Midlife Mayhem

Midlife Memoirs #1: Lupe — She Couldn't Do One Pushup, Now She Does 57
Welcome to Midlife Memoirs
This is the very first Midlife Memoirs.
The idea is simple. Real people, real midlife journeys, shared out loud.
So we can share stories, help others, maybe laugh a little, and realise how far we have come.
My first guest is Lupe, a dear friend I have known for close to 30 years.
We first met at Gold's Gym Venice in the late 1990s.
How Lupe and I Met
Lupe was a flight attendant on a layover.
She saw a fitness competition, looked it up, and came to find me because I was training Monica Brant at the time.
She sat down with me outside Gold's Gym Venice and said she wanted to do a fitness competition.
In eight weeks.
I asked how much training she had done. How much dancing.
Zero. Zero.
So I asked her to do a pushup.
She couldn't do one. On her toes. At 26 years old.
We trained together for almost five years after that. She would drive from Hermosa Beach, then Huntington Beach, to Venice to train with me.
And now, at 57, she can do at least 57 pushups in one go.
57 at 57. That says everything.
The Kindergarten Lesson
Lupe's analogy for walking into Gold's Gym Venice is perfect.
She was entering kindergarten. She didn't even know how to do a pushup.
I already had my masters, so to speak. I had competed and done it all.
Her point, and mine: everybody wants to start at the end.
Nobody wants to do the dirty work at the beginning. Everybody gets frustrated because they start and they are not already good at it.
If you accept you are starting at the beginning, you can actually enjoy all the progress.
And a good trainer at the very start can save you decades. YouTube and apps are fine. But a good coach for even a few months can save you from years of doing it wrong and then having to unravel it.
When Midlife Crept In
For Lupe, menopause did not arrive with a big announcement.
It crept in, bit by bit, at around 51.
She was flying back and forth to Sacramento caring for her mum, who had suffered a stroke and had aphasia. Life was full: a window cleaning business with her husband, a dog, all of it.
One day she noticed she didn't think she had had her period that month. She put it to one side.
Then came the hot flashes. Lupe had always been cold. Suddenly she was hot, and she didn't understand what was happening.
Nobody had warned her, in any detail, what to expect.
Her two older sisters, 18 and 20 years older, had completely different experiences. One, with poor eating and exercise habits, had terrible hot flashes. The other, with great habits, barely felt it.
That contrast is the whole lesson.
The Window Before It Starts
Women who go into perimenopause insulin resistant get slammed. Women who go in healthy get through it far easier.
That is why the late 30s and early 40s matter so much.
Get your fasted insulin checked. Eat better. Watch your carbohydrate intake. Get your protein up.
You don't have to be perfect. But if those habits are in place before things start changing, the experience is completely different.
Once the weight is gained and the issues have piled up, it is much harder to undo. Like trying to put toothpaste back in the tube.
There are six hormones that change your body composition with age, but the two big ones are insulin and cortisol, and you can control both of those.
Grief, Anxiety, and Thoughts That Weren't Hers
Lupe's mum passed away five years ago. A year later, her husband's mum passed. Then his dad, about a year ago.
Grief on top of hormones was, in her words, a recipe for havoc.
Her superpower used to be sleep. Then she was waking at 2am, night after night.
She started having anxious thoughts that had never been hers. Walking the dog and imagining another dog attacking it. Freaking out going through a tunnel on the freeway. Uneasy in an elevator if it stopped for a second.
She didn't tell anyone. She thought people would think she was crazy.
Estrogen keeps a lid on cortisol. When estrogen goes away, cortisol can rise, and worry rushes into the gap.
That is why women can suddenly start worrying about things that never once entered their minds before.
My own embarrassing moment: I lit a neighbour up over her dogs attacking ours. The old me would have had a calm conversation. That day, I went off like a flare. Afterwards I thought, who was that?
Awareness is a huge part of it. The moment you recognise what is happening, it drops from a 10 to a 2.
The Turtleneck Story
✓ Lupe's funniest symptom story: a turtleneck on a plane to Mexico, a hot flash closing in, and her ready to cut the thing off with scissors.
✓ Her rule now: wear something underneath you can strip down to, and only wear tops you can get off fast. Zip-ups, not pullovers.
✓ Costume changes, ladies. That is part of this journey too.
The Worst Advice She Was Given
A friend, a breast cancer survivor, told Lupe how terrible HRT was.
It wasn't intentional. But Lupe trusted her, didn't do her own research, and it put her off even considering it.
There is a stigma around the word menopause itself. Lupe felt her body was betraying her, and even telling her husband felt like admitting it out loud.
Sharing it with him was hard. Intimacy became painful, and that was devastating for both of them.
The reframe that changed it for her: HRT is not a drug foreign to your body. It is replacing what your body already makes.
Optimise, not turn back the clock. Nobody is trying to be 20 again.
And order matters. Usually progesterone first, to help mood and sleep, then estrogen, then possibly testosterone, in the dose you actually need.
Lupe's doctors at her yearly exams never once suggested testing her hormones. Nobody said, at 40, heads up, this decade is when things change.
If your symptoms are changing your life experience, that is a conversation worth having with your doctor. This episode is information and conversation, not medical advice for anyone else. Your blood work and your doctor decide what is right for you.
Finding Herself Again
Lupe tried HRT, stopped, then restarted about a year ago after doing the research and getting tested.
Now she is on testosterone, progesterone, and estradiol, with levels rechecked in three months.
She is sleeping through the night again. She feels like herself again.
As she put it, and as I felt it myself: she didn't become someone different. She got herself back.
At 57, she feels better about herself than she did going through it. She is thankful to be 57. Thankful she can walk her dogs and work out and share this, so the next generation laughs and says, wait, you guys didn't know all this?
The Coping Trick Worth Stealing
Brain fog was a real problem at work. She would start a task, five other thoughts would ping in, and the original thought would vanish.
Her fix: write every single thought down on paper, even one word. Laundry. Groceries. Whatever it is.
Once it is parked somewhere, you can forget it for the moment and focus.
She does the same with her phone. Siri, remind me about that appointment at 4pm. Alarms everywhere.
Park it, then focus. Otherwise the mental list just builds until you are overwhelmed and can't even remember what overwhelmed you.
What She Would Tell Her Younger Self
Pay attention. Stop long enough to notice what is happening.
Lupe realised she would rush her three Rottweilers to the vet within 24 hours if anything was wrong, but she wasn't doing the same for herself.
Put your own oxygen mask on first. You can't help anyone else if you have no oxygen.
And get the data. Her first blood test showed her testosterone at minus 10. No wonder she felt the way she did.
There is nothing scary about numbers. Numbers are just data.
What She Would Tell a 45-Year-Old
Pay attention to your body. It is so easy to take care of everybody else first.
Resistance training and nutrition are the foundation. Good, stable habits. Water. Protein. The simple things, done consistently, are a game changer.
Self-care is the first chapter. HRT, if you want it and if you are symptomatic, is the second chapter, not the first.
And don't do it alone. Hearing other women talk about what is actually happening, instead of suffering in silence, is huge.
And For the Guys
Guys go through their own journey, and it is subtler. Easier to dismiss as just aging.
A bit sadder. A bit more anxious. A bit isolated. Losing hair here, growing it somewhere else.
Guys, check your numbers too. Don't just pay attention to the obvious stuff.
The Cost Surprise
When Lupe first looked into it, it was going to be around $400 a month.
Now it is $75 for her progesterone, estrogen, and estradiol, and much of it is covered.
Joanne's experience was the same. Over $400 a month at first, compounded everything. Now progesterone and estrogen are covered, and she only pays for testosterone.
That matters. $400 a month is not doable for a lot of people.
Coming Next Year
Joanne's membership program is coming in the new year, with live coaching twice a month, working through topics from all her programs, topic by topic.
Watch for that.
Your Turn — We Want Your Story
If you have an interesting journey, please email me at hello@joannelee.com.
Guys, I would love to hear from you too. Midlife Memoirs is for men as well as women.
Everybody's journey is different, and yours might be exactly the one somebody else needs to hear.
Watch and Listen
For those listening, the video version of this episode is available on YouTube and Spotify.
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The Facebook Post that had me Stunned
But first - Protein Scavenging ... 
What is protein scavenging?
In certain birds, researchers have shown they eat and eat and search for food until they hit the optimal protein they need for that day. Once they hit it, they stop eating.
The hypothesis is that we do the same thing.
We keep eating until we hit the right amount of protein for the day.
If we do not hit it, we just keep eating all day.
This has not been proven in humans, but Joanne says over three decades of coaching, she has seen exactly this pattern.
When people finally eat enough protein, the frustrations greatly diminish.
The snacking goes away.
The meals get smaller.
The food noise goes away.
All of a sudden, they look disciplined. They look like they have self-control.
Protein does that. Yet so many people fight it, because protein does not taste as good as carbohydrates and fat.
Doing what is necessary, not what you want
As we get older, protein is not absorbed as well, and we need more of it per meal to trigger muscle protein synthesis. A 20-year-old may manage it with 20 grams. Over 45, Joanne talks about 35 to 40 grams per meal.
Protein has to be deliberate. Logging alone will not fix it.
Logging and finding you only reached 70 or 80 grams tells you the problem. It does not solve it.
Planning the protein first, then building the rest of the day around it, does.
A protein shake, tuna, and some ground turkey can get you there. Joanne also uses ready-made protein drinks, 30 grams each, two a day, before she eats a thing.
Try it for two weeks.
People who say they cannot eat enough protein are often not valuing themselves enough to make it non-negotiable.
If you knew it would guarantee a long, healthy life for your pets, or your grandkids, you would make it happen. Apply that same value to yourself.
Anyone with kidney disease should stay within their doctor's protocols. That exception sits beside every protein recommendation.
The Facebook post that blew her mind
In an over-50s group, a woman posted that she had trained for nine months, eats 1,400 calories a day, weight trains four days a week, and has not lost a pound. She said she gets about 80 grams of protein a day. The post drew around 2,500 comments.
Most of the advice was nonsense, Joanne says.
"You are not eating enough, you are in starvation mode."
"It must be your hormones, you need oestrogen."
"Lift lighter weights for your body type."
Joanne's reading of the same post.
If she is not tracking, she is almost certainly eating about 30% more than she thinks, so probably closer to 1,700 calories, not 1,400.
80 grams of protein is only 320 calories. On 1,400 calories, that leaves close to 1,100 calories from something that is not protein, likely over 200 grams of carbohydrate a day.
With a waist that suggests an insulin load, that carbohydrate load blocks access to stored fat. Lipolysis is inhibited.
The fix is not more calories and not a new hormone. It is flipping the macros: keep the calories, get the protein grams right up, which in itself brings the carbohydrates down. And get bloodwork done.
One commenter, a woman in her seventies, got it exactly right: eat unprocessed food, stay in a deficit, exercise every day, and you will get results.
Joanne's own 5-Amino experience, from YouTube to audio
Joanne shares only her own experience here, for information, not as a recommendation for anyone else.
Right after Christmas 2023, she was 147.5 pounds.
She started taking 5-Amino-1MQ in the summer of that year and deliberately changed nothing else.
By December 29, 2024, she was 137 pounds, 10 pounds down, with strength up and training great.
Since then, her weight has held at 137 to 138 pounds, with no fluctuation over holiday seasons.
A recent InBody test put her at 138.8 pounds, 13.6% body fat, with visceral fat under 4.
Her point: a body fat percentage that low is only possible with muscle behind it. A woman in great shape who does not resistance train would more likely sit around 22%, because body fat is a percentage.
Coming next year
A membership program with live coaching twice a month, working through the topics from all of her programs, topic by topic. More details to come. Subscribe to the email list so you hear about it first.
New series: Midlife Memoirs
Short conversations, 30 to 45 minutes, about real experiences going through midlife. Men and women welcome. If you have a story to tell, contact Joanne. Nobody has to go through this alone.
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The problem
A man of 52 and a woman of 52 walk into the same hormone conversation and get handed the same advice.
Fix the testosterone, fix the fat.
That advice is wrong for at least one of them, and possibly both.
In men, body fat crushes testosterone, so adding more is rarely the answer.
In women, body fat can be CAUSED by excess androgens, so for those ladies adding more is NOT the answer
"Hi there, I do hope you enjoy my podcast. Things are getting tricky out there with regard to giving information, talking about personal experiences or giving any sort of advice. Be sure to subscribe to my email list, scroll down there for the link"
 
What this episode covers
From a review in Frontiers in Medicine, October 28, 2026, by Komai and colleagues, a subject Joanne has taught in her Mastering Midlife program for five years.
In men, fat drags testosterone down.
Excess body fat suppresses testosterone.
Sex hormone binding globulin (SHBG) rises with age and binds testosterone, leaving less of it active.
Aromatase, an enzyme stored in fat, converts testosterone into oestrogen.
So a heavier man prescribed testosterone can end up converting much of it into oestrogen. A futile cycle.
Body fat loss itself is the first testosterone intervention for men.
Training, protein, sleep, and a calorie deficit you can actually live with come first.
Resistance training in itself raises testosterone.
Only once body fat is down, and numbers are still low and symptoms are present, is there a role for testosterone replacement therapy.
In women, the arrow often points the other way.
Obesity in women is more often linked to androgen excess, not androgen deficiency.
Insulin resistance pushes the ovaries to produce more androgen and lowers SHBG, leaving more androgen free and active.
Fat tissue converts androgens through an enzyme called AKR1C3.
This pattern is clearest in PCOS, now called PMOS under the 2026 global consensus, polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome.
PCOS does not go away at midlife.
If you dealt with it in your twenties and thirties, it is still there in midlife.
Do not jump on the testosterone bandwagon without checking insulin load, insulin resistance, and androgens first.
A quick rule Joanne uses for both sexes.
If your waist is more than half your height, you are likely insulin resistant, or heading that way.
That rule alone tells you a lot about what is happening with testosterone, before any lab result.
Joanne's own experience
She has taken testosterone for years.
For years, on a very low dose, she felt it did nothing at all.
Her insulin was already in good shape and her waist was less than half her height, so foundation was not the issue. The dose was simply too low.
When she raised it, modestly, and her level reached 90 and above, she felt a difference in energy.
Older women, she says, tolerate and indeed need higher testosterone than younger women would. At 35, a level of 90 would have meant acne, hair loss, and road rage. At 59, it is doing great things for her.
Foundation first, always. If midsection fat and insulin load are high, testosterone is not the first answer.
What this does not prove
This is a review of existing studies, not a new trial.
It does not mean every overweight man is hypogonadal.
It does not prove testosterone replacement is right for every man with low readings.
For women without PMOS, the optimal testosterone range is still poorly understood over the long term.
This is general information, not personal medical advice. Talk to your own doctor about what it means for you, with your own history and bloodwork in front of them.
New series: Midlife Memoirs
Joanne is starting a new series of short conversations, 30 to 45 minutes, about people's real experiences going through midlife. Informative, vulnerable, and funny. First guest: Amanda Fletcher, a cancer survivor, on hormones and the advice she received after breast cancer. One or two a month. If you would like to be included, message Joanne.
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Nutrient Partitioning: Why Your Body Stores More Fat in Midlife
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Why does it seem like you can eat the same way you always have, yet your body composition keeps changing?
In this episode of Midlife Mayhem, Joanne Lee Cornish breaks down nutrient partitioning — how your body uses the calories you consume and why, as we age, more of those calories may be stored as fat rather than used to support muscle, movement, and energy expenditure.
Joanne also discusses 5-Amino-1MQ, the molecule that caught her attention because of research into its potential effects on fat storage.
In This Episode
1. Nutrient Partitioning Explained
Calories in versus calories out is only part of the story. Joanne explains the four potential destinations for excess calories:
Muscle growth and glycogen storage
Non-exercise activity thermogenesis (NEAT)
Heat production
Fat storage
2. Why Body Composition Changes in Midlife
As we age, we tend to move less, lose muscle, and become less responsive to the signals that support muscle growth and maintenance. These changes can affect how our bodies use and store energy.
3. Muscle Is Key to Successful Aging
Consistent resistance training, progressive overload, and adequate protein are essential to supporting muscle as we age. Joanne explains why repeating the same workouts without progression may not provide the stimulus your muscles need.
4. The Problem With Rapid Weight Loss
Losing weight quickly can mean losing muscle alongside fat. When muscle mass and daily movement decline, your body may burn fewer calories than before, making weight regain more likely to consist primarily of fat.
5. Hormones, Insulin Resistance, and Changing Fat Distribution
Joanne discusses how declining estrogen and testosterone can influence where fat accumulates, particularly around the midsection, and why muscle health and insulin sensitivity matter.
6. 5-Amino-1MQ and Fat Storage
What caught Joanne's attention about 5-Amino-1MQ was research investigating its effect on NNMT, an enzyme associated with fat tissue and metabolism.
She discusses research in mice investigating reduced fat accumulation and fat loss, even under conditions designed to promote obesity, and explores how these findings relate to nutrient partitioning.
The Takeaway
You cannot outsource the work of building and preserving muscle.
If you want to improve your body composition in midlife, focus on consistent resistance training, adequate protein, progressive overload, and more daily movement.
Understanding nutrient partitioning gives you another way to look at why your body changes — and what you can do to support your goals.
Interested in 5-Amino-1MQ?
Joanne shares her experience with 5-Amino-1MQ and discusses the research that sparked her interest in this molecule.
Explore 5-Amino-1MQ and shop Joanne's products:
https://www.joanneleestore.com
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Crepey skin is loose skin!  You can pick it up; it moves freely around and doesnt seem to be tethered down the way it used to be.  And because of this looseness, it buckles like tissue paper. Most products proclaim that hydration and collagen are the problem - but the biggest problem is something called the DEJ - the very layer holding the skin in place - crepey skin is a structural problem, so we need products that promote skin remodelling and structure, not just something that polishes the outside.
Today we talk about DEJ
Crepey skin on the backs of your hands, neck and inner arms has been a big topic on the podcast, and this is round three. Today Joanne covers something she hasn’t discussed before: the DEJ (dermal-epidermal junction), the paper-thin layer that “zips” the top layer of your skin to the layer underneath.
In this episode
Why crepey skin isn’t really a moisture problem, and why moisturizers only change how it looks
The three layers of skin, and what the DEJ is and what it does
How the DEJ flattens and weakens with age, so the top layer loosens from the layers below
Why constantly irritating your skin barrier works against holding hydration in
Joanne’s experience with retinols and high-strength vitamin C on sensitive skin
GHK-Cu: how long it’s been studied, why the skin studies used topical GHK-Cu, and her experience with the injectable
Why she developed her own range: she couldn’t find the concentration, quality or body option she wanted
How the Face Serum, Body Booster and Face and Body Oil work together
Why structural change takes 8 to 12 weeks of consistency
Blue Theory GHK Skin Range
Face Serum, Body Booster, and Face and Body Oil. The 100 ml sizes are the best value.Use code PODCAST for 10% off (expires November 30).👉 https://www.bluetheoryskin.com
Join the email list
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Midlife Mayhem: CBL-514, the Injectable That Could Change Cellulite and Stubborn Fat
Is an injection, pill or potion coming for everything? This week Joanne looks at CBL-514, an experimental injectable aimed at stubborn fat and cellulite, and shows how to read a breakthrough headline without getting swept away.
🎧 In This Episode
Cellulite and stubborn fat are the two things midlife women ask about most. CBL-514 is an experimental injectable developed for both. It isn’t approved anywhere and can’t be bought, but it points to where this whole field is heading, and it makes a great case study in reading the headlines critically.
🔬 What Is CBL-514?
Developed by Taiwanese company Calaway Biopharmaceuticals
A small molecule injection (not a peptide)
Designed for non-surgical, localized fat reduction and moderate to severe cellulite
Still in clinical trials, not approved anywhere
💡 Why It’s Different: Fewer Fat Cells, Not Just Smaller Ones
Diet, training and even GLP-1 medications shrink the size of the fat cells you already have, like letting the water out of a balloon. The cell is still there, which is why weight regain is so common.
CBL-514 is proposed to induce apoptosis (programmed cell death) in fat cells, so there are fewer fat cells in a targeted area.
Think of it as an injectable liposuction.
If the fat cell is gone, it can’t refill.
📊 What the Data Shows So Far
Early phase 2a study: abdominal fat volume dropped about 25%, roughly 120 ml (about half a cup)
Reported cellulite results: roughly 95% of women with moderate to severe cellulite saw significant improvement
Reading the Headline: Key Caveats
The results come from the company’s own announcement. That doesn’t make them false, but companies share their most flattering numbers.
The study was open label. Participants knew what they were being treated with, and in aesthetics, expectation matters. Placebo-controlled data is the goal.
120 ml is meaningful, but the real question is what it looks like on a real body in the mirror.
🧪 What’s Next: The Trials
Phase 3 trial, “Supreme 01”: randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled; started September 2026 and currently recruiting
A second pivotal trial has been cleared by the FDA
Results from both are expected sometime in 2027
Trials use MRI to measure fat volume alongside patient-reported scales
After that comes regulatory review, so the product is likely a long way off
🧬 Why Cellulite Is So Hard to Treat
It isn’t simply too much fat. It’s largely structural.
Bands of connective tissue anchor the skin to a deeper layer, and fat pushes up between the bands, creating dimples.
That’s why lean, fit women can have cellulite and some heavier women have none.
Hormones, genetics and skin thickness all play a role, and it often worsens after 30 and through menopause as skin thins and collagen declines.
Past treatments have had mixed results: an injectable called Qwo (collagenase) is no longer sold in the US, and devices can help modestly but need a lot of maintenance. Joanne also trained in Endermologie and says it can help.
💉 The Weight-Loss Medication Angle
Many women on weight-loss medications worry about muscle loss and rapid regain after stopping.
Calaway presented animal data at the American Diabetes Association meeting in 2026, looking at CBL-514 combined with tirzepatide. The company says it may help reduce weight regain after stopping treatment and improve metabolic health.
Human trials of the combination are planned to begin very soon.
As Joanne notes, animal studies aren’t small humans, so the human results are the ones to watch.
⚠️ Joanne’s Take
If it works, targeting fat cell number could be a real option for stubborn areas that diet and training don’t touch.
Long-term safety is the open question. If fat cells are killed off, where does the fat go? Ectopic fat (stored in places like the liver, muscle and brain) is a concern, and there’s potential for misuse.
For cellulite, injecting small pockets of fat under the skin looks incredibly promising.
It still won’t fix muscle loss. You can never outsource muscle: results will always depend on resistance training and enough protein.
 
📣 Announcements
Membership program coming next year! Joanne is planning a membership with plenty of topics, including this one.
5-Amino 1MQ Pure (Joanne’s product) inhibits lipogenesis, the creation of new fat, and is available now on her website.
🔗 Links & Resources
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This week’s episode is the one piece of advice I’d give anyone approaching midlife, dealing with it, or coming out the other side: be prepared.
We almost always wait until we’re in a situation to educate ourselves about it. We’re sitting in a pool of night sweats, googling what causes them. We’ve gained the weight, then we search for fat loss. We’ve lost 10 pounds of muscle, then we look up muscle loss with age. It’s like getting marriage advice in the middle of a divorce. The information doesn’t stick, because you’re too deep in it to take it in.
In this episode:
Why preparing early is a strength. It applies to health, money, relationships, and parenting.
My timeline. Perimenopause started around 44 with a “nagging voice” at a gas station in Malibu. At 47 came the night sweats. Then came menopause at 51-52.
The panic attack. Even with 30+ years of coaching experience, I thought I was having a heart attack. I filled the animals’ bowls and wrote letters to my mum and dad. It shows how much being in the moment clouds your thinking, and how fast the toolkit came out once I recognised what it was.
The life pivot. Ten days after moving to Idaho at 50, I had emergency surgery. My hormones crashed and I lost about 15 pounds of muscle, and my legs just disappeared. Because I’d built so much muscle beforehand, I was ahead of the curve.
Amateur vs. master. Knowing a little gets you a good week. Mastering something gets you ease.
Why I didn’t gain the 35 pounds many women gain. It wasn’t luck. I understood insulin and cortisol long before I needed to.
Why going it alone is the hardest way. When you’re already in it, support from a coach, a group, or a medical professional is priceless.
This isn’t just for women. The signs in men are subtle (sadness, isolation, body changes) and often ignored.
One action you can take this week: If you’re in your late 30s, 40s, or 50s, get your baseline blood work done. You’re probably fine right now, but when things change (and they will), you’ll have your numbers to compare against.
Want to be a guest? I’m setting up a monthly (or bi-monthly) video podcast where I interview someone about their journey through life. If you’d like a 30 to 45 minute chat, reply to this email and let’s set it up. We can all learn from each other’s experiences.
 
Questions? Just reply to this email or write to hello@joannelee.com.
To your strength,Joanne
P.S. I detest promoting my programs, but I love coaching them. If you’ve ever said “I’ll deal with it when it happens,” this is your nudge to deal with it now.
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Better Legs After 50!
What 5 New Studies Say About Muscle, GLP-1s & Creatine
What if a cheap, well-studied supplement could specifically help the muscle most of us lose first after 50 — our legs?
That’s the finding I didn’t see coming this week, and it’s why I’m actually leading with something other than weight-loss medications for once!
In this episode of Midlife Mayhem, I’m breaking down five recent studies looking at creatine, weight-loss medications, muscle preservation, postmenopausal women, HIIT and resistance training.
And there’s one theme running through all five:
Muscle is kept by what you DO — not simply by what you take.
1. Creatine after 50 — the legs responded best
This was the one I didn’t know, and it might be my favorite finding.
A December 2025 meta-analysis looking at adults over 50 found that creatine combined with resistance training worked — and the lower body responded particularly well.
That matters enormously.
Your legs affect your balance, mobility, ability to get off the floor and everyday independence. They also contain a huge proportion of your total muscle.
There’s an old bodybuilding saying: “legs go first.”
Even people who never stop training can notice their legs becoming lighter as they age. I certainly have.
And what about the scale increase that puts so many women off creatine?
Yes, your weight can initially tick up. But that’s intracellular water, not body fat. Creatine pulls water into the muscle cell, which can actually make the muscles look fuller.
The other interesting finding was duration. The research suggested benefits were strongest with supplementation lasting 32 weeks or less, with effects appearing to diminish with longer continuous use.
My own long-standing protocol has been eight weeks on and five weeks off, so the idea of cycling creatine rather than simply taking it continuously was particularly interesting to me.
But remember the order:
Train first. Supplement second.
Creatine isn't going to build your legs while you sit on the sofa.
2. Weight-loss medications: 80–85% of the weight lost was fat
Now let’s get to the GLP-1 conversation.
Real-world research presented at the European Congress on Obesity in Vienna in 2026 followed 486 adults taking weight-loss medications and measured their body composition using clinical-grade bioelectrical impedance.
The headline was pretty encouraging:
Approximately 80–85% of the weight lost was fat.
That's very different from the frightening narrative that these medications automatically strip muscle from your body.
But there was an important distinction.
The people who preserved the most lean tissue were also doing the things I talk about constantly: eating adequate protein and resistance training.
The medication can help manage appetite.
It cannot lift the weights for you.
It cannot eat the protein for you.
You still have to give your muscles a reason to stay.
3. Semaglutide in postmenopausal women: strength went UP
This study particularly caught my attention because it looked specifically at postmenopausal women taking semaglutide.
Lean mass initially declined — but then it stabilized.
And here's the interesting part:
Grip strength actually improved.
This is why we need to stop using the terms lean mass, muscle mass and strength as though they're interchangeable.
They're not.
Lean mass includes muscle, but it also includes glycogen, water, organs and connective tissue.
If somebody suddenly eats significantly fewer calories and carbohydrates, glycogen stores fall. The water stored with that glycogen falls too.
A body-composition scan can register that as a reduction in lean mass.
That does not mean the equivalent amount of actual muscle tissue disappeared.
So stop worshipping one number on a scale or scan.
Pay attention to strength and function too.
And grip strength deserves particular attention after 50 because it's an incredibly useful marker of how well we're maintaining strength as we age.
4. HIIT preserved lean mass — at an average age of 72
This one should destroy the idea that getting older means training has to become completely gentle.
Researchers at the University of the Sunshine Coast studied 120 adults with an average age of 72 and incorporated high-intensity interval training.
They preserved lean mass.
Now, that doesn't mean every 72-year-old should suddenly start doing hill sprints.
HIIT is relative.
Your version might involve:
An exercise bike
An assault bike
Battle ropes
A treadmill
Kettlebells
Bodyweight circuits
Walking is fantastic. Keep walking. Get your steps. Go outside and move.
But walking is not training.
If you want to keep muscle, the muscle needs a reason to stay.
Intensity provides part of that reason.
And more isn't necessarily better. You don't need HIIT every day. Two or three purposeful sessions a week can be plenty.
5. You can get stronger before your body composition changes
Finally, this study explains something I've watched happen with clients for more than three decades.
After 12 weeks of resistance training, participants were stronger, moved better and improved their everyday physical function.
Their body composition?
Barely moved.
That isn't failure.
It's what I call the adaptation window.
Strength, movement and function can improve on a completely different timeline from visible or measurable body-composition changes.
I've seen it countless times.
Someone trains hard for six or eight weeks, jumps on an InBody scan, doesn't see the change they expected and immediately thinks:
"This isn't working."
But it is working.
Your nervous system is adapting. You're producing more force. Your movement is improving. You're becoming stronger.
The body-composition changes can come later.
Don't mistake a delayed result for no result.
The common thread
Five different studies, but the message is remarkably consistent.
Eat enough protein.Resistance train.Include appropriate intensity.Protect your recovery.Measure strength and function — not just scale weight.And give your body time to adapt.
The emerging research around weight-loss medications and muscle is encouraging. Creatine continues to be fascinating, particularly for those of us over 50. And we have more evidence that challenging our bodies still matters as we get older.
But none of these things changes the fundamental rule:
You cannot outsource the signal your muscles need.
In this episode, you'll learn:
✓ Why creatine may be especially valuable for lower-body muscle after 50✓ Why the scale can rise when women start creatine — and why it isn't fat✓ What the research suggests about cycling creatine✓ What recent research says about fat vs. lean-mass loss on weight-loss medications✓ Why losing “lean mass” doesn't automatically mean losing muscle✓ What happened to strength in postmenopausal women taking semaglutide✓ Why grip strength deserves more attention after 50✓ How HIIT can help preserve lean mass even in your 70s✓ Why walking is valuable — but isn't training✓ Why strength can improve before body composition catches up
Products & Resources
The only products I sell are the ones I personally use.
5-Amino-1MQ & SLU-PP-332www.joanneleestore.com
Blue Theory™ SkincareGHK-Cu Body Booster, GHK-Cu Face Serum and Face & Body Oilbluetheoryskin.com
There's also a full video on YouTube showing how I use the Blue Theory products.
If this episode changed how you think about muscle loss after 50, send it to someone who needs to hear it.
And make sure you subscribe to Midlife Mayhem on your favorite podcast platform, Spotify or YouTube so you don't miss the next episode.
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Midlife Mayhem with Joanne Leehello@joannelee.com

The scale says “lean mass.” Your strength tells the fuller story.
If you’re using a GLP-1, moving through menopause, or simply trying to stay strong as you get older, losing weight isn’t the only thing that matters. What you’re losing—and what you’re keeping—matters more.
In this episode of Midlife Mayhem, I’m connecting three conversations that are usually discussed separately: protein, GLP-1 medications, and HRT.
We’re talking about why the standard protein RDA may not be enough when your goal is preserving or building muscle, why I recommend around one gram of protein per pound of goal body weight, and what really happens when you dramatically increase protein intake.
I also break down one of the biggest concerns surrounding GLP-1 medications: muscle loss.
When a DEXA scan reports a drop in “lean mass,” that doesn't automatically mean you've lost that amount of muscle. Glycogen, water, organs and connective tissue are all included in lean mass—and rapid weight loss can change several of those very quickly.
That doesn’t mean muscle loss can’t happen. It absolutely can, particularly when calories drop dramatically without enough protein or resistance training. But this isn’t a problem invented by GLP-1 medications.
And then there’s HRT.
Hormone replacement therapy can be enormously valuable during menopause and may improve symptoms, sleep, recovery and quality of life. But HRT doesn't replace the muscle-building stimulus of resistance training.
The hierarchy is simple:
Resistance training provides the signal.
Protein provides the raw material.
Sleep, recovery, stress management—and, for some women, HRT—support the process.
In this episode, I also explain why your strength may be one of the most useful warning systems you have. If your weight is falling while your strength is holding or improving, that's very different from watching your weight fall while becoming progressively weaker.
Precision is the antidote to panic.
We’ll cover:
How much protein you may actually need in midlife
Why protein isn't the body-fat villain it's often made out to be
What “lean mass” on a DEXA scan actually means
GLP-1s, rapid weight loss and muscle preservation
Why resistance training becomes even more important when appetite is suppressed
Where HRT fits into the muscle-building equation
Why strength can tell you something the scale cannot
No pill, powder, injection or prescription does the reps for you.
Listen to the full episode of Midlife Mayhem with Joanne Lee Cornish.
 
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Subject: Should Women Rule the World? (Depends Which Decade)
Hey there, this episode is dedicated to my SIL and brother who are "Stranded in Albuquerque," which sounds like a bad movie :)  Love you much and good luck getting home tomorrow....
New episode of Midlife Mayhem is live, and this one got away from me a little — in the best way. I started with a silly question (should women run the world?) and ended up going down a genuine rabbit hole on hormones, age, and what actually makes a good leader. Whether you listen or just want the highlights, here's the full rundown — grab a coffee, this one's a long one.
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**THE QUESTION**
If you had to hand the keys to civilization over to women, no debate, no committee, just hand them over — would we actually be better off? My honest answer isn't "women, full stop." It depends enormously on which decade of a woman's hormonal life you're talking about. A 28-year-old, a 45-year-old white-knuckling through perimenopause, and a 62-year-old on the other side of it are basically running on different fuel, different brain chemistry, different priorities. And fair's fair — the men get the exact same treatment later on. If we're going to talk hormones and leadership, testosterone doesn't get a free pass.
One honest caveat before any of this: we're talking about averages here. There's enormous overlap between men and women on every trait below — plenty of men are more patient than the average woman, plenty of women are more reckless than the average man. Picture two bell curves stacked almost entirely on top of each other, with just the tails poking out on either side. That's what most of this research actually looks like. Averages tell us about tendencies at a population level. They don't tell you anything about the specific woman or man standing in front of you.
**PATIENCE ISN'T ONE THING, IT'S TWO**
Women tend to have a real, measurable edge on delayed gratification — waiting for the bigger payoff instead of grabbing the smaller one right now. That's a huge asset for long-horizon leadership: the difference between greenlighting a policy that won't pay off for ten years versus needing a visible win by next quarter to survive the news cycle. Some of this comes down to dopamine and reward sensitivity, both of which are influenced by testosterone — higher average testosterone tracks with more impulsive, immediate-reward-seeking behavior, in both sexes.
But patience for other people's behavior — frustration tolerance — is a totally different animal, and women don't score especially high there. Shorter fuse, faster escalation to interpersonal slights, even while showing more patience with numbers and long-term payoffs. So "patience" as a leadership trait is really two separate skills, and women only clearly win on one of them. There's also a workplace wrinkle worth mentioning: wanting more time or more data before committing to a decision is a real form of patience, but it's culturally read as weak, while slamming your hand on the table and deciding right now gets read as strong. Which one is actually better leadership? Depends entirely on whether you're in a five-alarm fire or making a call that'll play out over a decade.
**THE NEGOTIATION MYTH, BUSTED**
The old research (Linda Babcock's "Women Don't Ask") found women negotiate less assertively for themselves — smaller salaries, smaller raises, faster concessions, across multiple industries and countries. But later work, especially by Hannah Riley Bowles, found that gap almost completely disappears — or reverses — the moment a woman is negotiating on behalf of someone else: a client, a team, a department, a cause. Women assigned to advocate for someone other than themselves perform just as assertively as men, sometimes more so.
So it was never a competence gap or a confidence gap. It's a social penalty — women get judged more harshly by observers of both genders for self-advocacy specifically, sometimes called the "backlash effect," which creates a rational incentive to soften their own asks. And since leadership is almost always negotiating on someone else's behalf — a country, a shareholder base, a cause — this stereotype falls apart exactly where it matters most. There's a style difference worth a mention too: women tend to favor integrative, win-win approaches slightly more than purely winner-takes-all ones. In complex multi-party negotiations — trade deals, coalitions, multi-stakeholder mergers — that instinct finds trades a purely competitive negotiator would walk right past.
**TEND-AND-BEFRIEND VS. FIGHT-OR-FLIGHT**
The classic stress response — fight or flight — was studied almost entirely in men for decades, which is a genuinely embarrassing gap in the scientific record. When researchers (Shelley Taylor at UCLA) finally looked at women specifically, they found oxytocin and estrogen often produce a parallel stress response: de-escalate, calm the room, protect and support others, alongside or instead of pure fight-or-flight.
Neither response is objectively better. Tend-and-befriend is brilliant for de-escalation and keeping a room, a company, or a country from fracturing under pressure. Fight-or-flight is brilliant for fast, unilateral action when there's genuinely no time to build consensus — a real ten-second decision. A world run entirely by one or the other would have a real blind spot. Good leadership needs both responses available, ideally at the same table. There's a cortisol wrinkle too: men tend to show a sharper cortisol spike under status-threat stress (think public failure, being outperformed in front of peers), while women tend to show a sharper spike under relational stress (conflict, social rejection). Different triggers, equally real stress — neither sex has a monopoly on "the calm one."
**ARE WOMEN "TOO EMOTIONAL" TO LEAD?**
Not by the data. Men and women experience emotion with similar intensity on average — the real difference is what researchers call emotional granularity: how precisely you can name what you're feeling and why. "I'm angry" versus "I'm frustrated because I feel unheard, not actually angry with you." Better labeling is a regulation skill, not a lack of control — you genuinely can't manage an emotion you can't accurately name — and women are consistently better at it, partly because we're socialized from a young age to identify and express emotion more than men are. So the "too emotional" stereotype has it exactly backwards: the ability to explain the emotion is evidence of more control, not less.
**THE TWIST: WHICH WOMAN, AND WHAT AGE?**
This is the part I had the most fun with, because I don't think every woman over eighteen is hormonally interchangeable, and pretending otherwise is a little insulting to all of us.
- **30s — peak drive era.** Estrogen and progesterone at their most stable, dopamine-driven ambition running high. A lot of women describe this decade as their most confident, most externally-focused, "I will build the thing, get out of my way" period. Some of this is career stage and hard-won reps as much as hormones — but it lines up consistently with peak self-reported ambition. Founder energy.- **Perimenopause (mid-40s to early 50s) — the messy middle.** Estrogen doesn't decline smoothly here; it swings wildly before it drops, and estrogen directly regulates serotonin and GABA, the brain's calming chemicals. Real, well-documented irritability and mood volatility follow. Would I want her making a split-second, high-stakes call on a rough week? Probably not, and I say that with love, since I've got this decade ahead of me too. But that same hormonal chaos also produces a total collapse of patience for nonsense, injustice, and things she's quietly tolerated for years — a bad job, a bad dynamic, a friendship that only took. Redirected well, that's the leader who finally says "we are not doing this anymore" about the exact thing everyone else was too polite to fix. There's a reason "perimenopausal rage" has become such a widely shared, almost celebrated phrase — a lot of us recognize it as clarity wearing an irritable costume.- **Postmenopause (late 50s and beyond) — the era nobody markets correctly.** Anthropologist Margaret Mead called it "postmenopausal zest" back in the 1950s. Once the volatility settles, a lot of women report a genuine surge in confidence, directness, and lowered social anxiety — some of it tied to testosterone declining more slowly than estrogen, leaving proportionally more of it than at any earlier stage. Less concern about being liked, more willingness to say the useful, blunt thing everyone else is thinking. Historically, in a striking number of cultures, this is exactly the life stage when women became tribal elders and matriarchs — the person whose opinion actually ended the argument, because she had nothing left to prove.
If I had to pick one age bracket to hand the keys to? Late 50s to late 60s. Established, hard-won judgment. A documented drop in people-pleasing. Decades of pattern recognition that a 32-year-old, no matter how brilliant, simply hasn't had time to accumulate yet.
**NOW, FAIR'S FAIR — WHAT ABOUT THE MEN?**
Andropause is real but far fuzzier than menopause — there's no hard biological cliff-edge like ovulation stopping, and huge individual variation between men. Some seventy-year-olds have the testosterone of a forty-year-old, and vice versa. What's more consistently documented with age is a decline in cognitive flexibility: the ability to update a belief cleanly when new information arrives, instead of defaulting to an entrenched, previously-stated position. There's real cognitive science behind why people (not just men) get more rigid with age — confidence in existing beliefs tends to outpace accuracy, and reversing a public position starts to feel less like updating an opinion and more like losing a piece of yourself, sometimes called the "sunk cost of identity."
I even used the 2024 U.S. election as an accidental, genuinely even-handed case study — two candidates in their late 70s and 80s, each showing a different flavor of the same aging-brain story: one leaning toward processing-speed and verbal fluency decline, the other toward rigidity, refusal to concede facts, and reactivity under provocation. Not a partisan dig at either — genuinely useful precisely because they're two different failure modes wearing the same decade. If there's an "ideal" age for a male leader hormonally and cognitively, the data points to late 40s to mid-50s — old enough that impulsivity and dominance-seeking have settled, young enough that the brain still bends.
**SO, SHOULD WOMEN RULE THE WORLD?**
My honest answer, after all of that: not one woman, not one age. I'd build a three-person table — a driven woman in her 30s to build things from nothing, a decisive man in his late 40s or 50s for the fast unilateral call when there's genuinely no time for consensus, and a postmenopausal woman in her 60s to decide which of it was actually worth building, with nothing left to prove and no interest in being liked for the answer. If there's only one seat at the table, though? I'm handing the keys to the woman in her late 50s or 60s.
Come tell me which "era" you're in — I read every reply. And if you know a woman heading into her postmenopausal-zest years who needs a little permission to finally say the blunt, useful thing in the room — forward this to her. She's earned it.
Talk soon,Joanne