Women, Perimenopause and Training: Finding Strength in the Transition
The fitness industry is awash with messages about female-specific training. Scroll through social media and you’ll quickly come across influencers or self-proclaimed experts telling women that perimenopause requires radically different approaches to exercise. The implication is that your hormones alone dictate what you can and cannot do.
But here’s the thing: much of this narrative is not built on robust exercise science in women at all. Instead, it often comes from rodent studies, or mechanistic cell data extrapolated in ways that don’t reflect real human training outcomes. These theories, when sold as fact, do more harm than good. They plant the idea that women in perimenopause are fragile, limited, or somehow incapable of doing “normal” training. As a coach, I see that as deeply disempowering.
The truth is more encouraging: you are capable, and training remains one of the most powerful tools to support your health through this transition. The question is not about tailoring your exercise plan to hormone patterns, but about learning how to navigate your unique experience of perimenopause so you can continue to show up for yourself.
How Perimenopause Can Affect Training
Yes—hormones during perimenopause can feel like they’re all over the place. This shifting hormonal landscape can influence:
Energy levels – Some women feel unpredictable dips that make workouts feel harder than usual.
Recovery – Sleep disturbances or hormonal fluctuations can lengthen recovery time.
Body composition changes – Redistribution of fat, loss of lean mass, and difficulty maintaining muscle may be more noticeable.
Thermoregulation and endurance – Hot flashes or changes in temperature regulation can affect cardiovascular training.
Mood and motivation – Shifts in mood, anxiety, or brain fog can influence consistency.
These aren’t imaginary, and they’re not “weaknesses.” They’re real physiological responses to a transition period. But importantly: how, when, and to what degree these affect you will be entirely individual. No two women will walk through perimenopause the same way.
Connective Tissue, Tendons, and Ligaments
Another subtle but important shift during perimenopause involves connective tissue. Estrogen helps maintain collagen and tendon elasticity. As estrogen fluctuates, tendons and ligaments may become stiffer and slightly less resilient. This doesn’t mean they suddenly become fragile, but it can partly explain why some women notice:
Increased stiffness or achiness in joints.
Higher susceptibility to tendon irritation (like Achilles or shoulder tendinopathies).
Slower healing time from connective tissue–related injuries.
It’s not that injury is inevitable, but the balance between load and recovery can become trickier. Think of it less as a sign of decline and more as a reminder that your tissues may need a little extra care.
Practical ways to support this include:
Progressive strength training: Strong muscles protect joints and help tendons adapt to load.
Eccentric training: Slowly lengthening a muscle under load (like lowering into a calf raise) strengthens tendons.
Mobility and circulation: Regular walking, stretching, and low-level movement keep tissues supple and nourished.
Recovery attention: Prioritizing rest, protein intake, and overall inflammation management supports healing.
The Real Work: Building Your Own Work-Arounds
This is where empowerment comes in. Instead of trying to decode a “perfect menopause workout program,” the goal is to build flexibility and resilience into your routine.
Here are some practical strategies:
Listen to your body, but don’t over-interpret. Feeling sluggish one week doesn’t mean training has stopped working for you. It may just mean adjusting intensity or volume that day.
Prioritize strength training. It’s the single best investment for protecting muscle, bone, and connective tissue health as hormones shift. The way you train may need small tweaks, but the principle doesn’t change.
Have a “menu” approach. Some days heavy lifting feels right. Other days, walking, yoga, or Zone 2 cardio may be a better fit. Give yourself permission to choose based on how you feel, while keeping consistency as the larger goal.
Focus on recovery. Better sleep hygiene, nutrition (especially protein), and stress management become more important than ever.
Detach from self-limiting narratives. Perimenopause doesn’t mean decline. It’s not a signal to stop—it’s a call to adapt.
Strength Over Fear
Rather than getting lost in hormone levels or searching for the “magic bullet” exercise plan for women in perimenopause, I encourage women to anchor their training in self-knowledge. Recognize that your body may feel different week to week, even day to day. But that doesn’t mean you can’t build strength, improve endurance, and pursue fitness goals.
The narrative that women’s capacities are reduced by perimenopause serves no one. What does serve women is understanding their own bodies, seeking support when needed, and finding sustainable ways to keep moving. Exercise isn’t something you lose access to during perimenopause, it’s something that can carry you through it, helping you feel stronger, steadier, and more in control.
There is no universal “perimenopause workout.” There is only the training approach that fits you best in this season of life. The aim isn’t to hack your hormones, but to respect your body’s signals, adapt where needed, and keep going.
Perimenopause isn’t the end of strength—it’s another chapter in discovering it.
[Readers are encouraged to follow Dr. Lauren Colenso - Semple for the science of exercise physiology and Tony Boutagy for more science-backed information on how to navigate training through hormone fluctuations.]
© Tina McInnes Coaching 2025