THE HARDCORE ONE: Dr Mindy Pelz, holistic health expert

Dr Pelz has a totally different approach to midlife weight gain: fasting. This, she says, helps to reboot the microbiome and repair the gut, reducing insulin resistance and helping hormonal symptoms, too.

3 midlife musts:

1 The intermittent fast (IF) of 13 hours without food is the entry level. ‘Push breakfast back an hour, then by two hours, until you feel comfortable going 15 hours,’ says Dr Pelz. Work towards fasting from dinner to dinner (Dr Pelz also has a three- to five-day water-only fast). If you get stuck, you can have a ‘fasted snack’ – such as a spoonful of nut butter or a cup of bone broth.

2 If you have a cycle, the week before your period is a time for ‘hormone feasting’; you need carbs in order to make progesterone to support your cycle. NB, those carbs need to be natural carbs.

3 If you are on HRT or postmenopause, fast in a 5:1:1 pattern. Five days a week, do the 13 to 15 hour IF. One day a week, do a longer fast, perhaps dinner-to-dinner. And one day a week, eat as you like.

The perfect midlife meal The 3 Ps: The meal at the end of your fast should contain polyphenols (berries), probiotics (yogurt) and prebiotic fibre (nuts and seeds).

Most surprising advice: Eat ‘good’ oils (olive, avocado, coconut, grass-fed butter, raw nuts, ghee). Avoid ‘bad’ ones, such as vegetable oil and sunflower oil. ‘Good fats give you long-lasting energy. Bad oils block hormone receptor sites,’ says Dr Pelz.

The flipside: If your cycle isn’t regular, it’s hard to work out when you should fast. Also: not eating! More information: drmindypelz.com; The Menopause Reset and Fast Like A Girl (Hay House), both by Dr Mindy Pelz. Find the community group at http://bit.ly/resetters