Many adults gain weight as the years go by. Lifestyle changes can help you shed extra pounds—no mater what your age.

“Middle-age spread,” a reality for many American men and women in their 40s and 50s, may seem to be inevitable. But it doesn’t have to be.

“There is no inherent age-related trigger for weight gain,” says Dee Sandquist, R.D., of Portland, Ore., a spokeswoman for the American Dietetic Association. “It tends to happen to a lot of Americans because of changes in lifestyle that occur in midlife—primarily people not balancing their calorie intake with the amount of physical activity they get.”

Here are some causes of agerelated weight gain and what to do about them.

Causes
People gain weight in middle age for a variety of reasons:

• Changes in metabolism (the number of calories your body burns through the day). After age 25, metabolism slows by about 5 percent a decade. “If you’re in your 40s and still eating as much as you did in your 20s, you’re going to have some extra pounds to show for it,” Sandquist says.
• Changes in activity level. Most middle-aged people are not as active as they were in their teens and 20s.
• Changes in body composition. As you age, your muscle mass diminishes and your fat increases. Since muscle burns more calories than fat, your body burns fewer calories when you’re working, playing, and even sleeping.
• Changes in hormones. The hormonal shifts women experience before, during, and after menopause add pounds and make fat build up around the abdomen.

Solutions
You can avoid midlife weight gain by making these lifestyle changes:

• Change your portions. In the era of super-sizing, it’s easy to lose sight of what a normal portion should be. Slowing down and enjoying your food can help you eat less, according to Sandquist.

  “It’s really pretty simple: The faster you eat, the more you eat,” she says. “If you rush through a meal, you’re going to eat more than you need or want because it takes about 20 minutes for your brain to get the signal from your stomach that you’ve had enough.”

• Change your diet. Rather than going “on a diet”—and then going off it and regaining the weight you lost—make simple, permanent changes to what and how much you eat.

  “By cutting just 100 calories per day, for example, you can lose a pound a month,” Sandquist explains. Easy 100-calorie cuts include switch-ing from regular to low-calorie salad dressing and from whole milk to skim milk lattes. She also recommends eating more lean protein, fruits, and vegetables and less bread and potatoes.

• Change your activity level. Adding physical activity to your routine can burn calories and improve muscle tone. Walk more, drive less, take the stairs, and do your own yard work.
• Change your workout. Walking, running, and biking are important, but if you do a cardio workout with no strength training, you miss the best fat-burning workout around. “That’s because strength training can counteract the loss of lean muscle that occurs as we age,” Sandquist says.

“If your weight is starting to creep up, now is the time to lay the groundwork for maintaining a healthy weight for the rest of your life,” Sandquist advises. “And it really gets back to balance—if you eat a balanced diet and balance your activity level with the amount of calories you consume, the weight will come off.”

Barbara Floria spoke with Dee Sandquist, R.D., of Portland, Ore., a spokeswoman for the American Dietetic Association. For more information, visit www.eatright.org.

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