Keto Over 50

Ready to slim to your happy weight? You’ve come to the right place! Keto Over 50 is filled with inspiring stories of women over age 50 who lost up to 255 pounds on a ketogenic diet. From lifetime dieters to those who found themselves inexplicably gaining weight after menopause, these women agree: The keto diet works! And it comes with impressive extra benefits like improved energy, sunnier moods, lower cholesterol and relief from hot flashes, heartburn and more! In the pages that follow, you’ll learn the science behind the plan—and why it’s especially beneficial for women over 50. You’ll also find expert advice on how to make keto work for you, along with mouthwatering keto-friendly meals, snacks, cocktails and desserts (yes, you can have chocolate!) and more! Diane McKinney/Ikonik Pix. H&M: Marie…

Like most of us, you’ve probably noticed that it gets more and more difficult to avoid belly bulge as the years go by. Foods you’ve always eaten without a problem suddenly make the numbers on your bathroom scale move in the wrong direction. Extra pounds seem to creep on out of nowhere, expanding your stomach, hips and thighs and refusing to go away no matter how hard you try. While men of the same age can simply cut back on calories to quickly drop weight, for women, slimming just isn’t that simple. Researchers have pinpointed a key reason we have it tougher when it comes to losing weight after age 50: female hormones. When scientists from the Mayo Clinic and Canada’s Concordia University studied fat cells in perimenopausal and postmenopausal women,…

The ketogenic diet is a powerful weight-loss tool for women over 50 because it addresses hormone-related issues that have been shown to trigger excess pounds. The high-fat/moderate-protein/low-carb plan pushes the body into ketosis—a state where it burns fat instead of sugar for fuel, making extra pounds disappear! This metabolic switch also quashes appetite and cravings, and it delivers an array of health-boosting benefits including a sunnier mood, sharper memory and sky-high energy. To get started, just follow these simple eating guidelines: Aim for 70% of your daily calories to come from fat. “Get your body into fat-burning mode by eating plenty of healthy fats like olive oil, coconut oil, avocado and nuts,” suggests osteopathic physician Anna Cabeca, D.O., who lost 85 pounds on a keto diet she created. Get 25% of…

MCT oil This flavorless oil extracted from coconut triples calorie burning, according to Italian scientists. Add it to coffee, smoothies and salad dressings. Find flavored and flavorless options at GNC stores and SimplyGOODFATS.com. Macadamia nuts Each of these tiny, delicious nuts is an especially rich source of monounsaturated fats that switch on the genes that speed belly fat burn by 25%. Avocados They’re loaded with omega-9 fatty acids that stimulate fat burn—enough to melt away 6 pounds of belly flab in two months when you eat half of one daily. Avocados’ carotenoids also encourage cells to flush fluids, helping you shed 1 pound per week. Grass-fed butter Compared to standard butter, the grass-fed version is richer in conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), a compound proven to activate fat-burning enzymes that increase weight loss in women. Two brands available…

Not losing fast enough? Eat more fat Frustrated because the pounds aren’t dropping off as fast as you’d like? Chances are, you’re not consuming enough fat. Studies show that women tend to underestimate how much fat they should eat to hit their keto goal, often getting just 30% to 40% of their total calories from fat. Consume 70%, though, and wow! “Eating plenty of dietary fats paves the way for weight loss,” promises David Perlmutter, M.D., author of The Grain Brain Whole Life Plan. He explains that once the body is supplied with enough fat to produce ketones efficiently, metabolism kicks into high gear and cells begin to burn stored fat for fuel within just five days. The proof: Researchers at Bethel University in St. Paul, Minnesota, found that keto dieters’…

So say researchers in a study just published in the journal Scientific Reports. They used state-of-the-art measurements of blood lipids to assess heart risk among 577 subjects based on how much fat, protein and carbohydrates they consumed. The results? Eating fat had little to no impact on heart health, says senior study author Kalyana Sundaram, Ph.D. But a diet high in carbohydrates was associated with increased risk factors for cardiovascular disease, including high triglycerides, elevated cholesterol and high blood pressure. The findings support a number of studies over the past decade that have vindicated dietary fat (a mainstay of the keto diet) as the primary culprit in heart disease, says nutrition expert Jonny Bowden, Ph.D. For instance, research published in the Annals of Internal Medicine showed that people on a high-fat/low-carb…