I'm not going to post regularly on this bit of the board, but just thought I'd pass on something that has worked for me over the last 2 months. Specifically an overweight woman who had an early menopause at 42, and is on HRT - and who can't stick to a 'diet' or to low carb or to intermittent fasting etc.
I found a menopause nutritionist and this is what he advised:
10,000 steps a day
Three periods of resistance exercise a week (can be for as little as 10 mins at a time)
Find your 'extra 500 cals'. So, it might be wine, it might be snacking, it might be massive portions - whatever, we're not going to calorie count other than for a week to work out where your 'extra' cals are. When you've found them, work on stopping consuming them.
Three meals and 2 snacks a day.
No more than what you can fit in your cupped hands as a portion to begin with (you can go back for seconds if you need to)
Half fruit/veg, quarter carb, quarter protein (this literally means one sausage, or half a chicken breast) - no other restriction on what your food is
Be the last person to finish your plate
Snacks shouldn't be all about the chocolate and cake
That's it.
It's about finding something you can do for the rest of your life, and it's about being realistic - you might not be able to be a size 8 again without severely restricting your food intake, if you can do that fine, if not then reassess your intended results. You need to think about a waist of 31 inches or less, and a hip to waist ratio that is healthy - can't remember the number.
I decided that I can't always get to 10,000 steps, but I can get to 8,000 consistently, so that's what I went for. My 500 cals are the cals I eat between 3.30pm and 6.30pm - so I need a decent snack - a proper sandwich, or hummus, or cheese. Portion size was the biggest 'oh dear' - seems I was eating at least double what I needed to in terms of quantity at a given meal.
Anyway, I lost 4kg in around 6 weeks without it feeling like a massive effort. Have stuck to portion size over xmas, but not bothered with healthiness of it. Back to not eating chocolate for breakfast tomorrow though.