, if you're experiencing sleep disturbances, please be cognizant of your caffeine intake. Even though you love it, we all do. Yeah. So let's talk about the different forms of stress because, like we said earlier, your body doesn't differentiate between the kinds of stress. So let's start with circadian stress. So you've already mentioned caffeine, if caffeine's interrupting your sleep. So, many of our body systems, I would say all of them, our organs work on daylight, daylight hours and nighttime hours, and our hormones also fluctuate during the day or in the night depending on what our eyes see in in there. So anytime that you have any kind of disruption to your sleep, that is stress on your body. So we have a time change coming up, That's going to be stress on our body, and hopefully, it's the last one ever. Is that true? That's what I heard. I don't know. But if you travel, you could go to a different time mommas, and that is definitely stressful, which could include jet lag, but just just a time change in general going to a different time zone is tough. Yeah. So we've already mentioned cam caffeine, but also, if you have breathing problems, sleep apnea is a big, big problem when it comes to midlife weight gain, believe it or not. That's come up on my nutrition call several times, enough for me to pay attention and mention it on the podcast. That's so interesting. And also, if you work an alternate shift. So if you're a night shift worker, that could certainly affect that's obviously part of a circadian rhythm issue. So lots of things that can disrupt. And even, Cam, I will say even, you know, it's great to do fun things, but I'm very hesitant to go to a concert or a club or anything, even when I know it's gonna be fun, if it's gonna keep me out late because it just I would use an ugly word here, but it messes up my sleep. Oh, Emilia. Yeah. And then and then then we know the next day we're craving craving you know carby carbs because we're like we need energy I know I know. Yeah. Another form of stress is glycemic stress, which we're talking about a little bit ago, insulin resistance. So that's anything about your diet quality or even your meal timing because, Amelia, what happens when you eat late? Do you eat late? Oh, yeah. I try not to. I mean, last night, I've been really working towards, like, really having a time to connect with my husband and, with we're trying to get his mom into assisted living or senior living, I guess, is more accurate. Anyway, he's over there a lot. Her oh, I don't even want to get started on her sleep patterns. They're horrendous, and it makes me crazy to even consider. But anyhoo, he didn't get home last night until almost 7 o'clock, and I was about to come unglued. But, you know, at that time, I was like, alright, you've made a commitment to, like, support him and be with him, and so I made a choice, that I would wait for him to eat, but eating late for sure, not a good thing for me. Yeah. And then there's always stress eating. And so at least I'm more aware of that. I think I lived my life until I was I don't know, recently, and I was not aware that I was stress eating OCD my emotions. Yeah, and I hear that a lot. And, you know, let's just touch on intermittent fasting. I toyed with intermittent fasting a couple of years ago, And there are days that I more or less 2 meal a day 2 meals a day, but really strict intermittent fasting did not work for me. I thought it did, and I I pushed it for a while. Like, I would I think the most I would do was this. Yeah. I I think the most was about 17 or 18 hours, but in honesty, Cam, my weight was okay, but there was a lot of things that were kinda jacked up. So I'm glad I've gone back to a to a different, more normal eating pattern. I mean, it's normal to have periods of time when you're not eating. It's called nighttime. Right. It's nature's it's nature's intermittent fasting. Now I don't break my fast. I break my fast when I'm hungry. So sometimes it's more hours than others, but as you know, I'm not a fan of fasted workouts. We want our workouts to count and if you're running on fumes, they're not gonna count. You could lift heavier. You could do more or whatever. And so why not make those minutes in the gym count? So put some fuel in your system first, ladies. Yeah. And also, Cam, you've talked a lot about, the order of food eating or I don't know, that might not be the right term, where the Yeah. That's right. Your vegetables and your protein first. So, you know, carbs aren't bad. I mean, we need carbs, but the order in which we eat things can affect, this, glycemic stress. Absolutely. I just wanna say if you're cutting carbs, keto does not work for most women and that might be why you're waking up at 2 AM, 3 AM because your body your brain is waking you up saying I need carbs. Carbs our brain uses the most energy out there, and it needs carbs. Carbs is our preferred energy source. What Amelia is hinting to is if you eat them later in the meal, if you eat fat, fiber, or protein first, you're going to have a lower blood sugar response to the food, and that that wins. You know? Don't start with the chips and the salsa and the bread on the table when you go to a restaurant. I'm not saying don't eat it. Just eat it later. Eat a salad first or eat something first so that the blood sugar response is less. That's all. Yeah. There's a lot to this glycemic stress and I love that we're unpacking it because so much of it, the way the the bad ways or the things that induce glycemic stress are very normal eating patterns in the US. Yeah. Yeah. It's I mean, Chinese not Chinese, Mexican restaurants or Italian restaurants or whatever. You start with the bread, you know, or the chips, and then it doesn't matter what you eat because you're already spiked. Right. Exactly. Exactly. So what's another sort of stress? Yeah. Inflammatory stress. And so it's funny that we're recording this today because I have a rash on my face. I'm under I've been under a lot of stress the last few days, and so inflammatory stress could be allergies, arthritis, something like that. And I have an allergy reaction on my face. That's what happens to me. It's like a histamine response when I'm overdoing it. So that would be one. And and, you know, allergies for a lot of people in this time of year are profound. Things are starting to bloom again, and so inflammation in itself is protective, or our bodies are made to produce an inflammatory response to protect it. But in excess, it can be negative. It's just like the whole thing with cortisol. It's protective in a little bit, but a whole bunch of it, not so much. Yeah. And so that also includes, like, if you're fighting the infection or cardiovascular disease. And I think we need to say something about this because in menopause actually, in menopause we are more likely to have cardiovascular issues. In fact, we were talking about this I think it was off mic but we always hear about men having heart attacks. But the statistic is about 10 years into menopause, we are equal or more likely to have a heart attack than a man. And so with that loss of estrogen, we are like, cardiovascular health is a really big deal, and protecting your heart is important. Yeah. Absolutely. And because we know, we talked about this last week with exercise stress, that cardiovascular health may look differently than it did when you were 35. So if you haven't listened to last week's episode on belly fat and exercise, please go back and listen to that one too. Here's a hint. Do some strength training, which is cardiovascular health, and then do a little tiny tad of interval training called hurt. So go back to that episode and learn how to do it. Absolutely. Well, this next form of stress is near and dear to my heart in a really, you know, tongue in cheek sort of way, and this is perceived stress. These are our thoughts, our feelings, neurological responses. And, Cam, this has been one of the toughest for me. Even employing meditation techniques and devotional time in the mornings, it's still really tough. I'm high energy, I set tremendous goals and expectations of myself and others. So trying to calm that down for me has been a years long process. I agree. It's a it it I would say it's a daily and I don't wanna use the word struggle, but it's if I don't start my day in a quiet mode, it the whole day goes off the rails, and that I used to be able to juggle all the juggles and multitask and be a queen, but not anymore. Yeah. And you know what's funny is even when I start my day like that, it doesn't take but a few negative thoughts to put me off the rails. You know, for instance, if I cam start and think, oh, this is, I've had a great day, I've done my devotional, I've had my coffee and my water and my supplements, and all it takes is that first email to be inflammatory, and I kinda use air quotes, but it makes me inflamed. If I get mad right away, that can kinda spiral out of control if I don't immediately say, this is okay. This is someone else's opinion. Their crisis doesn't have to be my crisis or whatever. I can talk myself out of that, but it's an active daily practice. It's not something that necessarily comes natural to me, but you have to work at it. Absolutely. And, again, it's all day. I agree with you. Me, personally, I've been taking I have stress balance, which is a a blend of, some adaptogens, rhodiola and ashwagandha, whatever. And, the on the back, it says take 3 twice a day. Believe me, I've been doing that. I need extra help right now when you're dealing with stress. And it kind of takes the edge off, but it doesn't numb me out because, like, alcohol would numb you out. And plus that's just gonna add more stress to your body. It's gonna be inflammatory. But there are natural ways, whether it be breathing, meditation, adaptogens, whatever, to help you take that edge off without taking the edge off, like, with alcohol. Yeah. I agree. I use one of those kind of blends as well. There's also some herbal teas that will help. I think the one that I've gotten has it may have ashwagandha, holy basil, and they actually taste really good. I do take more magnesium when I'm under stress like that as well. So there's a lot of things you can do, but daily practice, and you almost have to make these things some sort of habit so you remember to employ these tools when you do have stress. Yeah. Let's just say it out loud. Like, magnesium is something you should never ever skip and you need more when you're stressed out. Let's just make it a rule. Oh, I agree. We traveled not this past weekend, but weekend before, and I got I forgot the magnesium that I normally take at night, but I did have a slightly it was the same I think it was the same formulation, but it was instead of a powder, I think it was like a pill. And then I actually I think the other thing I got, I actually just at the drugstore. It was a combination. It had GABA, L theanine, and Mhmm. Lemon balm, maybe. Maybe that was it. But once you're kind of in the habit of looking for these kind if you're new to this, do some research. And then if you get caught, you might be able to find an acceptable substitute. But there's several things in there. You mentioned the rhodiola and the ashwagandha, and there might be a couple of others there. Holy basil for sure. Yeah. Holy basil. Yeah. I wanna say, passion flower might be in some of these, formulations as well, but it's it's out there, I promise. It's not difficult to obtain some of these things, and they really, really do help if you remember to use them. Yeah. And that just leads us to this. Like, figuring out the tools for your stress in midlife is really a nonnegotiable if you wanna lose your belly fat and, like, have a joyful midlife. Yeah. Figure out what works for you. And we're just mentioning a whole bunch of stuff, and I think that we experiment. I don't know if you have any go to's. I think magnesium is a go to. But Yeah. Me too for sure. Yeah. And when I miss it, I know it. So don't miss it. Don't skip it. I think that's probably my number one, Cam, is the magnesium, and the mixed herbal supplements for adapt that are adaptogens. In fact, I'll try to put in the show notes the ones that we use so that people can get a hold on that. The other thing that really helps me is getting outside. It can be actually walking, but honestly, just being in nature is super helpful. I agree with you. So we're gonna actually list some examples, some tools in the tool chest that we invite you to explore and see if you can lower your stress. Because, really, all of these kinds of stress, circadian, glycemic, inflammatory, perceived, your thoughts, Your body doesn't know the differentiate doesn't differentiate with between the kinds. So it's your job to find the stress in your life and then find ways to take the stress away from your body and watch how it responds. Yeah, absolutely. And just kinda going back to what we talked about in the beginning, and we've said this before, the 2 things that you can control are the insulin and the cortisol based on how you're responding. There's a lot you can't control. There's a lot of hormones that you can't control, but these 2, which are the primary drivers of belly fat, we can actually do something about. Yeah. Let's start with a psychological or physical physiological sigh. Are you ready for this? Yeah. Absolutely. Okay. So I want you to inhale through your nose and then inhale some more, an extra sip, and then I want you to exhale for longer through your nose. And do that 5 to 10 times when you feel that stress level going up. So what you're doing is you're actually activating your vagus nerve, and your vagus nerve is this amazing nerve that runs through your face. I can always tell when I'm stressed out. My vagus nerve is is mad. Through your face, runs through your organs all the way down, and what happens is your vagus nerve is communicating to your brain. Research says 80% of the messages go from your organs to your brain, and 20% go from your brain to your organs. So this vagus nerve is like the highway. By breathing, you're actually activating your vagus nerve, which is like free and easy, and no one even knows you're doing it. You can feel better. Absolutely. It's quick. It's cost nothing. Yeah. So it's an inhale through your nose and then an extra sip inhale and then an exhale that's longer. That's all it is. It's amazing. That's awesome. Next up, we have the box breathing method, which I think I've used in several times. The Navy SEALs use this. They're amazing athletes and humans, patriotic humans. And so they use it to stay calm when their body is obviously under stress, whatever they're doing. So imagine a box, and we're just gonna move around the sides of the box. So inhale for 4, hold for 4, exhale for 4, hold the exhale for 4. Do that a few times. Again, easy. I like as it's visual. You can imagine your breathing going around the box. Go a few cycles of that and you I feel calmer. Do you feel calmer? Oh, absolutely. And we only did it once. I know. So do it a few more times and you'd be like, What else do you love to do to take the stress off? You know, that's a really good question. Some of the some of the things that I do actually doesn't does require more time and planning, and sauna is one of those things. I really love the sauna, when I'm able to do that because I don't have one in my home. But meditation or, devotional work, I do actually every day. That's kind of a nonnegotiable for me. And I gotta be honest, the last thing, Cam, is, my work days tend to start and end with a lot of activity. So I'll, a lot of times, just drive in my car and be silent or, like, have the window down and listen to the wind. I love to walk outside and hear the birds. So just that whole idea of trying to quell my own thoughts with silence instead of filling it with a whole bunch of noise. Yeah. I love sitting in silence. You if you haven't done that, we challenge you to try that because, wow, it's amazing, and you will hear the birds and the leaves rustling and Mhmm. Whatever. Yeah. It's really interesting. There's one tool that I I've talked about and moved it out, but not here on the podcast and it's, actually essential oil. It's called parasympathetic and it's a blend by vibrant blue. It's actually lime and clove, and it smells amazing. And so I put it sometimes on the bone behind my ear. Sometimes I'll put it on my wrist like my pulse points or sometimes I'll just smell it, but it's something I actually carry in my purse. And it helps you just stay cam, and I would suggest staying calm before you eat because if you're stressed out, your digestion shuts down. So that's just another way whether it be breath or essential oils or, you know, sitting in silence, but find a way to be calm before you eat and then enjoy the people at your table. See what happens. So good. Such tremendous, advice and lots of suggestions. So we basically kind of got a tool for everybody. Yeah, I think so. I I just also would like to say when when your body are responding by holding on to more body more body fat in a in a particular area, in particular the belly, just instead of being mad at yourself or being frustrated, think of it as, like, your body is out of balance and what can you do about it because you can do something about it. It's almost like it's almost like your body speaking to you. Something's out of balance. Help me out. I mean, think of it that way instead of getting angry and mad because that was just frustrating. It worse. Yeah. It makes it worse. Yeah. I I do love that. And, you know, just accept. I mean, I know age is just a number, but we are in in midlife. We are different and we need to accept those differences with grace. And then look look for ways to help, which I think we've we've talked about a bunch of ways. So I'm super excited about that. And come back next week for part 3. We're going to have a special guest. Her name is Lindsey, and she's gonna talk about gut health and belly fat because there's a connection there too. Super exciting. Thanks for listening today. You can find us on Instagram@midlife.mommas For all of our other contact info, check out the show description below, and we will talk to you next week.