369 // Thinking About HRT? What Actually Happened After 3 Months

369 // Thinking About HRT? What Actually Happened After 3 Months

What can we learn from those who have battled addiction? This midlife check-in with Stacey Ziegler blends hormone health, faith, and long-term habit change for women who feel stuck and worn out. Stacey shares a three‑month update on her hormone replacement therapy (HRT), talking honestly about weight, energy, sleep and hot flushes. She’s been following a 12‑week strength training programme, completing 39 out of 48 workouts and dropping around six pounds while reducing body fat from about 28% to 23%.

As she puts it, "For me, HRTs as of now is working. It’s working." She chats through the frustration of doing "all the right things" – lifting weights, walking, watching macros – yet still gaining weight before starting HRT. Stacey links this to perimenopause, falling oestrogen and rising cortisol, describing how chronic stress and over‑exercise left her body clinging to belly fat.

Now, with a low‑dose oestrogen patch, micronised progesterone and magnesium at night, she reports "amazing" sleep, fewer hot flushes and feeling "great in my skin". Faith and encouragement run through everything she shares.

Stacey repeatedly reminds women to "love yourself along the journey" and stop blaming themselves for biology, and she frames healthy living as caring for "the body, renewing the mind, and strengthening the soul God's way." She’s clear that HRT isn’t a magic pill – strength training, sensible cardio, tracking calories, prioritising protein and staying hydrated are, in her view, non‑negotiables for midlife women.

Her message lands somewhere between gym buddy and prayer partner: do the work, seek support, and remember you’re "not behind" but becoming the person God created you to be. If you’re a midlife woman wrestling with weight, hormones, or old coping habits, could this be the nudge to rethink both your health plan and your self‑talk?