YOU'RE METABOLISM ISN'T SLOWING DOWN! Sorry for yelling but I've had a at least two different people (who don't know each other) ask how to combat their "slowing metabolism".
Ok now to be completely honest, as your metabolism does slow down a little, little, tiny, itty bitty, teeny weeny bit as you age. I know you've been told the opposite. Believe me.
So why have you gained weight over the years then?
One of the women I was having this conversation with mentioned she's steadily been gaining weight. Now for context, she'd like to lose some weight but she is nowhere near overweight and she's 58 years old. She explained that she's gained like 10lbs since her 20's. She also explained that in her 20's she used to go on like 50 mile bike rides and run 5k's and half marathons on the regular.
At 58 while she exercises regularly she's never done those things since I've known her, which is going on about 6 years. I pointed that out to her.
The majority of the reason you've been gaining weight is simply because you're not doing nearly as much as you used to. You're working more and working out less. You most likely have more responsibilities (at work and at home) that push exercising to the back burning.
To go along with this, when you were younger you were probably more active in general (outside of working out) also. You walked more maybe because gas money was harder to come and you lived in the city. Nowadays you're buying premium in the burbs. It might not be to those extremes but you get the point.
The last thing I'll say about this is you're also gaining weight because you're losing muscle. Like I said you used to do more stuff. Now because you're not doing as much stuff, muscle you used to need is being turned to fat. Hopefully by now you've heard that muscle burns more calories than fat at rest. In other words, because you have less muscle you're burning fewer calories while you're sitting around not doing anything. Which again is most of the time.
What to do about it then?
This is preventable and reversible. It's actually quite simple too (not that easy though). The first thing is you've got to be more active. This includes working out more but you also need to be doing more non-exercise activity; things like walking more and taking the stairs. You can't go long stretches where you're sitting around doing nothing. At the very least every couple of hours you need to get up and move around.
Also when you do exercise, you must be lifting weights. Heavy weights. You have to keep the muscle you have and/or build more muscle. As explained above this will keep you burning more calories while you're at rest. Get on a good strength program.
There are certainly other reasons why you could be gaining weight as you age. These are probably the ones though. The main point is that it's not your metabolism slowing down.
