What is the best way to lose weight during menopause? Are you asking this question more often now? As if it was not bad enough that, during menopause, a woman has to deal with things like hot flashes, mood swings and other physical ailments that make life miserable, but now, the way she puts on weight is changing, too! One more issue to deal with is how to find the best way to lose weight during menopause.

And, as if that were not enough, the stress a woman in under during menopause causes the release of cortisol. Cortisol is the messenger that tells the body to slow down the metabolism. This does not help at all in trying to find the best way to lose weight during menopause.

Menopause signals the end of an era for a woman's body. Chemical changes are going on like crazy, causing all sorts of chaos. Hormone levels are fluctuating wildly and signals are getting crossed as the body tries to realign its systems for the new chapter of life about to be started. Trying to find the best way to lose weight during menopause can be quite a challenge.

One very significant change is the way a woman metabolizes calorie intake and the storage of fat. It used to be that fat would accumulate in the arms, hips or legs. Now, with the onset of menopause, the message the body receives is to stop storing fat as the subcutaneous type (the kind that lays just under the skin) and instead, to start storing it in the intra-abdominal cavity (under the abdominal muscle wall).

This is when a woman starts to notice that her belly is getting bigger instead of the usual places she might pack on weight. Even women for whom gaining weight was not an issue may now find their stomach getting bigger and will want to find the best way to lose weight during menopause.

It is this deeper fat, called visceral fat, that poses more health dangers than any other kind of adipose tissue. Because this fat is closer to the liver, and more importantly, the portal artery to the liver, fatty acids excreted from the visceral fat invade the portal artery and enter the liver. This is the reason why many women develop high cholesterol when it was never a problem before. Other health issues involved with visceral fat accumulation are heart disease, type 2 diabetes, hypertension and some cancers.

Losing this visceral fat means critical attention must be paid to three areas of a woman's life: exercise, diet and sleep.

1) A healthy diet is absolutely required, not just for the replacement of nutrients and hormones that have gone wanting, but also to speed up the slowing metabolism. An over-stressed, worn out body needs good fuel to keep fighting the good fight.

2) It can go without saying that exercise plays a key role and is one of the best ways to lose weight during menopause. But we are going to say it anyway. Exercise is vital to prolonging your life. By reducing visceral fat, you reduce the chances of life shortening, debilitating diseases taking over your life.

3) Ah, to sleep-perchance to restore cortisol levels to their normal range-aye, that is the rub. Cortisol levels drop to their natural levels when we get a good night rest and thus will stop telling the body to slow down. So, if you want to find the best way to lose weight during menopause, be sure to include good rest.

Take these three steps into account and this is for sure the best way to lose weight during menopause.